What does "Lehi moment" mean?

After posting yesterday's post on Facebook yesterday, a good friend who was basically my mom during the two years I served an LDS mission in Brazil asked for more information about "Lehi moment." I laughed later as my mother-in-law posted a response, explaining to someone who probably taught me more about Lehi and the Book of Mormon than I learned on my own up to that point in my life, who Lehi was. 

But I guess there might be some people who don't know who Lehi is or was, maybe you don't care to know and that's fine, but maybe some context would be helpful in understanding.

Lehi was a prophet in the Book of Mormon. Kinda like Moses or Noah from the Bible. And Lehi was probably just a normal guy trying to do the right thing, being a good husband and dad I don't know, when he basically had a vision or a message directly from God that it was time for him to get the heck out of town. And so, he listened and obeyed and grabbed his family and some tents and maybe some supplies and he got out of town. Lehi left behind what seems to be a fairly comfortable life, family and friends and familiarity, to go into the unknown and travel in the wilderness. All because God told him to. There's more to it than that, but that about covers the gist of it.

So the "Lehi moment" comment refers to Lehi up and leaving everything he knows for the unknown simply because God told him to. And that's pretty much why I left Utah. There's a whole long story about how that came to pass, how I actually received my own answer, but I'll save that for another time. I read somewhere you're supposed to keep blog posts short.

The title of my post, "My Dad had a Lehi Moment" is referring to my daughter, Maile, who had to leave Provo High School going into her junior year. She found that was the best way to explain to her friends who asked "why are you moving to Hawaii?" Most of her friends being Mormon, members of our church who would understand the Lehi reference.

And we still feel very strongly that this whole move to Hawaii was an act of faith. I still have no clue why or how or what. I have some ideas but I have learned that God works in ways my imagination cannot begin to consider.

 This is Lehi finding a kind of compass known as a Liahona outside his tent. Meant to guide them on their journey by their faith in God. The muscular dude leaning over him is his son Nephi. I'm sure there's some historical inconsistencies and such in this painting, maybe not. Just trying to add "color" to my post here...