1Ne Ch16

Are you ready for some weddings!? It's about time right? We don't know if this part of the record is chronological but retrieving Ismaels family wasn't for nothing. Lehi's sons marry their daughters. In this chapter, the family is also given the Liahona. Also there's the story of Nephi's bow breaking and him making a new one.

The first part is finishing the conversation from the previous chapters (v1-5), where the brothers are saying its hard to hear what Nephi has to say. Nephi then gives them this thought, "the guilty takers the truth to be hard, for it cutters them to the very center." If we are righteous and guilt free because we have repented it will be easy to talk about touchy subjects. I have my own past I had to come to grips and repent for, but because I have learned from my mistakes, I can give my 'wisdom' to others and also know how to not make those mistakes again.

In v7 everyone gets married (apparently all at the same time...jk!), and Nephi is summarizing them because he want to show that his father has "fulfilled all the commandments of The Lord" (v8). So put a check by that. It's done. What next? We see in v9, The Lord commands them to continue their journey into the wilderness. To do this task, they are given the Liahona (v10 - also tells you how it looks).

They pack up and head out in a south-southeast direction and travel 4 days (v11-13). I look at v14-17 as a set up of the story about Nephi's bow breaking. These are their day to day tasks and a glimpse into how they survived and traveled. Now I find it funny that they don't get any food when Nephi's bow breaks, apparently he's the only good hunter (or at least had the best shot). So they aren't eating and they get hungry which makes people crazy. Laman and Lemual murmurs like always and even Lehi murmurs! It must have been bad if the prophet is murmuring (v19-20).

So Nephi chastises them (we don't have the exact words) then goes and fixes the problem (v22-23). It's important to note that he approaches his father, the prophet and patriarch of the house, where to hunt. Nephi respects the authority Lehi has. 

Now Lehi was really sad because he realized what he had done wrong by murmuring against The Lord (v24-25). 

When they look at the Liahona now they see words written and the ones they read now were words to chasten them for their misdeeds. These words change from time to time just like the direction pointers, but only by the faith given when asking for help (v26-29).

Nephi gets guidance to hunt in some mountains and gets a bunch of food for his family (v30-32). Then they leave and travel for a bit again, during which time Ismael dies (v33-34). Of course his daughters are devastated and began to dispare and desire to return to Jerusalem (which I think would be way to far...). So they are murmuring (v35-36). Laman and Lemual encourage and take this farther wanting to slay Lehi and Nephi (v37-38). Like always, The Lord protects his servants and he actually speaks to them and chastens them (v39).