Free The Fugitive Son by Adell Harvey, Mari Serebrov

marked. Andy was surprised by all the markings in the Bible. The major must have spent a lot of time reading and pondering it. Why would anybody love a book enough to read it over and over?
At testimony and fast meetings, I always stood up and testified how much I love the Book of Mormon,
Andy recalled. He paused as his own thoughts convicted him. Despite his proclaimed love for the book, he hadn’t read it much. And judging from the comments of other Mormons, neither had they.
    The first couple of days here in his self-imposed exile, Andy had been too busy setting up camp and laying in food to honor his promise to the major to read the Bible. Every time he glanced at it, lying on his duffel in the cave, he had felt pangs of guilt for not honoring that promise. Then boredom set in, and he began reading just to pass the time.
    Now, it was like a magnet, drawing him into it, raising questions and doubts. On the front inside cover, someone had inscribed, “This Book will keep you from sin; sin will keep you from this Book.”
    He reflected on the strange sentiment. What is sin? The Mormons didn’t speak of sin very often. When they did, it was defined as disobeying the laws and ordinances of the gospel. But was it sin to lie and steal and murder people, as he had witnessed so often lately?
    Andy remembered the first time he had opened Major Crawford’s Bible. He had felt guilty, as if he were dishonoring Heavenly Father and the prophet. But then he remembered – the Mormons’ Articles of Faith stated that the church believed in the King James Bible insofar as it was translated correctly. Andy had flipped to the title page of the Bible he held in his hands. Yep, it was definitely King James. Why shouldn’t he read it?
    Since then, he had read and reread the opening chapters of Genesis, becoming more confused each time he read it. “Sure sounds like Adam and Eve sinned; that God was displeased with their actions,” he murmured. “So why do the Mormons say they didn’t really sin? That they simply chose the lesser of two evils?”
    He had heard the story of the Garden of Eve since he was a little boy. How God told Adam and Eve not to eat of the fruit, but at the same time had ordered them to multiply and replenish the earth with their offspring. Adam wisely chose the right command and ate the fruit, so that “man may be.”
    If Adam chose wisely, why did God kill an animal and shed its blood? Andy followed Major Crawford’s references to verses like, “The soul that sinneth, it shall die,” and “Without the shedding of blood is no remission of sin.”
    “Am I a sinner? I’ve tried to follow all the laws and ordinances of the gospel to the best of my ability. Is that not enough?” Andy gave voice to his questions, feeling a deep agony of soul. Conviction coursed through him. “Of course I’ve sinned,” he confessed aloud. “I’ve lied. I’ve coveted my father’s wife. I’ve harbored secret thoughts against the prophet and the leaders.
    He shuddered violently as he reread the statement, “Without the shedding of blood is no remission of sin.” Did this mean only blood atonement would cover his many sins? Must he offer his life to the brethren’s knife? Was he strong enough for that?
    Almost of its own volition, the Bible flipped over to another verse the major had marked, in First Peter 2. Andy read the entire passage that was marked and quickly deduced it was talking about Jesus Christ, who did no sin – a sinless man “who his own self bare our sins in his own body on the tree, that we, being dead to sins, should live unto righteousness, by whose stripes ye were healed.”
    He bore our sins on the tree. That clearly is talking about the cross on which Jesus was crucified
, Andy mused.
But the church teaches that Jesus paid for most of our sins in the Garden of Gethsemane. Really awful sins, like murder and adultery, must be paid for by our own blood. Did Prophet Smith get it wrong? Did Jesus bear all