Heidi Swinton

Listening to sister Heidi Swinton, who wrote the biography of President Thomas S. Monson, was such a privilege. The spirit was so strong in tuesdays devotional, it testified to me the truthfulness of President Monson as the holy prophet called of God. I'm grateful that Sister Swinton was able to speak to us.

She shared a scripture in Jacob, "We knew of christ and had a hope of his glory and also all of the holy prophets which were before us wherefore we search the prophets and we have many revelations and the spirit of prophecy and having all these witnesses we obtain a hope and our faith becometh unshaken insomuch that we truly can command in the name of jesus christ, and the very trees obey us or the mountains or the waves of the sea"

Do you have that kind of faith in Jesus Christ? and then place into that the reverence "wherefore we search the prophets", because from the prophets can come to that understanding of Jesus Christ and help us to develop that faith in him that can move mountains.

Everyone has some sort of a mountain in front of them that seems very hard to climb. what do we do about that? Where do we go for the guidance, direction and help so we can essentially move mountains? What do you do about those things in your life that seem to be berriors to where it is you want to go, that seem to stop you dead in your tracks sometimes, or that just seam to eat at you?

Where do you turn? You turn to the Lord Jesus Christ.

He is so conscious of what's in front of us and the power we need to face it, that he has given us a prophet that is on the earth today, a living prophet.

There is no other church today with a living prophets with the priesthood power and all the keys that Thomas S Monson holds. He is the lords chosen prophet on the earth today. If you know that and have a testimony that Thomas S Monson is a prophet of God then everything else in the church will fall in line. You will come to understand all of the doctrines and principals on the plan of salvation. He is the one on earth given the responsibility to speak for God. What they give us to understand simply adds to our capacity to receive that faith and that spirit of the lord jesus christ.

There have only been 16 prophets in this dispensation.

President Monson when he is speaking to you is speaking to you one by one.

Sister Swinton shared the story how she was called by President Monson to write his biography. Sister Swintion at the time was on the mission field with her husband as mission president. It was in interesting experience. She had the office send her all the talks he had ever given. As she read every talk the words of Jacob took a whole new meaning to her, what it meant to search the words of the prophets. There will be things that the spirit knows you need to hear, as you listen for those things know that they are messages coming from the lord. Know that when you go to conference those words spoken are for you individually with that same spiritual strength behind them, that the lord is speaking to you through his prophet of God. There is no one else on the earth who has that same kind of responsibility or connection to you individually then our prophet Thomas s Monson. If you are not sure about about your testimony of Thomas s Monson as the prophet if you okay that he is a prophet then get down on your knees and pray for a witness that he indeed is the prophet today, that he speaks for God and that those words are for you. The spirit can answer that prayer in your heart, and once you know that you are a different person. To see him and hear him and study his life and his words gives you access to the strength and the power described in that verse, "Our faith becometh unshaken" our faith in Jesus Christ, his representative on the earth as his prophet Is Thomas S Monson.

Everybody is carrying a burden on their shoulders, everyone has something that they are trying to work through and they are in your eyes mountains and trees and waves of the seas, there is power and strength in the words of a prophet to help you grasp what to do next.

Think about what president Monson has asked us to do, what has come into your heart and your mind as you have heard this prophet of god speak to you?

President Monson grew up in a very humble environment. God placed him in a home where he could come to understand that charity is the pure love of Christ.

Its not the rescue of people stranded someplace, Its the rescue of individuals of people who have lost contact with who they are. Everyone of us at one point that will have one of those moments when we ask ourselves heavenly father are you really there? President Monson is a prophet of god and conforms to us that not only is heavenly father really there but he has put someone in front of us to lead us and guide us and what he is teaching us to do is reach out and care for one another it is a remarkable message. President Monson is teaching us to follow prompting. When the spirit prompts us, what we may be asked to do is move the mountain for someone else. That the spirit may be saying you have the faith and you have been given the assignment go move a mountain, and we say mmm not right now.... think about those times in your life when people have come to you and it was at the right then. Have you recognized the lords hand in your life, we learn that from president Monson time and time again. President Monson told a story of how he was prompted to ask a gas station attendant clerk who was young and had a style with piercing everywhere, if he was getting ready to go on a mission, the man responded with " i don't really go to church anymore." It was several months later that the young man as his parents were watching general conference saw man at the gas station that asked him if he was preparing to go on a mission. Because President Monson acted on that prompting this young man went on a mission and is now married in the temple. He had written to president Monson from the mission field and told what had happened in his life.

Do you get those kinds of promptings from the spirit, and when you get them do you act upon them?

D&C 84:88 I will go before your face i will be on your right hand and on your left, my spirit will be in your hearts and mine angels round about you to bear you up." the lord often uses us to be his hands and be the angels and we have to be prepared to do that. The impression comes into our hearts. We are those angels. If we put the pieces together we suddenly understand that faith in the lord Jesus Christ is not just for us at a solitary life moving forward, but faith in the lord Jesus Christ lead by a prophet of god is the power to make a difference in this world. We can change the landscape but more importantly we can change lives.

Search the prophets understand their words grasp what in their lives makes a difference in your life.

Steven C. Wheelwright- Setting worthy goals

Sorry i didn't post this up earlier, i got sick. But this talk was amazing none the less.

President Wheelwright started his talk with setting worthy goals and explained how, when you are younger you set goals so know where your going and you feel like you're making progress. He went on to say that one of the primary reasons why we set goals later on in life is not only to make sure we're on the track we want to be on, and heading for the end goals we would like to achieve its also so we can find a balance in our own lives.
It was so sweet, he had his wife talk to us about their experiences in setting and keeping goals, when their life was hectic. She mentioned that through his job when he had to travel a lot they came up with a goal of how he be an involved husband and father. They decided one way he can spend more meaningful time with his children was to take each of them on an individual trip to where ever he went. As the children got older and started leaving home, his job started wot slow down, but one of the things he wanted was to spend more time with his shrinking family. He told his wife that he had taped a note to the telephone in his office that read "would i rather do this then spend time with my family?" and so every time an offer to travel came up, he would read that note and turned down 90% of those trips.
After his wife made an end of her speaking, president wheelwright spoke about how we can actually set goals.
He shared a story of how he received a letter from a former missionary that asked him 2 specific questions.
#1 How did you come to know exactly what rout to pursue and why?
#2 What goals did you have for your career as you started your career?
As graduation was coming up, he and his wife were unsure what path he should take.
Setting effective goals can have a great impact on your peace of mind, your confidence, and most importantly where you're going to end up.

He gave us 3 simple aspects of setting worthy goals.

1. Understanding the blessings that come from worthy goals as outlined in the scriptures and by the prophets.
   The lord and his father in heaven have a very specific goal for us, which is immortality and eternal life. The savior as he related to his apostles has a specific goal in mind with regards to this life, which is life eternal is to know the only true god and Jesus Christ. these are specific goals and they have great blessings attached.
   Joseph smith said in D&C 58 that we need to be anxiously engaged in a good cause and do many things of our on free will and choice. We need to decide what is the intermediate path that is going to lead us to these very long term worthy goals. The lord expects us to make our choices, because he gave us free agency. The choices that we make about our goals will impact our ability to reach the long term goal that God and Christ have for each of us.
   
   How are we going to decided whats between here and the end of our lives and be prepared for the eternities?
   When you think about goals think about Matthew chapter 6. he gave specific scriptures.
   Matt 6:19
   Matt 6:24
   Matt 6:33
   proverbs 3:5 trust in the lord with all thine heart and lean not unto thine own understanding
   If we try and set goals that are too specific we end up closing off the options that the lord has for us because we are leaning to our own understanding. Let him direct you.
   


2. Types of goals that you might consider setting (3 types of goals)
   Josephs from Egypt's story. Look at his goals.
   
   A. Joseph knows who he is, he is the son of a patriarch and the son of a loving heavenly father. His identity is a type of goal, is that of being a worthy, righteous, Faithful son. and you see this throughout his life. His First goal is to be worthy son of a loving father, and loving heavenly father. Who are you? how do you identify yourself?
   
   B. His second goals is how he will conduct himself. the way he will do his work is with integrity. What characterizes your behavior and the way you do things? Setting standers.
   
   His temporal success was due to the first two goals that he had set, knowing himself and characterizing his behavior with integrity.What are the challenges in setting following and achieving your goals.
   
   C. Set Temporal Goals. Its is fine to have temporal goals. As long as they are worthy.
   
   


3. What are the challenges in setting, following, and achieving these types of goals. Seek the council of god in everything you do. If you will seek his council he will lead you down a path that will give you far more opportunity then you would ever imagine for yourself.

Brian K. Taylor - Faith, Hope, Cherity

Brain Taylor's talk was truly inspired, he opened it with his testimony.
He told us that he felt impressed to change his talk to faith, hope, and Charity.

"You have a mission you have a purpose and a divine destiny in heavenly fathers plan. I know there are some of you thinking 'not me not right now, i don't even know what I'm going to do next" Faith hope Charity of Christ will lift you
He gave an analogy of balloons. He got 3 balloons, one out of the 3 have helium in it. Explaining that he hopes his stories will put helium in our balloon.

#1
"My wife and I were looking for a house, wanting to stay in bountiful. We looked for 2 years. One day i read a scripture that changed my thinking. What am i going to do next what am i supposed to do, where am i supposed to go, what am i supposed to be?
1 Nephi 17:13 we realized rather then drive around, we would be better at keeping Gods commandments. as you go into situations and you turn to the lord and make a commitment to obey the commandments just a little bit better each day, that he will be your light in the wilderness and you will arrive at you promise land."

#2
"When i was at BYU before one of our basketball games we meet with Ezra Taft Benson. he said 'your basketball team has the spirit, the spirit will be your greatest asset on the basketball court, it will do more for you then all your talents combined. what ever your righteous desires you goals,if you have the spirit you will be successful. IF you don't, you wont.'
As we obey the commandments this will allow the spirit to be in our lives. If you need repentance and to change, if you don't; don't kid yourselves, you will be like the 2 balloons sitting on the floor. We can not progress when there is something that stands in the way of the helium, or the holy ghost that is taking us where we are supposed to be. 2 Nephi 32:5 and Maroni 10 by the power of the holy ghost you will know all things what ye should do. This is the gift that will lift us to where we need to go, where ever we are right now. We need to do what ever is necessary for the companionship of the holy ghost"

#3
"When times are tough there are scriptures there. In Jacob we read, 'the word that healeth the wounded soul.' Alma 58 'there for we did pour out our souls in prayer to god, that he would strengthen us...and it came to pass that the lord our god did visit us with assurances that he would deliver us...'
The word protect is in the scriptures 33 times and the word Deliver is in the scriptures 939 times. The lord truly is our deliverer. The Lord promises that as we seek to obey the commandments and pour out our soul in prayer, that he will visit us with assurances and cause us to have great faith in him...
1 Nephi 24:15 if we hold fast and hearken to the word of god we will never perish. All the answers to the vexing problems and concerns of life will be answered with the living word of God, from the prophets, seers, and revelatory of our time."

He told us to go PRO. Pray.Read.Obay. everyday
"As we do these small simple and things the helium will come back into our balloon, the holy ghost will lift us and we will be lead along, ultimately getting to where our promise land is."

#4
"Where can i turn for peace. Trumen G. Manson was once driving to the temple with his stake president in a dark stormy night. The temple president said to him. "The temple is never more beautiful then during a storm"
"Know ye not that you are a temple of god and that the spirit of god dwelleth in you?"
He has great faith in you.
Let this be a motto you can take.

Make the word of God part of your life and you will be lifted up.
Do the things you need to do to put the helium into your balloon (have the holy ghost in you life)

Brent Cherrington-Follow Through

Devotional opened with a talk about judgments. John 8:7 if every one sins how can we judge, how can we exclude people from being in our social circles, how can we condemn anyone? with what judgement ye judge ye will be judge Matthew 7:2. We are expected to follow the spirits guidance in making good judgments. Only Jesus can judge us and others. We need to reach out to those who have fallen away, not judge them but help them come back to the gospel.

Brother Cherrington gave a remarkable talk. He was impressed to talk about the follow through to our decisions.

"Our goals are the same, but our paths are different... through the atonement we can be sanctified from sin."

He referenced 1 Nephi 8:20-25 talking about Lehi's vision of the tree of life. He explaining that there were 2 groups in the story, the first group wanted to go to the tree but got lost on their way to the tree of life. The second group found the path and partook of the fruit, but then were ashamed. "They lacked follow through" he said.

Following through is important in all aspects of life, if we didn't have to follow through life would be very different, things could be ignored, but the consequences would eventually mount up. "We need to follow through on our decisions."

He gave us 4 simple principles that we can do to improve our follow through to our decisions.

1. Gain Control of our time. "we need to control it, not it control us."


2. Control our thoughts "When the lord repeats himself, its because it is important."


3. Respond to impressions "The more often a person feels without acting, the less he will be ever able to act, and in the long run the less he will be ever able to feel."


4. Become what we want to be "Consistently be what we want to become each day"

Gain control of your time. We don't know how much time we have and that is why we must guard the time that we do have, he said not to mistake what he was saying as not to have fun in our lives he just wants us to control our time and not have it control us.
"All work and no play makes Jack a dull boy; all play and no work makes Jack a mere toy"- Irish proverb Brother Cherrington said we shouldn't do things to just pass the time. Remember your goals and work to reach them.

Gain control of your thoughts. Pondering can help us with our follow through. The results of pondering forms the basis opinions and later actions.

Do we make time for thoughts or are they just a result of our thinking? There can be others sources for our thoughts, negative thoughts come from a source of the advisory, and positive thoughts could be from the source of heaven.

D&C 42:61 "Revaluation upon Revaluation, Knowledge upon Knowledge"

Boyd k Packer "The world grows increasingly noise, clothing and grooming and conduct are looser and sloppier. Irreverence suits the purposes of the advisory, by obstructing the delicate channels of revelation in both mind and in spirit"

If we minimize the noise, improving our dress, and conduct, we will be able to do a better job of following through with our commitments and know gods will for us. We need to take time to interact with each other. We can learn so much from each other. We should take the time to recreate with your peers.

Listen to your feelings. "Active habits are strengthened by repetition but passive ones are weakened" The more often a person feels without acting, the less he will be ever able to act, and in th long run the less he will be ever able to feel.

if we respond to the impressions of the spirit the lord will trust us with more impressions. The lord will be as involved in our lives as let him be. We are the lords hands and often the answer to other peoples prayers.

Our feelings are given us to excite to action, and when they end in themselves they are cherished to no good purpose.

Become what we want to be. "Be what the lord wants us to be." We each have a vision of ourselves that is our ideal selves, it is the "natural man" that gets in the way of that vision. It is easy to procrastinate what we want to become. Set goals both long and short term.

"The road to our ideal self is not a short trip, Its a life long journey."

We must learn to overcome the natural man. Decide who you want to be, and then sail off in that direction, taking the time to make mid course corrections if necessary.

Mosiah 3:19

Elder Gunnerson - Don't lose Focus

Elder Gunnerson had an amazing talk, you really missed out if you didn't attend. He touched on a couple of things through out his talk but one that stood out the most was putting the savior in the center of our hearts, and to become more like him.

Elder Gunnerson shared with us an experience he had when he was 15 years old. It was a typical Sunday, even though Elder Gunnersons ward had priesthood and Sunday school in the morning and regathered for sacrament in the afternoon. On his way to Sunday school he had been offended by something a church leader had said. Elder Gunnerson decided to walk home, and considered not retuning to church ever again. Elder Gunnerson's father went home to look for him after he was told his son was no longer at church. "This was one of thoughts defining moments," shared Elder Gunnerson. He sat knee to knee and eye to eye with his father, as his father taught him an important lesson in life. His father drew 2 stick figures on a sheet of paper, one was Jesus and the other was Elder Gunnerson, in between them he drew another stick figure and said "this is elder so-and-so, my councilor."

He then proceeded to draw a line from Elder Gunnerson's head to the councilor's head and from there to the head of Jesus. After he did this he asked what's the problem here. Elder Gunnerson didn't understand what it represented. His father then explained, you can not see Jesus because of elder so-and-so. His father said,"Son, please don't ever let anyone or anything stand between you and Jesus."

After this father-son talk he went back to church and has never left since.

What happened to him that didn't allow him to see the savior?

"There are many distractions in life school work, family, activities, etc. If we are not careful we can get easily distracted from what is most important.

Someone offends us, we start running around with wrong friends. We may feel alone, we may feel we're not as good as others who seem to have everything going right.

These are ploys of Satan, sometimes they are subtle and sometimes they are direct."

Elder Gunnerson quoted Isaiah, saying that in the latter-days many would stumble and fall. It is our duty to reach out to those who are stumbling. If it was not for his father who reached out to him when he had stumbled, Elder Gunnerson might not have been able to get back on his feet.

"In all that we do we can not lose our focus of [Jesus] by embracing less important things such as studies, career or anything else."

"The essence of Christianity is not Christianity, the essence of Christianity is Christ."

"The study of great books of scripture including the king James bible is clear, they are through the spirit to bring us to Jesus."

We must help each other understand what is most important, Elder Gunnerson spoke of Lehi and his dream. He said the reason that Lehi had the dream was because of his concern for Laman and Lemual. Laman and Lemual although raised from good parents, had allowed something or someone to get between them and the savior.

Elder Gunnerson said these are thing Nephi had as to not become like his brothers.

• Desire
• Prayer
• Inspiration
• Humble attitude

Nephi like his father didn't allow anything or anyone get between him and the savior.

If you are spiritually strong Satan might not come at you directly, but in a different way so you will not notice. It takes our best efforts to withstand Satan's attacks and we must be diligent and prepared.

"We need to have our eyes focused on light, not truth in some abstract sense but, the joy of keeping the gospel of Jesus Christ and, the Joy of not having anything or anyone come in between you and your savior. If I decide I will not make light and the savior my primary vision I'm already out of the contest to see good, and to want and desire it in the midst of filth" -President Iring

In directing our life if we have as a foundation the savior and His doctrines we will find the ability and power to withstand Satan in times we lest expect.

Our focus needs to be on Him, the savior, not on lesser truths. Nothing should ever come between us and him.

"When you center your life on Jesus you will then have the foundation and the power to overcome any obstacles and difficulty, and be able to bless everyone you come in contact, you will become a true disciple. You will become an image of him to bless and bless and bless again until blessings become what you are."

-Elder Gunnerson.

Are you making Jesus Christ the center of you life?

Did you lose focus?

Elder Barfuss- Be Steadfast and Immoveable

Kristine Butler gave a short talk on how life is like a road trip. She talked about avoiding distractions. Often we must slow down, embrace it, and learn from it.

G. Andrew Barfuss was the main speaker. He spoke about being steadfast and immovable. He told a story about a water pipe that burst and caused thousands of dollars in damage just because the thrust block shifted 1/16th of an inch. (The thrust block is what keeps the pipe together where the pipe turns a corner.)
He spoke of the great sin of being casual. He said that we should make sure our mistakes are sincere and never casual. Casualness causes Heavenly Father much sorrow.

Faithfulness is consistency. He spoke of the club that most of us find ourselves members of: The Better-Offer Club. We agree to do something, but then change our minds as soon as another offer that is better comes up. Example: "Sure I will eat dinner at your house (unless I get invited to a party that night)." This causes us to break promises.

He talked about how, in the Book of Ether, the brother of Jared became casual and stopped asking the Lord where to go or what to do when they encountered the beautiful land of Nimrod. He got a severe chastisement from the Lord.

Three things we can do to become more steadfast and immovable:
1. We can discern between good things and distracting things by increasing the amount of light in our lives. When we find a bad habit, we should be willing to do anything necessary to stop. Don't be afraid to seek help from the Lord and Church leaders. 90% obedience still isn't pleasing to the Lord. Go for 100%.
2. Be willing to do things that are hard but worthwhile. God doesn't seek to make our lives easy, but enables us to do hard things. We can take pleasure in the accomplishing of hard tasks. D&C 88:32
3. Remember how the Lord blesses us. Don't forget what He does for us to succeed.

Happiness- A Choice

This week Elder Kevin Pearson spoke to us.

I enjoyed how vibrant this man was. He said a lot of good things and he spoke quickly, so I was only able to get a few of the things down. 

I enjoyed how he talked about the two best decisions he ever made. They were serving a mission and getting married. He explained that everything good in his life came from those two choices. I also have made those choices and I have to say my life has been better because of them.

So the main theme of Elder Pearson's remarks were about happiness. He said that people who are happy do better in life, get better jobs and positions, have happier marriages, etc. But in order to be happy we need to understand the doctrine of happiness. He explained that happiness is a principle, like we've been learning in class. We need to live according to the plan of happiness in order to be happy. We know this plan, but he asked if we live according to it daily? Are  we reading our scriptures, having meaningful prayer, and going to church faithfully? If not then we won't be happy.

Another good point that I enjoyed is that the thought process of: If I only had this... I'd be happy. He said that is delusional thinking. Happiness is a choice we make, and is not based on obtaining things. 

He gave us three principles to obtain true happiness. They are:

1. Decide to be happy. If you're not happy, change your attitude. 
2. Keep the commandments (be obedient)
3. Seek always to have the companionship of the Holy Ghost.

I really enjoyed this devotional and it has helped me realize that I need to work on choosing to be happy and being an agent to act, not letting outside forces influence my level of happiness.