While most of our pictures are from things surrounding the weekend, the most impactful thing will be the words and the talks given and and how they will change us as parents and followers of Christ. The conference was very focussed on the restoration of the gospel and how that is ongoing today.
This conference was very different in that it was held from an auditorium in church headquarters with only those speaking or praying attending the conference. All others participated digitally, but watching online or on TV. This is of course due to COVID-19 and the ongoing pandemic.
I am grateful for all of the messages, but a couple stood out in particular.
-President Nelson shared a message called, "Hear Him" and shared the following:
For example, whenever He has introduced His Only Begotten Son to mortals upon the earth, He has done so with remarkably few words. On the Mount of Transfiguration to Peter, James, and John, God said, “This is my beloved Son: hear him.”9 His words to the Nephites in ancient Bountiful were “Behold my Beloved Son, in whom I am well pleased, in whom I have glorified my name—hear ye him.”10 And to Joseph Smith, in that profound declaration that opened this dispensation, God simply said, “This is My Beloved Son. Hear Him!”11
Now, my dear brothers and sisters, consider the fact that in these three instances just mentioned, just before the Father introduced the Son, the people involved were in a state of fear and, to some degree, desperation.
The Apostles were afraid when they saw Jesus Christ encircled by a cloud on the Mount of Transfiguration.
The Nephites were afraid because they had been through destruction and darkness for several days.
Joseph Smith was in the grips of a force of darkness just before the heavens opened.
Our Father knows that when we are surrounded by uncertainty and fear, what will help us the very most is to hear His Son.
Because when we seek to hear—truly hear—His Son, we will be guided to know what to do in any circumstance.
The very first word in the Doctrine and Covenants is hearken.12 It means “to listen with the intent to obey.”13 To hearken means to “hear Him”—to hear what the Savior says and then to heed His counsel. In those two words—“Hear Him”—God gives us the pattern for success, happiness, and joy in this life. We are to hear the words of the Lord, hearken to them, and heed what He has told us!
As we seek to be disciples of Jesus Christ, our efforts to hear Him need to be ever more intentional. It takes conscious and consistent effort to fill our daily lives with His words, His teachings, His truths.
We simply cannot rely upon information we bump into on social media. With billions of words online and in a marketing-saturated world constantly infiltrated by noisy, nefarious efforts of the adversary, where can we go to hear Him?
He they told us that we can hear Him by studying the scriptures and His words and by being in the Temple. As we live in and through perilous times, we must learn to hear His words in the scriptures and listen quietly in the temple to be receptive to the messages he has for us. I am excited to work to Hear His voice better through my own study and temple attendance.-President Nelson also announced a new church symbol of the resurrected savior. The purpose is to help us continue to make sure we recognize this is Jesus Christ's church and we should remember him.
-President Nelson invited all members and the entire world to participate in another worldwide fast to seek God's help to lessen the impacts of the Coronavirus.
-President Nelson announced new temples including in Dubai and a Temple in Shanghai that will be for live ordinances only. It is miraculous to seek the work of the Lord move forward. One thing that struck me is that someone mentioned a prophecy that thousands of temples will dot the earth. I am excited as we continue to build temples.
-Elder Holland shared an incredible message of hope. I wish I could copy the whole thing here, but I'll include one of my favorite excerpts below:
In addition to having these global desires, many in this audience today have deeply personal hopes: hope for a marriage to improve, or sometimes just hope for a marriage; hope for an addiction to be conquered; hope for a wayward child to come back; hope for physical and emotional pain of a hundred kinds to cease. Because the Restoration reaffirmed the foundational truth that God does work in this world, we can hope, we should hope, even when facing the most insurmountable odds. That is what the scripture meant when Abraham was able to hope against hope13—that is, he was able to believe in spite of every reason not to believe—that he and Sarah could conceive a child when that seemed utterly impossible. So, I ask, “If so many of our 1820 hopes could begin to be fulfilled with a flash of divine light to a mere boy kneeling in a patch of trees in upstate New York, why should we not hope that righteous desires and Christlike yearnings can still be marvelously, miraculously answered by the God of all hope?” We all need to believe that what we desire in righteousness can someday, someway, somehow yet be ours.
There were many messages about the restoration and the role Joseph Smith played in restoring Christ's church on the earth. I have received my own witness, that Joseph Smith was called to be a prophet. I loved the opportunity to celebrate his First Vision and to learn how we can build our own strong foundation in Christ.
Shantel- any conference thoughts?
I have been preparing for this General Conference diligently for the past six months. At the end of conference in October, President Nelson invited all of the sisters in the church to study and learn more about the priesthood and their access to the power of God. He also invited all of the members of the church to "immerse themselves in the glorious light of the restoration" and to study the restoration as a preparation for this conference. I took those challenges to heart and I put forth my effort in studying and learning about both topics. I am grateful the the knowledge that I have gained over the past six months, and in a lot of ways, that preparation was more influential and more important to me than the actual conference was. (Which makes sense, but I was expecting... more... from conference, but instead I was left with the spirit whispering that the blessing was received over the past half-year.) I learned so much about myself, my relationship with the Lord and His power, and the temple endowment. I initiated a study group with other women in my ward to study the Priesthood Power and it was amazing to be able to study with those sisters. I also feel that my testimony of Joseph Smith and the restoration increased as I studied about his life and the restoration of the gospel. This was a huge blessing to me. One of the discussions I listened to in preparation urged me to search my heart for my testimony of Joseph Smith, to seek for a spiritual witness of Joseph's calling as a prophet in the latter days. This testimony can only come from the spirit confirming to MY spirit that Joseph was and is a prophet of God. Again, that blessing came not from listening to two days worth of conference, but from the study and effort I put into the preparation for conference. I want to share an instagram post by one of my favorite authors: Emily Belle Freeman:
There was a time when hard questions and division and doubt lead a boy into a grove of trees. Those questions lead him to God. To the restoration of His church. ..It was a heartfelt question that led to this living church. And living means messy, and growing, and progressing, because restoration requires sanding down and revealing the old and revelation is tricky to get right sometimes. .. (...)I can feel this in my heart. One of the most beautiful things about God is that he uses ORDINARY things- bread, water, a stone, an obscure boy, ... even me- and he uses them to bring about amazing things. I add my testimony here. I will stand by Joseph. Joseph wouldn't walk away from the grove and neither will I.
The most important truth of the restoration is that God answers prayers from obscure boys of little consequence. ..And this is what I know. God saw that obscure boy who read one verse and wanted to know something. The same way He sees you and me. ..He saw how messy he would make things. How he would try, and how he would make mistakes, and He knew how messy restoration would be. And He still spoke to him! Because He knew that boy wouldn’t walk away. Not after the tar and feathers. Not after losing the little one. Not after being chased down and tormented and taunted. Not ever. ..That obscure boy of little consequence wouldn’t back down because He saw God in the mess. ..He wouldn’t walk away from the grove. ..Neither will I.
I took notes in my notebook about how I can use my power as a mother to bring peace and faith to my home and to help draw my family to Christ. Notes about Joseph Smith, about "Hearing Him", about increasing my capacity for personal revelation. I especially loved the talks that focused on and brought clarity to what the power of the priesthood is, and how my own temple covenants grant me an endowment of that power. I want to understand this more and am excited to go and read through the talks again (although as they were speaking, I was reminded that everything they were saying was what I had learned from my study already. None of it was new to me, but it WAS new to me when I had studied it previously! I had been so excited to learn and study - sometimes even approaching David and asking "Did you KNOW this???" I'm just grateful for leaders to continue to teach us and help us understand the doctrine of Christ and for a loving (AND PATIENT ... some of the talks and things I studied were from 10-20 years ago but it seems that we need the PUSH from the prophet to finally understand those things) Heavenly Father (and Mother) who want to help us reach our full potential.
I will stop with this: I have put my Faith and Trust in the Lord. I stand by Him and I am renewing my efforts to Hear the things that He has to tell me so that I can become a better instrument in his hands.
Here are a few pictures from the weekend as well.
Caleb working on his first vision painting.
First session. One of my favorite things is that Shantel makes me this awesome conference notebook. I actually take very few notes during conference because it can be challenging with kids, but I like to have it for the following.
1) I do take notes/write down inspiration I do receive, it just ends up not being a ton in the moment.
2) I try and write a title or catch phrase for every talk. That helps me focus during the talk and then gives me something to look back at to remind me what they talked about.
3) I then use the conference notebook as I go back to study the talks later. Then, I have space to take all the notes that I want and really put down my thoughts and write down my inspiration/revelation.
I am grateful that Shantel puts it together for me.
Kids eating lunchables out on the grass during the break.
During the break last conference, we put up the Christmas lights in October, so it was only fitting that we took them down during the April conference.
Lydia really wanted to go on the roof- so she got her first roof adventure.
Austin originally wanted to come out, but got nervous so he just sat on the windowsill and looked out. He told me he would come out next conference in October.
That evening, we put the kids down to bed super early so that Shantel and I could watch the evening session, which was for all members of the church, 8 and older.
Lydia and her huge tower of cushions.
Caleb carrying around magna tiles.
After the morning session on Sunday we went to the Saratoga Springs Temple site so that we could take our picture to track the progress of the temple. It is hard to see, but you could see the the giant piles of dirt from the hole they are digging.
