Lesson 18: GD-L18
Gospel Doctrine:
BofM: L-18: God Himself-Shall
Redeem His People
Highlights: President
Ezra Taft Benson said: “Christ changes men, and changed men can change the
world. Men changed for Christ will be captained by Christ.”
Scriptures:
• Mosiah
12: Abinadi speaks repentance
Mosiah 12: 20-24 Priests
asks Abinadi to interpret scripture from Isaiah
• Mosiah
13: Abinadi gives the purpose of the law of Moses
Mosiah 14: 5-6 Christ’s
suffering and purpose
à How did Abinadi’s interpretation of scripture differ
from the Priests? (Mosiah 15: 10-19)
à What is the significance of 13:10?
à What would have happened if Abinadi has not
chosen to fulfill his mission? How does this relate to us?
I loved working with these chapters. It was very rewarding to read Abinadi's explanation of the roles of Christ and the Father as well as how he explains Isaiah's vital teachings. If you look in the manual, President Hinckley shares a wonderful story that relates to how you never know the impact you may have in your mission. Here it is:
4. The unseen results of missionary work
Explain that Abinadi may have died without knowing if anyone believed his teachings. But Alma was converted because of Abinadi’s efforts, and he and his descendants had a great influence on the Nephites for many generations. Share the following story told by President Gordon B. Hinckley:
“You don’t know how much good you can do; you can’t foresee the results of the effort you put in. Years ago, President Charles A. Callis, then a member of the Quorum of the Twelve, but who previously was president of the Southern States Mission for twenty-five years, told me this story. He said that he had a missionary in the southern [United States] who came in to get his release at the conclusion of his mission. His mission president said to him, ‘Have you had a good mission?’
“He said, ‘No.’
“‘How is that?’
“‘Well, I haven’t had any results from my work. I have wasted my time and my father’s money. It’s been a waste of time.’
“Brother Callis said, ‘Haven’t you baptized anyone?’
“He said, ‘I baptized only one person during the two years that I have been here. That was a twelve-year-old boy up in the back hollows of Tennessee.’
“He went home with a sense of failure. Brother Callis said, ‘I decided to follow that boy who had been baptized. I wanted to know what became of him. …
“… ‘I followed him through the years. He became the Sunday School Superintendent, and he eventually became the branch president. He married. He moved off the little tenant farm on which he and his parents before him had lived and got a piece of ground of his own and made it fruitful. He became the district president. He sold that piece of ground in Tennessee and moved to Idaho and bought a farm along the Snake River and prospered there. His children grew. They went on missions. They came home. They had children of their own who went on missions.’
“Brother Callis continued, ‘I’ve just spent a week up in Idaho looking up every member of that family that I could find and talking to them about their missionary service. I discovered that, as the result of the baptism of that one little boy in the back hollows of Tennessee by a missionary who thought he had failed, more than 1,100 people have come into the Church.’
“You never can foretell the consequences of your work, my beloved brethren and sisters, when you serve as missionaries” (Teachings of Gordon B. Hinckley [1997], 360–61).
