2 Nephi 6-8

2 Nephi 9

• Jacob read the words of Isaiah so his people would know the covenants of the Lord to them. (v1)
• “…for it behooveth the great Creator [, Jesus Christ,] that he suffereth himself to become subject unto man in the flesh, and die for all men, that all men might become subject unto him.” (v5)
  • It is counter intuitive, but extremely cool how Christ allowed himself to be subject to the government at the time and be crucified; and how that sacrifice made him owner of our spiritual lives.
• “Remember, to be carnally-minded is death, and to be spiritually-minded is life eternal.” (v39)

2 Nephi 10

• “…thus saith the Lord God: When the day cometh that they shall believe in me, that I am Christ, then have I covenanted with their fathers that they shall be restored in the flesh, upon the earth, unto the lands of their inheritance.” (v7)
  • “they,” that will one day believe, are the wicked Jews that crucify Jesus Christ. It’s amazing to me the strength of the covenant; the Lord doesn’t remove the covenant, He just waits for the people to be righteous enough for it to be fulfilled.
• “Therefore, cheer up your hearts, and remember that ye are free to act for yourselves—to choose the way of everlasting death or the way of eternal life.”
  • We are free, meaning we each have the same opportunity no matter our circumstances, to choose “everlasting death” or “eternal life.” There is absolutely nothing standing in our way except ourselves.
• “Wherefore, my beloved brethren, reconcile yourselves to the will of God, and not to the will of the devil and the flesh; and remember, after ye are reconciled unto God, that it is only in and through the grace of God that ye are saved.”

2 Nephi 11

• “…all things which have been given of God from the beginning of the world, unto man, are the typifying of him.” (v4)

2 Nephi 12

• There will be time in the future when all man will be humbled before the Lord. “…the Lord shall be exalted in that day.” (v11)
  • I believe this is referring to the millennial reign of the Lord Jesus Christ.

2 Nephi 13-15

2 Nephi 16

• Chronologically, the first chapter of Isaiah.
• Isaiah is called of the Lord to be a prophet. The calling came through a vision.
• Seraphs w/ 6 wings. Religious beings that rank right under Jesus Christ.
  • Jesus Christ
  • Seraph
  • Servant / Son of God (the elect)
  • Zion & Jerusalem
  • Jacob Israel
  • Rebellious & Idolaters of the Nations
  • Sons of Perdition
• Wings… maybe energy fields / power to travel and veil their presence.
• “Holy, holy, holy”
  • The superlative meaning “of the high quality or degree”
• The earth was created for a purpose… to end up with an elect group of people.
• When the Lord exalts people, He is exalted. The Lord is everything to those people.
• The mist or cloud represents the Lord’s presence.
• “People of unclean lips”
  • Isaiah identifies himself really closely with his people. He wants to do for them what has been done for him; help them achieve the highest level of righteousness.
• Seeing the Lord often has some physical effect on a person.
• Alter of atonement
  • ember represents purity… through the atonement of Jesus Christ.
• When the Lord calls for a messenger, Isaiah volunteers to go.
• Apostle means “one who is sent” / a messenger. Isaiah becomes a messenger of the Lord.
• The Lord refers to him in the plural. It implies a council of individuals.
• [continue at 10:11 at http://www.isaiahexplained.com/6#one_col)

2 Nephi 17

• This is 2 generations from Isaiah 6.
• King Ahaz, king of Judah, was not a righteous king.
• Storm imagery is alway judgement imagery in the book of Isaiah.
  • It’s only with wicked who are confused and shaken.
• Isaiah can’t prophesy directly, so he names his sons strategic names to share a message.
  • Shear-Jashub means a “remnant will return”. It’s a prophesy that the people are not righteous and will be scattered; and a few will be restored in the future.
• Isaiah met with Ahaz at the Upper Reservoir because is a place that reminds Ahaz of the Davidic covenant.
• The Lord’s way is to be calm and unshaken.
• Ahaz doesn’t need to worry about Rezin and Aram as Assyria will take care of them.
• Ahaz and Aram want to put a puppet ruler over Judea so they have a united front against Assyria.
• Son of Tabeal means “non-covenant vasil”
  • Not a decendent of David. He did not fit in with the Lord’s promise to David.
• 65 is probably a scribal error as these prophesies came to pass very quickly. Scholars think it was 5-6 years.
• The very thing Rezin and Aram are trying to do to Judea is going to happen to them: the 10 tribe kingdom will be conquered by Assyria and puppet kings will be established.
• Ahaz doesn’t believe Isaiah, so Isaiah asks Ahaz to ask God for a miracle sign as a conformation. (v10-11) Ahaz doesn’t want the conformation; Ahaz isn’t interested.
• Isaiah is frustrated with Ahaz
  • Ahaz must be persecuting the people
  • Isaiah says “my God” to show Ahaz has rejected God
• God is going to give Ahaz a sign anyway. (v14)
  • A son will be born: Immanuel (“God is with us”)
  • When God is with the people, there is protection and blessings
• Hebrew prophesy has multiple levels of fulfillment
• The prophesy of a son named Immanuel needed to be fulfilled at the Ahaz level; something he would understand and experience. Christ being Immanuel is too far removed from Ahaz. Therefore, the son of Ahaz, King Hezikiah, is the righteous vasil king that comes along.
  • Jesus Christ comes later as another level or fulfillment of the prophesy.
  • Immanuel represents a category of people
• Cream and honey is the food of nomads. (v15)
  • Symbolizes the nomadic lifestyle that Israel would resort to when things got bad.
  • By the time the boy is 8yrs old, he’ll have learned to live a covenant life.
  • In his youth, he’ll have to live a nomadic life.
• In the child’s youth, the leaders of the lands of Assyria and North Kingdom will be killed. This is a sign to Ahaz. (v16)
• The “day of the king of Assyria” is the day of judgement will come. (v17)
• “That day” means the day of judgement.
• Swarms of people are going to come from Egypt and Assyria and swarm all over the land. (v18)
• The people will be everywhere. (v19)
• The “razor” is the King of Assyria. Removing the hair from the body symbolizes
  • “head” refers to the leadership of the people. The Assyria’s would take away the leaders of the nation.
  • “hair of the legs” represents slavery. Shaving was the attempt to humiliate the people.
  • “cut off the beard” means to cut of the elders.
• “a man” refers to a few men will be able to escape this. (v21) They’ll take a little food with them.
• Those that flee will have enough to eat. It won’t be fancy, but enough. (v22) Those left in the city will eat cream and honey – an emergency state. This ties the people to King Hezikiah that will also eat cream and honey in his youth.
• Wilderness is a covenant curse. (v24) Cultivated is a covenant promise.
• Cattle and sheep is a reference to people.
• Ahaz also represents a latter day davidic dynasty that will apostatize. And, then succeeding latter day davidic dynasty will return.

2 Nephi 8 (Isaiah 8)

• Isaiah called in witnesses, Uriah and Zechariah, to prove he prophesied before the events actually happened. (v2)
• “Hasten the plunder, hurry the spoil” refers to the King of Assyria delivering destruction. (v1)
• Isaiah refers to his wife as a prophetess; describes her righteousness. She brings forth a son, Maher-Shalal-Hash-Baz. (v3) Again, Isaiah is prophesying with the name of his son. This new son’s name means “Hasten the plunder, hurry the spoil”
• “Water’s of Shiloah” represents the king Ahaz and the davidic dynasty. The people have rejected the Davidic dynasty. Instead they support the wicked. (v6)
• The Assyrian destruction is what will spread over the land as the “great and mighty waters of the River”. (v7)
• Immanuel applies to King Hezikiah (v8) as that is when Assyria destroys Jerusalem (Isaiah 36).
• v9. People will try to group together to protect themselves, but it won’t work. The wicked will band together, but will still be scared and eventually destroyed.
• v10. The Lord allows the Assyrians to destroy Judea.
• v12. You don’t need to be fearful of conspiracy if you rely on God.
• v13-14. The Lord will be a holy place (sanctuary) or place of protection if you trust in and rely on Him. But to the transgressors, the Lord becomes a snare.
• v15. The Assyrians will capture/enslave the Israelites.
• v16. There are disciples throughout all these events, but they will be few.
• v17. Isaiah waits for the Lord who allows the “house of Jacob” to be punished. “Waits” and “expect” represents trusting and having faith and hope in the Lord.
• v18. Isaiah’s children’s names represent a prophesy of what is to come.
• v19. The wicked will turn to other sources other than God for help. Who knows what spirits will reply; it will further lead the wicked astray.
• v2o. During the awful time of destruction, the righteous are in the sanctuary while the wicked, who have turned away from God, “roam about embittered by hunger” (hunger is a covenant curse). They become angry with God and the government.
• v21-22. The wicked look outside the cities to the country side, but here is nothing for them there either. Trusting in the Lord was the only option to avoid destruction (this testifies of Christ as He is the only way to be saved spiritually) so they are cast into outer darkness.

2 Nephi 19 (Isaiah 9)

• v1.
  • Chapter 9 shares the flip side of the gloom and doom from Chapter 8.
  • It will not be gloomy for the righteous.
  • “Sea Route”
    • Sea represents the King of Assyria
    • The sea route is the highway that Assyria used to take the 10 tribes to exile.
  • “Galilee” means “to roll on and on”
• v2.
  • “walking in darkness” can mean physical darkness, spiritual darkness, being influenced by the King of Assyria.
  • “land of the shadow of Death” can mean those in a situation of danger, the 10 tribes in exile
• v3.
  • People have come out of excile to the promised land.
  • “spoil” means they have power over them previously.
• v4.
  • People are released from some type of bondage. The Lord’s servant had a part in the release.
  • “yoke”, “staff”, “rod” refer to the King of Assyria.
  • Whatever the King of Assyria does to the wicked Israelites, will happen to him.
• v5.
  • The implements of war will be burned and forgotten.
  • The war of all wars will usher in the millennium.
• v6.
  • “a child is born” … The Lord’s servant that will prepare for the coming of the Lord. Could refer to Christ too.
  • “Wonderful Counsellor, One Mighty in Valor, a Father for Ever, a Prince of Peace” refers to Christ and also other lesser Saviors. Refers to Abraham too.
• v7.
  • “justice and righteousness” are the foundation of a good nation
  • “zeal” means the Lord’s servant.
• v8
  • “Jacob” and “Israel” refers to a lesser level of people. They are wicked at this point.
• v9-10
  • “pride and arrogance” are the sins of the wicked.
  • “bricks have fallen down” represents covenant curse.
  • transgression has caused the curse. repentance can restore the protection
• v12
  • “mouth” represents the King of Assyria.
  • “Yet for all this his anger is not abated; his hand is upraised still.” This anger will be a for a relatively long time.
• v13
  • The people don’t turn to the Lord. If they would turn back, He’d bless them.
• v14
  • “single day” means a time period. The Lord will let the King of Assyria cut off “head” government and “tail” spiritual leaders.
• v15-17
  • The people will be so wicked
• v18
  • “briars and thorns” refer to the wick
  • “fire” refers to the instrumentality of the King of Assyria
  • the wicked will overrun the land
  • “tree” is people, “forest” is cities, “mountain” is nation
• v19
  • “wrath” and “fire” mean the King of Assyria. He’ll try to annihilate entire nations.
• v21
  • There will be enmity between everyone.

2 Nephi 20 (Isaiah 10)

2 Nephi 21 (Isaiah 11)

• v1
  • Not everyone falls, some will survive
  • The objective is that the tree will bare fruit.
  • Olive Tree
    • Suckers (or water sprout) grow up and drain the tree moisture. These shoots don’t bare fruit.
    • A shoot can be used to save a dying olive tree. It a shoot gets big enough, you can cut it off at its base, graft in a natural branch, and that natural branch will bare fruit again.
  • There will be a time of judgement (when the trees will be cut down) and a remnant will be preserved.
  • Those that are grafted in survive.
  • What category of people are grafted in?
  • fruit is a covenant blessing; no fruit is a covenant curse.
  • The tree is the house of Israel. It stops baring fruit. The tree is cut down; the house of Israel is scattered. A shoot grows up to keep the tree alive; these are the gentiles. They don’t bare fruit. Eventually, a natural branch is grafted in and the tree bare fruit again.
• gentiles (unclean animals) and covenant people (clean animals) will live together in the millennium. Everyone will eventually be God’s people.
• The Lord’s servant (the child) will lead the righteous into the millennium.
• The millennium is always a rural context

“Therefore, in the ordinances thereof, the power of godliness is manifest.” (D&C 84:20)

I feel like I got a little more insight into why covenants are so critical. I’ve also believed covenants were important to salvation, but that belief seems to only have a long term application. What I mean is, I’ve alway believed that my covenants were necessary at the final judgement, but struggled to understand the immediate benefit.

Today in speaking with Cindy Jones, she mentioned that she had read a book about a non-member that spoke about only 29 angels available to help people. Cindy thought that was weird, but confirmation from the Spirit that those that haven’t made covenants are limited to receive help from a small number of angels. Those that have made covenants are entitled to receive help from deceased family member angels that have also made covenants; that includes those that have accepted covenants made for them vicariously in the temple.

When Cindy shared that with Paula and me, the light bulb turned on in my mind and the Spirit witnessed to me that this benefit is why missionary work is so important. Not having this blessing must make life so much more difficult.

As a result of my new learning, I published the talk I gave in church today and sent it to Michael Dabriel. My hope is he’ll watch something and the Spirit will touch him such that he’ll want to learn more.

Cindy also shared with us a book about diet and health. She told us the story of the author and explained why what he’s learned will help our family. I felt the Spirit testify while she spoke that it was true. I was a little surprised to have a spiritual experience regarding a health book, but it did. I’m excited to buy and read and implement it.

Shelby was working on some math this evening and it wasn’t going well. She was especially stressed because she needed to take a quiz that she wasn’t yet prepared for. After about 30 minute of working on the same problem, Shelby broke down and started to get angry. After some needed venting, I asked if she was open to help from Troy Jones, our math teacher neighbor. She agreed. I reached out to Troy and he agreed to help. I’m not sure what happened, but within the hour, Shelby was back at the table working on her math. When I walked by, she happily shared that she had got 100% on her quiz.

Walker turned 14 today. I believe he had a good day. Paula had Shelby and Chloe buy him a Costa Vida meal for lunch. Paula also made two amazing brownie cheesecake desserts; one with cherry pie filling and the other with strawberry. Walker received a Nike hoodie and sweats, and a Westlake thread wallet and lanyard. He seemed happy and grateful.

Work was good. I learned how to better create and manipulate surveys in our Legacy platform and got Explore and Data Exploration apps to work in the XI platform for our Andy’s BBQ Pit development account. I also poked around the GraphQL queries for Data Exploration and borrowed some credentials to make service calls. Some ideas have started to come to mind how we might be able to create more native integrations using some of the existing internal services and APIs.

I scheduled a meeting with the India Cybage team tomorrow at 7:30a. I think the last time we met I was a little out of it due to Covid. I hope to make a better impression tomorrow and get the team rolling on Workato work.

Abby tested for Covid this morning after being required to quarantine from the USU team. The result of the test was a negative; what a blessing! That means she gets to travel to her indoor meet in Seatle this weekend.

Chloe’s varsity team won tonight and she played a lot. Her defense was quite amazing. She hesitated on offense and didn’t score much. I’m not sure why. We’re trying to help her be more aggressive on offense. I think she’s scare of making a mistake and the coach benching her.

Willy’s team lost to AF by 9. They played pretty selfishly and, as a result, didn’t shoot well. Willy is pretty concerned about the direction the team is going. He personally called each starter after the game to try to motivate them. When I learned of that action, I thought it was really mature. Way to go Willy. I’m not really that worried about this team; they have great skill and will be successful once they figure out the team game. They’ll get it together. I just hope it doesn’t take too much longer.

I broadcast church every week. I feel like it’s a good service I can provide, but it takes me away from sitting with my family. That separation bothers Paula too. I’m so grateful… I found a mobile software that lets me control my OBS app on my laptop from my phone. I tried it today and it works brilliantly at the church. Now I can provide the service with some control while sitting with my family.

Willy’s bball team lost to PG tonight. It was a pretty good battle, but our team made too many mistakes and couldn’t get it together. Willy had a great game. He was high scorer. After the game, Willy drove to Ashton’s house in Bluffdale to use his recovery compression boots. His legs have been really sore lately; he isn’t used to playing an entire game. Along the way, Willy got pulled over for speeding. He got a speeding ticket a few weeks ago. Fortunately, he was let go with only a warning. God is good.