As I Search the Holy Scriptures: Book of Mormon Challenge 2018

For the next few months I'll be sharing the thoughts and impressions I receive as I read and study the Book of Mormon with the goal of finishing it by the end of the year as well as a special emphasis on what it says about Jesus Christ.

My heart swells with love and joy when I read these simple words. "[To] the convincing of the Jew and Gentile that JESUS is the CHRIST, the ETERNAL GOD, manifesting himself unto all nations."
1) It's a testament and testimony of our Savior, who makes my heart rejoice.
2) The phrases "convincing of the Jew and Gentile" and "manifesting himself unto all nations" are so exciting because the purpose is for the entire world to hear the gospel preached and to come to know the Savior, no matter where they're from or who they are. Jesus didn't come to save a select few. He came to save us all.

It's truly a work of love and power that these records were "hid up unto the Lord, that they might not be destroyed--To come forth by the gift and power of God" when the time had come for the gathering of scattered Israel to begin.

I haven't even started reading the actual book yet and I'm so overwhelmed by how much the Lord loves His children. He sent His Son to pay the price we never could. We are worth redeeming and in addition to the work the Savior did, we are also blessed with records to learn from so that not only can WE know Jesus for ourselves, but we can share Him with the entire human family too.

As I read the Book of Mormon again, preparing for the new year and responding to the prophet's invitation in October's General Conference, I've specifically asked to be guided in my study of the bible as well, and to gain a testimony and love for it as I read both precious accounts of God's work among the children of men on the earth.

I'm so excited to have the opportunity to keep learning of my Savior and growing in love for Him. To become more like Him every day through the power of His atonement and the word of God.

"Here's my heart, oh, take and seal it"

Oh, the journeys we take in life. The things we learn, the things we forget. The things we learn again, and promise to remember this time. The mistakes we make, the heartache and pain we feel. The joy we find when we look beyond ourselves.

Part of me has held onto a fear that this time will be like the last time, and the time before that. That the conviction and faith of today will dissolve at the first real test, or the second, or the third, like it always has in the past. It seems like I've been here before, wanting to know my Savior and living my life with that goal in mind, but I lost that heart every time. What's to stop it from happening again?

What the Spirit whispers to me in the midst of my fear is this: "You were never truly converted before. But you are now. You know this. Cling to it and let not your faith be shaken by tempests without or within." And I trust him. Maybe that voice that whispers doubt isn't even mine anymore. Satan is an excellent liar. I hear thoughts in my head that sound like mine and I assume they must originate with me. But sometimes they don't. Sometimes I need to give myself more credit.

Because I do know, don't I? That this time is different from all the others because this time I came to Jesus shattered into a million pieces that no amount of tape or glue could hope to repair. This time I was ready to let Him enter into all the rooms in my heart and mind I'd kept locked away before. This time I rejoice when I face the pain of acknowledging what I am, because I know it means Christ is changing me. He's not just putting me back together, He's building something new. I can see it, and I can feel it, and I can trust it.

Some of the same things are still hard for me. They don't come from deep brokenness or insidious lies I believe about myself and my God. They're simply human weakness, and with effort and God's grace I will overcome them. I believe that, because my heart is not my own anymore. I want my life to match. Little by little, day by day, the dramatic changes within my heart are manifesting outwardly.

I know it will take time to be the kind of person I want to be in more than just intent. I have a lot to unlearn still, and much yet to learn. I'm just grateful to have a Savior leading me through it all. And I'm grateful my Lord can use my years of rebellion to draw me even closer in the end.

I know Jesus Christ is the Savior and Redeemer of mankind. He is MY Savior. I know He lives, and loves me. And I know His grace is sufficient even for me. I am not alone. I am not worthless. I am a precious child of God. We all are. YOU are. You are loved, cherished, valued beyond measure. No matter how dark your path may seem, you are not forsaken. Jesus is waiting with open arms and healing hands. Come unto Him and be made whole. I promise it is worth it.

Wrapping up Faith Exp #1

Ha, I said in my last post about this that I'd be back in 3 weeks...it's been a little longer than that, but to be fair to myself, I've had a lot going on. For instance, the third week of the challenge, my week got totally taken over by the fact that I was interviewing and orientating and starting work at Wal-Mart. I'm not one of those people who can just adjust my schedule with no problem when something big like that changes, so even though I'm surviving the new schedule, my productivity in other areas kind of fell off. I need to start actually scheduling my time from now on, instead of just going with the flow. XD

Anyway, I haven't been spectacular about praying every single morning, mostly because I seem to be exhausted and forget a lot because I wake up at the last minute so I can go to work...I do remember sometimes, but I think I need to clean my room faster and put a prayer rock somewhere I will step on it so I will be reminded on those mornings I would normally just forget. XD Once it becomes habit maybe I won't need a reminder, but for now that's probably helpful. And putting it into my schedule's a good idea, too. ^.^

So, what I've gained from this.... One thing that I love is that prayer helps me focus my thoughts in the right directions. Half the time I don't really even know what I'm thinking until I can say it out loud or someone else says it for me. When I pray, I can think about the things that are important to me and examine them more readily as I bring them before the Lord.

I don't have the strongest testimony of prayer ever yet, which is something I'm working on because prayer is a very important tool in our relationships with God. The reason I've always struggled with prayer is that I have a tough time determining if I'm feeling the Holy Ghost or if my mind is making things up. Not all the time, but just in general. When I have a big decision to make and my mom tells me to pray about it, I always feel bummed out because I'm so terrified of my own desires being too strong for me to know what the Lord wants for me. It frustrates me to no end, but I keep praying because sometimes I definitely do feel the Spirit and I definitely do know that the Lord hears and is answering my prayer. I know that it's a problem I have, rather than a problem with prayer itself.

On a more upbeat note, the more often I pray, the more I learn to recognize the influence of the Holy Ghost when I'm praying. I have faith that I'll continue to grow in this area as I keep praying and taking things to the Lord every day.

Anyway, from my Personal Progress journal:

I think we don't have to have real faith to kneel down and rattle off a few generic sayings every night before we go to bed, but we do have to have faith to really pray. And in return, praying with faith strengthens our faith.

Having faith that the Lord is listening to our prayers and that He cares what we have to say is necessary; if we don't have a bit of faith at all then we wouldn't even bother pretending to pray. The whole idea is that we want to converse with our Father in Heaven, because that's how relationships are strengthened. By communicating with someone, by sharing things with them.

And in turn, as we trust more and more to the Lord, we will see more and more His hand in our lives, and recognize all that He does for us, which helps to strengthen our faith and testimonies.

Faith: Value Experience 2

Okay, last post for today.

Today I completed the second Faith Value Experience:

"Discover the principles of faith taught by the mothers of Helaman’s stripling warriors. Read Alma 56:45–48 and 57:21. Review what “The Family: A Proclamation to the World” (see page 101) says about a mother’s role. With a mother, grandmother, or leader, discuss the qualities a woman needs in order to teach children to have faith and to base their decisions on gospel truths. How can these principles help you in your life today and help you prepare to be a faithful woman, wife, and mother? Record your thoughts and feelings in your journal."

I talked to my mom and Cathy about this, and there was one major idea we discussed--ultimately, I think it's the single most important one. My journal entry here:

"I guess, to me, the biggest thing I need to do is strengthen my own faith and my own testimony. The most important teaching tool I will ever have with my own children is the example I set.


If I want my children to have faith as sure as that of the stripling warriors, to know that all I teach them is true, I need to make it a part of my own life, now. Before I have children.


It is important that I learn to lean on the Lord for guidance in my life decisions. I need to strengthen my faith of gospel principles and live them in my life so that I may know for myself they are true. I need to learn patience, and forgiveness, and charity, so that I may serve my children and show them an example of how the Savior sees them, and all of us.


I have to work on these things so that my children can look at me and see that all they are being taught is true. So when I tell them things, the weight of my example will help them understand and believe."

I also want to add something I just now understand from the example of the mothers of the stripling warriors. Aside from their examples convincing the sons that what they were saying was truth, living the words they taught showed their sons that they knew it was true. The stripling warriors knew it was true because their mothers knew it was true. It is amazing how much influence mothers have on their children. I know in my own life, I depend on my mom for a lot of things. I value her wisdom and advice so very much. Even though I'm 21, I don't hesitate to run to my mom when I need something. What she says to me carries great weight. Her opinion is valuable to me.

That makes me realize that what I teach my children is so very important. If they can see without a shadow of a doubt that I know the things I am teaching them are true, they will be impressed upon that those things MUST be true. So I must strive always to teach them only what is right.

Faith Experience 1: Progress (and a blurb about the Bible)

Blah...

It hasn't quite been 2 weeks yet, but I'm going to have to start the 3-week thing over tomorrow. Establishing good spiritual habits has been such a challenge for me. I did fine at first but I seem to have plenty of excuses for not being "able" to stick with it. Maybe I'm just not feeling very spiritual one day, or I'm just too tired another...stupid reasons, but I let them slide.

But I have to keep trying. I guess the more times I try, the better the chance I have of succeeding, right? >.>


I'm not entirely sure if this is related to the value experience or not, but I learned in Institute that the way to have more meaningful prayer, to know God better, is to study the scriptures and come to know Him that way. That's another thing I struggle with. Sometimes I'll study the scriptures pretty avidly and other times I just...don't.

But I'm trying. I actually found this cool thing, Bible360, which has a lot of really cool tools and resources to help people get the most out of their Bible studies. Now, it's one of those new translations...actually, I just found out you can read the bible in 4 different translations, and one of those is the King James Version, which is the one I use, so that's okay. The thing is, though, the people who created this program aren't members of the Church, so it doesn't have footnotes the same way the LDS scriptures do (there are notes, though), or reference any scripture outside of the Bible, and some of the information they have is incomplete or incorrect--I can see a lot of differences between what other people get out of the Bible and what we get out of it. So I can't depend entirely upon Bible360 for my Bible studies. But there is a lot of great stuff in there, and I feel this will be very valuable.

I think this actually might help me gain a stronger testimony and appreciation for the Book of Mormon. So many of the things we understand, we understand because we have the Book of Mormon to clarify and confirm what the Bible says. It's such a great blessing.

To finish this little bit, I'm making a conscious effort to study the Bible along with the Book of Mormon from now on. I have tended to take for granted, or even dismiss, the Bible as scripture and the word of God. And that is really not good. We need both the Book of Mormon AND the Bible. I'm no exception to that. I have a friend who loves the Lord, and loves Christ, and loves to study his scriptures. He does the best he can to live his life the way God wants him to. And the only scriptures he reads are in the Bible. I've known this in the back of my head my whole life, that people who aren't members of the Church can still be good people and can still live Christlike lives. I just never really thought of it, consciously. And now I have this friend and it's a personal example of that. The Bible DOES contain the word of God. There IS truth in there. It IS valuable and important. If his life is based on the truths he gets solely from the Bible, and his life is good, then doesn't that mean the Bible is good?

So partly as an effort to connect with and understand him more, and partly because I know I need it, I'm making a goal to come to know the Bible.



Back to the value experience. I read all the scriptures (let me refresh my memory really quick) and I am going to read two talks on faith now....

Okay. Done with that (and I'm getting ready for a bit of a break from this intensive gospel study XD).

What I like about the talks is that they emphasize how essential it is that we have faith. One talk teaches how a foundation of faith is important for enduring the trials of life and for learning and growing from them. They can in fact be blessings as well, but only if we have the faith to recognize it.  The other talk was a bit more general, but among the key principles I gleaned from it were the fact that we must have faith in Christ because He is our salvation, and that when we are faithful the Spirit will dwell with us to guide us through life's challenges and to help us stay on the path that will lead us safely home.

What the scriptures teach.... I love all the examples in Hebrews 11 of all the many miracles that were wrought by faith. When the Lord makes promises to us, He will keep them. We have to believe that, and trust that. I love Alma's comparison of faith to a seed. Like the Primary song... "Faith is like a little seed: if planted, it will grow." When we have faith, we act upon the things the Lord desires of us. We keep His commandments and strive to serve Him and be like Him. In return, we will be blessed and our faith will grow.

In relation to prayer: one of the commandments the Lord has given us is to pray, always. I need to keep that line of communication open. Not just when I'm in need of comfort, not just when I'm eating food or at church, but constantly. Praying always will bless me firstly because I am keeping a commandment, and secondly because that is how I can receive direction. Like Joseph Smith did. If he had not had faith that the words he read in James were true, that he would receive an answer to his prayer, he would not have been the prophet who brought about the restoration of the gospel. He would not have had Heavenly Father and Jesus Christ appear to him and tell him that no church upon the earth at that time was the right and true church.

I don't really expect anything so drastic in my life. But I need direction in my life, especially at this point. I have lots of decisions to make that will affect the rest of my life, and I can't do it without the guidance of the Holy Ghost. I believe that praying and asking in faith, and building up that relationship with the Lord, will help me to make the right choices and bring blessings of comfort and peace into my heart.

I shall come back to this value experience in 3 weeks' time.

My new calling

I was released from my callings in Relief Society today and I am now the branch's Primary Music Leader. I will miss the opportunity I had to teach in Relief Society, and I love the lessons and whatnot, but I think that Primary will be a great source of blessings.

Firstly, I was in a similar calling a few years back (only I believe I was the second counselor in the Primary presidency in the branch then, and the music was a part of my duties), and that was a bad time in my life. I was off doing my own thing and I wasn't dependable or responsible. I rarely showed up for church and I let the rest of the presidency down. Made it harder on them. I don't remember everything, but I think part of it had to do with me not wanting to do the work to plan music time and also a lesson for sharing time every so often. So I just...didn't go. And I felt bad for doing it, so I was depressed and felt unworthy to go to church, and it just became a cycle of unhappiness all around. I feel like this is a chance for me to repent of that and move forward. Forgive myself. Know that I have come a long way since then. I've always kind of felt guilty in relation to Primary in general since then, and I think this will help me finally release all that pent-up misery I have.
That reminds me, I also need to apologize to the person who was Primary president back then. I'm sure I can find a way to get a hold of the person who was first counselor, too. I think that's part of why I haven't been able to move on. I think they've both forgiven me already, but I never said sorry.

Another reason I'm excited is that I get to work with kids and this is another opportunity I have to pick up teaching skills for when I'm a parent someday. A lot of the kids are hyperactive and kinda crazy, so this will help me further hone my patience. Which I'll be grateful for; I could use the practice. XD

Finally, I think this goes along with wanting to work through the Personal Progress manual for Young Women. It represents a sort of back to basics thing. Line upon line, precept on precept; the best way for me to strengthen my faith and gain an unshakable testimony of the gospel is to work on the principles first. You must have a foundation before you can build upon it. I will be there with the kids and hear the things they are being taught. I can look for the lessons in the songs I teach and strengthen my testimony that way.

So I am looking forward to this. It may not be easy, who knows, and maybe I'll feel like procrastinating a bunch, but I know that the Lord will bless me as I serve in this calling and that I have a wonderful opportunity to make a positive impression in the lives of these young children.

Value: Faith

Wow, okay, this is new. The way the site is set up and stuff.

Anyway.

I'm not actually all that positive where my old Personal Progress manual is, and it's a bit outdated anyway, so today I remembered (finally) to look it up on the church website. And I found it, woohoo!

So, starting from the beginning...Faith.

"Faith is not to have a perfect knowledge of things; therefore if ye have faith ye hope for things which are not seen, which are true (Alma 32:21).

I am a daughter of Heavenly Father, who loves me. I have faith in His eternal plan, which centers on Jesus Christ, my Savior.''

That is from the Personal Progress manual.

Okay, this is really cool--I just found out, the manual on the website is interactive and I can save my progress there and stuff. I definitely am going to use that tool. AWESOME!

So, the first Value Experience is this:

"The first principle of the gospel is faith in the Lord Jesus Christ. Learn about faith from the scriptures and living prophets. Read Hebrews 11; Alma 32:17–43;Ether 12:6–22; and Joseph Smith—History 1:11–20. Read two general conference talks on faith. Exercise your own faith by establishing a habit of prayer in your life. Begin by regularly saying your morning and evening prayers. After three weeks of following this pattern, discuss with a parent or leader what you have learned about faith and how daily personal prayer has strengthened your faith. In your journal express your feelings about faith and prayer."

I'm too tired at this moment to do the reading I need to do, but I definitely can start the prayer part tonight. I don't know if I'm going to just do one experience at a time or if I'm going to have others I'm working on at the same time, so I'll figure more of that out later.... For now, though, I'll be checking in at least once a week while I'm doing this experience. I'll probably post my thoughts about the scriptures I read, and the talks, and beyond that...we'll see. =)

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One thing I'm already doing that I think will help strengthen my faith is paying tithing. I was terrible at it before. Sometimes I'd pay, and then I'd just stop, or else I wouldn't do it in the first place. This year, though, I've been determined to be a full tithe payer. I want to be able to go to the temple, and I can't do that without paying tithing.

And it feels good, when I put the checks in an envelope and hand them to a member of the Branch Presidency. I don't even notice the money going, and so far I've never been tempted to pull money out of my "tithing" account for any reason. I don't have enough of a history paying tithing regularly to have had any significant experiences that demonstrate the blessings that come from paying tithing--but that's not what it's about. It's about thanking the Lord for everything He's blessed me with by giving a portion of it back to him. I'm starting to gain a testimony of that--right now it's just some faith and intellectual understanding, but I have faith that as I keep on with this, my heart will change so that I don't feel like I "have" to pay tithing, but I will feel that I "want" to. It will feel a privilege instead of a duty.

I look forward to that day. =)