Lesson - Do you Believe?

I gave the lesson yesterday.  We had a great time with having the young women come into our first Sunday lesson.  (They always do!!)  I took my lesson from several different talks.

Do I Believe?  Bonnie L. Oscarson

Safety for the Soul--Elder Jeffrey R. Holland

Hold Fast to the Rod--Elder Danile L. Johnson

All excellent talks.  I would recommend you look them up and read them.  Very powerful!!
Sister Oscarson shares a story about a young mother who needed to find out really whether she truly believed in what she had been taught all her life.  Is the church true, or is it not.  She had a very sick little boy who was being life flighted to Primary Children's Medical Center.  As she was sitting in the front of the helicopter she could see all the temples in the Salt Lake Valley.  At that moment she was so grateful that she did believe and that she had the peace she needed at that time because of her beliefs.  We all come to a point in our lives where we need to know for ourselves.

She asks--Do we sometimes become so accustomed to the blessings we have been given as members of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints that we fail to fully comprehend the miracle and majesty of discipleship in the Lord's true Church? 

Are we ever guilty of being complacent about the greatest gift we can be offered in this life?

If we believe that:
We have the only true church
That the Book of Mormon is true
That Jesus Christ is our Savior
That we are the very same church that existed back when Christ was on the earth
That we have living prophets
That families can be eternal
That we can save our ancestors
That we can perform saving ordinances for ourselves and others
That we have Holy Temples
Then we have the greatest message of hope and help that the world has ever known.....
We can add so many more wonderful things to that list of principles and doctrines we believe in.
We are so blessed.
We have a knowledge of these things, but do we believe them?
We need to get the gospel from our heads into our hearts!!
She goes on to talk about the question that is asked of her often...
"What is the greatest challenge our youth face today?
Her answer:  The ever present influence of the "Great and Spacious building" in our lives.
And that lead us to discussion Lehi's vision.
We talked about the 4 groups of people that either made it or tried to make it to the "Tree of Life."
A mist of darkness comes over all of us and we need to continually hang on to that Iron Rod which is the word of God to make it through this life.  NOT EASY!!
Elder Holland makes the statement that "Men's hearts shall fail them in the last days."  We talked about what that meant too.
You can study Lehi's dream in 1 Nephi 8.  It's great to see just which group you belong to.  And what group you would like to belong to.  I vote group 3!!  I pray for all of us to continually strive to hang on!!  Sometimes we need to look at our lives and see what we need to do better at.  The key word here is continually!!  Not just when we're in a crisis!  We need to continually study and pray and come to church and read the words of the living prophets and support our neighbors. Gain a testimony for ourselves of the Book of Mormon.
We had a great discussion and I am so grateful for all that participated!!

We missed you if you couldn't be with us!!.  Please come and join us.