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One of the insights that I discovered and was pondering over recently was symbolism in Lehi’s dream concerning God’s love for us, his children found in 1 Nephi 11:22,25. WARNING: PARSING ATTEMPT AHEAD
“Yea, it is the love of God which sheddeth [pours out, effuses, allowed to flow out] itself abroad [open air, outside boundaries, with expansion] in the hearts of men…”
So, God’s love effuses out into the world and touches the hearts of men. I can see whenever a person or an organization choses to keep the 2 great commandments, loving God and loving others, it is the love of God going out into the world and touching our hearts. We have had great leaders and examples across all walks of life say and do things that inspire us and draw us closer to God.
Another thing I realized about the dream is that the tree keeps blazing throughout the entire dream sequence to let us know that God’s love is unceasing. The tree does not flicker off and on like Christmas tree lights do. While there is the swirling, misty darkness to obscure the view, both Lehi and Nephi could see the tree even when others couldn’t and stumbled off. It increases my faith to believe that God loves us even when I don’t feel it at a specific time in my life.
Some of the people wanted nothing to do with God’s love, so rejected the path to the tree and scoffed at those who did. Some of the people navigated to the tree, ate the fruit (aka recognized God’s love in their lives) but perhaps it wasn’t what they expected or to they felt it cost too much, so they turned away. Some people experienced great joy in eating of the fruit (perhaps having strong spiritual instances, or great contentment in making an uplifting choice) and turned to encourage others to navigate to the tree and share the joy.
I don’t see anything completely separating the different groups of people – so a building person can see the twinkle of the tree and decide to go through the obstacles presented and investigate for themselves if they want to. Not everyone who made it to the tree stayed with the tree. Perhaps this is to explain to people that there are times we won’t feel God’s love so clearly in our lives, that part of the process will be to wander through misty passages and scary swamps.
Great thoughts, Amy. AmyJ wrote:
the tree keeps blazing throughout the entire dream sequence to let us know that God’s love is unceasing.
Good point. I think sometimes we get hard on ourselves and think we need to do x, y, and z and THEN God will bless us with his Love.
But His Love is unceasing.
Perhaps the thing for me to figure out is what that means. So …he loves me unceasingly…how does that help me?
For me…it helps to accept these things, live in the present and aware so it can bring peace to my thoughts. Where I get off track is when I think I can “earn” his love by obedience to some rule in more exactness than someone else, or if I think I’m not worthy of his love by something I did, or if I get too caught up in the prosperity gospel where I constantly strive for more or for protection from hurricanes, when in reality…all that stuff just is happening in the universe and praying for seagulls to come eat my cricket problem which just sets me up for failure.
I agree…God’s love is unceasing. And it is powerful and meaningful. But I have to keep my expectations in check as I wander around in mists of darkness.
There is much to like about your take on this. I struggle with Lehi’s Dream a lot. One of my biggest struggles is how it doesn’t leave room humanness. Viktor Frankl told a story about a physician he worked with who eventually became known as Doctor Death in the concentrations camps. The man was horrid. Practiced awful things on the Jewish people and gained great joy out of it. Years later when Frankl was practicing back in his previous hospital, a co-worker or patient asked Frankl if he had ever met Doctor Death because they had worked in the same hospital. Frankl said yes. The asker said that Doctor Death had been imprisoned by the Russians and sent to their prison camps. While a prisoner he had a change of heart. Though he ended up dying in the camps, from the day of his change of heart, he worked tirelessly to use his medical and life knowledge to heal instead of destroy.
How does that fit the building, those who can not stay with the light, etc. In a way I get that “light” found him. But in the analogy of the dream, does that mean that someone left the building, climbed down it’s massive walls, walked through all the pits, and grayness to reach the tree? I don’t know. I’d like to think so.
I also find, that we as a church have taken the analogy to a point where “we” “the valiant church members” have a right to point fingers of judgement at the people in the tower or those too weak to remain. For me, I can’t square that with my God. I see myself as a loving person. I believe I am trying hard to obey Laws 1 & 2, but I am outside the circumference of my flock, so where does that leave me?
I hope these ramblings make some sense. I really do like your thoughts. Keep going.
Thanks for sharing. I love thought-provoking insights and interpretations. 2 thoughts that I have found thought provoking related to this. 1) There was a time when many (like BRM’s first edition of MD) thought that the church of the devil was representative of the Catholic church. Now (like BRM’s second edition of MD) we understand that the church of the devil is much more expansive that that comprising everything and system that is designed to pull us away from God. It seems reasonable that the “church of the Lamb of God” might also be much more expansive than the LDS church and include everything and system that draws people to God – since God works though much more than the LDS church to accomplish his work and glory.
2) That perhaps the church of the Lamb and the church of the devil, the tree, the mists, the spacious building and the rest of it represent the landscape of our own heart. Perhaps we can toggle between rebellious wandering, haughty and judgmental finger pointing, and repentant contrition in the space of a single afternoon. We are both saint and sinner.
Roy wrote:
2) That perhaps the church of the Lamb and the church of the devil, the tree, the mists, the spacious building and the rest of it represent the landscape of our own heart. Perhaps we can toggle between rebellious wandering, haughty and judgmental finger pointing, and repentant contrition in the space of a single afternoon. We are both saint and sinner.
I think so also, Roy. And god loves us anyway.
Roy your comment reminds of one of my favorite hymns – Come Thou Font of Every Blessing Prone to wander, Lord, I feel it
Prone to leave the God I love
Here’s my heart, oh, take and seal it
Seal it for Thy courts above
I love it, Roy. I probably will use the landscape of our hearts in a talk at a point.
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