Chapter 40: The Sermon About How to Be Good Like Jesus Instead of Hiding Like a Rabbit (3 Nephi 12-16)

3 Nephi 12:5 And blessed are the meek, for they shall inherit the earth.

When Jesus first came to the Nephites do you think they were excited? Did they jump up and down and say, “Hurray hurray”? They did not. They did not even say hello. Instead, they fell flat on their faces and tried not to move. They were hiding like rabbits. And like rabbits, their hearts were beating really fast, and they were really nervous. Perhaps they were thinking, “If we don’t move, he won’t see us.”

Now you might think that it is strange to try and hide from someone who is hovering above you shining like the sun. Of course he will see you. It is very hard to hide from the sun, and much harder to hide from Jesus. But that is not the only thing that makes their hiding strange. The strangest thing is why would anyone want to hide from Jesus?

Well, it turns out they were hiding for the same reason that Laman and Lemuel hid from the tree, and Corianton hid from his father and brothers, and the Lamanites hid from t…