Day 344

• Principle: Seek "the fountain of all righteousness and be saved." 

• Book of Mormon Reading: Ether 8:18 - 8:26

• Secret combinations were around during Book of Mormon times as well as today.  Cross reference these verse with Helaman chapter 6 to learn more about what motivates them, how they work, and how they come to power.  Below is a list of 12 characteristics of secret combinations.

  • Their two objectives are to get gain and power; then they glory in it (see Helaman 6:17; Ether 8:22; Moses 5:31).

  • Secret combinations require general wickedness to survive (see Helaman 6:21, 31, 38).

  • Secret combinations thrive on secrecy, violation of which is a capital offense (see Helaman 5:22; 6:22; Moses 5:29, 50).

  • Secret combinations involve formal covenant making (see Helaman 6:22; Moses 5:30–31).

  • They use murder, violence, threat of violence, plunder, vice, whoredoms, and flattery to get gain and power (see Helaman 2:4–5; 6:17, 23).

  • Secret combinations operate on laws contrary to the laws of the country (see Helaman 6:23).

  • Satan is the grand conspirator and author (see Helaman 6:26–30).

  • Participants have court trials for their own people—not according to the laws of the land but according to their own set of laws (see Helaman 6:23–24).

  • They seek to take governmental power as rapidly as possible (see Helaman 2:5; 6:39).

  • Participants seek to overthrow freedom for others but seek to maintain freedom for themselves (see Ether 8:25; Moses 5:28–33).

  • Secret combinations cause the destruction of nations (see Alma 37:21, 26, 29; Helaman 2:13; Ether 8:21–22).

  • Secret combinations are abominable in God’s sight (see 3 Nephi 9:9; Ether 8:18).

• At the end of these verses Moroni offers how you may overcome secret combinations through the fountain of all righteousness.  

• Joseph Smith said

  • The Prophet Joseph Smith (1805–44) declared: “The devil has no power over us only as we permit him; the moment we revolt at anything which comes from God, the devil takes power” (Teachings of Presidents of the Church: Joseph Smith [2007], 214).

• What is the fountain of all righteousness? 

• What do you need to do in your life to come to the fountain of all righteousness?

• Additional Study:

  • Boyd K. Packer, “The Key to Spiritual Protection”, October 2013

  • The Iron Rod, Hymns No. 274

  • Seek the Lord Early, Children’s Songbook No. 108