Words. Words. Words.

While reading today's lesson in Alma 30-31 of “Come, Follow Me,” I was struck by the power of words to change human behavior and beliefs. Alma's faith in that power led him to organize a missionary effort to try and reclaim the Zoramites. He wanted to bring them back into the fold of God. 

The effort was partially successful. Their efforts converted many of the poor. But most Zoramites, those who didn't change, drove them out of the land. Then, true to Alma's fears, the Zoramites turned their backs on the Nephites and became Lamanites.

There was a similar story in the land of Ammonihah. Those who were changed by Alma's missionary efforts paid with their lives or were driven out of the land by those who weren't. In a demonstration of divine justice, those who didn't change, who murdered those who did, were utterly destroyed by a Lamanite army.

Amalikiah's use of the spoken word is also instructive. In one year, his use of it unified a divided nation and galvanized it into going to war. Thus began a war of conquest to sate Amalikah's ambitions. In the end however, it failed and succeeded only in the deaths of thousands.

Words have great power: they can build or they can destroy. Like the Native American story of the two wolves, the wolf that thrives within us is the one we feed. Which words do we choose to listen to? Words which build faith? Words which instill fear? Words which foster love and unity? Words which incite anger and hate? 

The lesson showed me that while I have the freedom to pick the words I listen to, I am bound to the influence of those words.