Are We Not All Beggars?

Most of us are aware that Alma gave up his seat as the Chief Judge so that he "might preach the word of God unto (the people)..seeing no other way than bearing down in pure testimony against them" (Alma 4:19). What we may not understand is why Alma believed it was necessary. Alma observed that "the people of the church began to wax proud" because of what they "had obtained by their industry" (Alma 4:6). This "was the cause of much affliction to Alma," and he was "sorely grieved for the wickedness which (he) saw had begun to be among (his) people" (Alma 4:7). "He saw great inequality among the people of the church" which he described as "wickedness." It caused Alma to be "very sorrowful." (Alma 4:6-19). In 3 Nephi we also read of "a great inequality" in all the land and in the church which resulted in "Satan leading away the hearts of the people to do all manner of iniquity" and that they "did not sin ignorantly, for they knew the will of God concerning them, for it had been taught them..." (3 Nephi 6:11-18). 

Why is inequality among the Lord's people described as wickedness? Because it is contrary to the law of God. The Lord has taught us "that it is not given that one man should possess that which is above another, wherefore the world lieth in sin." (D&C 49:20). He wants us to be equal that "the poor shall be exalted, in that the rich are made low" (D&C 104:16). "For if ye are not equal in earthly things ye cannot be equal in obtaining heavenly things" (D&C 78:6). This is the Lord's law, His only law, and He has asked us to enter into a covenant to keep it. The truth is every covenant we enter into with the Lord leads up to this covenant.

Let me make something clear. A covenant is not a two way promise. A covenant can be made by only one party, such as God covenanting with Abraham, the Gospel being His new and everlasting covenant (D&C 101:39-40), or the Oath and Covenant of the Priesthood which was made by God and sworn by God with an Oath. We enter into and agree to abide by his new and everlasting covenant through repentance, "faith on the Savior, and remission of sins by baptism, and by fire, yea, even the Holy Ghost" (D&C 19:21;31), and then living the higher law based on loving God and each other with all our, heart, mind and soul, as we desire, pray for with all our heart, and are infused with His love.

 

But we also make covenants or promises to our Father in heaven as did Israel when Moses introduced the Law of Moses (which, by the way, is a performance, based on the right spirit, version of the law of consecration), which was given to the people in remembrance of our God and King. Moses asked the people if 1) they would do things God’s way rather than their own way? 2) would they be obedient to Him no matter what He asked of them? 3) would they willingly sacrifice anything He asked for, including their own lives? 4) Would they at all times, behave morally and soberly? 5) After answering yes to each, God says, "Very well, this is what I want you to do." (see Deuteronomy 5:6). Moses then tells the people what they are to do, and the spirit in which they should do it. 

 

However, before we are ready to receive His law, we must hear and believe His words, enter into His new and everlasting covenant, and desire with all our hearts to be filled with His love. Because unlike the Law of Moses, we should want to keep His law, not because we are commanded to, but because we are filled with charity or the pure love of Christ.

Let us go to King Benjamin to discover how this process works. For his great farewell address, Benjamin summoned all the people to gather by families around the temple "that they might rejoice and be filled with love towards God and all men" (Mosiah 2:2-4). He begins his discourse on an economic note: "I have not sought gold nor silver, nor any manner of riches of you" (Mosiah 2:12). "I, myself, have labored with mine own hands" (Mosiah 2:14-15;17). "I, whom ye call your king, am no better than ye yourselves are" (Mosiah 2:26). He is setting the keynote, which is absolute equality. And that follows naturally from the proposition that we owe everything to God, to whom we are perpetually and inescapably in debt beyond our means of repayment: "In the first place....ye are indebted unto him...and will be forever and ever" (Mosiah 2:23-24). Let no one boast that he has earned or produced a thing. "Therefore, of what can ye boast?... Can ye say aught of yourselves? I answer you, Nay," right down to the dust of the earth, it all "belongeth to him who created you" (Mosiah 2:24-25). It is His property, not ours.  

What is more, no one can even pay his own way in the world, let alone claim a surplus:  "If ye should serve him who...is preserving you from day to day...and even supporting you from one moment to another--I say if you should serve him with all your whole souls, yet, ye would be unprofitable servants" (Mosiah 2:21).

What do we do, then, to qualify for his blessings? "Behold, all that he requires of you is to keep his commandments; and he has promised you that if ye would keep his commandments ye should prosper in the land" (Mosiah 2:22). To what commandments is he referring? "Now this is the commandment:  Repent,...and come unto me and be baptized in my name, that ye may be sanctified by the reception of the Holy Ghost" (3 Nephi 27:20). In return "ye are eternally indebted to your heavenly Father, to render to him all that you have and are" (Mosiah 2:34), which is simply the law of consecration.

Now keep in mind that these are not Benjamin's words, but were made known to him "by an angel from God" (Mosiah 3:2). Furthermore, the angel assures them that it is all good news, "that thou mayest rejoice; and that...thy people...may also be filled with joy" (Mosiah 3:4), for all this looks forward to the coming of the Lord.

He then delivers the words of the Angel. Eager as they are, the people must again be taught and cautioned before the law itself is set before them. For these people, like those taught by Moses, remain "a stiffnecked people" (Mosiah 3:14), and after all God did for them "yet they hardened their hearts" (Mosiah 3:15). "For the natural man is an enemy to God...and will be forever and ever, unless he...becometh as a child, submissive, meek, humble, patient, full of love, willing to submit to all things" (Mosiah 3:19). He tells them that "none shall be found blameless before God, except through repentance and faith on the name of the Lord God" (Mosiah 3:21). To prepare them to receive this law by covenant, he first teaches them the Gospel of Jesus Christ (3 Nephi 27:13-21).  

Thus ended the first address of King Benjamin, by which the people were quite overcome, falling to the earth, viewing themselves in their own carnal state, crying out for forgiveness and receiving a manifestation of the Spirit that filled them with joy, "having received a remission of their sins, and having a peace of conscience, because of the exceeding faith which they had in Jesus Christ who should come, according to the words which king Benjamin had spoken unto them (Mosiah 4:2-3).

They were now ready to receive the law and covenant to keep it. Benjamin recognized that they were ready to "hear and understand the remainder of (his) words because at last and because of the knowledge of the goodness of God...(they) were awakened to a sense of (their) nothingness and (their) worthless and fallen state" aware that (they) could only put their "trust in the Lord...keeping his commandments.... Believe in God...believe that (they) must repent...(and) always retain in remembrance, the greatness of God, and their own nothingness, and his goodness and longsuffering... If ye do this ye will always rejoice and be filled with the love of God" (Mosiah 4:5;9-13).

We then see other fruits of our repentance, "ye will not have a mind to injure one another, but to live peaceably, and to render to every man according to that which is his due" (Mosiah 4:13). And "ye will not suffer your children that they go hungry, or naked, or ... transgress the laws of God" Mosiah 4:14). "Ye will teach them to love one another, and to serve one another" (Mosiah 4:15) No more competitive society. No more humanism as taught by Satan through Korihor, that "every man fares in this life according to the management of the creature, (and that) every man prospers according to his genius" (Alma 30:17). No more survival of the fittest. No more inequality.

Moreover, beyond your family, "ye yourselves will succor those that stand in need of your succor; ye will administer of your substance unto him." A beggar is one who asks, for some reason or other, not having what he needs. "Ye will not suffer that the beggar putteth up his petition to you in vain, and turn him out to perish" (Mosiah 4:16). To turn the beggar down may be to sentence him to death. The usual pious appeal to the work-ethic--there is no free lunch--will not do.

"Perhaps thou shalt say, the man has brought upon himself his misery therefore I...will not give unto him of my food, nor impart unto him of my substance that he may not suffer, for his punishments are just" I worked for mine! You work for yours! (Mosiah 4:17). Joseph Smith said it is better to feed ten impostors than to run the risk of turning away one honest petition. Anyone who explains why he denies help to another who needs it, says Benjamin "hath great cause to repent...and hath no interest in the Kingdom of God" (Mosiah 4:18), which kingdom is built up on the law of consecration. "For behold, are we not all beggars?" This is no mere rhetoric--it is literally true. "Do we not all depend upon the same Being, even God, for...food and raiment, and for gold, and for silver and for all the riches which we have? You are dependent for your lives and for all that ye have and are" (Mosiah 4:19-20).

"O then, how ye ought to import of the substance that ye have one to another" (Mosiah 4:21-22). We all give and we all receive, and never ask who is worthy and who is not, for the simple reason that none of us is worthy, all being "unprofitable servants" (Mosiah 2:21). "And if ye judge the man" who asks for your "substance that he perish not" and find him unworthy, "how much more just will be your condemnation for withholding your substance, which doth not belong to you but to God" (Mosiah 4:22). Benjamin says it applies to both the rich and the poor, the poor who want to be rich and who "covet that which (they) have not received" (Mosiah 4:26).

 

Benjamin sums it up that every man "should impart of (his) substance to the poor, every man according to that which he hath" for all have a right to food, clothing, shelter and medical care, "both spiritually and temporally according to their wants" (Mosiah 4:26; 18:29).

He does not tell them what they must not do but what they must do. "I cannot tell you all the things whereby ye may commit sin; for there are divers ways and means, even so many that I cannot number them" (Mosiah 4:29). Instead of telling them what they should not do, he has told them what they absolutely must do. It "doth not belong to you, but to God" (Mosiah 4:22), who wants it distributed equally.

Note that not a word is said from first to last about hard work, thrift, enterprise, farsightedness, and so on, the usual preludes to the no-free lunch lecture. The Lord is teaching them about His Real World, not what we refer to as the real world which belongs to Satan. And as long as we live by the world's economy, we are in the world and of the world, from which we should desire to be delivered. And as Nephi reminds us "The laborer in Zion shall labor for Zion; for if they labor for money they shall perish" (2 Nephi 26:31).

Note the preparation the people had to undergo before they could receive this law and covenant to keep it, and the preparation you must also undergo. In fact your response to His words is a measure of where you are in the process. It is critical for us because we "are not united according to the union required by the law of the celestial kingdom. And Zion cannot be built up unless it is by the principles of the law of the celestial kingdom" (D&C 105-4-5).

Will the Lord say to us: "they were not willing to enjoy that which they might have received.... For what doth it profit a man if a gift is bestowed upon him, and he receive not the gift? Behold, he rejoices not in that which is given unto him, neither rejoices in him who is the giver of the gift."

“Be one; and if ye are not one ye are not mine” (D&C 38:27).