Alma also uses language that echoes Paul's - "this mortal body raised in immortality, and this corruption raised in incorruption..." (v. 15). As in the previous two Book of Mormon uses, the context is the association of the resurrection with the judgment - "...to stand before God to be judged according to the deeds which have been done in the mortal body."
In this classic sermon Alma uses that judgment as a horizon against which to measure what happens in mortality. Are we going to be prepared to face it? Should it not motivate us to be constantly evaluating ourselves and our readiness? If we would let it, wouldn't its reality be prompting a series of deep personal questions that would impel us to use the atonement in a more immediate and powerful way?
First of all, doesn't the reality of the judgment that accompanies resurrection force us to acknowledge our basic fallen, mortal state?
Until we come unto Christ and put our faith in Him, Alma reminds us, all of us are in the same condition as King Noah's people before the preaching of Abinidi and Alma. We are in a "deep sleep," "in the midst of darkness," "encircled about by the bands of death and the chains of hell" (v. 7). We yield ourselves "to become subjects to the devil" (v. 20). Our destination is a meeting with God where our souls are "filled with guilt and remorse, having a remembrance of all [our] guilt, yea a perfect remembrance of all [our] wickedness, yea a remembrance that [we] have set at defiance the commandments of God" (v. 18). The path we are on leads to hell (v. 6) and an everlasting destruction (v. 7).
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