In the vision, Lehi pleads with Laman and Lemuel to keep the commandments. What does it mean to "keep" the commandments? One obvious definition would be to "obey." But, what do you do when you keep something? You hold onto it. You treasure it. You can keep something when you protect it. You have to protect the commandments. In all these senses, we have to keep the commandments.
In ancient languages, the word "keep" often means to protect or to guard. You have to guard the commandments. You have to guard them for your own good, but you also have to guard them so that they do not slip into some kind of misunderstanding or errors in the way they are applied. I think after Nephi had done what he did to get the plates, he wanted to keep them. He did not want to lose those plates. And so, keeping the commandments means not only obeying them, but keeping them and preserving them and passing them on to the next generation.
Now what about our phrase "keeping at it?" Lehi’s dream helps you see that he was keeping at the commandments. This is not something you do once in your life. And, what about that iron rod? There was one group—the third group—that managed to get all the way to the tree. But what did they do? They did cling to the rod. I suppose they were going hand over hand as they gripped the rod. They didn’t let go with one hand in order to keep moving ahead. They kept in direct and constant contact with it.
There were some who were wandering in the darkness and, somehow, they bumped into the iron rod. They continued on the path and they got to the tree—this is the second group. We all pray and hope that we will cross the straight and narrow path as often as possible. Well, this second group looked around and felt ashamed. So, off they went. They did not keep clinging to the rod. They did not keep holding to it. Tenacity is an important part of our keeping the commandments.
Lehi clearly believed with all his heart that Laman and Lemuel had the opportunity to repent. Even though, at this point, Laman and Lemuel had rejected the tree and had rejected the path, Lehi did not believe that this was their fate. He still, with the tender pleadings of a loving father, continued to entreat them to come to the tree.
Finally, at a certain point, Lehi stopped talking. Maybe they had heard enough. That is a good parenting lesson as well.
Louis Midgley, "To Remember and Keep: On the Book of Mormon as an Ancient Book," in The Disciple as Scholar: Essays on Scripture and the Ancient World in Honor of Richard Lloyd Anderson, ed. Stephen D. Ricks, Donald W. Parry, and Andrew H. Hedges (Provo, UT: FARMS, 2000), 95–137.
"The Book of Mormon links remembrance with covenants and their renewals. Remembering means to keep the terms of the covenant between God and his people; it is faithful response to God’s commandments. At the same time, strictly keeping the commandments leads to remembering. Thus … [l]ike the Hebrew Bible, the Book of Mormon uses the expressions keep and remember interchangeably."