Abinadi: Prioritizing the Eternal over the Temporal - Book of Mosiah, Chapter Fifteen (Mosiah 15)

You can access the entire chapter at the following link: https://www.churchofjesuschrist.org/study/scriptures/bofm/mosiah/15?lang=eng

In the last chapter, Abinadi used the words of Isaiah to remind Noah and his priests that righteous messengers of God with power to help save people from their sins often aren’t physically appealing, nor do they use flattering words of false praise when they speak to the people. Whether the righteous messengers are prophets or the Savior Jesus Christ Himself, they come in all shapes, sizes and appearances, and they share the truth because they want people to be able to prepare themselves to meet God while there is still time in mortal life.

In this chapter, Abinadi builds on the previous chapter by focusing on (1) the power of Jesus Christ to save, (2) the superiority of truth over flattery, and (3) the real consequences Noah, his priests and all of us face from whether we accept or reject Jesus and His teachings. In doing so, Abinadi puts the finishing touches on the stinging rebuke he has for those of Noah’s priests who claimed that his words were not the “good tidings” Isaiah spoke of. In fact, Abinadi shows that the tidings he brings are the best there could possibly be because they provide real opportunity for change (repentance) before it’s too late.

In doing so, Abinadi powerfully relates who Jesus is and what He will do. Through His willing, sinless sacrifice, and the fact that He is the physically begotten Son of the Father, Jesus will become so united with the Father that they will be indistinguishable. In fact, Jesus is so devoted to His Father and so focused on becoming exactly like Him that Jesus will take on the Father’s name and full power and authority (verses 2-9). And that is so significant to us because through Jesus we can then become heirs to all the same promises. As verse 11 says, if we hearken to the words of the prophets who testify of the Savior, we become the literal seed of the Savior. As Jesus assures of our resurrection, we rejoice in the knowledge that following the gospel path leads to eternal life (verses 23-24). Eternal life is more than simply living forever. It is living forever in a fullness of joy, hand in hand with the Father and Son as we learn to feel and practice love as they do, radiating the blessings of that love as widely to others as we can imagine. It is indescribably wonderful. Abinadi wants his audience to understand that eternal consequences of obedience or disobedience to God’s plan ultimately matter far more than whatever they decide to do within their comparatively small circles of earthly power.

Abinadi: Pointing the Way to Christ Through Isaiah - Book of Mosiah, Chapter Fourteen (Mosiah 14)

You can access the entire chapter at the following link: https://www.lds.org/scriptures/bofm/mosiah/14?lang=eng

To add power to his testimony of the coming Messiah, Abinadi—like Nephi and Jacob in earlier parts of the Book of Mormon—quotes the great Old Testament prophet Isaiah (the entirety of Isaiah 53). Abinadi is trying to show his detractors (King Noah and his priests), with no room for doubt, that the covenant they have with the Lord goes far deeper than a set of rules they can twist to rationalize their evil deeds. Ultimately, judgment is the Lord’s, not theirs. 

The covenant is tied to a Savior whose triumph over death and sin will qualify Him to exercise perfect judgment in the case of each man and woman. The Savior will triumph over sin in two ways. First, He never gives in to temptation. This qualifies Him to be able to accomplish the second triumph—to suffer the pain of others’ sins voluntarily so that He can remove the burden that sin places on all other people. But, the burden is only lifted if those people repent and are willing to turn to Him and actually recognize Him as their Savior.

As Isaiah’s prophecy tells us, many (perhaps most) of the people among whom Jesus lived and moved ultimately could not sufficiently humble themselves to appreciate that this person held the key to their redemption and happiness, and that their acceptance of Him was so much more important than obtaining or maintaining any earthly status or possession. The prophecy says that Jesus will be “despised and rejected of men; a man of sorrows, and acquainted with grief; and we hid as it were our faces from him; he was despised, and we esteemed him not” (verse 3).

As part of the Lord’s perfect plan, Jesus didn’t necessarily look the part to our natural eyes. Isaiah says that “he hath no form nor comeliness; and when we shall see him there is no beauty that we should desire him” (verse 2).

There is a clear double meaning here. In addition to testifying of Christ’s coming,  Abinadi (through Isaiah’s words) is giving his captors and tormentors one last chance to realize that they are making the same mistake with him that Christ’s persecutors will make almost 200 years later. Noah and his priests see Abinadi as a troublemaker emerging from the margins of society, with no advantage in his earthly appearance or status to give them pause about treating him so wretchedly. Abinadi, of course, does not pretend to be the Messiah, but his own situation is a “type” or example that does help point to the injustice that Christ will suffer later.

As the prophecy continues, Abinadi (again, through Isaiah’s words) explains why the Father is willing to have His Son sacrificed for others. And this also gives us some insight into the reason for Abinadi’s own sacrifice. In the bigger picture, by allowing Jesus to suffer and die for all by making “intercession for the transgressors,” the Lord’s “righteous servant shall justify many, for he shall bear their iniquities” (verses 11-12). With this perspective, the wicked who subject Jesus (and Abinadi) to an unjust death are souls to be pitied, because they are completely missing that the person who can save them is the very one they are ridiculing and torturing. By the same token, Jesus (and Abinadi) will receive “a portion with the great” because he made “intercession for the transgressors” and he “hath poured out his soul unto death” (verse 12).