Come Follow Me – Moroni’s Connectors -Moroni 1-6 – powered by Happy Scribe

Have you ever felt alone or scared? Well, then you probably know how Moroni feels right now.

It’s about 480 A.D. Things are looking pretty bad. The bloodthirsty Lamanites have wiped out the entire Nephite army and are now fighting each other in big, brutal battles. And they’re hunting down and killing all the remaining Nephite who won’t deny the Christ. And boldly Moroni states, I will not deny the Christ. And so to stay alive, Moroni hides away, dedicating himself to finishing his and his father’s great work.

And so Moroni, who’s frankly a bit surprised he’s still alive, settles in to give us his final words of great words. And what are they? A church handbook.

But wait, this isn’t just a church handbook. It’s the nuts and bolts of how to run the Kingdom of God or Jesus’s church on earth and in the world. We live today filled with challenges like war and sickness and trials. And yeah, let’s not forget Satan’s efforts to make us feel miserable, alone and angry. Well, the kingdom of God is still the best place to be. And also nuts and bolts can do pretty awesome things. These small things can do really big jobs and they connect things and make them work without them.

Toys, bikes, cars and even buildings would fall apart.

You see, God wants a connected people and to have special connections to him.

And so Moroni now dives into ordinances.

Yes, ordinances are like special godly Connector’s their outward ways. We show how we feel inside, like when we see a friend across a crowded room and we wave to say hi, we are physically showing with our hands how we feel inside. And while some ordinances give us direction, comfort and organize this church, the most important ones like baptism, the temple endowment and celestial marriage come with covenants attached. This means as we participate in them, we’re making promises to God and he’s making awesome promises to us.

So forget face time ordinances connect us to God in a way nothing else can. And once connected, God doesn’t want to lose us. He wants us to keep that connection strong.

And so now in Chapter four and five, Moroney tells us how he does that with another ordinance, The Sacrament, as he gives us a not so secret formula to not only having a strong connection to God and Jesus Christ, but even to be forever changed little by little. And it’s simple, spiritual man first eat and drink of his bread and water, then remember Christ’s sacrifice, take on his name, keep his commandments, and always remember him. And that equals having his spirit to be with us.

Now, there’s one more super important thing about nuts and bolts. They only work when they’re used together. The ordinances of the Gospel are wonderful, but like bolts, they need something to secure them in place. That something is the power and authority of Jesus Christ or the priesthood, which connects these ordinances to heaven, making the entire structure of the Kingdom of God on Earth eternal and indestructible like an ultimate bomb shelter. And so now that we know how awesome the Kingdom of God is, Moroni, it tells us exactly how we can get inside.

And it’s as easy as one, two, three, first repent. Second, be baptized. And third, receive the gift of the Holy Ghost and boom, your is recorded and you’re in. And now comes the cool part. Once inside, we become nuts and bolts to connect members to each other and to Jesus Christ. And so in Chapter six, Moroni explains what we need once we are in. First, we need further constant nourishment from the good word of God or the Gospel.

As we learn from Alma before, the gospel is more powerful than anything, and this nourishment will cheer us when we’re sad, make us strong when we’re weak, and help us to become like Jesus. But most importantly, it teaches us to depend on the atonement of Jesus Christ, the author and finisher of our faith. Next, he teaches us to stay connected together by meeting often to pray, sing, teach fast and take the sacrament moron. I probably longed for these connections as he lived alone for a very long time.

Yes, the Kingdom of God looks much the same today as it did 2000 years ago because it’s not Moroni. Or Joseph Smith’s church, because it’s the Church of Jesus Christ. Nuts and bolts and all. And finally, at the end of Chapter six, Moron teaches, when a church member doesn’t keep certain commandments, they can also get the boot as well. But every time they repent and seek forgiveness in sincerity, they will be forgiven and welcomed back.

And so with all the nuts and bolts in place, Moroni is ready to finish the book with his dad’s final mega sermon on faith, hope and charity.