1 Nephi 1:6; “And it came to pass as he prayed unto the Lord, there came a pillar of fire and dwelt upon a rock before him; and he saw and heard much; and because of the things which he saw and heard he did quake and tremble exceedingly.”
Exodus 13:21; “And the LORD went before them by day in a pillar of a cloud, to lead them the way; and by night in a pillar of fire, to give them light; to go by day and night.”
You’ll find a number of stories in the Book of Mormon that are eerily similar to events found in the Bible. The catch is that the BoM stories are always bigger and better than the biblical accounts.
Kirk and I knew a guy in Germany that no matter what you told him he always had a better experience than we did. We could share a story of a camping experience when we saw squirrels and deer and our friend Steve went camping and saw a bear! Oh my!
In our group of friends his nickname became ‘Steve you ain’t got nothing on me Smith’. I’ve changed his last name to spare him! The stories in the BoM are much like our friend in Germany. It got to the point where no one believed our sad friend Steve and so it is with Joseph’s stories.
You’ll notice with Lehi’s account there are no definitive explanations of what he saw or where he was when this happened.
What did he hear?
What exactly caused him to quake and tremble ‘exceedingly’?
If this experience was important enough to hammer it into the plates of brass why wouldn’t the details be important?
As always, my main concern is for people like my mother. What does this passage in their canon do for her on a daily basis? Does she know about the fire God provided at night for the Israelites? How can she apply this to her daily life?
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