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Making money is a skill. Keeping money is a discipline. Growing money is wisdom.

Daniel 4:17 & 32 – “The Most High rules in the kingdom of men, gives it to whomever He chooses, and sets over it the lowest of men.” [JHK Note: This is the great lesson of the Book of Daniel. Three very different kings with very different hearts test Daniel and his friends.]

Jesus was asked by a religious leader who was an expert in the law “What is the greatest commandment?” We believe his answer is foundational to who we are and paramount to understanding what it means to “live relationally” within the Kingdom of God.

John 10:18 – “I saw Satan fall like lightning from heaven. Behold, I give you the authority to trample on serpents and scorpions, and over all the power of the enemy.”

We learn from Genesis 1:26-27-28 that we humans are created “in the image of God” .. “male and female” .. to have dominion “over all the earth.” What does this mean? “God is love. Whoever lives in love lives in God and God in him.”

Across many old stories, angels seem so close to humans yet always just out of reach. They appear in visions, stand beside travelers, whisper warnings, or light the sky with their presence. However, one rule appears repeatedly in ancient writings and secret traditions. Angels were forbidden from touching human skin.

Lehi’s vision of America as “the land of promise.” (2 NEPHI 1:3) “I have seen a vision … notwithstanding our afflictions, we have obtained a land of promise, a land which is choice above all other lands; a land which the Lord God hath covenanted with me should be the land of inheritance of my seed. Yea, the Lord hath covenanted this land unto me, and to my children forever, and also all those who should be led out of other countries by the hand of the Lord.”

There are FOUR main messages in the Book of Mormon. First is personal or individual salvation/atonement through faith in Christ – Christ to Come, Christ Present, or Christ Past – Jesus Christ, the Son of God, the Lamb of God, the Holy One of Israel, who was born, lived, preached & healed, was rejected, crucified, rose from the dead, and is one with God (in heart, mind & spirit) though always obedient to the commands of the Father, thus teaching us obedience through striving to follow his model of perfect God-centered or godly character. Second is God’s desire for virtuous, righteous families. The patriarch and prophet Lehi left Jerusalem (and its imminent destruction by Babylon) with his wife, four sons, and Zoram (the chief servant of the recently deceased Laban). Quite conveniently, but not at all coincidentally or accidentally, Lehi decided to take along a friend – Ishmael – who had sons enough, but also (at least) five daughters! Zoram married the eldest daughter of Ishmael, and the other four were married to the four sons of Lehi. The “message” here is that God clearly wanted and planned for FAMILIES to come to and populate The New World of North and South America. Third is God’s seemingly eternal desire to establish a righteous nation. Attempts to do so in The Old World(s) of Africa, Europe, Asia, and especially the Middle East failed, as the children of Adam, Noah, Abraham, Isaac, Jacob, and David (not to mention everyone else) repeatedly failed to do so. Thus, God went to Plan B and made several attempts to establish a righteous nation in The New World(s) of North America and South America. The first such attempt was with the Jaredites, who came to The New World in “barges” (submarines) after the fall of the Tower of Babel, albeit with the original Adamic language intact. This first attempt and its subsequent failure is sketched rather briefly in the Book of Ether, though there are references to it in other books of The Book of Mormon. Another unsuccessful attempt was made through the migration of Mulek, son of Zedekiah, the last king of Judah, a “branch” broken off from Israel and somehow (we are not told how) transferred to The New World. (Curiously, there is no mention whatsoever of Mulek in the Bible, which clearly tells us three times that the sons of Zedekiah were killed before his eyes, before his eyes were gouged out and he was taken captive to Babylon.) The third unsuccessful attempt is made through the patriarch and prophet Lehi, who departs Jerusalem in 600 B.C. together with his four sons, Zoram, and the family of Ishmael. Lehi has two more sons (Joseph and Jacob) during their decade long wilderness course before they depart in a ship fashioned after God’s own instructions by Nephi, the fourth son of Lehi & his wife Sariah. In all three cases, due to the relentless invasions by Satan, the immigrants divide into warring factions, fight to the last man, and the last man dies, leaving behind the historical records of their failures in what becomes The Book of Mormon, etched or engraved onto metal plates of brass and gold in the language of Lehi, “which consists of the learning of the Jews and the language of the Egyptians.” Fourth is God’s blessing of and warning to the United States of America today! The Pilgrims landed in Massachusetts in 1620; Joseph Smith had his first revelation in 1820; and today is 2020 = 400 years from the landing of the Pilgrims. Clearly, The Book of Mormon came forth as part of God’s eternal desire to create Christ-like individuals, virtuous families, and a righteous nation; and that plan began in what is now the United States of America with the landing of the Pilgrims in 1620. The constant, oft-repeated messages of The Book of Mormon are (1) that individuals must repent of personal sins, accept and follow Jesus, in order to qualify for salvation rather than damnation and (2) that nations must also repent of national sins to qualify for and retain God’s blessings and avoid total annihilation.

1 Samuel 10:9 – As Saul turned to leave Samuel, God changed Saul’s heart. (NIV) So it was, when he had turned his back to go from Samuel, that God gave him another heart. (NKJ) And it was so, that when he had turned his back to go from Samuel, God gave him another heart. (KJV)