Nephi Built a Ship!

Everyone that has read The Book of Mormon knows the Nephi built a ship. But How many of us stopped to really think about what that meant at the time?  For the first time in my life, as I was pondering this week chapters, it hit me!  We wouldn't have The Book of Mormon today with out that Ship!  Now perhaps the Lord would have found another way, but how grateful I am to Nephi For following God's commandments to build the ship and take his family across the sea.

It was at a time when they had just over come the hunger of the forest and finally made it the sea side, the land of bountiful, of honey and fruit. They were happy by the sea and certainly could have lived the remainder of their days there. Even Lehi himself had started to murmur against the Lord and wanted to go back to Jerusalem with the daughters of Ishmael after their father died and his sons Lamen and Lemuel. However Nephi was able to reach them, The spirit was able to humble them once again and the Liahona was able to direct them to food and get them safely to the sea side,

Then all of the sudden Nephi is ask to build a ship. If he had not done so, we would not have all the stories in The Book of Mormon that come after that time. The sons of Helman,  Captian Mornoni, Abinidi, Samuel prophesying of the Lord's birth, the Lords visit to the people here in this new land, and the stories of Mormon and Moroni. Of course there are more. My point is that the records Nephi wrote before he built the ship, would have been kept with the brass plates from Laban and over time would have found themselves back in the hands of the same people who pulled apart the bible.

The Bible as sacred as it is, is not complete. It does not have the fullness of the gospel, it only has part of the church of Christ and how it was set up in the new testament. What the Book of Mormon gives us is truly another testament of Christ and with another testament of Christ we have sort of a back up piece of evidence that says, "Yes the Bible is true, Yes Christ is our Savior, Yes he has a plan for his church and wants it set up a certain way. The Book of Mormon gives more meaning to the Bible and proves that he is our Lord, our Savior, our Redeemer, and without that ship, we could have lost it all. It could have ended there and What we know as the Book of Mormon could have ended up being part of the bible or even thrown out.  

I was telling my 16 year old daughter my thoughts on this, and she gave me a look and said, " Mom I already know this, We learned about this in Seminary last year." 

I graduated form seminary, and took 2 years of institute and I never gave much thought to Nephi's Ship. I think most of us think of Noah when we think of a ship being built.  I am glad she knows it is important! I know there are many key things that happened in order to get the church established here on the earth today. There were plenty of crucial things that happened in the scriptures that were a huge part of bringing us this sacred book. Just as we all know, without Joseph Smith we would not have the restored gospel the earth. I also truly believe the because we have freedom of choice if someone had failed to do their part the Lord would have found another faithful servant. 

I am truly thankful for the recent insight that I have had on this simple matter. It has strengthen my testimony.  I recently made a Necklace that had symbol of  The Book of Mormon on it. I have always loved The Book of Mormon, but I think the necklace has even more meaning to me now. However currently the Tree of Life is in the center of my necklace and the ship piece is quite small in comparison ow great it really it. But that is ok, as long as I know how important it is. who knew that after only one month of school, I could grow so much?