Mosiah 11

(March 1, 2015)

                One of the great problems with sin, I have learned (sadly, through experience), is that it makes you more and more self-centered and self-absorbed.  Life, in general, is not about you and it is not about me.  Heavenly Father has put together a perfect plan for us, and that means that the life that I experience is perfectly tailored for me.  But it also means that it is perfectly tailored for everyone else as well.  The chance meeting with a friend in the store is as much for them as it is for me.

                But Noah demonstrates a fact of sinful behavior – it causes the sinner to become so self-focused that they cannot see that there is anything out there.  Noah denies the Lord, and claims that Abinidi is speaking out solely in an attempt to discredit and destroy Noah.  He has made something personal that really was not.  If Noah truly disbelieved Abinidi, he would have spoken of him being mad or handled the situation differently.  But because his sins had made everything about him, he reacted solely from a self-centered perspective.