Room 13 of 20
Alma 34:32–34
This life is the time
Verse
For behold, this life is the time for men to prepare to meet God; yea, behold the day of this life is the day for men to perform their labors… For behold, if ye have procrastinated the day of your repentance even until death, behold, ye have become subjected to the spirit of the devil, and he doth seal you his.
Why they use it
They say this life is the only chance, so work for the dead is unbiblical.
Why they are wrong
Amulek is warning people who already heard. He is not closing the grave on everyone else.
The room (aka the context)
- Who wrote it
- Amulek, in Alma’s record.
- Who is in the room
- The Zoramites — people sitting in a synagogue of the proud, who already have the word.
- Who is speaking
- Amulek.
- What is going on
- He is warning people who are putting repentance off. Not a seminar on those who died without a missionary. If you heard and stalled until death, that spirit still has you.
- What they already believe
- Today is the day to repent. Mercy is not a plan to stall.
- How they would hear these words
- Don’t procrastinate. That is not “God cannot reach the dead.” Peter says the gospel was preached to the dead. Paul mentions baptism for the dead without blinking.
Clarifying verse
1 Peter 4:6
For for this cause was the gospel preached also to them that are dead, that they might be judged according to men in the flesh, but live according to God in the spirit.
The New Testament already has preaching to the dead. Alma 34 is a warning to the living who know better. FAIR’s baptism-for-the-dead pages hold both.
Gal1:8 topic →Mark it
Tap when you can say the verse out loud.