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Murmur ye, because that ye shall receive more of my word?
2 Nephi 29:8
Toward the end of his record, Nephi wrote of the coming forth of the Book of Mormon in the latter days. He prophesied that many Gentiles would treat the book lightly, saying, “A Bible! A Bible! We have got a Bible, and there cannot be any more Bible” (2 Nephi 29:3). Nephi recorded the Lord as saying, in response to this criticism, “Murmur ye, because that ye shall receive more of my word? Know ye not that the testimony of two nations is a witness unto you that I am God, that I remember one nation like unto another? Wherefore, I speak the same words unto one nation like unto another. And when the two nations shall run together the testimony of the two nations shall run together also” (2 Nephi 29:8). The context tells us that the question “Murmur ye, because that ye shall receive more of my word?” is directed toward those who do not want to receive the Book of Mormon, or those who claim that because they have the Bible they have already received enough of the word of God.
Most Latter-day Saints do not complain about receiving more of God’s word. In fact, many Latter-day Saints are eager to receive more—witness the numbers who flock to general conference, for example. Perhaps, for faithful members, the question “Murmur ye, because that ye shall receive more of my word?” might mean something entirely different.
Perhaps one way we murmur at receiving more of the word of God is when we receive the same teachings over and over. Maybe we have listened to general conference hoping to hear something new, such as a commandment to pack our bags and move to Missouri. Instead, we hear familiar themes such as “Teach the gospel in your homes,” “Avoid pornography,” or “Pay tithing.”
Maybe we murmur when we learn that the Sunday School or Relief Society lesson is about faith—again. At times like these we have a choice: we can choose to murmur about our opportunities to hear the word of God repeated, or we can choose to learn something new through the Spirit.
President Henry B. Eyring explained this concept: “You may not know who your . . . teacher[s] . . . will be next Sunday . . . , but you can . . . pray specifically that the Holy Ghost will come to them as they prepare to teach, and again as you sit at their feet to listen. . . . I know it works. . . . I think you can have faith and confidence that you will never need to hear an unprofitable sermon or live in a ward where you are not fed spiritually.”1
A man once asked President Spencer W. Kimball, “What do you do when you find yourself in a boring sacrament meeting?” After a moment of silence, President Kimball said, “I don’t know. I’ve never been in one.”2
His attitude certainly should make us think twice about our own perceptions of Church meetings. Elder Gene R. Cook, who related this story, said, “That’s interesting, isn’t it? That tells me that the real meeting was between President Kimball and the Lord. . . . If you enter a meeting with your heart prepared to be written upon by the Lord, then that will happen.”3
Whatever the meeting is, if we enter with our hearts prepared, we will be fed spiritually. Murmuring about hearing more of the word of God will not help us prepare to be taught.
Another way we might murmur about receiving more of the word of God is through our attitude toward daily scripture study. One brother of our acquaintance had developed a good habit of daily personal scripture study, and his family’s scripture study consisted of reading a few verses each day from the Book of Mormon. Then this brother’s bishop invited the ward members to read three pages each day from the Book of Mormon. If they did so, they would finish the Book of Mormon twice in one year.
The brother grumbled a bit. He was already spending time in the scriptures, and to try to shepherd his family through three pages of the Book of Mormon a day seemed like a lot to ask. But, with his wife’s encouragement, this family took the bishop’s challenge and began to read three pages each day. The brother later said, “Increasing the amount our family studied really was beneficial for our children. I don’t know why I was so upset about the invitation to make God’s word a bigger part of our lives.”
We are incredibly blessed to live in a time in which access to God’s word is so readily available. We can read it in books and hear it at church; we can download general conference talks from the Internet, and, in many cases, we even have the scriptures on our phones. God has given us these resources so we can drink more deeply from His words—not so we can be, as our friend Anthony Sweat says, the “blessed generation” that gets to play video games. Let us seek out every opportunity to drink deeply from the well of the Lord’s words.
Murmur ye, because that ye shall receive more of my word?
Notes
^1. Eyring, To Draw Closer to God (Salt Lake City: Deseret Book, 1997), 16, 24.
^2. In Gerry Avant, “Learning Gospel Is Lifetime Pursuit,” Church News, March 24, 1990, 10.