Drinking from a hydrant

The past two Saturdays I have spent 12 hours each with the young women in our ward listening to almost the entire Book of Mormon. Prior to that the most time I had spent studying the scriptures in any one go was four hours I spent one afternoon when I had graduated from college and did not yet have a job so I went to the library near my apartment for an afternoon. And I thought I’d gotten a big picture view of things at that time. That was nothing compared to the big picture of the past week.

First, it was scripture study with teenagers, specifically teenage girls. Which meant a lot of unrelated giggling, breaks to run around in the dark of the cultural hall (gym), and a general sleep over feel to the room. I will be the first to admit that I have had experiences that were more reverent and spiritual. However, it was still an experience I will never forget and one I am grateful to have had.

I came home from the first day and told Brett I felt like I’d been drinking scriptures from a fire hydrant. The scriptures had been blasted at me and I felt overwhelmed. However I was also amazed at the connections I was able to make that I had missed before and the insights I gained because of the largeness of what we did.

Certain connections between seemingly unrelated stories seemed perfectly obvious this time because I was reading the chapters in much closer proximity than I have ever read before. Suddenly Jacob 5 and 1 Nephi 8 were connected in my mind because rather than reading them weeks apart as I have in the past, there were only a few hours separating them. In fact, the general themes of 1 Nephi 8 kept popping up over and over again throughout the two days.

As I listened to the recounting of the Savior’s visit to the Americas and his review of the records they had kept, I wondered about my own records. Would the Savior have to point out spiritual experiences and revelations I had received and had not written down previously, or have I been keeping a good record of my spiritual growth?

It took a lot of faith and organization to set it up so that I could spend the time I did doing that. Carving out two 12 hour blocks like that is not something that happens in my life regularly, so I’m not sure if that is something I will ever be able to do again. But I am very grateful I had the chance to do it now.