Write Your Own Parable | Mosiah 7-10 | May 6-12 | Week 19

Hey, guys! Welcome back. I'm Cindy Young, and this is Primarily Scripture, where we focus on studying the Book of Mormon in really easy ways. In fact, it's so easy a kid can do it. This is perfect for anybody who wants a nice, simple approach to studying the Book of Mormon, and we follow Come Follow Me. And this week we are in Mosiah. 

Now, Mosiah can get a little bit tricky to follow. Have you ever been watching a TV show or a movie and they go, "oh, I remember when..." and you hear this sound? [harp]

And you go, okay, so this is in the past. Well, when you read the Book of Mormon, you don't get that sound, but we do get those flashbacks, and we get there this week. And it can be a little tricky to understand. If you've never read the Book of Mormon before, or if you don't remember the last time you read it, that's okay.  I would suggest going onto the church website and find the videos that are for the little kids, and it explains it so well. They're  only like two minutes long, and it gives you a nice overview of what's going on. 

So, Mosiah and his people had left the land of Nephi, and then some of them, Zeniff and a whole group of people, went back. And then things kept happening in the land of Zarahemla, like King Benjamin became the king, and we learned all about that last week. So then the people were like, Hey, whatever happened to our friends? And so Ammon was sent out to find them. And he did. He found them. And that's in our reading this week is how Ammon finds them. It's a pretty fun story how he gets captured and put in jail for two days. And then when King Limhi finds out who he is, he was like, Oh, thank goodness you're here! We need your help!  So there's my explanation of how this all fits together, but it might be really helpful if you go onto the church website and find their videos and watch the videos about Zeniff, and I'll link them on the website. Okay?

 So,  [harp sound] 📍  flashback  and here we are in Mosiah chapters nine and ten. This is when Zeniff first leaves the land of Zarahemla and this tells about how they get set up over in the land of Nephi. 

And if you go on to the worksheets, there's a section from Mosiah chapter 9, talking about how the Lamanites are trying to come in and attack them. And what Zeniff and his people do in order to be saved.  

But right now, what I want to do is turn to  Mosiah chapter 10, okay?  So now we know that Zeniff and his people are set up in the land of Nephi, and the Lamanites live really close to them, and so they keep coming in and attacking. 

Now...  hold up... I'm gonna do my own little flashback, okay? [harp sound] 📍 A long time ago,  I had little kids at home,  and I would read books to them. I loved sitting on the couch with my two little kids with me, and we would read stories, and it was the best. Maybe you like to read stories, too. I absolutely loved it. But as a mom, I really wanted to be sure that these books I was reading to my kids were teaching them good lessons.
And so rather than just reading the story and seeing if it was a good story, I was also looking really close to see what kind of lessons it taught.  After doing that for years and years, now I'm doing that all the time. Every song, every movie, every book that I read, I stop and think and go, Hmm, but what are the lessons that this is teaching? 

And that is a really good tool that you can use when you read the scriptures. You take what's there, and then you 📍 stop and think and say, Hmm, what can I learn from this?  And then the Holy Ghost can come and teach you something totally different. So we're going to do that together. I wrote on the worksheet that it's like, um,  📍 making a parable out of a real story.

When Jesus told parables, it was a story about real life things, but it wasn't a real story.  But that story would teach a lesson. Okay?   So let's turn to Mosiah chapter 10 and look at verses 1 and 2. Okay? Are you ready? I'm going to read those real quick.  

"It came to pass that we again began to establish the kingdom, and we again began to possess the land in peace." Okay, so Zeniff and his people are living peacefully. Still close to the Lamanites, but things are okay.  "And I caused that there should be weapons of war made of every kind, that thereby I might have weapons for my people against the time the Lamanites should come up again to war against my people." Zeniff is expecting the Lamanites to come, so he's making weapons so they're ready.  "And I set guards round about the land, that the Lamanites might not come upon us again unawares and destroy us." He doesn't want them to sneak up on them. Smart.  "And thus I did guard my people and my flocks, and keep them from falling into the hands of our enemies." 

What a great lesson right here. We read all about what Zeniff did to keep his people safe.  Now, that is a really good lesson, and if we were at war with our neighbors, then we would want to use this to remind us that we need to be ready to protect ourselves.  But most of us aren't at war with our neighbors, are we?!

So now we're going to take those two verses and that little bit of a story and we're going to think about it and see if we can turn it into a parable. Okay? So parables have symbolism. So if this is a parable that was being told, what would the different things represent?

What do you think 📍 war with your enemies would represent? If you need to pause the video to think about it or talk about it with your study buddy, go ahead.  I think that war with your enemies could symbolize war with Satan. Aren't we all in a war with Satan? He is trying to get us to do bad things and he is trying to convince us that we need to ignore Jesus and ignore choosing the right and just do whatever we want. And there is this battle going on all the time, all the time. So that's what I think that is.  

So what else is in this story? Let's look.  Zeniff caused that there should be 📍 weapons of war made.  What could the weapons represent?  Do you have any ideas? You can hit pause and think about it if you want. 

What do weapons do? Weapons are things that we fight with.  What weapons could you use for your protection against Satan?  Here are some of the ideas that I came up with.

 Okay. First of all, of course, scriptures! I love the scriptures and reading them is such a protection. What else? Maybe you thought of going to church or  baptismal covenants. Maybe you thought of  taking the sacrament. What about  prayers?  Primary songs and hymns, going to church on Sunday, going to activities during the week, reading good books, staying away from the bad things. General conference talks, friend magazines, and even YouTube  channels and podcasts that help you to focus on spiritual things.

There are a lot of them out there, and these are all tools that you can use, weapons, if you would, against Satan that you can use to really fight back and to strengthen your own army!   

Okay, let's keep looking in the scriptures. What else does it say?  So, weapons were made of every kind and 📍 I set guards round about the land that the Lamanites might not come upon us again unawares and destroy us. 

Okay, guards.  What could that represent? Any ideas? You can hit pause if you want. I think that the guards represent those people who are here to help us, specifically our leaders,   📍 the prophet, the apostles, even your bishop and stake president. Your teachers could even be guards. They're there to help you. Now these guards, what would these guards do? 

When you're thinking about a story and  trying to come up with the spiritual lesson that you can learn from it, it's helpful to stop and think about it and go, Hmm, what would this do in real life? And so what is the spiritual lesson? 

So, what do guards do in real life? If they're going to protect against bad guys coming in, the guards would be watching, right? They're always watching. And when they see something coming that's bad, they're going to be ready to fight, but they're also going to let everybody in town know, hey, they're coming, get ready, protect yourselves. How  do the prophets and apostles do that for us?

Did you know that the prophet and apostles can help us to be warned and know what things we need to do to be prepared for the future? They do it all the time.  If you go back and listen to General Conference, which we just had a few weeks ago, they're asking us to do certain things.  Now those things are the protections that we need right now  to guard us against Satan.  It's that simple! It really is! Now, same thing goes for your parents, and for your bishop, and for your leaders. They can see things that you can't.  For a couple of reasons. 

First of all, If you're a kid, then your leaders are older than you, and they have all this experience. I know it seems like they're just old, but they really do know things. 

But even more important than that, and the way that they are going to guard you, is that they have the Holy Ghost with them, helping them to protect you. Did you know that?  Every single calling has this.  And parents do it just because they're parents. That's a calling. It's not a calling in the church, it's a calling in life. Okay, but then every calling in the church has this gift where they are called and set apart and given a special blessing so that they can have the Holy Ghost with them that helps them to be the very best guards that they can possibly be to help you know what you need to know and do what you need to do so that you can be protected. 

Heavenly Father has given you guards and weapons. so that you can fight against the enemy. Does that make sense?   That's one of the biggest ways that Heavenly Father will send messages to you, is when you stop and you kind of look and go, hmm, is there a different message here? 

 I love the scriptures. Love them! And I want you guys to remember that when you study, you don't have to read all of the chapters  that are in Come Follow Me this week.  Okay? Because there's a lot there. And if you can study all of it, that's fantastic! That's so awesome! But you can still find very meaningful things in the scriptures just by looking at a couple of verses. 

Two verses is all we did today, and look how much time we spent on it.  We just spent 10 minutes, and we have done a good study of these verses. You can do that all through the whole Book of Mormon. Even if you're reading just a couple of verses, take the time to look for the spiritual lesson from the physical things that happened.  Okay, does that make sense? 

If you guys want more study ideas, then you can go onto my website and download the free worksheets, and it will give you excerpts from the scriptures to read, and study ideas specific to those excerpts, There are also general conference quotes, and  chapter headings that give you a very brief summary of what's going on so you can remember what is happening in the story this week. Okay?  

You guys, thank you so much for being here! Go read your scriptures! I'll see you next time. Bye!

  📍  Thanks for tuning in to Primarily Scripture with Cindy Young. Don't forget you can subscribe to the newsletter and download free worksheets on the website PrimarilyScripture. com. And if you like the channel, be sure to subscribe, like, share, and leave a review. See you next time!