Follow Him: A Come, Follow Me Podcast - Helaman 7-12 Part 2 • Shima Baughman • September 2 - September 8 • Come Follow Me

Episode Date: August 28, 2024

Professor Baughman continues to explore the intrigue in Helaman 9-12 and explore the dangers of the Gadianton Robbers and the power of God to redeem His people.SHOW NOTES/TRANSCRIPTSEnglish: https://tinyurl.com/podcastBM36ENFrench: https://tinyurl.com/podcastBM36FRGerman: https://tinyurl.com/podcastBM36DEPortuguese: https://tinyurl.com/podcastBM36PTSpanish: https://tinyurl.com/podcastBM36ESYOUTUBEhttps://youtu.be/451VBADMwAwALL EPISODES/SHOW NOTESfollowHIM website: https://www.followHIMpodcast.comFREE PDF DOWNLOADS OF followHIM QUOTE BOOKSNew Testament: https://tinyurl.com/PodcastNTBookOld Testament: https://tinyurl.com/PodcastOTBookWEEKLY NEWSLETTERhttps://tinyurl.com/followHIMnewsletterSOCIAL MEDIAInstagram: https://www.instagram.com/followHIMpodcastFacebook: https://www.facebook.com/followhimpodcastTIMECODE00:00 Part II– Dr. Shima Baughman00:07 Helaman 9:12-14, 38 - 5 Guys and Nephi calls out murderers03:49 Circumcised of heart and South African rituals08:13 Helaman 9:39 - Prison converts11:56 Helaman 10:1-4, 12 - Heavenly approval and Nephi’s sadness15:48 Helaman 10:16-17  - Miraculous escape21:21 Helaman 11:7 - Famine for remembrance24:19 Helaman 18-19 Unrecognized yet faithful Lehi27:10 Helaman 11:26-38 - Gadianton robbers increasingly evil30:35 Justice and mercy37:25 Helaman 12:1-12 - Repent and be steady 40:41 Helaman 12 - Mormon’s personality43:33 Helaman 12:7 - Men < dust45:55 Why a famine?49:41 How to have hope in sinful world?51:36 Professor Baughman shares her testimony of the Book of Mormon and Jesus56:47 End of Part II– Professor Shima BaughmanThanks to the followHIM team:Steve & Shannon Sorensen: Cofounder, Executive Producer, SponsorDavid & Verla Sorensen: SponsorsDr. Hank Smith: Co-hostJohn Bytheway: Co-hostDavid Perry: ProducerKyle Nelson: Marketing, SponsorLisa Spice: Client Relations, Editor, Show NotesJamie Neilson: Social Media, Graphic DesignWill Stoughton: Video EditorKrystal Roberts: Translation Team, English & French Transcripts, WebsiteAriel Cuadra: Spanish Transcripts"Let Zion in Her Beauty Rise" by Marshall McDonaldhttps://www.marshallmcdonaldmusic.com

Welcome to part two with Dr. Shema Boffman, Helaman 7 through 12. I sometimes find humor in the stories that we read here. There's this moment that you've talked about Shema where they find the chief judge is dead. They sent these five men to see what happened and they fall to the earth and then some people come up and they're like, well these five must be the murderers. And so they put them in prison. And then the people who sent the five, they ask, where are this verse 12? Where are the five who we sent to inquire? And they answered and said, we don't know about those five that you sent, but these

five, they're the murderers. We put them into prison. You sent five. Well, I don't know where those guys are, but... Different five, different five. And they're like, no, that wasn't us. We, verse 14, we ran and we came to the judgment scene and we were astonished. And I like how it says in verse 38, in so much the five were set at liberty. So I put my margin, they went on to found Five Guys Burgers and Fries. They became so well known that they founded that burger chain.

But there's another thing I was going to mention is that there's a seminary movie of this, which you could probably find online called The Pride Cycle, and all of this story is depicted. It's really well done. I remember it because I met Siantum in the grocery store once. The guy who played Siantum, I met him at Days Market in Provo once. And you're like, hey, I know you. Hey, yeah. Did you murder your brother? He didn't like that question.

When I teach it, I say, now, this is how you remember. Cesorum was the one who was murdered. So now you Cesorum, now you don't. And Ciantum was the murderer. Ciantum, as in Tom, Tom, Tom, Tom, the little song of justice there at the end of Dragnet. So. It was so good. Well, John, if we can find that link our wonderful team member Lisa spice She'll put it in the show notes go over to follow him not co follow him.co If we can find that video John is talking about yeah, we'll link it there. Yeah, I love it This is so fun. Nefai tells him earlier that nothing unclean can come unto God

it's interesting because the brother of Caesarea, Siantum, has this blood on his cloak. Think of Alma's analogy in Alma 5 where he says garments stained with blood is used as a metaphor for sin. Here we have an actual cloak soaked with blood that ends up condemning him. Think of Jesus Christ who is cleansing us with his blood, makes us spotless white. Frequently the scriptures say garments made white through the blood of the Lamb. And man's blood always seems to be a stain where Christ's blood always seems to be a cleanser. I always thought that's cool. I love that, no, it's beautiful. What happens when the five men

discover that the chief judge has been murdered, they fall to the ground and they're so overcome. They take this position, you know, flat on the floor, lying there in this position of humility before God. And this happens all the time throughout the Old Testament. And still in Islamic tradition, I have to say one of the things I have holy envy of is Islamic prayers, where one of the positions they take in prayer is laying completely flat on the ground with their head on the ground on a rock. And that's to symbolize, as King Benjamin said, that we come from the dirt or the dust and this humility towards God.

There's something so beautiful about bowing your head to the floor and humility before God. When people feel the spirit in the Book of Mormon as well as in the Old Testament, they lay down. That's what they do. They lay down to the ground to show that they're nothing before God. And I think it's so beautiful. One of the things I thought was super interesting and this phrase comes up often, it's in Helaman 921 where Nephi says to them, oh ye fools, ye uncircumcised of heart, ye blind, ye sickened people. And this phrase uncircumcised of heart comes up often and it means that your heart's not broken, you don't have a changed heart.

And it's also you're kind of unresponsive to God's commandments and you have a hard heart. I was fortunate enough to spend four months studying in South Africa and it was during the time in the summer where they have these circumcision ceremonies. Circumcision in kind of the Western world happens when you're a child, a baby. And the Xhosa people in South Africa, that's Nelson Mandela's people, it happens when they're a teen and before they're 18. So sometime between 14 to 18 they have this circumcision and there's some really beautiful parallels with this. What happens is they go into the bush

and they're taught by the elders how to behave as a man. And part of it is this circumcision that they have. It's very painful. You can imagine as a teenage boy to have this happen. And they have this open wound. And in this time, they're taught how to be a new person. When they come out of it, they're called a new man.'re taught how to be a new person. When they come out of it they're called a new man. They're even called like a new word. They

go in being called one word and they come out as a man being a new word. They undergo this ritual. Paul describes so beautifully that we have to have a fleshy heart. We have to have a broken and an open heart to be vulnerable to the words of God touching us. And this new covenant we have, it's in Hebrews 8-10, where he says so beautifully, I will write my laws into their hearts, and I will be unto them a God, and they will be unto me a people. And in 2 Corinthians, he talks about in 3-3, the word of God comes written not with ink, but the spirit of a living God, not in tables of stone, but in the fleshy tables of our hearts. And you think about how when our hearts are broken,

and they're ripped open, there's an open wound, we're completely open to the Spirit of God, and we can change, and we can have this dependence on Him. And we realize where we come from. Is your commitment inside of you? So circumcision is an outward symbol, right, of I'm committed to God. Similar to, say, garment. I wear my garments. And I wonder if today a prophet might say, but are your garments on your heart? You wear perhaps a wedding ring. But does your heart have a wedding ring on it? Yeah, I love your description, Shima. I've always thought that they haven't made covenants in their heart. That's how I've always said that, especially when my kids were young, even having a new name.

This is what it means to be a man. They were probably taught some things about responsibility and how they should behave and so forth. Yes, it's a very pivotal moment in these boys' lives and like you said, it's the old law to the new, right? There's no more law that requires men to be circumcised, but we are all to be circumcised of heart. It's a good parallel from old to new, the love Jesus Christ that's changing our hearts. I think it's so good. And that's a question for all of us then. Is it really in your heart? Now we're back to those introspective questions that I want to avoid. Well, this time it was your fault.

This idea of being circumcised of heart at the end of Isaiah chapter 52, which is also 2 Nephi 8. This is 2 Nephi 8 verse 24, Awake, awake, put on thy strength, O Zion, put on thy beautiful garments, O Jerusalem, the holy city, for henceforth there shall no more come into thee the uncircumcised and the unclean. Reminds me of that, that people will make covenants. We talked about this in our past podcast, Hank, shake thyself from the dust, get up off the ground, Arise, sit down, which sounds opposite, unless you're getting up out of the dirt and sitting down in dignity,

O Jerusalem, loose thyself from the bands of thy neck, O captive daughter of Zion. Loose thyself from the bands of thy neck, O captive daughter of Zion. We are all daughters of Zion, the way Isaiah is using it, right? And Jesus is the bridegroom and we are the bride. As we move along, Helaman 9.39, I have to point out where it tells us that the five men who bore testimony, right, of what happened to the chief judge, it says they'd been converted while they were in prison. That's not lost on someone like me where this is the kind of work that I seek to do. And some of the most beautiful work I would say done by members of our church is in prisons. And in Utah, there's more members of our church serving in prisons

than any of the other churches. And we daily and there's these beautiful stories of people ministering and studying scriptures and giving incredible priesthood blessings to people in these very low points in their lives. Yeah, one of the first experiences I had as a lawyer a couple years in was representing a Jewish rabbi who wasn't able to pray in his prison cell. And I remember feeling such profound love that God had for this man that I went to visit with. He was serving a 27-year sentence in federal prison, but I felt so much love. And when I walked into those prison doors, I felt so profoundly this was the place I needed to be. I felt like I'm in the exact right place that God wants me to be. I should be doing this work. This

is what a Christian should be doing is helping a man who wants to pray. He wants to rehabilitate himself. He wants to change and I wanted to help him be able to pray in the way his faith required, which is he can't pray in his prison cell because under Jewish law it's unclean because it has a toilet in there. I was trying to help him and we eventually got him accommodated for that, but it was this profound realization of how much God loves his people, all of them, including those in prison. So I love this little nugget that Mormon saved in here that they're converted while they're in prison. And it reminds us how important it is to keep remembering those

people that are serving, that we can continue to teach them that the power of redemption applies to them as well as to all of us outside of prison. It gets so dramatic and beautiful. I've never seen those six words before, converted while they were in prison. There's a man in my ward, Elder Fulkerson, who is at the prison every week. He's an addiction recovery missionary. I've had a chance to go with him a few times and I'll tell you, there's a powerful spirit. Those inmates were willing to come and listen to a meeting. I looked at Steve and said, I'll come whenever you want. And he took me up on it a couple of more times, but powerful spirit there. I'm glad you pointed that out. That's underlined and starred right now. I drew a little prison on the prison, if you want to do the same. I'll do that too. One thing that's really neat as we were talking about

how our church is so involved in prison ministry is our church actually has a website that they started a couple months ago that gives you instruction. There's videos to share with inmates. There's a lot of good tools for those serving in the prisons. There's just so much good that can be done. Jesus Christ, when he talks about certain groups of people that we served, when we served Him, he points out prisoners specifically, the sick. And when I was in prison, you visited me. That wasn't by accident.

I think that's a call for all of us to do that work. Our church is really facilitating that, helping us get more access. And there's so much good we can do with people in prisons. I very much have a testimony of that. Our podcast is in some prisons on the tablets in prison, and we've received some letters from inmates, very touching letters. They hit you. Yeah, how interesting.

God keeps looking at you. He'll find you where you are. He won't be. He does. Moving along to chapter 10, I think that's another funny part that happens is at the beginning of the chapter, the people are divided and they they're like is Nephi prophet or is he not and as they're fighting Nephi is left alone standing there and then he walks home pondering these things which is such a funny scene you can imagine he's like oh

well I guess you'll you guys can fight go home but then in verse 4 this is so beautiful this answers our pride question earlier a little bit where he has this voice come to him and it says, blessed are thou Nephi for those things which thou has done. Good job. For I have beheld how thou hast with unweariness declared the word which I have given unto thee and to this people and thou has not feared them and has not sought thy own life, but has sought my will and to keep my commandments. Think about pride as we talked about earlier. Is it wrong to congratulate yourself when you did something good? It is not wrong when you do it when you're doing God's will and when you give him the credit rather than yourself.

And I think that's such a great example where the Spirit tells Nephi like well done, that good and faithful servant. That's what we want. That's the kind of congratulation we want. It's from the Spirit and it glorifies him for doing his work, not glorifying ourselves. Oh, this is amazing because he tells him in verse 4, blessed art thou Nephi, calls him by name and then is going to give him the sealing power. I have a note in my scriptures where Jesus says, thou art Peter, and it does the same thing. And I'm going to give you the sealing power, the keys to seal on earth and in heaven.

And then look at verse 12. And what does he do in verse 12? I noticed also that he's cast down in verse 3. It almost feels like he's in a state of depression. And we've gotten that from him since we've had him come on the scene here. He's, I don't want to live at this time. These people are so terrible. Perhaps when you're in that state, that it's okay that God can speak to you in this state of being cast down. I'm not saying that you have to be in that state, but it's not necessarily something you have to fight off. It's okay to be cast down. You know, the Lord's going to lift you up.

You know, the video I mentioned earlier, they do a really good job on verse one. I mean this is the best friend they possibly could have had who actually has access to infinite intelligence and they all walk away. And they show him looking around like everybody just left. And maybe that's part of it, Hank. Like I have such a message of love and hope and beauty for you and they all leave. There's no interest. Yeah. And that's the thing is that prophets have ups and downs too. It goes to kind of Nephi's character as we talked about earlier, he doesn't really care what the public thinks. He's trying to do God's will. He's not concerned about their divisions and their fighting. He turns to God when he needs to complain about their

wickedness. He goes to God and so he's going home pondering and then you get one of the greatest blessings as you referenced earlier John, the sealing power. He's given the sealing power and that's pretty profound that he's given the same power that Peter, James, and John, and the other apostles are given as it talks about Matthew and Joseph Smith and Oliver Cowdery are given this power in the Doctrine and Covenants. And it's the power to seal on earth what it is in heaven. It's interesting because right now we're at this point where the prophet has asked us to study D&C 109 since last conference that we should study this dedicatory prayer at the temple. And that's exactly when Oliver and Joseph

were given the sealing power. It's a beautiful thing to study right now to remember the miracles of God. The prophet has really encouraged us to think about these miracles. And I think of Nephi, who only seeks to glorify God and is given this beautiful power and not only the sealing power, but he's also then given power to bring whatever he wants. God is like, your will is my will. You can do what you want. So then later he's able to bring a famine because he sees that he doesn't want to destroy his people, but he's even given that power. So it's profound what happens when you do the will of God as exactly as Nephi does. Joseph Fielding Smith in Answers to Gospel Questions says,

The Lord conferred authority on some of His chosen servants and gave them exceptional powers. He talks about Elijah, Peter, James, and John, and he says, The Lord gave this similar authority to Nephi, who had the authority to close the heavens and perform other mighty works. This wonderful power has been bestowed on but a few of the servants of the Lord." I think it's significant too. This came after the unwearyingness. You know, maybe there's a sequence there. He had proven he was so devoted that, boy, here comes this at a time where he was cast down. I just love what happens next. He didn't even go home again. He went right back out to the multitudes.

I mean, I think I see an angel, I think I wanna go home and maybe have a snack and lie down for a minute. Well, this is after his public trial. He's gone through all this drama with the trial and then he's right back at it. Such a good example of faith and willingness to do God's will, it's incredible. And then the blessings right back at it. Such a good example of faith and willingness to do God's will.

It's incredible. And then the blessings that come from it. Then we have in Helaman 1016, it talks about how they then want to put him in prison. And because of the power of God that he now has, they can't put him in prison. And he's taken away by the Spirit in the midst of them. And it's very reminiscent of what happens to Jesus Christ when he is challenged a few times with death by the Pharisees. They condemn him after he testifies that he is the Messiah, and they try to take him, but the first time they try to throw him off the cliff, but he disappears through the crowd, and there's another time where he does the same thing.

I think that's an interesting thing that he's able to escape. And not only does he escape, but it talks about in verse 17 of chapter 10 that when they try to kill him, not only does he just escape, but he then goes forth in spirit with the multitude and declares the work of God, even until he's declared it to all of them. Basically has the opportunity to teach all the people despite the fact that they were trying to kill him. The lesson that teaches me of how when you're trying to do God's will, that He opens these doors for you. We have a family tradition when we watch general conference. We, you know, as parents, we're

trying to make the kids look forward to it. So we have games and sometimes we go somewhere and make a big weekend. Well, it was the night before, it was Friday night before general conference and we're all excited and everybody's together. But there's a mission reunion and my mission president, who is not local, is actually going to be there from St. Louis. And I was, ah, maybe I just won't go. I'll just stay with the family and everything. And had a pretty direct thought, John, this isn't about you.

Go to the reunion. You might be able to lift some people and I'll take care of your family. You might think that John is this, I want to be the center of attention guy. Let me walk into the room. So everybody knows John, by the way, is here. and that is completely the opposite. John is a homebody in every way. If he can stay home, he'll stay home. So John it has to be a pretty significant prompting for you to go by yourself without your family to go to some sort of reunion meeting. Well thanks for saying that Hank. Yeah I didn't I didn't really want to go but it was Britjian. This isn't about you. My sweet wife, I said, I think I should go. She said go. So I took off and

I got there a little late. But oh my goodness, so glad I went. I saw so many people, friends. I saw the children of companions I had who had passed and was able to hug on some people and lift them up and then the guy in charge said come and talk about President Smith and I got to do that and give a tribute to my dear mission president and the best thing though for me was an elder that I felt like we had gone and visited with him when he taught and we kind of reprimanded him about something that was not exactly the way we were supposed to do it. And I've had a stomach ache about that for so many years.

To see him there, I thought, oh my goodness. And that was like, oh, Heavenly Father, it is for me. I've got to go talk to him and see if I can repair this. And to be honest, I don't even think he remembered it. But I was able to go and talk to him and tell him how I remember what a hard worker he was and everything. And I remember when we came to visit you and I drove home just thinking, I'm so glad I went to that thing. It turned out that was a very tender mercy for me. But I think I remember Elder Bednar talking about his wife does not go to church just for her

She goes for her but she will find people elder Bednar said that need to be talking She'll go find people and lift them up and help them and it's yeah We're gonna go to worship but we're gonna find people and see if we can lift them up in some way I love that such a good story some way. I love that. Such a good story. Moving along to chapter 11, we have some fighting again, lots more destruction, wickedness, and Nephi says to God, please don't destroy the people, let's just have a famine instead, which sounds a lot better of their options. They get famine. Every civilization as we read, and you think about us today, we all think we're too strong to fall. It takes killings and famine for people to turn back to God and you see in chapter

11 verse 7, it came to pass that people saw they were about to perish by famine. Then they began to remember the Lord their God and they began to remember the words of Nephi. We're sometimes slow to remember and Helaman 8 6 if you recall they said, we know this is impossible for behold we are powerful and our cities great therefore our enemies have no power over us. It reminds me of our time for those of us that have lived a long time before COVID. You think of our world shutting down and having a world global pandemic, something that we've never seen in our lifetime and uncertainty that we faced with that. It's a good reminder we're're never too great for destruction, right?

Our cities are never too great. We can be humbled very quickly. Makes you wanna ask, like, do we repent as a people? And did we turn more to God? Because during COVID, in our similar corollary to Nephi's people, we killed each other more often than we've had in a long, long time.

Murder rates went up in 2020 and 2021, and now it's starting to come back down in 2022 and 23. And there's such a parallel. This murder comes in these times of turning away from God, these times of wickedness. And I see that in Nephi's time, so many people died, grain wasn't coming in season, but when they were humbled, there was food again. And I wonder, you know, where are we in our pride cycle? Are we on the increase towards humility? We've endured a global pandemic, people are starting to come back to faith now. In 2022, 23, you know, 6% of Gen Z's come back to faith, 4% of millennials. Hopefully, we're on the uptick for now. And coming back to God. It's such an interesting reminder that we're never too great to be destroyed. Fantastic. I did not know that the crime rates were.

It went up a lot. Do you know what I love about this? Nephi was so inspired to ask for a famine. If you're in a war, then you're mad at that village over there or that city over there. And that goes on and on and there's revenge and everything. But if there's a famine, everybody suffers. And where do you go? You can't be mad at them. You have to turn to God if there's a famine. I've got my margin the way to a man's heart is through his stomach and boy everybody's stomach. I love that it was a fam, I thought it's brilliant because now everybody is affected and everybody can turn only one way and that's to God until he causes it

to rain again because nobody can control the rain. Helaman 11, 18 to 19, it's so beautiful. So where we have Nephi and it says in verse 18, he's a great prophet and a man of God and he has power and authority given to him from God. And then in verse 19, it says, and behold, Lehi his brother was not a wit behind him as to these things, as to things pertaining to righteousness. President Hunter pointed out this beautiful point about Lehi recognizing Lehi because he's not as recognized and it's seemingly mentioned only in passing, but I think it's so important for us to remember because so many of us feel more like the Lehis in the world. You think of how many

righteous people who aren't prominent, who aren't known for their righteousness, but equally serve and are loved by the Lord. There's so many of these people that we all are or have known in the church and it's like the woman on the activities committee that walks every flier to everyone's door or the volunteer that brings treats every single time or priest that sets up the chairs every single time in the activities. And these people aren't recognized, they're like the Lehi's of the world, but yet God loves them and appreciates them. And I love that this Mormon appreciates Lehi and gives him a verse and he's no less righteous or

loved by God than Nephi, but yet he's not as famous. And I remember President Emily Belfriman, who's president of the Young Women's, she mentioned in Inklings in her study group that she hadn't had a prominent big calling in her ward or state for a very long time before the prophet called and called her to be the Young Women's general president. And that doesn't happen to all of us, but I think there are so many people that are serving in righteousness, they're keeping their covenants, they're doing good work, they're remembering that they're serving God and Jesus Christ. And these accolades and the prestige that might come sometimes with callings that people might perceive them to be important aren't as important as what we're doing just to

serve God. And I think I love the Lehi's that are mentioned in passing, because that's most of us, that's many of us as a reminder that, hey, who's important is watching. And God is aware of us and loves us and doesn't matter what calling we have or what status we have in the eyes of men. It's the eyes of God that matter. Shema, that is so crucial. When I look around my own ward, I think these are my hereofs. I've been in this ward a long time, 13, 14 years now, and I've seen people devote year after year after year their lives to God, and it's really between them and the Lord. It's a beautiful thing in this church.

Yeah, do you know the phrase that comes to mind is, remember the war chapters a few weeks ago, Alma 48, where he's talking about Captain Moroni so often, and then he says, now, Helaman and his brethren were no less serviceable. I wanted to go on. In Helaman, he then describes after some of the secret combinations and the difficulties that come back to the people, we have the Gadianton robbers. They're killing people. They're going into the mountains at this point. They found the secret plans of gattianton it describes and become the robbers of gattianton in chapter 11 verse 26. And then the people sent an army to stop this. They couldn't stop it because they became too great number. They go into the wilderness and basically doing

all these bad things. What I want to point out, which is so interesting, is I think we often forget that with the gadianton robbers, they spend about 50 years wreaking havoc amongst the Nephites. As we move on and learn more about the story, they're defeated with the help of God, which is miraculous. And they're defeated in one day, which is very miraculous. But the greatest miracle I see in what happens to the Gadianton robbers is that they murder, they plunder, they conspire. They're basically the serial killers of the Nephites. And you think about who they are. I mean, it tells us in 3rd Nephi 5 for they're put in prison, finally captured. This is when they come to their justice. But while they're in

prison, again, they're preached the Word of God. And it says, as many as would repent of their sins, enter in a covenant that they would murder no more and what's really miraculous in 35-54 is they then enter covenant that they'll be punished you know according to the law and after if they agree to not commit these crimes in 35-63 they're granted those who have entered into covenant so those those robbers who enter into covenant to keep the piece of the land are released from prison and they're given land with which they can work and survive on with their labors. And this is something as somebody who thinks about what happens once people commit crimes after we hold them accountable and they're willing to change when they can covenant to

do good. It's a great example in the Book of Mormon where it shows look they've wreaked havoc for 50 years they've conspiracy, rape, murder, talks about them taking women and children into the wilderness but yet it's like they find Ted Bundy and his associates and then they promise not to do it again and then they let them go because they've covenanted to fall. This is like an atonement miracle. If you think about all the things that happen in the Book of Mormon, this is a miracle that the Gadianton robbers are then given lands

or unable to live amongst the people peaceably and it really gives me pause to reflect on are we willing to have this same sort of miracle of the atonement allowed in people in our lives, in our criminal justice system, in our daily interactions with people who have harmed us. How willing are we to let people repent and change if they're willing? And the people allow them to, and not only do they let them go, they give them land to work on. It's just so beautiful, this redemption that and it's such a powerful story of the atonement. I mean, think of how do we treat people in our day that do the same thing. It's definitely not this way. I don't think we give them the same chance.

Sheema, how do you balance that as a criminal lawyer where people might say they deserve their punishment and yet here you are. There's also there's justice and mercy that this person wants to change. We need to allow them to change. I'm sure you've had students be confused about that. Like, where's the line? Well, this is the theme of my course I teach at BYU. It's where does justice end and mercy begin? That's what we really talk about. And I think through the power of Jesus Christ, through people, people can change and they do change. And that's where we need to flip. There's room for accountability. I actually have someone come in who was a former felon.

His name is Dave Verochet, the head of the other side academy. He formed it with Joseph Graney, who's also a member of our church. And he's like, you know, I committed burglary. I did, I was arrested 25 times. And he's like, you know, I committed burglary. I did, I was arrested 25 times. And he's like, I needed to be held accountable. And he needed to, because he needed to repent and change. He wasn't in a place to want to change. Eventually does have this opportunity to change. And he goes to this place that's founded

on principles of integrity and faith, and has this come to Jesus moment and changes. And then he has redemption. I think both. We need to hold people accountable who are not willing, who are not ready like the Gadianta Roberts, the covenant to change. But when they are ready, we don't need to say, okay, well, you still have 15 more years to serve. I think there are opportunities and ways to be able to have them have mercy and be able to change. Right now our criminal justice system is more

focused on the harshness. I think we can be moved towards mercy a bit more compared to the rest of the world. We're more harsh and more willing to incarcerate at quicker times. But I do think there's room for that. But I also think there's room for accountability. You know when people are in the midst of crime and they're making

bad decisions if we don't arrest them it's almost like you're harming them more. You're allowing them to harm themselves and other people more. It's not like I think people should be arrested when they commit crimes. I think they should. But also we should have mercy when they're willing to change and they show that. Shima, I'm sure I'm not teaching you anything here in law but it did make me think of we studied John Doctrine Covenants a couple of years ago, and Joseph Smith ran for president in 1844. Mostly it was because no presidential candidate currently running would do anything about freedom of religion. And so he thought, well,

if no one's going to do it, I'll do it. As part of his presidential campaign, Joseph Smith was in favor of abolishing prisons. He wanted to turn those buildings into what he called seminaries of learning. He said that intelligence could banish barbarism. He suggested reforming criminals through reason and friendship. He didn't say that someone shouldn't be punished for major offenses against humanity. Of course, he called for the day when quote, the neighbor from any state or from any country, whatever color, climb or tongue could rejoice when he put his foot on the sacred soil of freedom.

But that's a hard place to come to. And when you study punishment, Shima, is punishment the most effective way? What works to rehabilitate people is two things, right? In prison. One is education. So Joseph is spot on. And the second is faith. And actually, that's something that's not as commonly known. Yeah. So people will change through those two things. We have studied very well how education helps inmates. Every prison system, they'll track very carefully how many hours, for instance, somebody spends in some sort of scholarly enterprise, but they don't study how much time they spend reading the Bible or meeting with the missionaries or meeting with members of their congregation. That's what I'm trying to do. I'm doing this new research with Professor Justin Dyer that you all you've had him on before as well. We're doing this research

to show the benefits of religion in prison so that people can see this is really effective. If you want to punish in the right sense, punish so that they can be held accountable and change. That's the kind of punishment I'm in favor of. Seeing someone change, it's those two things. It's education and religion. I'm excited to show how this is so effective in Utah prisons. Shima, how do people who've been offended against respond to that kind of thing? So someone hurts my family, then they go to prison and they reform, that's got to be a difficult spot to be in. Absolutely. It's so difficult. But the research on forgiveness actually shows that it has more

benefits for the victim to be able to forgive. So people are less anxious, they're less depressed, all of these physical symptoms that they'll feel when they're able to forgive. And one of the most powerful things I show to my students in my class, and you think of one of the worst crimes, because you're still alive after is rape. I mean, murder, you're dead. So you don't get to talk about how horrible that was. But when you're raped, you do.

And one of these powerful stories I share is a woman who was raped, who then actually confronts her rapist. They do these TED talks together now, which is remarkable. Wow. And they both talk about their sides and how they've come to reconcile and that she's come to forgive him and he's come to change through this process. And that's the kind of thing that gets me really excited about criminal law is watching the atonement in action. If that's not

the atonement, I don't know what is. Somebody that's been so harmed in such a horrible way, being able to forgive and move on, allow this person to take accountability and change himself. It's sometimes rare, but I hear enough stories about it that it's really exciting to me. There's so many beautiful stories of redemption and criminal justice because people don't want to hold that hatred and that anger that they might have towards someone. And when you look at the stats, you know, 19 million people in the US suffer from crime that's never dealt with. They never have justice in the

sense of that person is punished for it. What really most people that are victims have to do is deal with that internal process on their own. They deal with it with God and that's the healing power that you'll really find. There's no healing power in having that person suffer behind bars. That might be helpful for them to be held accountable, but for you as a victim, you have to go to God and Jesus Christ can solve those wounds better than anyone as we know. And now if you're listening and you have been offended against and you're not in that place yet, You're not ready to do that. You're not ready to let it go. And that's okay. There's a process. These things take time. Working through prayer

and trying to allow the atonement to work in you is okay. We shouldn't beat ourselves up if we aren't at the point of complete and utter forgiveness. I think sometimes, you know, my bishop described it as a wave. I think he described something bad happening to him and it was like, he felt forgiveness and then he didn't again. And we go through this, we're human, we're not perfect. It's not like the Atonement Works check and then we're kind of moved on. I think sometimes when you've gone through hard things, it's a difficult process and

it takes more time than we think. And I think it's okay to allow yourself that time to heal. Excellent. Then we move on to Helaman 12. And this is the song of Mormon. And this is kind of lengthy commentary of human nature. And he's a little pessimistic, I could say, reading the records, having witnessed the destruction of his Nephite civilization. But I think there's a lot to be learned here from him. One comment I'd have on the first verse on chapter 12 where, in chapter 12 verse 1, it says, And thus we behold how false and also the unsteadiness of the hearts of the

children of Man yea, we can see that the Lord in his infinite goodness doth bless and prosper those who put their trust in him. And I wanted to think about that phrase, the unsteady hearts, because I had a couple thoughts on this, you know, how we're unsteady and we kind of forget the Lord. We, you know, it says we trample under our feet the Holy One, and he says, and there's two things I thought of on this unsteadiness principle. One is, how do we be more steady in our hearts towards the Lord? The opposite of unsteady and forgetful in my mind is where Elder Kieran recently talked about where we relentlessly pursue God, where he relentlessly pursues us.

Could we love the Lord in that way where we relentlessly pursue Him as He does us? Think about when you were younger and then if you think back to when you had relentlessly pursued someone, I can think of as a kid I remember being 12 years old and I was in one of those wards all girls, I was in New York and all girls and one boy. All of the girls had a major crush on this one boy that was in our ward, we were 12 and there's no one else really and I remember having such a major crush on this boy, thinking it was a good idea to tell a friend at school and it ended in

this one of the most embarrassing moments in Youngshima's life where we look up his phone number in the phone book, because that's how old I am, right? And then she decides to call him because we're like, oh, let's call the boys we have crushes on. She calls him and tells him I have a crush on him. And of course, he doesn't know who I am and has no idea. And it's so embarrassing. So I'm mortified. What's even worse that, you know, this boy doesn't even know I exist at this point. And I'm humiliated. It was all consuming. I was very deliberate and steady in my feelings towards this person.

And, you know, if you had a crush when you were young, I'm sure everyone can remember this, I think about how steady your heart is when you're infatuated and it's like, you can picture your future with this person. You think about them every hour of the day. So you try to dress your best in front of them and maybe your better version of yourself when you're with them.

You might put a picture of them up in your locker or your room and you might wanna get close to people who are close to them and I think about how all these tools that we know how to pursue right in a crush and could we use those tips to be more steady in our hearts towards God because all these tips apply could we dress our best when we go to worship our God can we think about him often and speak to him and speak of him? Can we put a picture of him in our house? All these same things. It was really encouraged me to think about this as I listened to Elder Ciaran last conference. How can I relentlessly pursue God?

How do I be more steady than my heart and avoid this unsteadiness that he speaks about. I'm sure that Ryan, your husband, is listening. And Ryan, it was you all along. It was you, Ryan. Don't you think, John and Shima, that chapter 12, we get a glimpse of Mormon's personality here where he usually gives us side comments, thus we see, and it came to pass, you know, he's writing this story, but it seems like he's done. He's written and written, he's throwing the plates off the table and all the records, and he says, let me talk for a second. Thus we can behold how terrible human

beings are, right? Everything obeys God except for His children. They don't want to be ruled over by God. They'd rather not have His mercy and His goodness. John, doesn't he rant here for a full chapter? Yeah, I felt the same thing. He's like, I've been abridging this for so long and I've got to say something. Can you believe these people? Yeah, I picture him in his little cave. I'm done. I cannot believe this. They're so quick to this pride cycle now is speeding up by the chapter where it was a few chapters, then it was one chapter, now it's just almost one verse where they cannot remember God in their prosperity. Not everybody has to do this,

but it seems like the default way to go is become prosperous, forget God, go through difficulty, remember God, become prosperous, forget God, go through difficulty over and over and over. Yes. He so carefully mentions how we need to be steady and the steadiness in spiritual things. We need the same amount of spiritual nourishment several times a day. We get that through prayer or scripture study or temple attendance, listening to music that might praise the Lord. But I think that the signs are not as obvious when you're as spiritually undernourished as they are in knowing what

to do to fix it. If I'm feeling impatient, I know I need to pray and I need to feel God's love and I need to listen to uplifting music. Those are things that help me to nourish myself. And if I'm feeling less than or envious or angry, I need to read my scriptures. If I'm feeling anxious, I know I need to go to the temple because that's where I feel peace. I love that reminder because you think, oh, I can spiritually nourish every Sunday. Well, that's not enough for your spirit, at least not enough for mine. And I need to do it constantly. That's how I avoid my impatience and my anger

and all these natural man tendencies that I have. It was Enos who said, my soul hungered. We know what it's like for our body to hunger, but you're teaching us, hey, there's some indication that your soul is hungry. Even says we're all nothing. So in verse seven, oh, how great is the nothingness of the children of men. Yay. Even they are less than the dust of the earth." I have always thought it would be so funny to have that become a youth conference theme. We are less than the dust, youth conference

2024. Do you think that'd be funny? And we never use that verse for a theme. I don't know why. The great part is, then he kind of tells us why in verse 8, because the dust obeys God. When God tells the dust to do this, it just does it. Yeah, so John's point really leads to what I was going to talk about next to you, which is the destruction verses. As I counted for curiosity's sake, how many verses in these chapters from 7 to 12 talk about destruction and the hard things that will happen that we need to repent and we don't repent. And there was 23 of them. So 23 verses, quite a few.

Sometimes we like to skip over the destruction and hard verses when we're talking about trying to be uplifting with our scripture study. But I actually think it's important to read that. And I think there's a couple of really important reasons. One is, I actually think when God warns us, it is such an evidence of His love. If He didn't love us, He wouldn't warn us. And you think of how, as parents, if you gave your kids joy and happiness and praise all the time and didn't teach them in the course of your parenting, you know, some of these things that you have to warn them about, we're not doing them any favors. And you think of God in His endless love for us, that He gives us these warnings and these rules and consequences so that we don't harm ourselves,

so that we don't forget what our Heavenly Father will do for us and how He can bless us. I frequently tell my children, I'll say, warning this, warning this, warning this, wear your seatbelt. And they'll say, I'm a good kid. And I say, I know you're a good kid. My job is not just to help you be a good kid, it's to help you be a good adult. And I think that's what the Lord is, you know, why are you giving us all these warnings?

Well, my job is not just to help you be a good person, but to become something even bigger than a good person. And I love what you said. I warn my children because I love them. How unloving would it be to send them off? No warnings whatsoever. You know, it's itchy. We all think about this with our children.

But I think as adults, sometimes we forget that this is what our Heavenly Father needs to do for us, too. If we had no health challenges, if we didn't have difficult people in our lives that confront us, if we didn't have any stress, we'd become weak soft people that are distracted by the shiny things that we see in our earthly experience and we lack the opportunity to gain godly traits. So it's not just our kids, it's for all of us and we need the famines and the pandemics and the droughts and yes even the heartines and the pandemics and the droughts. And yes, even the heartbreaks and the cancer

so that we can remember our human frailty and rely on him and remember the point of all this. Sometimes the hard things that happen to us, the destruction, so to speak, in Helaman that we see, it's so that God can allow us to come to him and to learn that this is just a state of our mortality. And in the greater scheme of things, this brings us closer to him rather than letting us suffer and not change and become better.

The second thing we learn from the destruction and hard things is where it talks about grace in verse 24, and may God grant in His gratefulness that men might be brought unto repentance and good works, that they might be restored unto grace for grace according to their works. When we think about destruction and misery, we can also learn a thing or two about grace. Healman really explains how do we come to the Lord when hard things happen to us when we're afflicted, when we forget to walk in wisdom's past, as it says, where we do set it not his counsels, and it says, and they will not that he should be their guide. Who is a better guide for us than Jesus Christ and our Heavenly

Father? There's this beauty of allowing us to come to repentance and having it done grace for grace. I think that's such a beautiful phrase. I think you can sense in chapter 12, I think you can sense in chapter 12, Mormon going through this frustration with human beings, and how it's so obvious to do the right thing and they won't do the right thing, and he almost sounds like he hates human beings in general, but by the end, he says, I would that all men might be saved. You almost see this go through this process. As a criminal lawyer, have you ever been so frustrated with human beings before Shima? Have you ever been like, how could you do that?

Oh, absolutely. The hardest time I have is when my students ask me, they're like, well, what punishment? Because I often tend towards mercy in class. But the hardest time I have is when people harm children. I think that's where I get this rage and I can't even understand why people do such things to children. Yes like I often feel that. You know this textbook that I edit and work on and it's in the process right now and pages and pages of abuse and murder and rape and it's like it's

horrible. So I'm so grateful to be able to come talk about the scriptures when that's like my day job is thinking about when people harm each other in these horrible ways. You can sense that same frustration that Mormons feeling as he writes this story. Right. When he's seen this stuff, he's seen the murder and the killings and the horrible things that people do to each other. And he knows the remedy, the antidote is Jesus Christ. Yeah, he lists all the things that God does for them in verse two, doing all these things for their welfare and happiness. Then that's the time they harden their hearts and forget

the Lord their God. Like, oh, how frustrating. I like what you said there that you read case after case after case and you're just going, human beings, they'll never get it. But then he says, I would that all men might be saved. Verse 25. Shema, I've thought of this question the whole time we've been together. I had a good friend who was an undercover narcotics officer in a big city. He was told, you won't be able to make it in this job if you're a religious person. And he eventually took his own life. How are you able to, like you just said, read all that stuff and deal with all of that and able to keep that smile on your face and that cheerfulness in your in your

spirit? How do you do it? This is why I had a career change. I never had planned on leaving the University of Utah to come back to BYU, but as I've been seeing hope and what I'm seeing as far as hope and criminal justice, it's not the policy work, it's not my empirical work that I've been doing, it's these little nuggets of people that have faith, that are able to convert inmates, they're able to minister to people and with their love, change them. That's what gives me hope. These are these people that have been so far seen as irredeemable. Let's lock them up and throw away the key. But yet we see that there is redemption possible. There is hope and it's through Jesus Christ. And that's what gets me excited.

That's why I have a smile on my face because I know that the answer is always Jesus Christ and it's also the answer for criminal justice. It's also for all of the wounds and the horrible things that we go through that we inflict on each other, that is our answer. That's where we have this hope that we're not gonna sit and wallow in depression because we know that Jesus Christ has conquered all and he can continue to redeem these quote-unquote unredeemables because nobody's unredeemable. We can all come to Jesus Christ. That's that little hope of redemption for all these people, even though serving time that I've been convicted, it gives me hope and I'm excited for it. There's such power in that kind of redemption, right? The lower you sink, the more powerful

your conversion oftentimes. Shima, this has been so fun to see these chapters through the lens of criminal law. And what a perfect lens to put on it. Ashima, before we let you go, I think our listeners would be interested in not just your thoughts on these few chapters, but your thoughts on the entire Book of Mormon in general. You've got such an interesting life story from Iran to a BYU law professor. That is quite a journey. How do you feel about the entire Book of Mormon? Like, how do you see it? It's not an exaggeration to say that the Book of Mormon has changed my life. Without the Book of Mormon, I would be in Iran, you know, desperate to get out,

having no freedom, no ability to worship my Savior. So I am so indebted to this book and I feel like the more I study it, the more I want to be like Jesus Christ. The more I study it, the more really interesting points I learn. The more I learn about different prophets, the more I learn about how the nature of God is. I love this book so much. When I'm reading the Book of Mormon, I'm happier. I feel more peaceful. I feel more patient. There's just so much goodness in this book that I've been so grateful. And I've actually noticed my happiness this year as we're studying it more intently than when we kind of move along with Come Follow Me. I think the power in the Book of Mormon is real. It is a power that is unlike any other book of scripture in that testifies of Christ so often. It's almost every verse that talks about our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. And when we remember Him, we're better. When we remember Him, we remember His atonement, we remember His life,

His teachings. And that's what we're trying to do as Christians is to try to remember him. For me, the Book of Mormon is such an integral tool in that. And I actually funny, because my TikTok where I share the gospel of Jesus Christ, and I actually don't talk as much about the Book of Mormon on there because it's something to unify Christians.

I'm trying to talk about Jesus Christ. And I honestly feel a bit constrained on there. There's so much more we learn and so much more power that we learn about His Atonement specifically and the power of Jesus Christ as our Savior in this book that I feel like those that don't know about it, they're missing out. I love this book so much. I love the Book of Mormon. It's changed my life. Shima, this has been wonderful. So fun.

Thank you. Those of you who are listening and you have access to YouTube, come onto YouTube and let us know what you learned, where you're listening from, even if you're from Enoch, Utah, all the way to if you're close to Iran. Let us know so we can tell Shima who is listening and where they're listening and what they learned. With that, we want to thank Professor Shema Boffman for being with us today. This has been so fun. We want to thank our executive producer, Shannon Sorensen, our sponsors, David and Verla Sorensen, and every episode we remember our founder, Steve Sorensen. We hope you'll join us next week. We're going to talk Samuel the Lamanite on Follow Him. Before you skip to the next episode, I have some important information.

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