The lesson on Sunday (number 14, for those who may be keeping track) deals with the books of Enos, Jarom, Omni, and the Words of Mormon. As I read the account of Enos praying in the wilderness, I feel like I’ve been reading Miracle of Forgiveness and stopped before I get to the reassuring part at the end. I can’t help but compare with my own life and come up short on the balance. Enos goes off and prays all day and into the night, and if I kneel down at night there’s a good chance I’m falling asleep before I’m done.
Enos is on a hunting trip and from verse two seems to be concerned about a remission of his sins. There is a parallel here with Joseph Smith’s First Vision. One of Joseph’s first accounts (did you know there was more than one?) was in 1832 where he recounted his search for the true church from age 12 – 15. Part of his search was driven by a desire to obtain forgiveness and remission of his sins, recognizing that proper authority was necessary. (Milton V. Backman Jr., “Joseph Smith’s Recitals of the First Vision,” Ensign, Jan 1985, 8).
Anyhow, I don’t think there is any room here to assume Enos was guilty of any serious transgression. As the Prophet Joseph Smith taught:
“The nearer man approaches perfection, the clearer are his views, and the greater his enjoyments, till he has overcome the evils of his life and lost every desire for sin.” (Teachings of the Prophet Joseph Smith, p. 51)
Our friend Enos was probably a habitual jay-walker or maybe he waited until the 20th to do his hometeaching every month. Whatever it was, he was moved by the Spirit to seek forgiveness as part of his process of improvement. I’m always impressed at how he describes his experience. He only uses the word ‘prayer’ (or variants) three times in his narrative (in verses 4, 11, & 12). He uses other descriptive phrases ten times. For example:
Enos is on a hunting trip and from verse two seems to be concerned about a remission of his sins. There is a parallel here with Joseph Smith’s First Vision. One of Joseph’s first accounts (did you know there was more than one?) was in 1832 where he recounted his search for the true church from age 12 – 15. Part of his search was driven by a desire to obtain forgiveness and remission of his sins, recognizing that proper authority was necessary. (Milton V. Backman Jr., “Joseph Smith’s Recitals of the First Vision,” Ensign, Jan 1985, 8).
Anyhow, I don’t think there is any room here to assume Enos was guilty of any serious transgression. As the Prophet Joseph Smith taught:
“The nearer man approaches perfection, the clearer are his views, and the greater his enjoyments, till he has overcome the evils of his life and lost every desire for sin.” (Teachings of the Prophet Joseph Smith, p. 51)
Our friend Enos was probably a habitual jay-walker or maybe he waited until the 20th to do his hometeaching every month. Whatever it was, he was moved by the Spirit to seek forgiveness as part of his process of improvement. I’m always impressed at how he describes his experience. He only uses the word ‘prayer’ (or variants) three times in his narrative (in verses 4, 11, & 12). He uses other descriptive phrases ten times. For example:
-“wrestle … before God” (vs 2)
-“my soul hungered… and I cried unto [my Maker]” (vs 4)
-“supplication” (vs 4). Interesting side-note, ‘supplication’ comes from Latin, meaning to bend or yield.
-“did… raise my voice high” (vs 4)
-“pour out my whole soul unto God” (vs 9)
-“struggling in the spirit” (vs 10)
-“many long strugglings” (vs 11)
-“labored with all diligence” (vs 12)
-“cried unto [the Lord] continually” (vs 15)
-“did cry unto God” (vs 16)
Elder David A. Bednar in conference last week started out by saying, “Simply saying prayers is quite a different thing from engaging in meaningful prayer.”
How long do you think it had been since Enos merely “said his prayers”? Look at how he describes his prayers, he felt his prayers! He was familiar with the process, he was used to praying under the direction of the Spirit. Check out verse 13, that’s a pretty specific “what if” to just pull out of the air.
Some have used his desire for a remission of sins to claim that this was a great turning point in his life. I feel that this was simply the next logical step in his spiritual progression. One doesn’t just jump right into an all-day, all-night prayer marathon after saying routine prayers at home. Try praying for just 30 minutes, how long would it take you or me before we could pull a ‘prayer-a-thon’ like Enos did?
Elder Bednar also said “meaningful prayer requires both holy communication and consecrated work.” Well, Enos had both of those marked off. He “labored with all diligence” (vs 12) while praying, and then when he got back home, he testified “of the things which I had heard and seen” (vs 19) and “declared [the truth] in all my days” (vs 26).
On a different topic, something jumped out at me as I was reading verse 1. Enos describes his father Jacob as “a just man” who “taught me in his language, and also in the nurture and admonition of the Lord…” What does it mean to be “taught… in the nurture and admonition of the Lord”? At first, I figured it must mean that Jacob taught him the gospel. But why not just say “he taught me the gospel”? Especially considering the difficulty involved with the engraving process. Enos, like his father, chose his words very carefully. So, what did he mean? May I suggest a few possibilities…
Could this be his way of saying Jacob taught him about the Lord’s nature? Our Perfect Parent nurtures us and encourages our growth and admonishes us if we start to wander off (admonish: ‘to advise, caution, to reprove in a mild and good-willed manner’).
Maybe he is describing Jacob’s parenting style? To paraphrase, ‘my father used the nurture and admonition of the Lord to teach me’. It’s not a stretch to see gentle Jacob as the nurturing type, and it’s easy to see him admonishing in his sermon at the temple (Jacob 2-4).
Anyhow, I’m not exactly sure what he meant. Just thought I’d throw that out there because it is the part that stuck with me the most over the last couple of days.
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