1 Nephi 13

My conjectures:

It says the Spirit of God wrought upon the man (Columbus) and he crossed the waters to this land. Now history says that Christopher Columbus was cruel to the natives. This makes me think that one, God works in degrees—Columbus was more righteous than many—a great man with a great mind obviously—but he had serious flaws. The Lord chose him in his time and with those flaws. (Or he was incredibly more righteous inside than his time gave provision for.)

Heavenly Father can chose us within our times and with our flaws also—for whatever mission, be in tiny, yet still ours and significant for some reason.

Secondly, the seed of Lehi was scattered by the gentiles. That was a cruel thing. First, hopefully, the Saints of God did not participate despite it having the Lord's permission. Second, I don't know why the Lord gave His permission—they had fallen away, but it was cruel … The Lord let's life be cruel so that the march of humanity continues according to the principles of agency. The agency of another is only preempted on the basis of the righteous prayers of another. And, I think, many righteous have to submit to their times. Their tragic end would not be a tragedy in the next life—hence, Mormon's fall because of his people—and his obvious triumph, both in this life in that he found peace and love amidst genocide and depravity and his lifting up to everlasting life by His God after his tragic death.

Scripture Reading Goal:

The meridianmagazine article, "The Battle for Our Brains," also lists specific steps for scripture reading:

1.  Pray before you begin

2.   Read, cross-reference, immerse yourself in the texts.

3.   Keep a notepad and pencil near you. Write down every impression that comes to you, without dismissing thoughts that may seem random or out of context.

4.   Over time, look back at what you have written and search for patterns. Trends and themes will emerge. You will see what the Holy Ghost is trying to teach you.

OK, my goals below, allow me (time for a short prayer), journal taking, and eventual search for patterns.  I think the cross referencing will need to wait until I test out the exposure hypothesis.  Hopefully, then I'll be searching for the time that cross referencing would take (I've never been good at that).

Scripture Exposure Goal

1.  Have the General Conference Ensign at my place at the table.  When I eat breakfast, ask Ivan to read a column.  Have a pencil and highlighter, just in case I want it marked or want to jot a note.

2. Take an old set of scriptures and cut out a page where I am reading (currently, it is the Book of Mormon)  Put the page in my briefcase and pull it out if I had a spare moment--and definitely at lunch.  Read a minimum of a verse a day from this page.  Get a new page when finished.

3. Have a small hardback copy of the Book of Mormon upstairs where I change clothes after school.  Include a yellow marker, pencil, and composition notebook in the stack.  Before I change clothes, read one column and jot a note in the composition book.

4.  Later when I start my work on the computer, first go to LDS.org and read the next column of scripture.    Jump to Mormon.org and watch one vignette. Jot a note on my blog when any thoughts come. Let these, over time, squeeze the time from the other electronic sites I visit.

5.  Have my quad at my bedside stand and read one column when I crawl into bed.  Have a pen and composition notebook there also in case any thoughts come.

Repeat the brief exposures each day. 

The first goal is not a huge amount of reading, nor deep immersion, though I wouldn't fight it if it came.  The goal is to experiment and see if frequent exposure gets me past the slump I perpetually slide into--and keeps me out of the slump after I've pulled myself out.

New Start.

Yesterday, I sat down and worked on Bishop Broadbent's challenge for this year--to make goals in all of the areas of personal preparedness (roughly).  My first goal in the area of Social, Spiritual, and Emotional was the following (and forever unmastered): "Regular scripture study, prayer, and journals--with a definite purpose and a new way of gaining motivation."

I'm doing quite well at prayers, and I'm sort of meeting the criteria for scripture study, but it is random passages and not enlightening at the moment.  On journal entries, it has been on again off again for forever, and mostly off again.  So I need a change.

So today, I read on Meridianmagazine.com, "The Battle for Our Brains," by Catherine Arveseth quoting Tina Peterson.

As aside here.  I know I am addicted to Conservative Websites and Facebook.  For one thing, they are easy places for short escapes from my freelance computer job.  Yet, they are still addictions and not the top tier of the Good, Better, Best criteria.  One step I took a long time ago was to change my startup page to meridianmagazine.com, rather than a conservative website.  For a long time, I've seen meridian load and immediately gone to my conservative site.  ... But slowly, I am starting to read at meridian.  That's interesting because of this article about battling for our brains.

It says that a new website (as in any sensory stimuli) creates a new synapse pathway in our brains.  When we revisit a particular site many times, the pathway widens and competes for increased stimuli (hence a habit and maybe eventually an addiction).  Perhaps, that is why meridian is starting to take a bit of hold, just due to exposure (even without my enthusiasm).

So we need to do the same with our exposure to scripture.  So, I'm doing to do an experiment.  See the above post.