6
The Lord our God spake unto us in Horeb, saying, Ye have dwelt long enough in this mount:
• • •
19
¶ And when we departed from Horeb, we went through all that great and
terrible wilderness, which ye saw by the way of the mountain of the
Amorites, as the Lord our God commanded us; and we came to Kadesh-barnea.
20
And I said unto you, Ye are come unto the mountain of the Amorites, which the Lord our God doth give unto us.
• • •
25
And they took of the fruit of the land in their hands, and brought it down unto us, and brought us word again, and said, It is a good land which the Lord our God doth give us.
• • •
41
Then ye answered and said unto me, We have sinned against the Lord, we will go up and fight, according to all that the Lord our God commanded us. And when ye had girded on every man his weapons of war, ye were ready to go up into the hill.
57
The Lord our God be with us, as he was with our fathers: let him not leave us, nor forsake us:
• • •
59
And let these my words, wherewith I have made supplication before the Lord, be nigh unto the Lord our God
day and night, that he maintain the cause of his servant, and the cause
of his people Israel at all times, as the matter shall require:
• • •
61
Let your heart therefore be perfect with the Lord our God, to walk in his statutes, and to keep his commandments, as at this day.
• • •
65
And at that time Solomon held a feast, and all Israel with him, a great
congregation, from the entering in of Hamath unto the river of Egypt,
before the Lord our God, seven days and seven days, even fourteen days.
17
And I sent them with commandment unto Iddo the chief at the place Casiphia, and I told them what they should say unto Iddo, and to his brethren the Nethinims, at the place Casiphia, that they should bring unto us ministers for the house of our God.
18
And by the good hand of our God
upon us they brought us a man of understanding, of the sons of Mahli,
the son of Levi, the son of Israel; and Sherebiah, with his sons and his
brethren, eighteen;
• • •
21
¶ Then I proclaimed a fast there, at the river of Ahava, that we might afflict ourselves before our God, to seek of him a right way for us, and for our little ones, and for all our substance.
22
For I was ashamed to require of the king a band of soldiers and horsemen
to help us against the enemy in the way: because we had spoken unto the
king, saying, The hand of our God is upon all them for good that seek him; but his power and his wrath is against all them that forsake him.
23
So we fasted and besought our God for this: and he was intreated of us.
• • •
25
And weighed unto them the silver, and the gold, and the vessels, even the offering of the house of our God, which the king, and his counsellors, and his lords, and all Israel there present, had offered:
• • •
30
So took the priests and the Levites the weight of the silver, and the gold, and the vessels, to bring them to Jerusalem unto the house of our God.
31
¶ Then we departed from the river of Ahava on the twelfth day of the first month, to go unto Jerusalem: and the hand of our God was upon us, and he delivered us from the hand of the enemy, and of such as lay in wait by the way.
• • •
33
¶ Now on the fourth day was the silver and the gold and the vessels weighed in the house of our God by the hand of Meremoth the son of Uriah the priest; and with him was Eleazar the son of Phinehas; and with them was Jozabad the son of Jeshua, and Noadiah the son of Binnui, Levites;
8
And now for a little space grace hath been shewed from the Lord our God, to leave us a remnant to escape, and to give us a nail in his holy place, that our God may lighten our eyes, and give us a little reviving in our bondage.
9
For we were bondmen; yet our God hath not forsaken us in our bondage, but hath extended mercy unto us in the sight of the kings of Persia, to give us a reviving, to set up the house of our God, and to repair the desolations thereof, and to give us a wall in Judah and in Jerusalem.
10
And now, O our God, what shall we say after this? for we have forsaken thy commandments,
• • •
13
And after all that is come upon us for our evil deeds, and for our great trespass, seeing that thou our God hast punished us less than our iniquities deserve, and hast given us such deliverance as this;
32
Also we made ordinances for us, to charge ourselves yearly with the third part of a shekel for the service of the house of our God;
33
For the shewbread, and for the continual meat offering, and for the
continual burnt offering, of the sabbaths, of the new moons, for the set
feasts, and for the holy things, and for the sin offerings to make an atonement for Israel, and for all the work of the house of our God.
34
And we cast the lots among the priests, the Levites, and the people, for the wood offering, to bring it into the house of our God, after the houses of our fathers, at times appointed year by year, to burn upon the altar of the Lord our God, as it is written in the law:
• • •
36
Also the firstborn of our sons, and of our cattle, as it is written in the law, and the firstlings of our herds and of our flocks, to bring to the house of our God, unto the priests that minister in the house of our God:
37
And that we should bring the firstfruits of our dough, and our offerings, and the fruit of all manner of trees, of wine and of oil, unto the priests, to the chambers of the house of our God; and the tithes of our ground unto the Levites, that the same Levites might have the tithes in all the cities of our tillage.
38
And the priest the son of Aaron shall be with the Levites, when the
Levites take tithes: and the Levites shall bring up the tithe of the
tithes unto the house of our God, to the chambers, into the treasure house.
39
For the children of Israel and the children of Levi shall bring the
offering of the corn, of the new wine, and the oil, unto the chambers,
where are the vessels of the sanctuary, and the priests that
minister, and the porters, and the singers: and we will not forsake the
house of our God.
9
To the Lord our God belong mercies and forgivenesses, though we have rebelled against him;
10
Neither have we obeyed the voice of the Lord our God, to walk in his laws, which he set before us by his servants the prophets.
• • •
13
As it is written in the law of Moses, all this evil is come upon us: yet made we not our prayer before the Lord our God, that we might turn from our iniquities, and understand thy truth.
14
Therefore hath the Lord watched upon the evil, and brought it upon us: for the Lord our God is righteous in all his works which he doeth: for we obeyed not his voice.
15
And now, O Lord our God,
that hast brought thy people forth out of the land of Egypt with a
mighty hand, and hast gotten thee renown, as at this day; we have
sinned, we have done wickedly.
• • •
17
Now therefore, O our God,
hear the prayer of thy servant, and his supplications, and cause thy
face to shine upon thy sanctuary that is desolate, for the Lord’s sake.
9
And our spirits must have become like unto him, and we become devils, angels to a devil, to be shut out from the presence of our God, and to remain with the father of lies, in misery, like unto himself; yea, to that being who beguiled our
first parents, who transformeth himself nigh unto an angel of light,
and stirreth up the children of men unto secret combinations of murder
and all manner of secret works of darkness.
10
O how great the goodness of our God, who prepareth a way for our
escape from the grasp of this awful monster; yea, that monster, death
and hell, which I call the death of the body, and also the death of the
spirit.
11
And because of the way of deliverance of our God,
the Holy One of Israel, this death, of which I have spoken, which is
the temporal, shall deliver up its dead; which death is the grave.
• • •
13
O how great the plan of our God! For on the other hand, the paradise of God
must deliver up the spirits of the righteous, and the grave deliver up
the body of the righteous; and the spirit and the body is restored to
itself again, and all men become incorruptible, and immortal, and they
are living souls, having a perfect knowledge like unto us in the flesh,
save it be that our knowledge shall be perfect.
• • •
17
O the greatness and the justice of our God! For he executeth all his words, and they have gone forth out of his mouth, and his law must be fulfilled.
• • •
19
O the greatness of the mercy of our God,
the Holy One of Israel! For he delivereth his saints from that awful
monster the devil, and death, and hell, and that lake of fire and
brimstone, which is endless torment.
20
O how great the holiness of our God! For he knoweth all things, and there is not anything save he knows it.
3
Wherefore, as I said unto you, it must needs be expedient that
Christ—for in the last night the angel spake unto me that this should be
his name—should come among the Jews, among those who are the more
wicked part of the world; and they shall crucify him—for thus it
behooveth our God, and there is none other nation on earth that would crucify their God.
• • •
16
Wherefore, he that fighteth against Zion, both Jew and Gentile, both
bond and free, both male and female, shall perish; for they are they who
are the whore of all the earth; for they who are not for me are against
me, saith our God.
• • •
18
Wherefore, my beloved brethren, thus saith our God:
I will afflict thy seed by the hand of the Gentiles; nevertheless, I
will soften the hearts of the Gentiles, that they shall be like unto a
father to them; wherefore, the Gentiles shall be blessed and numbered
among the house of Israel.
• • •
20
And now, my beloved brethren, seeing that our merciful God has given us so great knowledge concerning these things, let us remember him, and lay aside our sins, and not hang down our heads, for we are not cast off; nevertheless, we have been driven out of the land of our inheritance; but we have been led to a better land, for the Lord has made the sea our path, and we are upon an isle of the sea.
7
Now, these are the words which he said unto the people concerning the matter: I thank my God, my beloved people, that our great God has in goodness sent these our brethren, the Nephites, unto us to preach unto us, and to convince us of the traditions of our wicked fathers.
• • •
13
Behold, I say unto you, Nay, let us retain our swords that they be not stained with the blood of our brethren; for perhaps, if we should stain our swords again they can no more be washed bright through the blood of the Son of our great God, which shall be shed for the atonement of our sins.
• • •
15
Oh, how merciful is our God! And now behold, since it has been as much as we could do to get our stains taken away from us, and our swords are made bright, let us hide them away that they may be kept bright, as a testimony to our God at the last day, or at the day that we shall be brought to stand before him to be judged, that we have not stained our swords in the blood of our brethren since he imparted his word unto us and has made us clean thereby.
16
And now, my brethren, if our brethren seek to destroy us, behold, we will hide away our
swords, yea, even we will bury them deep in the earth, that they may be
kept bright, as a testimony that we have never used them, at the last
day; and if our brethren destroy us, behold, we shall go to our God and shall be saved.
8
Blessed be the name of our God; let us sing to his praise, yea, let us give thanks to his holy name, for he doth work righteousness forever.
• • •
16
Therefore, let us glory, yea, we will glory in the Lord; yea, we will rejoice, for our joy is full; yea, we will praise our God
forever. Behold, who can glory too much in the Lord? Yea, who can say
too much of his great power, and of his mercy, and of his long-suffering
towards the children of men? Behold, I say unto you, I cannot say the
smallest part which I feel.
17
Who could have supposed that our God would have been so merciful as to have snatched us from our awful, sinful, and polluted state?
11
Yea, and it came to pass that the Lord our God did visit us with assurances that he would deliver us; yea, insomuch that he did speak peace to our souls, and did grant unto us great faith, and did cause us that we should hope for our deliverance in him.
• • •
33
But behold, we trust in our God who has given us victory over those lands, insomuch that we have obtained those cities and those lands, which were our own.
• • •
41
And now, my beloved brother, Moroni, may the Lord our God,
who has redeemed us and made us free, keep you continually in his
presence; yea, and may he favor this people, even that ye may have
success in obtaining the possession of all that which the Lamanites have
taken from us, which was for our support. And now, behold, I close mine epistle. I am Helaman, the son of Alma.
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