Rhetoric: Alma takes the basic image of “straight paths” (a metaphor for preparing for the Messiah’s coming) and restructures it into the experience of one who is actually walking in the Yahweh’s path. This path is already “straight” because Yahweh “cannot walk in crooked paths; neither doth he vary from that which he had said.… ”
Reference: This verse contains language reminiscent of James 1:17: “Every good gift and every perfect gift is from above, and cometh down from the Father of lights, with whom is no variableness, neither shadow of turning.”