My (very slow) reading of the Book of Mormon has taken me to the part where Captain Moroni, after giving his troops the Timely Reminder I blogged about which turned the tides of the battle in their favor, gave Zarahemnah, the leader of this army of Lamanites, an opportunity to surrender. Moroni's proposed terms said nothing of capture. He had the Lamanites surrounded and pretty well beaten, but he was willing to let them go. All he wanted in exchange for their lives was their promise that they wouldn't attack the Nephites again, surrendering their swords to Moroni as a token of that covenant.
One thing to remember about this conflict was that the Lamanites had started this fight. They were invading Nephite lands with the intention to end Nephite lives. They were going to war, so they must have accepted the risk that this little excursion of theirs might cost them their lives, yet they attacked the Nephites anyway. Captain Moroni had every right to kill Zarahemnah and all his men, and it might even have been a smarter thing to do, from a certain point of view.
This was the first battle among the children of Lehi in which armor was used. If the Nephites had killed all the Lamanites who saw them in armor (and miraculously kept all of the Lamanites from escaping), they could have used the advantage of using armor against unarmored opponents again the next time the Lamanites decided to attack them. Speaking of which, if an army of Lamanites go to war against the Nephites and never return, it might have discouraged a few future attacks of Lamanites against the Nephites. It probably would have been wise of Captain Moroni to kill all those Lamanites right then and there - no mercy. But in his own words, "Behold, Zerahemnah, that we do not desire to be men of blood. Ye know that ye are in our hands, yet we do not desire to slay you."
Captain Moroni showed Zarahemnah mercy that I, personally, don't think he deserved. He knew he was going to war against the Nepthites. He knew he might be killed in battle, yet he came to battle anyway. That was a risk that he knowingly took, and if the battle went badly for him, that's just how things go. I don't think Zarahemnah deserved the opportunity to just walk away from this. In fact, I don't think he deserved mercy here any more than we do. We know what God's commandments are, or at least we have a basic knowledge of what's right and wrong. We know that God punishes sinners and that His punishments are just, and many of those who don't believe in God at least have some belief in karma, or in legal justice. When people do bad things, bad things happen to them. That's just how things go. And yet, just like Captain Moroni, God often grants us opportunities to repent, whether we deserve them or not.
God's terms are much the same as Captain Moroni's terms. We don't have to face severe punishment, we can walk away from this and leave it behind us, but God asks that we promise that we won't do it again, and He sometimes requires a small sacrifice from us, just so we can show that we're serious about our desire to repent.
But at this point, Zarahemnah wasn't. He didn't like Captain Moroni's terms, and the fighting continued. (Actually, Zarahemnah's refusal to accept Captain Moroni's terms said a lot of good things about his moral character. I should blog about that later. In the meantime, for this blog post, his refusal of Moroni's terms represents times when we choose not to repent.) Well, the Lamanites didn't suddenly regain the advantage. They kept losing until, over the clamor of war, Zarahemnah shouted to Captain Moroni that he had changed his mind and would now accept Captain Moroni's terms.
But let's think about this. Zarahemnah had a chance to survive this battle by, in the first place, not starting it. But he invaded Nephite lands anyway, at the risk of his own life. Then, when the battle was going badly for his army, the people he had chosen to attack, many of whom had friends and brothers whom he and his army had killed, offered him an opportunity to give up his conquest and escape with his life, a very generous offer! But he rejected it, further risking his own life. Now, only when all hope was lost and he seemed completely doomed to die right then and there, he said, essentially, "I'd like to surrender now."
And Captain Moroni let him. Zarahemnah and at least part of his army survived that battle, despite having foolishly caused it, then even more foolishly continued it despite it going badly for them and them being given an opportunity to give up and go home (alive).
Hopefully, this doesn't sound too familiar to anyone's personal lives, but just in case it does, I'd like to explain the parallel that I drew from my most recent re-reading of this story. We do stupid things. Sometimes, the stupid things we do are sinful. Sometimes we foolishly, knowingly, break God's commandments. Yet, God is often merciful, and gives us an opportunity to repent, but He leaves the decision in our hands. He doesn't take our swords away from us and kick us out, He asks us to drop our swords and walk away. He leaves it up to us, and that means that we can still be stupid, if we really want to be. We can keep fighting against God and rebelling against His laws and seeing how well, or rather how poorly, that works out for us. The choice is up to us.
We know that if we break God's laws, we become worthy of punishment, and if we reject God's offer to forgive us when He offers forgiveness to us the first time, we have further doomed ourselves and are even less deserving of mercy than we were when He first offered it to us. Yet, to paraphrase Captain Moroni and apply it to the Almighty, God does not desire to be a God of blood. And to quote Elder Craig A. Cardon of the Seventy, "The Savior wants to forgive." So, He gives us a second chance. And a third chance. And a fourth chance. And as many other chances as we need. His arms are always open. He wants us to repent before it's too late.
And just to make it clear in case anyone reading or writing this blog post takes this message of hope as some kind of license to delay repentance, I testify that it will eventually be too late. Zarahemnah could have surrendered at any time, and he eventually did, but if he had waited until he had been pierced by a Nephite blade, he would have been too late. And every time we reject an opportunity to repent, it becomes even harder for us to repent later. We need to repent, and for our own sakes, we need to repent as soon as we can. Consider this your second chance (or third or fourth - Who's counting?), and take it. Right now, God is offering us all mercy that we don't deserve. Let's take it. Let us accept His most generous offer and live.
1 comment:
love your posts!
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