The Doctrine of Christ in the Beatitudes

I haven't done one of these in a while so I will do a short update on what has gone in the last month. I have been released as a full-time missionary and have returned to school at BYU. I still plan on continuing to write in this blog, though it may not be as often as I would like, I will continue to do my best to keep up on it.

I will briefly step aside from my Lord of the Rings analyses to discuss a topic that I feel is far more important at this time. A little background first. I was blessed to have a mission president who's first priority was his missionaries and their personal preparation in order to teach most effectively. One of his favorite methods of doing this was to talk about the Doctrine of Christ in every meeting. How missionary work is connected to the Doctrine of Christ was discussed in a previous post. However, the Doctrine of Christ is central to all we do, and my mission president knew that. During one zone conference in January of 2012, he challenged us to mark in the Book of Mormon all the different parts of the Doctrine of Christ over the next 6 months. It was truly an amazing experience and it grew my testimony. Fastforward about 7 months to the present day. I am currently taking a New Testament class at BYU, which has been extremely interesting. My professor addressed the Sermon on the Mount and the Beatitudes in a way that I had never thought of before. It involved the Doctrine of Christ and how Christ is always teaching about it. We have to keep in mind, however, that this case, the Doctrine of Christ is mostly focused on what happens when we join the Church. I will discuss this in this post.

Surprising, I don't begin the Sermon on Mount analysis in the account of Matthew. I first turn to the account given in the Book of Mormon, which really starts off the Doctrine of Christ. 3 Nephi 12, known as the Sermon at the Temple, gives a different beginning, yet it starts off the process.

"And again, more blessed are they who shall believe in your words because that ye shall testify that ye have seen me, and that ye know that I am. Yea, blessed are they who shall believe in your words, and come down into the depths of humility and be baptized, for they shall be visited with fire and with the Holy Ghost, and shall receive a remission of their sins."

Christ starts out the Sermon at the Temple with faith in hearing the His word. When we are humble, we repent on our sins. He then tells us that we are blessed when we are baptized and receive the Gift of the Holy Ghost. We see the first 4 parts of the Doctrine of Christ just in this one verse. However, the rest of the Beatitudes are very enlightening as to what we need to do after we complete these first parts of the Doctrine of Christ.

"Blessed are the poor in spirit..." An interesting thing about the poor in spirit is that they have continuing faith. The poor in spirit are the ones who aren't caught up in the world because they are focused on Christ. He strengthens the poor and makes them strong.

"Blessed are they that mourn..." This one is an interesting one because it depends on what your definition of "mourn" is. In this context, it represents godly sorrow. When we commit sin, part of repentance is that we feel sorry for the things we have done. It is this mourning for our wrongdoings that drives us to repent.

"Blessed are the meek..." I think probably the best definition of "meek" is "teachable". We see that those who are repentant are those who are teachable. When we are teachable, we are open to the Spirit and we can be guided to what we need to do to be fully forgiven for our sins.

"Blessed are they which do hunger and thirst after righteousness..." For those who are repentant, a key is to seek after the righteous things of the world. We have to remove ourselves from the evil influences of the world and replace those things with the good. In order to do that, we have to actively seek after those things that will bring us closer to God.

"Blessed are the merciful..." I have been told that one of the ways to gain charity is to repent. When we repent, we feel the love of the Savior and in turn, share that love with others. We become as the Savior would, merciful and charitable to all of God's children.

"Blessed are the pure in heart..." In this context, the definition of pure in heart is "changed". When we allow the Atonement to purify our hearts, we are forever changed from our baser state to a higher plain of holiness. The scripture further teaches that the pure in heart will see God. This is because God cannot look on sin with any degree of allowance. Since we all sin, we all have to be changed to be pure in heart.

"Blessed are the peacemakers..." Having met many people in my life, I have come to recognize that people either are ready for confrontation or ready to make peace. It is the humble that are the peacemakers. The humble are the ones willing to submit to the Lord's will and try maintain that peace in their lives. Peace-making is also an individual thing. We help ourselves feel peace when we repent and feel the Spirit. We are peacemakers when we strive to maintain that.

"Blessed are they which are persecuted for righteousness' sake..." Quite simply, this is enduring to the end. When we endure persecution, we are following the Savior's footsteps. If we endure the persecution, the scripture promises that we shall inherit the kingdom of heaven.

The Beatitudes truly exemplify how we should repent and how the Savior taught His Doctrine. My BYU professor called this the "Process to Perfection". In the long run, each one is a step on a ladder. We can't reach the next one without having gone through the previous ones. This process can take a lifetime, if not more to accomplish. However, if we follow the Savior's teachings, it will be possible.

The Lord of the Rings: A Gospel Connection Part 1

One of my favorite customs as a missionary was to sit down after a hard day's work and talk about movies with all the missionaries in the apartment. But it's not what you think! The best part about our conversations is that we were able to make connections to the gospel. Obviously, some movies were easier to make that connection than most. Hands down, my favorite movies to make this connection have been The Lord of the Rings trilogy. They are clearly some of the most incredible films ever made and have such brilliant connections to the gospel. I will try my best in this post to summarize what we talked about as missionaries. Since there are multiple connections to certain characters, I will take each aspect of the films and discuss them separately. Also, since there are so many aspects to the gospel in the films, I will do it in separate intervals.

The Ring
The One Ring is very clearly sin. We see all throughout the history of the movies that it corrupts everyone who comes in contact with it. We see that everyone desires it so much that they are willing to kill to get it. It also becomes extremely tempting to put on when the Black Riders are around, similar to when you are in a sinful environment, it becomes very tempting to sin. The Ring can also only be destroyed in fires of Mount Doom, similar to the fact that the only way that we can be rid of sin is to forsake and destroy it. As is seen the third film of the series, it is not very easy, but the burden leaves once it is done.

Sauron

Sauron is a very clear representation of Satan. He is a man who craved power and gave men rings of power and eventually corrupting them, just as Satan does to the hearts of men today. The connection between Sauron and the ring is interesting. Sauron's whole existence hinges on the power of the ring. If it is destroyed, so is he. Similarly, Satan only has as much power as we give him. However, when we allow sin to take over us, he has almost limitless power over us unless we repent. It is also interesting to note that Sauron covered the land in darkness, similar to what the scriptures say that Satan will do.

Frodo Baggins

Frodo is certainly one of  more interesting characters in the story because he fits so many people in the scriptures. First of all, he is one of several characters who could be considered a similarity to Christ. Like Christ, Frodo was the only one to be able to resist the ring long enough to destroy it. Christ was the only who was able to take upon Himself the sins of the world. Jesus and Frodo mention several times throughout their stories that the burden they carry is extremely heavy. Frodo's destroying of the ring ultimately helps the armies of Man overcome Sauron, similar to Christ's victory giving us the strength to overcome sin. Frodo can also be be a representative of mankind in general. It shows that even the best people are corruptible by sin, but anyone can be purged of sin through repentance. It also shows that the longer we hang onto sin, the worse it gets, similar to the fact that Frodo's burden gets heavier the longer he carries the ring.

Samwise Gamgee

To me, Sam is a pretty accurate representation of Peter. Both are fiercely loyal to the men they followed, to the point of impetuousness at times. Peter also wanted to go where Christ went, but was unable to. Similarly, Sam wanted to help Frodo carry his burden, but was not the one called to do so. It is interesting to note that both Peter and Sam defend their masters with their swords, even though it was unnecessary to do so. Sam could also be seen as the angel that appears to Christ in the Garden of Gethsemane. Sam always provided the necessary strength to Frodo to help him carry on. He even literally carried Frodo when he lost strength near the end, similar to the angel lending strength to Christ in the Garden during the worst of His sufferings.

Meriadoc Brandybuck and Peregrin Took

Merry and Pippin are clearly representative of two of the disciples of Christ, though it is hard to pinpoint exactly who. I would like to think of them as James and John since an allegory of Peter has been addressed and it seems fitting to include them, since they are also precious Apostles to Christ. It's also interesting to the note the spontaneous manner that these two joined the journey, similar to how Christ asked the Apostles to follow Him and they followed without question. In addition, these two had their own victories, similar to the Apostles having their many separate journeys after the death and resurrection of Christ.