Day 32-A Good Day-4/29/06

I'm very tired. It seems that most of my entries start out like this. Today we helped a member and her family move. It's just as fun as it sounds. That took up most of our morning. Fortunately, lunch was provided.

The big thing that happened is that we taught a man named W. He's from Kenya. He's been in the United States about a year. We met him about 6 days ago. This is when it was raining. We came by to see his sister-in-law who was not at home at the time. We were dripping wet. He invited us in and asked us to "warm ourselves". We explained why we came and asked if hed be interested in hearing our message about Jesus Christ.

We told him about the restoration and about the Book of Mormon. He listened. He did not ask many questions, but he did understand what we were talking about. We asked if we could come back later and teach him more. He said that would be all right. We went over today to check on him and his son. I forgot to mention his son T. who is in his late teens. He is recovering from a head injury he got when he fell out of a tree. He is in-between surgeries and has to wear a special helmet to protect his head. He's a little self aware of it and is uncomfortable going out in public.

GREENIE MISTAKE that ONLY Elder Pierce in his warped mind would make. I brought up concerns when we were teaching a discussion. We were sitting there reading 3Nephi 11. Elder Buttars, D., W. and T. and me. Oh, dear, I should introduce D. I haven't gotten to know him very well yet. He is a member. He came to visit with us. He's from Ghana and a convert to the church. He has a very strong testimony of the Book of Mormon I found out tonight.

So, anyway, we were discussing 3 Nephi 11. We're going along at a good clip. The spirit is there. We come to the last few verses. 3 Nephi 11: 39-40.

Now, when you are a missionary, you are told about certain questions that you as a missionary will have to find answers to. One of these questions is: "How can the Book of Mormon be scripture when in Revelation 22:18-19 it says, "If any man shall add unto these things, God shall add unto him the plagues..." Non-members use this to say, "see, there, it says right in the Bible that you can't have any other books of scripture besides the Bible."

With all due respect, they don't understand the scripture. If they read that scripture in Revelation... (and it is Revelation, not Revelations. Bro. C. taught us that at the MTC and repremanded anyone who added the "s".)...if they read that scripture, I will politely ask them to turn to the book of Moses called Deuteronomy. Look up chapter 4 verse 2. I forgot. I need to set up the background of the scripture. Make sure it's in the right context. This is Moses talking to the children of Isreal in the Old Testament :

Deut: 4:2 "Ye shall not add unto the word which I command you, neither shall ye diminish ought from it..."

So you tell them, "well, it says basically the same thing in Deutoronomy that it says in Revelation. If you want to follow the letter of the law as you see it, we'd have to get rid of all but the first 5 books of the Old Testament."

They might say after reading, "No Deuteronomy is different from Revelations." They would say Revelations because they don't know to drop the "s". It's different because Moses is telling them not to add or take away from the commandments that God gave them. It's not talking about adding to the Bible being bad." Did you hear that folks? Adding to the Bible not being bad?

So Deut. wasn't talking about the whole Bible then?" I ask. "No", they say. Then I would say, "So, what you are saying is that Moses was just talking about not adding to his book, the one with the commandments. He didn't have a problem with the other books like Psalms, Jeremiah, even New Testament books like Matthew, Mark, Luke, John and Revelation, and so forth?" "Yeah", they'll say. He was just saying don't change what he wrote about the commandments."

"Well", I'll say. "I agree with you" and just to drive the point home, turn with me to Deut. 12:32. This is the Lord talking. "What thing soever I command you, observe to do it; thou shalt not add thereto, nor diminish from it."

Then all you have to do is point out how in the Book of Revelation, which was written by John the Divine, how he refers to "this book". Explain how "this book" just like in Deut. means the one book and not the whole Bible. Like Moses, John wanted to stress that as long as the writings in his book remained unchanged it would be true scripture. Some people tried to change the writings of the scriptures, adding things to the books or removing things that they did not agree with. He was not writing that message about not adding to the Bible, but only his book.

Why did I talk about this? Oh yeah...so anyway, it says the same thing in 3 Nephi 11:39-40 as it does in Revelation and Deut about not adding to this book. I stopped the lesson to explain what those verses meant. All it did at first was to add confusion. (Greenie moment). But, looking back now, I think it helped to show the importance of the scriptures being translated correctly. My companion requested that I refrain from introducing conflicting scriptures. He's glad that I know how to answer them, but to only explain them if the investigator brings it up.