Alma 60:32

"Behold, can you suppose that the Lord will spare you and come out in judgment against the Lamanites, when it is the tradition of their fathers that has caused their hatred, yea, and it has been redoubled by those who have dissented from us, while your iniquity is for the cause of your love of glory and the vain things of the world?"
Alma 60:32


This is interesting to me this morning… and I think that it is remarkably cool that God cares about the reasons behind our actions.  Even though the Lamanites were acting pretty thoroughly evil… trying to destroy an entire people because they thought that their Lamanite ancestors had been wronged by the Nephite ancestors… they were basically just living as they had been brought up to live… be nice to the people around you, but all Nephites are bad, and you should hate them.  Also interesting to me right now is the fact that we get to see the whole story… the progression from Lehi’s family and the beginning of the colonization of this new world, to this point where there are whole nations taking sides from what originated as a family squabble (albeit a big one).  We see things like this around us today… nations fighting nations because of some detail… with the Nephites and the Lamanites mostly it was just because they thought they had the right to rule (seniority).  We have a lot of conflicts globally that started out similarly.  One way to fight that trend is to raise our children to love… and break the cycle of hatred and bias.  And then… back to the reasons behind our actions… lets make sure that we remember what it important in life… the things that will last eternally.  People, animals, love, friendship, knowledge, wisdom… so many things that we can spend time on without worrying about “the vain things of the world.”  Let us match our knowledge of truth and right with our actions.