In the midst of all this government turmoil and pandemic, our mission as members of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints has not changed. We must serve the Lord our God with all our heart. Christ’s mission hasn’t changed which says, “For behold, this is my work and my glory—to bring to pass the immortality and eternal life of man.” Moses 1:39
We make a covenant with the Lord to obey His commandments and in return we receive Freedom, Protection, a Posterity, and a blessed country called the United States of America. The Book of Mormon Covenant Land is the United States of America Read Rod Meldrum’s The Scriptural Basis for Book of Mormon Geography
Book of Mormon Prophets and Covenants
The Lord covenanted with Enos to bring forth the Book of Mormon to the Lamanites. “And I, Enos, knew it would be according to the covenant which he had made; wherefore my soul did rest.” (Enos 1:17).
“…King Benjamin thought it was expedient, after having finished speaking to the people, that he should take the names of all those who had entered into a covenant with God to keep his commandments. Mosiah 6:1
Captain Moroni said …”whosoever will maintain this title [Title of Liberty] upon the land, let them come forth in the strength of the Lord, and enter into a covenant that they will maintain their rights, and their religion, that the Lord God may bless them.” Alma 46:20
Nephi said… ”we have obtained a land of promise, a land which is choice above all other lands; a land which the Lord God hath covenanted with me should be a land for the inheritance of my seed. Yea, the Lord hath covenanted this land unto me, and to my children forever, and also all those who should be led out of other countries by the hand of the Lord. 2 Nephi 1:5
The Lord has said …”repent and remember the new covenant, even the Book of Mormon…” D&C 84:57
“…I, the Lord, will make known unto you what I will that ye shall do from this time until the next conference, which shall be held in Missouri, upon the land which I will consecrate unto my people, which are a remnant of Jacob, and those who are heirs according to the covenant.” D&C 52:2
“And this shall be my covenant with you, ye shall have it for the land of your inheritance, and for the inheritance of your children forever, while the earth shall stand, and ye shall possess it again in eternity, no more to pass away.” D&C 38:20
Mosiah 12:32 “And now since the coming of Ammon, king Limhi had also entered into a covenant with God, and also many of his people, to serve him and keep his commandments.”
Even the Puritans who came from Holland to England and then to America made covenants with God. The Book of Mormon speaks of the Pilgrims and Puritans who landed in 1620 at Plymouth, MA.
“17 And I beheld that their mother Gentiles were gathered together upon the waters, and upon the land also, to battle against them.
18 And I beheld that the power of God was with them, and also that the wrath of God was upon all those that were gathered together against them to battle.
19 And I, Nephi, beheld that the Gentiles that had gone out of captivity were delivered by the power of God out of the hands of all other nations.” 1 Nephi 13:17-19
The Pilgrims’ Mayflower Compact as a Covenant
“When the Pilgrims came to America, they landed in unchartered territory, in present-day Massachusetts. Realizing they were outside England’s chartered bounds, some non-Pilgrims or “strangers” on board the Mayflower talked of leaving the group and venturing out on their own. But the Pilgrims had selected every man on the trip according to his particular skills. They depended on one another for survival. So, while aboard the Mayflower vessel, they made an unprecedented decision to draft and sign their own charter. The “Mayflower Compact,” as it became known, was a written agreement or covenant among themselves under God to stick together, create a civil body, and enact just laws in their new colony of Plymouth. The contract was signed on November 11, 1620, by all heads of households, Pilgrims and non-Pilgrims alike.
With their Mayflower Compact, the Pilgrims applied the principle of covenants to found their new colony of Plymouth in America. A covenant is a voluntary, moral agreement or pact between two or more free and consenting parties, usually for a religious or civil purpose. The Pilgrims derived this idea from the Bible—which tells the story of the ancient Israelites in the Old Testament and the early Christians in the New Testament. Covenants are the means by which God often relates with humans and how humans may effectively relate with one another. They are found in the Bible, for example, in Genesis, Exodus, Matthew, and Hebrews.
Moses Descends from Mount Sinai with the Ten Commandments by Ferdinand Bol, 1662 In the Old Testament, for example, God covenants with Moses and the Israelites. The Israelites receive from God at Mount Sinai the terms of this covenant to be God’s people. These terms—the Ten Commandments—are found in Exodus 20 and 34.
The Pilgrims had, for a long time, practiced covenants in their churches, and they applied this principle when creating their first civil covenant, the Mayflower Compact, in America.” American Heritage Education
Mayflower Compact
In the name of God, Amen. We, whose names are underwritten, the Loyal Subjects of our dread Sovereign Lord King James, by the Grace of God, of Great Britain, France, and Ireland, King, defender of the Faith, etc.:
Having undertaken, for the Glory of God, and advancements of the Christian faith, and the honor of our King and Country, a voyage to plant the first colony in the Northern parts of Virginia; do by these presents, solemnly and mutually, in the presence of God, and one another; covenant and combine ourselves together into a civil body politic; for our better ordering, and preservation and furtherance of the ends aforesaid; and by virtue hereof to enact, constitute, and frame, such just and equal laws, ordinances, acts, constitutions, and offices, from time to time, as shall be thought most meet and convenient for the general good of the colony; unto which we promise all due submission and obedience.
In witness whereof we have hereunto subscribed our names at Cape Cod the 11th of November, in the year of the reign of our Sovereign Lord King James, of England, France, and Ireland, the eighteenth, and of Scotland the fifty-fourth, 1620.
The Fog That Saved An Army
John Witherspoon’s The Dominion of Providence Over the Passions of Men caused a great stir when it was first preached in Princeton and published in Philadelphia in 1776, about a month before he was elected to the Continental Congress on June 22. He reminds his auditors that the sermon is his first address on political matters from the pulpit: ministers of the Gospel have more important business to attend to than secular crises, but, of course, liberty is more than a merely secular matter.
“Incredibly, yet again, circumstances – fate, luck, Providence, the hand of God, as would be said so often – intervened.” – Historian David McCullough from his book 1776.
Most Americans are not aware of how precarious the situation was at times for the American Continental Army during the Revolutionary War. I wrote about one such time during the Battle of Trenton December 1776: The Month That Saved America. Four months before the Battle of Trenton, the Continental and British armies met in the Battle of Brooklyn, or what is also called the Battle of Long Island or the Battle of Brooklyn Heights, in one of the largest battles of the Revolutionary War. The fate of the American Revolution and the future of our planet were forever changed by what transpired.
After the British abandoned Boston in March 1776, their next campaign was in New York. Their plan was to isolate New York and New England from the rest of the colonies. A large British force of approximately 32,000 soldiers opposed about 19,000 soldiers of the Continental Army. After the British force landed on Stanton Island, General George Washington moved much of his army across the East River from Lower Manhattan to defend Brooklyn.
A map of the battle
On August 27, 1776, the British attacked Brooklyn on three fronts. The British attacked American forces directly on two fronts, but sent a force of about 10,000 men through a little used pass and outflanked the Americans. Caught off guard and outnumbered, only a series of fortuitous events saved the American Revolution.
First, a small group of 400 soldiers from Maryland were able to fight and save the army from a complete rout. This allowed a larger group of Americans to retreat to Brooklyn Heights and avoid capture. Rather than press their advantage, British General William Howe ordered his men to stop the attack and instead dig trenches around the Continental Army. He expected the Americans to surrender. He also expected British ships to sail around and cut off the Americans from their only line of retreat across the river to Manhattan. But the ships never came. Why? Because there was not enough wind to get them there.
Washington had the night to secretly get 9,000 men to safety and keep his army intact. He ordered every available boat to be taken and used to get his army across the East River. Working throughout the rainy night, the oarsmen in the boats crossed the river multiple times to deliver soldiers across to the other side. The only problem was that as the sun rose, there was still a large part of the Continental Army left in Brooklyn. These men likely would have been killed or captured if they did not cross the river, losses the Americans could not afford.
But the final fortune would smile down on the Americans from Above. A heavy fog settled over the area and the rest of the Continental Army was able to conceal their movements from the British. As the fog lifted, the British were left in amazement as the Continental Army was gone.
The British went on to capture New York on September 15, 1776, but they did so without destroying the Continental Army. The Revolutionary War would continue and with it ultimate American victory. Without a few hundred soldiers, a lack of wind and some heavy fog, there may have never been a United States of America. Source
Three times weird weather saved America The Washington Post
Three times weird weather saved America
On the first day of spring, a look back at a heavy fog, a propitious hurricane and a sound-sucking heat that changed the course of the American Revolution , the War of 1812 and the Battle of Gettysburg.
But sometimes, weird weather can be a boon, particularly when it comes to the existence of one United States of America. Here are three times when the movements of the heavens helped Americans here on earth.This isn’t really what the secret evacuation of Brooklyn on Aug. 30, 1776, looked like, because that torch would have been seen by British troops and foiled the plot. (Library of Congress/Library of Congress) The fog of (Revolutionary) war.
On the face of it, it may not look like America was “saved” during the Battle of Long Island; Gen. George Washington and the Continental Army he commanded lost badly. They were outnumbered by the British 2 to 1. One-fifth of Washington’s force had been lost to death, injury or capture. And on the evening of Aug. 29, 1776, they were pinned down in Brooklyn between the East River and the British army.
Though rain had ruined Washington’s earliest military pursuits, on this night, Mother Nature did him a solid — in the form of liquid and gas. First, rain slowed down the British advance. That gave Washington time to plot an escape. As the sun went down, Washington gathered every boat available to the shore and began to — very quietly — evacuate his men across the shore. As Ron Chernow describes in “Washington: A Life,” cloth was wrapped around oars to mute their sound, and winds miraculously shifted so sailboats could silently glide across the river. Washington ordered campfires to stay lit all night to trick British guards into thinking they hadn’t moved.
[The plot to assassinate George Washington — and how it was foiled] But they still weren’t fast enough to beat the sun, which, in these pre-daylight-saving years, rose at about 5:20 a.m. Dozens of men were still waiting to leave, including Washington, when a glorious fog rolled in. It was so thick, one soldier reported, that you couldn’t see more than 20 feet away. That was all the Americans needed to evacuate the rest of their troops. Washington was the last one to board a boat to safety, and he and his army were free to fight another day.
“Say, do you smell rain?” (Library of Congress/Library of Congress) The singeing of Washington Frequently, when an invading army captures a city, they occupy it. (For example, when Washington’s troops evacuated New York, the British occupied it for seven years.) But not so when the British invaded Washington during the War of 1812.
Why? The weather, probably. Sure, when the British invaded on Aug, 24, 1814, they set the Capitol building on fire — which at the time housed not only Congress, but the Supreme Court and the Library of Congress. Then they set the White House alight, famously sending first lady Dolley Madison running (though not with a painting in hand, as you may have heard).
[Canada didn’t burn the White House. And Dolley Madison needs a fact check, too.] The next morning, with the previous day’s fires still smoldering, British troops continued their arson. And that’s when a severe thunderstorm, possibly a hurricane, came barreling in. A pounding rain put all the fires out. Wind sent debris flying, killing several British soldiers. Then a tornado touched down in the middle of Constitution Avenue, sending cannons into the air, which landed right on top of them.
Terrified British troops regrouped on Capitol Hill and decided to bail. The wind and rain continued, and as they headed for their damaged ships to sail away, a British admiral exclaimed to a resident: “Great God, Madam! Is this the kind of storm to which you are accustomed in this infernal country?”
Some historians say the British never intended to occupy the city, only to raze it; others disagree. In any case, they were in and out in 26 hours, and the incident soon became known as “the storm that saved Washington.”Two children play by a cannon on Little Round Top Hill on Nov. 18, 2013. (Michel du Cille/The Washington Post) Longstreet’s silent charge
Heading into the Battle of Gettysburg in July 1863, Confederate Gen. Robert E. Lee was aiming for a decisive win, one so big it would drive the Union to seek peace terms. Among Lost Cause apologists, Lt. Gen. James Longstreet is the villain whose dawdling foiled that plan.
But, according to one theory, a bizarre phenomenon known as an “acoustic shadow” may have played a bigger role in the defeat.As the summer heat bore down on the second day of fighting, Lee ordered Longstreet to attack Union troops at Cemetery Hill and take the virtually empty Little Round Top. Lt. Gen. Richard S. Ewell’s men were to make a show of force opposite them to split the Union troops and draw them away from the hill. Ewell was to begin his action at the sound of Longstreet’s artillery barrage.
Yes, Longstreet did take a long time to gather his men before attacking in the late afternoon. But, according to physicist and military expert Charles D. Ross, “for a long time after Longstreet had begun his attack, Ewell heard nothing and hence did not move his troops.” When the fighting that day was over, Longstreet’s men were narrowly defeated, and the Union had yet another high tactical advantage.
[Her image had been buried near a Civil War battlefield for 100 years. Then I found her.] So why didn’t Ewell hear Longstreet’s barrage? According to Ross, Ewell was likely in the middle of an acoustic shadow, an atmospheric phenomenon caused by a combination of geography, heat and wind by which sound is “stopped” from traveling in one direction, even while it travels perfectly well in others.
The hillsides of Gettysburg are just the sort of place where acoustic shadows can develop. “More importantly, the hot temperatures near the ground probably caused a dramatic upward refraction of sound waves,” wrote Ross.The next day, when Maj. Gen. George Pickett went on his doomed charge, his men were cut down by Union troops positioned perfectly on Little Round Top, the very place Longstreet had barely lost. From then on, the Union had the upper hand in the Civil War.
Because of this and other acoustic shadows during the war, Ross wrote, “One might even go so far as to say the acoustical shadows determined the course of the entire war.”Read more RetropolisThe truth about Confederate Gen. Robert E. Lee: He wasn’t very good at his job.
The worst Fourth of July George Washington ever had — and how it led to a new nation The rise, set and rise of daylight saving time.
1776: Witherspoon, Dominion of Providence over the Passions of Men (Sermon)
“Religion began to revive, nothing contributed more to facilitate its reception and increase its progress than the violence of its persecutors.”
In all after ages, in conformity to this, the deepest laid contrivances of the prince of darkness, have turned out to the confusion of their author; and I know not, but considering his malice and pride, this perpetual disappointment, and the superiority of divine wisdom, may be one great source of his suffering and torment. The cross hath still been the banner of truth, under which it hath been carried through the world. Persecution has been but as the furnace to the gold, to purge it of its dross, to manifest its purity, and increase its lustre. It was taken notice of very early, that the blood of the martyrs was the seed of christianity; the more abundantly it was shed, the more plentifully did the harvest grow.
So certain has this appeared, that the most violent infidels, both of early and later ages, have endeavored to account for it, and have observed that there is a spirit of obstinacy in man which inclines him to resist violence, and that severity doth but increase opposition, be the cause what it will. They suppose that persecution is equally proper to propagate truth and error. This though in part true, will by no means generally hold. Such an apprehension, however, gave occasion to a glorious triumph of divine providence of an opposite kind, which I must shortly relate to you. One of the Roman emperors, Julian, surnamed the apostate, perceiving how impossible it was to suppress the gospel by violence, endeavored to extinguish it by neglect and scorn. He left the Christians unmolested for sometime, but gave all manner of encouragement to those of opposite principles, and particularly to the Jews, out of hatred to the Christians; and that he might bring public disgrace upon the Galileans, as he affected to stile them, he encouraged the Jews to rebuild the temple of Jerusalem, and visibly refute the prophecy of Christ, that it should lie under perpetual desolation. But this profane attempt was so signally frustrated, that it served, as much as any one circumstance, to spread the glory of our Redeemer, and establish the faith of his saints. It is affirmed by some ancient authors, particularly by Ammianus Marcellinus, a heathen historian, that fire came out of the earth and consumed the workmen when laying the foundation. But in whatever way it was prevented, it is beyond all controversy, from the concurring testimony of heathens and Christians, that little or no progress was ever made in it, and that in a short time, it was entirely defeated.
It is proper here to observe, that at the time of the reformation, when religion began to revive, nothing contributed more to facilitate its reception and increase its progress than the violence of its persecutors. Their cruelty and the patience of the sufferers, naturally disposed men to examine and weigh the cause to which they adhered with so much constancy and resolution. At the same time also, when they were persecuted in one city, they fled to another, and carried the discoveries of popish fraud to every part of the world. It was by some of those who were persecuted in Germany, that the light of the reformation was brought so early into Britain.
The power of divine providence appears with the most distinguished lustre, when small and inconsiderable circumstances, and sometimes, the weather and seasons, have defeated the most formidable armaments, and frustrated the best concerted expeditions. Near two hundred years ago, the monarchy of Spain was in the height of its power and glory, and determined to crush the interest of the reformation. They sent out a powerful armament against Britain, giving it ostentatiously, and in my opinion profanely, the name of the Invincible Armada. But it pleased God so entirely to discomfit it by tempests, that a small part of it returned home, though no British force had been opposed to it at all.
We have a remarkable instance of the influence of small circumstances in providence in the English history. The two most remarkable persons in the civil wars, had earnestly desired to withdraw themselves from the contentions of the times, Mr. Hampden and Oliver Cromwell. They had actually taken their passage in a ship for New England, when by an arbitrary order of council they were compelled to remain at home. The consequence of this was, that one of them was the soul of the republican opposition to monarchical usurpation during the civil wars, and the other in the course of that contest, was the great instrument in bringing the tyrant to the block.
The only other historical remark I am to make, is, that the violent persecution which many eminent Christians met with in England from their brethren, who called themselves Protestants, drove them in great numbers to a distant part of the world, where the light of the gospel and true religion were unknown. Some of the American settlements, particularly those in New-England, were chiefly made by them; and as they carried the knowledge of Christ to the dark places of the earth, so they continue themselves in as great a degree of purity, of faith, and strictness of practice, or rather a greater, than is to be found in any protestant church now in the world. Does not the wrath of man in this instance praise God? Was not the accuser of the brethren, who stirs up their enemies, thus taken in his own craftiness, and his kingdom shaken by the very means which he employed to establish it.* https://oll.libertyfund.org/page/1776-witherspoon-dominion-of-providence-over-the-passions-of-men-sermon
Very Important
For those of you who usually endure to the end of some of my long blogs, I want to ask you a few things to ponder about.
Why did I choose the title Covenants and Miracles as the title of this blog? Consider what I have spoken about the past few blogs and you will know.
Miracles happen of course whenever the Lord wants. They can happen to the old and the young, the bond and the free, the black and white, and for anyone else and at any time.
A covenant made with God is a spiritually binding agreement between whoever makes the Covenant and the Lord. If I make a Covenant with God it doesn’t give me a greater chance of having or seeing a miracle does it? Just being a child of God gives me a possibility of a miracle. Birth itself is a miracle, correct?
Should we seek for miracles? Do we need miracles to make us happy? Did Laman and Lemuel see miracles? Did it improve their lives? You see if we seek for miracles, we are wrong. If we pray for miracles in times of need they may or may not happen. Either way we thank the Lord and pray we learn from our challenge.
Hopefully…
We have make a Covenant with God at Baptism
We made a Covenant with God by Endowment
We made a Covenant with God during our Sealing
Did we make a covenant with our Country?
These questions I ask are not meant to be answered by me, but by yourselves.
I just want you to THINK!
What is happening in the Covenant Nation of the United States? Is Satan winning today? What are we doing to prevent an evil overthrow?
Did you know worshippers of Baal are alive and thriving today? You don’t see the evilest but it is all around us. We must keep our Covenants and not expect a miracle. Why dont each of us become the miracle or create our own miracle?
We didn’t need a miracle to receive these covenants, but we may have had a few miracles along the way as a blessing. Covenants and miracles can come together or not at all.
Less than 20% of our Founding Fathers fought for our freedom and yet 100% of the people were blessed with freedom, that is a Miracle with no covenant. How blessed may we be when we make a Covenant with God and never expect a miracle? A miracle or two may still come but it is not necessary for miracles, but it is necessary to make Covenant with God.
May the United States Constitution be restored to its original glory. May the evil find punishment and the righteous prevail. May we keep our Covenants with God and praise Him when we get our Constitution back. I don’t believe the Lord will come for a 2nd time until we wise up to keeping our covenants in a newly restored world wide constitution of hope.
May we then give thanks to God and spend the rest of our lives in sharing the miracle of the Book of Mormon with the world, and especially with the newly liberated world after our Constitution is restored.
Keep Praying, God is with us all.
If you read this complete blog, thank you. Please email me privately with your comments at [email protected]. I just may share something with you. I love you and I pray for our Constitution and for all citizens of the world.
