“The enabling power of the Atonement strengthens us to do and be good and to serve beyond our own individual desire and natural capacity … .
“In Alma 31, Alma is directing a mission to reclaim the apostate Zoramites … .
“Notice the plea for strength in Alma’s personal prayer: ‘O Lord, wilt thou grant unto me that I may have strength, that I may suffer with patience these afflictions which shall come upon me, because of the iniquity of this people’ (Alma 31:31; emphasis added) … .
“Alma did not pray to have his afflictions removed. He knew he was an agent of the Lord, and he prayed for the power to act and affect his situation” (Bednar, “Atonement and the Journey of Mortality,” 42–45).