More Moroni 10

Today we will visit one last time Moroni chapter 10, this time focusing on three verses and two themes. Following the promise that Moroni gives to those who read, pray about, and reflect on the Book of Mormon, we find Moroni listed the various gifts of God, a section that I have to admit I have always found a bit pedantic and repetitive (the difference between teaching the word of wisdom and teaching the word of knowledge, for example, seems a bit opaque).

But right before this, we find Moroni wrapping up the discussion of how we can know truth my means of the power of the Holy Ghost. Then, as verse 7 comes to a close, we find this statement: "deny not the power of God; for he worketh by power, according to the faith of the children of men, the same today and tomorrow, and forever."

The idea that God work by power is clear to anyone who has been raised to believe in an omnipotent deity (a devoutly theist friend in high school would regularly argue this point with the tired bit of sophistry that goes thus: If God is all-powerful, can He create a rock so heavy that He cannot lift it?). But I think we often misunderstand what God's power means, much as my friend was mistaken in his supposed cleverness.

And I think this passage gets at this idea. God works by His power, but that power is conditional on our faith. This relationship between our faith and God's ability to work miracles in our lives is at first one of tension and apparent contradiction. But as we look deeper into Moroni 10, we see more clearly what this means.

In verse 23 we read that Christ has taught that "if ye have faith ye can do all things which are expedient unto me." The link between faith and our own ability to do things is clear here. If we understand faith the way Joseph Smith taught, as a principle of action, we understand how this works: if we have enough confidence in something to believe that acting will lead to a result, we are likely to act. If we have faith enough to repent--that is, change--we will in fact change. If we have faith to in relationships with others, we will form those relationships.

Taking this one step further, we find that our exercise of faith is what allows the effects of our acting on that faith to emerge. This, then, is what Moroni is getting at in verse 32: "if ye shall deny yourselves of all ungodliness, and love God with all your might, mind and strength, then is his grace sufficient for you, that by his grace ye may be perfect in Christ; and if by the grace of God ye are perfect in Christ, ye can in nowise deny the power of God."

If we have enough faith to act on what we believe, we admit (in both senses of the word) God's power, and thereby invite miraculous things to happen in our lives. The greatest of these miracles being the change that occurs within ourselves as we turn from pessimism, selfishness, violence, and the worldview that sees others as a treat, toward a life of hope, joy, charity, and opennness to all good things.

Ultimately, this concept will take us back to where Nephi begins the Book of Mormon, but I'll save my discussion of the thesis statement of the Book of Mormon for another day.