Skip to main content

Listening to the Prophets and Apostles

I listened to most of conference today and I thought I'd write some thoughts before they leave me. It is always frustrating when you think of so many things that uplift you and make you want to do better and then you forget. I wrote notes and so I hope I will go back and look at them and set my goals to be better.

I loved all the talks I heard but there were a few talks that really stuck out to me the most. The first one is by President Dieter F. Uchtdorf. He spoke of Hope. I was so grateful to hear his words. I feel that I am blessed with always having some hope in things. I don't feel like I'm a negative person and I try to see the good side of things instead of the bad. It still is hard sometimes to find hope in the future when it is so unpredictable. President Uchtdorf talked about how hope gives us eternal happiness. How could we be happy if we do not have hope? He also said that "with hope we can have patience and go through our afflictions." (I didn't write down notes word for word so if you happen to be looking for his exact words than you'll have to find those somewhere else.)

The part of his talk that really hit me the most is that happiness and blessings will not only be given in the next life but in this one as well. This is something that I've heard time and again but it didn't mean as much to me as it does now. I was thinking that I can't wait until after we are out of this world so that we can experience all the happiness and not be burdened with the temptations of Satan and the many trials that the earth brings us. I still am excited for that, but I needed to be thinking more of the happiness that I can have on this earth now. I do experience so much happiness and it seems like it always comes from family. They give me more happiness than I could ever get from any worldly experience or thing. So I want to have more hope in this life that I'm living right now.

Elder D. Todd Christofferson spoke a great talk about Zion. That is something that I've been studying about with my husband and so it was nice to hear from an Apostle about the same subject. His main points of what Zion consists of is that the people have unity, Godliness and charity. He talked about a lot of things I liked and I wish that our stakes could have more of these attributes to make our own Zion. We are able to do it. There shouldn't be anything stopping us. I realized that I should be working on being better so that if there is a Zion then I could be apart of it.

Now the last one that I'll mention was from Elder Bednar. I like listening to him. He is straightforward and easy to understand. He talked about prayer and why we should have morning prayers. He said that the Lord said that he created everything spiritually in heaven before it was physically on earth. He related that to our morning prayers. We should start our days spiritually before we go through our physical responsibilities. We need those prayers to help us during our days in all the decisions we make. Then he said that evening prayers are like a report of our day of how we did. We should give thanks for the Lords help that day and to repent of those things we did wrong that day. I have realized how easy it is to sin and how many reminders we need all day to keep us in line. Everything that Heavenly Father has commanded us to do: pray morning and night, read our scriptures with our family and by ourselves, have family home evening, go to church every week, and go to the temple are there to help us. Heavenly Father knows how easy it is for us to forget and how powerful Satan is tempting us.

Well tomorrow is more conference and I'm excited to hear more. I'm excited about the 5 temples that were announced today. It is wonderful to see the church getting bigger all the time. I wish I could let people know what they are missing. We are all so loved by our Lord and His Son. I'm so overly grateful for them and for the Holy Ghost to help me day after day.

Comments

Patty said…
I never look at this blog but I plan to begin. I enjoy the little reminders and the new education that comes. I liked the talk by Elder Bednar as well because I need a constant reminder to pray in the mornings. I have always had a hard time with this and I plan to start my goal yet again. Thanks Michelle.

Popular posts from this blog

In The Arms of Safety

  16  And thus a mercy can satisfy the demands of b justice , and encircles them in the arms of safety, while he that exercises no faith unto repentance is exposed to the whole law of the demands of c justice ; therefore only unto him that has faith unto repentance is brought about the great and eternal d plan of e redemption . The key phrase in this scripture that I love is "in the arms of safety."  I have been given the path to feel safe in Jesus Christ's arms. I am very grateful for the physical safety I enjoy every day, but I am also grateful for the spiritual safety I can enjoy when I follow Jesus Christ. When I'm following his footsteps as best as i can, I feel that safety. It is a gift that He has given me and everyone. Of course, it isn't easy and it requires faith in the atonement and Jesus Christ, but the joy you can feel doing it is worth it.

War - Force or Freedom

I have been looking at war in a different way lately. This quote from Spencer W. Kimball struck me when I heard it today and I wanted to share it here ( June 1976 First Presidency Message ): "In spite of our delight in defining ourselves as modern, and our tendency to think we possess a sophistication that no people in the past ever had—in spite of these things, we are, on the whole, an idolatrous people—a condition most repugnant to the Lord. "We are a warlike people, easily distracted from our assignment of preparing for the coming of the Lord. When enemies rise up, we commit vast resources to the fabrication of gods of stone and steel—ships, planes, missiles, fortifications—and depend on them for protection and deliverance. When threatened, we become antienemy instead of pro-kingdom of God; we train a man in the art of war and call him a patriot, thus, in the manner of Satan’s counterfeit of true patriotism, perverting the Savior’s teaching: "'Lov...

To Be Humble

Trials come into my life just like everyone else. They teach me and humble me. Life is pretty good right now. We just moved into a new house. I have definitely seen the Lord's hands in my life. He has blessed me to find an amazing man that makes me very happy. Our children have loved each other and for the most part, gotten along great. Our path has been a steady flow of progression, which has helped me know that it is the right one. The Lord's timing is so much better than my own. After I married my husband close to two years ago, our blended family moved into his parents home. His parents built their home over 30 years ago. They moved out to live with my husband's grandfather, because he was no longer able to be left alone. Less than a year after we moved in, his grandfather passed away. We started wondering where and when we need to move. We didn't feel the prompting to move until close to a year afterwards. It was time to sell the home we were renting. Our financi...