You find a lamp and
the genie offers you
one wish.
He will convert any
person you know to
the Gospel
Alma 29:1-2
Is this a bad thing?
(see Alma 29:3)
Alma 29
Many have learned to ignore the increasing evidence that society
is unraveling and that their lives and family lack the peace they once
thought was possible. That willingness to ignore the signs of danger
can make it easy for you to think: Why should I speak to anyone
about the gospel who seems content? What danger is there to them
or to me if I do or say nothing?
At some moment in the world to come, everyone you will ever
meet will know what you know now. They will know that the only
way to live forever in association with our families and in the
presence of our Heavenly Father and His Son. They will know that
the only way families can be together forever is to accept and keep
sacred covenants offered in the temples of God on this earth. And
they will know that you knew. And they will remember whether you
offered them what someone had offered you.
Alma 29
Years ago I worked for a man in California. He hired me, he was
kind to me, he seemed to regard me highly. I may have been the only
Latter-day Saint he ever knew well. I don't know all the reasons I
found to wait for a better moment to talk with him about the gospel.
I just remember my feeling of sorrow when I learned, after he had
retired and I lived far away, that he and his wife had been killed in a
late night drive to their home in Carmel, California. He loved his
wife. He loved his children. He had loved his parents. He loved his
grandchildren, and he will love their children and will want to be
with them forever.
Now, I don't know how the crowds will be handled in the world
to come. But I suppose that I will meet him, that he will look into my
eyes, and that I will see in them the question: "Hal, you knew. Why
didn't you tell me?" (A Voice of Warning: Elder Henry B. Eyring (October 1998))
Alma 29
0 Alma 29:8-9
0 So what can you do differently to help people that you love better
embrace the gospel?
Alma 29
The Name Alma
Alma’s name has been one of the most commonly attacked features
of the Book of Mormon, for Alma is a female Latin name. In 1961, a
prominent scholar in Israel, Professor Yigael Yadin, discovered a land
deed from the time of the Bar Kokhba rebellion in Palestine (ca. 131
A.D.). Prof. Yadin translated one of the names as "Alma the son of
Judah.“(See Bar Kokhba by Yigael Yadin, Random House, New York, 1971, p. 176; and Nibley, The
Prophetic Book of Mormon, pp. 281-82.)
Alma proves to not only be a genuine Semitic name, but is a name of
a Hebraic man. Finding the male name Alma in a record must be
viewed not as a reason for mocking the Book of Mormon, but as a
reason to take it seriously.
Elder Holland
“May I suggest to you that one of the things we
need to teach our [children], and one of the things
which will become more important in their lives
the longer they live, is the reality of angels, their
work, and their ministry…personal ministering
angels who are with us and around us, empowered
to help us, and who do exactly that.
Elder Holland
“Perhaps more of us… could literally, or at least
figuratively, behold the angels around us if we
would but awaken from our stupor and hear the
voice of the Spirit as those angels try to speak….
“I believe we need to speak of and believe in and
bear testimony to the ministry of angels more than
we sometimes do. They constitute one of God's
great methods of witnessing through the veil…” CES
Symposium on the Book of Mormon • 9 August 1994
“When messengers are sent to minister
to the inhabitants of this earth, they are
not strangers, but from the ranks of our
kindred, friends, and fellow-beings and
fellow-servants...
“Our fathers and mothers, brothers,
sisters and friends who have passed away
from this earth, having been faithful, and
worthy to enjoy these rights and
privileges, may have a mission given them
to visit their relatives and friends upon
the earth again, from the divine Presence
messages of love, of warning, or reproof
and instruction, to those whom they had
learned to love in the flesh.”
(Gospel Principles, p. 435)
Joseph F.
Smith
www.lds.org: Angels
The word angel is used in various
ways. A person who is a divine
messenger is called an angel (Moroni,
John the Baptist, Peter, James, John,
Moses, Elijah, and Elias all ministered
to Joseph Smith as angels). Angels
also has reference to the heavenly
messengers sent forth to minister to
the inhabitants of the earth.
“I will go before your face. I
will be on your right hand
and on your left, and my
Spirit shall be in your
hearts, and mine angels
round about you, to bear
you up” (D&C 84:88).
Joseph Smith
“Enveloped in flaming fire, they
[in the spirit world] are not far from
us, and know and understand our
thoughts, feelings, and emotions,
and are often pained therewith.”
History of the Church, 6:52
What questions do you have about the role
or doctrine of Angels?
Do you have any experiences with this doctrine?
Elder Enzio Busche
At a Christmas social once, I was sitting
next to a woman from a recently opened
country in Eastern Europe. She was in the
west for the first time and was helping with
the translation work. She was a convert of a
little over a year.
She told me about her branch and the
poor circumstances they were all living in
and how difficult it was for the members to
get to their Sunday meetings… These new
members could not say enough about the
love and the gracious care of the Lord.
Then she said, “Once in awhile, we have
holy angels visit and comfort and strengthen
us.” She added with a smile, “Can you
imagine? I have found people in Salt Lake
City who have never see an angel.” She
laughed as if that were the strangest thing
she had ever heard.
Yearning for the Living God, p. 234
Elder Neal A. Maxwell: “It has been a privilege to seal adopted
children to Nan and Dan Barker, now of Arizona. Some time ago
Nate, then just over three, said: ‘Mommy, there is another little girl
who is supposed to come to our family. She has dark hair and dark
eyes and lives a long way from here.’ “The wise mother asked,
‘How do you know this?’ “’Jesus told me, upstairs.’ “The mother
noted, ‘We don’t have an upstairs,’ but quickly sensed the
significance of what had been communicated. After much travail
and many prayers, the Barker family were in a sealing room in the
Salt Lake Temple in the fall of 1995, where a little girl with dark
hair and dark eyes, from Kazakhstan, was sealed to them for time
and eternity. Inspired children still tell parents ‘great and
marvelous things’ (3 Nephi 26:14)” (C.R., Apr. 1996, 95-96; or Ensign, May 1996, 69-70).
‘
Who is the angel that most commonly speaks to us?
“Through the Aaronic Priesthood ordinances of baptism
and the sacrament, we are cleansed of our sins and
promised that if we keep our covenants we will always
have His Spirit to be with us. I believe that promise not
only refers to the Holy Ghost but also to the ministering
of angels, for "angels speak by the power of the Holy
Ghost; wherefore, they speak the words of Christ" (2 Ne.
32:3). So it is that those who hold the Aaronic Priesthood
open the door for all Church members who worthily
partake of the sacrament to enjoy the companionship of
the Spirit of the Lord and the ministering of angels.”
(Elder Dallin H. Oaks, "The Aaronic Priesthood and the Sacrament," Ensign, Nov.
1998, p. 39)