Many readers skip over the process of shipbuilding by the brother of Jared (and also by Nephi) as if the Lord gave them a revelation and the next day they went out in their backyard and put a ship together with a little help from a few brothers. The Book of Mormon student would do well to ponder the words of Elder Harold B. Lee:
The Lord gave to the brother of Jared, that great prophet, a blueprint of the ships that he was to construct, by which he was to take his people across large bodies of water to a promised land. [But] as he surveyed these and began to build, he faced two problems: (1) no provision was made for ventilation and (2) there was no light. The ventilation problem was solved rather simply [by the Lord?] by having holes at proper places that could be opened and closed [see Ether 2:20-21]; but the matter of light was [quite different or was it?]. . . . The Lord said to the brother of Jared, "What will ye that I should do that ye may have light in your vessels?" (Ether 2:23)--as much as to say, "Well, have you any good ideas? . . . [The Lord then details the problem but instead of providing an answer He just leaves the brother of Jared on his own.] It was as though the Lord were saying to him, "Look, I gave you a mind to think with, and I gave you agency to use it. Now you do all you can to help yourself with this problem; and then after you've done all you can [both temporal and spiritual], I'll step in to help you." . . .
[The next thing we find is the brother of Jared gathering sixteen stones molten out of rock to the top of the mountain and petitioning the Lord to (1) forgive his sins (see Ether 3:2); (2) forgive the sins of his people (see Ether 3:3); and (3) touch the stones that they might give off light (see Ether 3:4-6)]
This is the principle in action. If you want the blessing, don't just kneel down and pray about it. Prepare yourselves in every conceivable way you can in order to make yourselves worthy to receive the blessing you seek. (Harold B. Lee, "How to Receive a Blessing from God," Improvement Era, Oct. 1966, pp. 862-63, 896)
While in no way trying to lessen anyone's appreciation for the faith that it took to ask the Lord to touch sixteen stones and make them give off light, or the additional spiritual lessons conveyed by the scriptural story or by Elder Lee's remarks, I have to wonder at this point just how much time and how many failed attempts on his own it took the brother of Jared before he felt like he had done all that he could mentally, physically and spiritually do in order to feel worthy to return to the Lord for help. For example, what prompted him to "molten" stones out of rock in the first place? Why didn't he just ask the Lord to light up any old stones? Or for that matter, why didn't he just ask the Lord to control the seas so that they could have windows which were not dashed out by the "mountain waves"? To me it is obvious that in stressing the spiritual, most of the cultural details concerning the brother of Jared's required study and experimentation with existing maritime lore has been left out of the story. The same can also be said for Nephi and his struggle to build his ship. [Alan C. Miner, Personal Notes] [See the commentary on 1 Nephi 17:8; 18:2]