You can read the entire chapter at the following link: https://abn.churchofjesuschrist.org/study/scriptures/bofm/alma/3?lang=eng.
If people could see the aftermath of the war they fight before it begins, it could really change their motivation. No one is exempt. Even though the Nephites had no choice because they were facing an attack from the rebel Amlicites, the picture of destruction is very distressing. Lives, possessions, lands—all forever changed by loss and violation. A powerful testament against rebellion and the broad damage it causes.
A broad principle that comes into this chapter is that those who depart from the Lord’s way somehow designate themselves as separate from those who are following His way. The Amlicites, for example, mark “themselves with red in their foreheads,” apparently to mimic something that the Lamanites do (verse 4). It causes me to reflect. Is there something I’m doing to signal my own attachment to the ways of the world that diverges from how the Lord would have me define my priorities?
Alma recalls a revelation (in verse 14) that the Lord gave to Nephi 500 years before (in 2 Nephi 5:21-23). The essence of the revelation is that the Lord set a mark on the Lamanites as a means to protect the faithful Nephites from intermarrying with them (verses 6-9). The broader principle for Alma’s time is that the Lord finds ways to help his people distinguish between those who follow Him and those who don’t, sometimes in a manner that can be physically discerned. He also may provide a way to make those distinctions go away when those in rebellion turn away from sin and stop persecuting those who are trying to follow the right path.
The Amlicites, according to Mormon’s historical narration, apparently do not know that the words of a 500-year-old revelation apply to their act of separating themselves from the Nephites by marking their foreheads (verse 18). Did they or their families neglect to study the record of their people’s dealings with God, or did they just forget? Their open rebellion against God has brought about condemnation and misery, as it does in any case.
As if the Nephites haven’t already endured enough, a Lamanite army comes upon them again (verse 20). Maybe the Lamanites believe that the Nephites will be vulnerable because they have so recently been beset by a bruising civil war. They have not only suffered death, injury, and destruction, but they have had many of their brothers and sisters abandon them.
With the Lord’s strength, the Nephites are able to repulse this Lamanite offensive at the cost of more casualties, buying themselves some precious time to recover (verses 22-24).
The last two verses (26 and 27) are an amazing testament to Mormon’s eternal perspective. As he abridges the record Alma has left, Mormon pauses to reflect—maybe in much the same way as Alma and his people are reflecting in this moment—on what has happened during a very eventful year. Many of God’s children have contended with one another, and tens of thousands have made an important transition in their eternal journey from mortal life to the spirit world. Mormon’s absolute conviction that death is no end is very evident. He focuses on the consequences that come to us eternally depending on whether we followed a good spiritual path or a bad one. Mormon’s prophetic teachings echo those of King Benjamin (in Mosiah 2:32-33).
These references to spiritual paths are not just metaphorical, but truly descriptive. There are good and evil spirits vying for our attention. How sensitive we are to their promptings, and which ones we decide to heed, has enormous bearing on our eternal future. The comforting truth is that the Lord’s power can overcome some poor choices on our part. But He won’t force us to seek His help if we start down the wrong path and become insensitive to the efforts of the Lord and His servants to remind us of the right way. As the chapter ends, Mormon leaves us to soberly ponder how so many Nephites, Amlicites and Lamanites have now made abrupt transitions out of this state of existence into the next after being thrust into violent situations that required deep discipline and virtue to avoid succumbing to anger and despair.
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