I've Got a Liahona and So Can You

One of my favorite symbols from the Book of Mormon is the liahona and its relationship with those who seek its guidance. I do not know if this actual navigation device is supposed to be used as a symbol, but I find that as I study it I gain more out of what I read and have a stronger desire to live my life as if I had a liahona, because in some ways we all have it.

Alma teaches his son Helaman about this sacred guide. In Alma 37 verse 38, he first calls it “a ball, or director.” This may not seem to be any surprise as there are many man-made devices that direct where people should go. However, as we read in verse 39, “there cannot any man work after the manner of so curious a workmanship…it was prepared to show unto our fathers the course which they should travel in the wilderness.” The second part of this phrase should not seem particularly new, but the first part where we learn that it was not man-made allows us to first see that perhaps there is something special and divine about the liahona.

And there is something incredibly divine about it. Verse 40 contains the word ‘God’ three different times: it worked according to their faith in God, God could cause that those spindles should point the way they should go, and that besides that miracle other miracles happened because of the power of God. Truly the liahona had nothing to do with man’s skill, but to man’s desire to follow God and God’s love he has for His children.

I think of God’s children today and myself, as I am a child of God. He knows that there are thousands of things that we could choose for our lives, and that ultimately, like Nephi and his family did, it is up to us to continue to walk and make the choices. Yet sometimes it is difficult to see what the right thing to do is. That is when we turn to God and pay attention to the promptings that the Holy Ghost gives to us. The Holy Ghost is a separate being from God, but he is real and powerful and provides guidance when we express faith in the Lord. We are not punished for not knowing what to do. Rather with love from our Father, we can choose because He provides His miracle of divine direction to His children today.