As modern readers, we fill in the phrase “weapons of their rebellion” with images of arrows, swords, and other weapons which inflict physical wounds. For the Lamanites, these weapons signified their participation in their old religion. (See commentary accompanying Alma 24:9–11.) However, the phrase that “they did not fight against God any more” suggests another reading, one that did not involve physical weapons. In modern times, weapons of rebellion against God might be secret disobedience to the Word of Wisdom, dressing in styles inappropriate to the worship of God, or justifying the neglect of family by citing the demands of one’s profession.
A weapon of rebellion can be anything that we use in our lives to combat the transformation toward which the Spirit is pushing us. We may know precisely what steps the Spirit wants us to take to increase our spirituality, and we fend off that understanding with our favorite weapon of rebellion. When we, like the Lamanites, come to see clearly what the peace of the Lord offers compared with our current life, we become willing to accept that peace by laying down our personal weapons of rebellion, our personal ways of resisting the transformation that the Spirit is urging upon us.