Perhaps, I should have began my talk with the following Sunday, but because time ran short, I neglected to share the following.
Family history has been a life pulse for me. At the early age of 16 I fell in love with it. In fact my first experience with Family History began as a 16 year old when I compiled all of my genealogical records together for my Laurel project. The grand finale of this project was in completing the temple work for my cousin Stacey Byrge who was killed in a fire in 1977. It was an incredibly powerful experience for me- one that truly changed me and led me to DISCOVER MY OWN STORY AND SHARE MY JOY!
Over the years with the ebb and flow of time, I have delved deeper and deeper into the stories of my ancestors. It was about 3 years ago though when I found something that shook my faith that a little hole in my testimony. And then of course the horrible Lucifer began to chisel away.
The discovery that my grandmother Sarah Ann Whitney (daughter of Newel Kimball Whitney and Elizabeth Ann Smith) was the first women given in polygamy in this dispensation to the Prophet Joseph Smith rattled my cage. (see MTA 19th Century Cemeteries) From Family search
Marriage to Joseph Smith Jr.
See also: Joseph Smith, Jr. and polygamy
Joseph Smith Jr. and Newel Whitney had a very close friendship. According to Brodie, after her parents were introduced to the principle of plural marriage by Smith, the marriage of Sarah to Smith was arranged with her parents' consent. [4][5] Compton claims this marriage is believed to have been performed for the purpose of creating a �dynastic� link between the Whitney and Smith families in the afterlife and to be �very much a family activity".[6]
I had grown up knowing that Brigham Young had many wives but the fact that the prophet Joseph Smith had many made me feel if the truth had been kept from me and in my own mind my grandmother had been a 17 year old victim. This all became a little to personal for me.
And that was just the first of many chinks in my testimony armor that Satan chipped away at.... But fortunately for me, the spirit directed me to take a break from family history for a bit and bolster my testimony in other areas. I will be forever grateful for this prompting.
But good old Satan he didn't stop and this question led me to other questions and then I began to see many family and friends leave the church with similar interests in concerns.
My response- I studied, prayed, attended the temple, focused on my children and husband, and service and to be quite honest, I held on for dear life.
As of late, I have been blessed with a church calling that has likewise strengthened my faith. This past Sunday, Bishop Heath asked me to introduce the Youth theme for this year, James 1:5-6- I am not sure I answered anyone else's prayers with my testimony and thoughts, but It was an answer to my own questions- questions I have had for 3 years.
You see the very first word I learned to spell was ASK, and who knew how that word would indeed lead me to my own answers.
Sacrament
Meeting talk- January 22, 2017
Introduction
of the 2017 Youth Theme James 1:5-6
I met
someone nearly 20 years ago that I have grown to admire, trust, and
respect. I hadn’t always felt that
way. In fact, it was quite difficult for
me to really get to know him. People had
been telling me stories about him for years, but I never really felt like I knew
him. So, I spent some time with him and
he shared his story.
He was a pretty
common boy for his generation. He worked
hard, loved his family, and he knew adversity.
He grew up reading the scriptures. In fact his family had daily
scripture study and daily prayer.
However, in his teens he began to have questions. Much like those around
him did. In fact, even members of his
family were having questions, some of them even questioned the faith of their
parents. In fact, his family was split
upon what religion to choose.
His
surroundings were engulfed in the excitement about his questions as well. Everyone thought they had the answer. In fact it was probably something somewhat
similar to today’s protests- such excitement. If it would have been possible, I
am sure there would have been Facebook posts, and tweets, and tagging and even
a little bit of snap chat not to mention the media would have had a hay
day. Everywhere and to everyone he
turned it seemed they had an answer for him.
Simply put, he was confused.
He really
desired to know so he asked. But he
didn’t ASK where he might get the easy answer- he really worked and dug, and
pondered, and studied. In fact one night
while he was doing his nightly scripture reading, he came upon a scripture that
changed his life
He wrote in his journal (Joseph Smith History)
10 In the midst of this war of words and
tumult of opinions, I often said to myself: What is to be done? Who of all
these parties are right; or, are they all wrong together? If any one of them
be right, which is it, and how shall I know it?
11 While
I was laboring under the extreme difficulties caused by the contests of these
parties of religionists, I was one day reading the Epistle of
James, first chapter and fifth verse, which
reads: If any of you lack wisdom, let him ask of God, that giveth to
all men liberally, and upbraideth not; and it shall be given him.
My dear friend is the prophet of the
Restoration, Joseph Smith.
Like me Joseph had questions- but was
he a seeker or a doubter?
He
recorded:
13 At
length I came to the conclusion that I must either remain
in darkness and confusion, or else I must do as James directs, that
is, ask of God. I at length came to the determination to “ask of God,”
concluding that if he gave wisdom to them that lacked wisdom, and
would give liberally, and not upbraid, I might venture.
14 So,
in accordance with this, my determination to ask of God, I retired to
the woods to make the attempt. It was on the morning of
a beautiful, clear day, early in the spring of eighteen hundred and
twenty. It was the first time in my life that I had made such an attempt, for
amidst all my anxieties I had never as yet made the attempt to pray vocally.
Simply put- Joseph Asked.. He did not settle for the answer given by the
Presbyterian, Baptist, or Methodist preachers. He didn’t blindly follow his
mother, Samuel, Hyrum, and Sophronia. He didn’t run with his friends and
neglect God altogether. Nope, he asked,
he prayed, and he pleaded. And he did it with Faith.
Joseph was a SEEKER!
Many of us are less familiar with the
verse that follows verse 6 it reads
“But
let him ask in faith, nothing wavering. For he that
wavereth is like a wave of the sea driven with the wind and tossed.”
Those that choose not to ask, or not
to ask in Faith (perhaps the faithless are those who get tripped up in the
philosophies of men) those are the doubters and it tells us in verse 6 that
those that do not ask or do not ask in faith wavereth- they are tossed with the
wind.
They are doubters?
A question I ask myself often is “Am
I a Seeker or a doubter?”
But here is the trick for all of us
today especially the Youth
WE MUST ASK GOD NOT GOOGLE!
With so much information available
today -all sorts of blogs, social media and websites, news and magazine
articles and all at the tap of a button- In fact Elder Ballard says it like
this “Many of four young people are more familiar with Google than with the
gospel, more attuned to the internet that to inspiration, and more involved
with Facebook than with Faith.”
But perhaps we should extend this description
to all of us and not just the youth of the church. it is crucial that we study and dig and
discover for ourselves by seeking sources that are valid.
It is also important that we not judge the Prophet and the early members of the
church. Remember we sit in houses that
have central heat in the winter, air conditioning in the summer, we have
refrigerators, washers and dryers, and we have remotes, cells phones, and
immediate communication to any part of the world. The prophet and early church members lived in
a different time. We can hardly
understand or truly appreciate their lives from our vantage point. But we can have faith and we can pray.
·
•
Just as Joseph
Smith did, ask Heavenly Father your questions. WE must Take time to kneel in prayer and ask
Him for guidance. Afterward, We should wait
and listen for ideas or feelings. Record your thoughts in your journal.
And Because Joseph
of we enjoy the following blessings of
knowledge- because he ASKED. Because he
worked, because he paused to connect to God (these were shared by Ted Barnes of
the Priesthood Department
l. We understand
who God and Jesus Christ really are
2. We know that we
are children of God
3. We know our
families can be Eternal
4. We have access to the priesthood and its
blessings
5. We can be free from addiction and harmful
substances- Word of Wisdom
6 We can know the
truth for ourselves through the Holy Ghost
I will not
exchange, give up or barter with any of my doubts to give up those 6 beautiful truths
and blessings.
The moment we
become seekers instead of doubters we empower ourselves. There are many examples from the scriptures
and modern prophets of those who had questions and then asked in faith- Nephi,
Lehi, Aaron the missionary, Moses, Enos, Abraham, and President Hinckley- the
list could go on.
We can discover for
ourselves- all we have to do is accept the invitation in James “ If any of you
lack wisdom let him ask of God.”
Something very cool
is happening in the teaching and the learning of the Church. It is referred to as the Come Follow Me
Curriculum with the ultimate goal being- Teaching for Conversion
Now when I was
growing up in the church we sat, we listened, we repeated and on a good day, hopefully
felt the Holy Ghost. If we were asked
questions. You could count on the
standard answers- read, pray, go to
church. But in the world in which we live today that is not enough
Why- We live a
world where we are bombarded with information of all kinds and from different
vantage points Now because we simply repeated instead of asking many have left
the church. There was no conversion, no
work, no deep roots. Unfortunately they
were doubters.
As counseled in
Doctrine and Covenants 88:118 We need to study from the best books.
Elder M. Russell
Ballard stated,
“Gone are the days
when a student asked an honest question and a teacher responded. “Don’t worry
about it.” Gone are the days when a student raised a sincere concern and a
teacher bore his or her testimony as a response intended to avoid the
issue. Gone are the days when students
were protected from people who attacked the church.”
Fortunately the New Curriculum has the tools the main goal of the Come Follow Me Curriculum
is to teach for Conversion. It teaches
us to Ask.
By so
doing we can become spiritually self-reliant- Instead of sitting and repeating
the goal today in the church is to Talk, Ask and Share
From
The Come Follow Me Manual it states
The Savior used the
scriptures to teach and testify about His mission. He taught people to ponder
the scriptures and use them to help answer questions. He helped them discover
gospel lessons in their own experiences and in the world around them by using
examples that they could relate to. He invited them to become witnesses of His
teachings by teaching and testifying to others and in this way deepen their
understanding of the doctrine.
Part of your responsibility
as a teacher of youth is to prepare learning activities that follow these
principles exemplified by the Savior. .
As youth express gospel truths, these truths are
confirmed in their hearts and minds by the power of the Holy Ghost. Sharing the
gospel with others also allows the youth to strengthen one another—hearing a
gospel truth from a peer is sometimes more powerful than hearing it from a
leader or teacher.
The Youth are meant to be
taught in such a way that they are taught to learn, teach, discover and then
share the gospel. Simply put they become
SEEKERS!
By Becoming Seekers
they and we become converted
President Harold B.
Lee offers this advice to us all- “the acquiring of knowledge by
faith is no easy road to learning. It
demands strenuous effort and a continual striving by faith.
“Learning by Faith
is no task for a lazy man or woman.
Someone has said in effect, that such a process requires the bending of
the whole soul, the calling up from the depths of the human minds and linking
it with God- the right connect must be formed.
Then only comes knowledge by faith.”
Now in closing- To
the youth I hope they remember one word today and that is the very fist word I
learned to spell. I wish it were more spiritual
than comical, but it is not. As number 6
of 7 children ours was a crowded dinner table- the nine of us crowded around a
rectangular table, me being a little one was sandwiched in on an end with my
younger sister- a place that was meant for two.
Often I would hear my father raise his voice and shout to my very big
and hungry four older brothers just ASK--
A S K”
and that was the first word I learned to spell ASK because my brothers didn’t . Not only did I learn to spell ASK at a young
age, but I also learned to ASK at a young age especially if I wanted mashed
potatoes- and I love mashed potatoes.,
So today in the
words of my father MAY WE ALL A S
K!
May we follow the
example of our dear friend Joseph may we become seekers.
