Words, Words, Words

My daughter is a very beginning reader and my husband and I have been trying to encourage her to recognize a few of the simple words that she can sound out. After reading advice from others, we thought we could easily translate this to scripture reading by letting her have her own Book of Mormon to underline the important words that she knows. While this did result in her unfortunately loud utterance during a recent Sacrament meeting of, "I see God!," in general this has been a great activity and she really loves looking in her own scriptures.

What has amazed me by this simple exercise is the frequency of meaningful words in the Book of Mormon. It seems on every page, we can find references to essential topics. In a online search of the Book of Mormon, the word "God" appears 202 times, "Christ" 99 times, "Jesus" 64 times, "Spirit" 113 times, "faith" 109 times, "prayer"/"pray 88 times, and "love" 40 times. It is no wonder that the introduction to this book teaches that it is, "the keystone of our religion, and a man [will] get nearer to God by abiding by its precepts, than by any other book." I am grateful that we truly have "another testament of Jesus Christ" in the Book of Mormon and that I have been able to feel the life-changing power of this book of scripture.

"Without reservation I promise you that if you will prayerfully read the Book of Mormon, regardless of how many times you previously have read it, there will come into your hearts an added measure of the Spirit of the Lord. There will come a strengthened resolution to walk in obedience to his commandments, and there will come a stronger testimony of the living reality of the Son of God."
~Gordon B. Hinckley