Mormon does not explain why he stresses universal access to salvation on condition of faith in Yahweh-Messiah. I hypothesize that many of these who joined the church at this time had previously opposed it. Because these new converts were all within the Nephite polity, they had previously been (at least) unchurched and (at most) apostates. They may still have been potential dissidents, if not dissidents in fact. Perhaps for this reason, Mormon points out that the gospel is open—including those who had been the church’s enemies or potential enemies.
Mormon spells out the importance in this process of confessing “the name of Jesus Christ, who is the Son of God.” Nothing in Mormon’s narrative is more important than the testimony of this Messiah who would come—and soon.
Text: In 1 Nephi 11:18, the 1830 edition read “mother of God,” changed in all subsequent editions to “mother of the Son of God.” The same phrase “Son of God,” here applied directly to Jesus, is in the 1830 edition. In Nephite theology, Yahweh was incarnate as the Messiah and therefore appropriately “God.” However, Yahweh was also known as the son of the Most High God, and Son of God is also an appropriate Book of Mormon title. (See “Excursus: The Nephite Understanding of God,” following 1 Nephi 11.)