The most important thing we can do to strengthen our faith is to pray. That is why Alma quoted the words that Zenos, the prophet of old, had spoken concerning prayer and worship. What Zenos had to say about prayer and worship was different from a Rameumptom prayer.
And just as Joseph Smith read in James 1:5, “If any of you lack wisdom, let him ask of God,” if we want to gain spiritual knowledge, we must, as Alma said, learn wisdom. If we lack wisdom, there is ultimately only one thing to do, and that is to pray—to ask God, and he will bless our hearts in many different ways so that our wisdom will grow. Too many discount prayer as the source of wisdom, and as a result, they are learned but not wise.
I suspect that Alma had not planned to recite this wonderful text from the ancient prophet Zenos when he prepared to go to Antionum. It was not until he and his companions got to Antionum and saw how the people were praying that they were astonished. Before that, they did not realize how far the apostasy had gone and how perfectly the ancient words of Zenos were what he needed to rehearse to them. Nevertheless, when the people asked him what they should do next, Alma asked them if they remembered the words of Zenos on this topic. He then quoted Zenos’s beautiful poetic text. In Alma 29 (“O that I were an angel”), Alma was able to give poetic expressions that really poured out his soul. I wonder if he learned how to do some of that by previously studying and memorizing the writings of Zenos.
Book of Mormon Central, “Why Did Nephi Work So Hard to Preserve the Wisdom He Had Received? (1 Nephi 6:5–6),” KnoWhy 262 (January 16, 2017).