Church Services This Week at Ridge Crest Ward Northridge Stake Layton Utah 28 September 2014

Elders Quorum

Joseph fielding Smith chapter 20

How do we develop a sensitivity to those in need and inspiration to know how to help.

Matthew 19:19

 19 Honour thy father and thy mother: and, Thou shalt love thy neighbour as thyself.

Matthew 22:39

 39 And the second is like unto it, Thou shalt love thy neighbour as thyself.

As we think about people that constantly need help because of their choices, we should consider how many times we need help from the Lord about the same thing because of our choices.

Sunday School

My lesson for the 13/14 year olds on How Does Keeping the Commandments Help Us Understand the Gospel. I did not get through one tenth of this lesson, but here was my intent.

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Ask the youth if they have any questions or comments about what they are learning in their other classes. Invite them to share personal experiences or impressions they have received as a result of their learning.

How does keeping the commandments affect my ability to learn the gospel?  Or How does obedience affect my ability to learn the gospel?

What are the commandments?  They are instructions for how to be happy.  God’s purpose is that we can have joy, right?  God knows there are things that will make life harder and make us unhappy and the commandments are to steer us away from those things.

When I follow what I want to do rather than what God wants or when I am not keeping the commandments I find that often I get in a fog. It gets hard to make decisions. It sometimes gets hard to concentrate or remember things. Sometimes it is harder to be patient with others.

If that fog isn't there and the spirit is speaking to me more clearly, because I have kept the commandments, I find that I learn and understand things better. I listen more and hear more.

Read scriptures from lesson about how keeping the commandments leads to increased knowledge.

D&C 42:61

Are there any mysteries of God you would like to know?  How would you go about finding out that mystery?

The more we keep the commandments the more we understand the commandments and life in general.

People try to figure out the problems of life while removing God from the solution. Their solution to the problems are constantly changing as they don't take into account God's plan and how he designed us and this earth. They don't know his purpose for us being here or the purpose of the earth.

Doctrine and Covenants 93:26-28

26 The Spirit of truth is of God. I am the Spirit of truth, and John bore record of me, saying: He received a fulness of truth, yea, even of all truth;

27 And no man receiveth a fulness unless he keepeth his commandments.

28 He that keepeth his commandments receiveth truth and light, until he is glorified in truth and knoweth all things.

"A knowledge of truth and the answers to our greatest questions come to us as we are obedient to the commandments of God." - President Monson

“Keep the commandments; keep the commandments! In this there is safety; in this there is peace.

He will send blessings; He will send blessings.  Words of a prophet: Keep the commandments.

In this there is safety and peace.

Read Daniel 1

“What is the Lord trying to emphasize and why? Is there anything in these verses that applies to me personally?”

Tell the boys that when we read stories we can write notes in our scripture margins of things we want to remember the next time we read that part of the scriptures.

We can also pause while we are reading to write things we think of in our journal. They wet can read our journal in the future and remember things that were important to us and things we have learned. We can look back and see places where God's hand was in our life.

Our kids or grand kids will also be able to look through our journal and see the spiritual experiences we have with the scriptures.

What are some ways you have thought of as we have talked that you can do to help you understand the gospel better?

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Sacrament Service

The Temple Endowment is a gift of power or knowledge from God.

“We need to acquire a testimony and a reverent feeling of the temple being the house of the Lord. To preserve the sanctity of the temple and to invite the Spirit to bless those who enter the holy temple for their ordinances and covenants, we are taught that no unclean thing should enter the temple. Reverence in the temple is a vital element in inviting the Spirit to reside within it every hour of every day.”

…

“Throughout history, in every dispensation, the Lord has commanded prophets that temples should be built so that His people could receive temple ordinances. Moses and the Israelites were blessed with a portable temple, the tabernacle, where the sacred ordinance work under the law of Moses was performed—and where, on occasion, the Lord came to converse with Moses. King Solomon completed a beautiful temple in Jerusalem, which was later destroyed. Then, during Christ’s ministry, another temple in Jerusalem was being built.” (Elder Robert D Hales, From a Brigham Young University devotional address given on November 15, 2005. For the full text of the address in English, seehttp://speeches.byu.edu.)

Mosiah 1:18

18 And now, it came to pass that Mosiah went and did as his father had commanded him, and proclaimed unto all the people who were in the land of Zarahemla that thereby they might gather themselves together, to go up to the temple to hear the words which his father should speak unto them.

3 Nephi 11:1-11

Church Services This Week at Ogden Utah Temple Cultural Celebration/Dedication 20-21 September 2014

20 September 2014

Ogden Temple Cultural Celebration

Elder Eyring

Go home and write what you saw and felt in your journals.

21 September 2014

Ogden Temple Dedication

“May I remind you that when we dedicate a house to the Lord, what we really do is dedicate ourselves to the Lord’s service, with a covenant that we shall use the house in the way he intends that it shall be used.” (Joseph Fielding Smith,  “Ogden Temple Dedicatory Prayer,” Ensign, Mar. 1972, 6)

We shouldn't take our temple recommends lightly.  A temple recommend is not simply an entrance ticket.

Each person does one ordinance for one person at a time. It is not necessarily efficient. It takes time.

We should have temple experiences in our living rooms, in our minds, and in our behavior.

Church Services This Week at Ridge Crest Ward Northridge Stake Layton Utah 14 September 2014

Elders Quorum

Teachings of Presidents of the Church: Joseph Fielding Smith chapter 19

Be in the World But Not of the World

"We should have no part in all its foolishness. We should not partake of its sins and its errors—errors of philosophy and errors of doctrine, errors in regard to government, or whatever those errors may be—we have no part in. " - From the lesson manual

Atonement

We should not let Satan dig up the garbage in our past,  but let it fertilize our life and let us grow. He would rather dig it up and throw it all over us. The atonement allows it to turn to fertilizer and be for our good. The atonement works for changing our sins and also for changing our trials.

Word of Wisdom

The word of wisdom is more than the don'ts.

We don't read the word of wisdom one time and think we have mastered it.  The same with the sabbath day or any doctrine. We study them over and over,  even if we think we've got it down.

Sabbath

The sabbath is not just the three hours at church. It is the sabbath day not the sabbath three hours.

Sunday School

Old testament lesson 34

Hosea 6:3

 3 Then shall we know, if we follow on to know the Lord: his going forth is prepared as the morning; and he shall come unto us as the rain, as the latter and former rain unto the earth.

Saying "God is love" or "Jesus saves" is great, but the scriptures are so much deeper than that. The atonement is so much deeper than that.  Saying that He is as the rain brings an imagery of a part of the atonement. Jesus saves, but one of the ways He saves is by washing us clean as the rain. If we stay inside, the rain had no impact on our body.

We must schedule time for our prayers and our scriptures.  We can read the scriptures or pray any time, but we need to put it on the schedule to make sure it gets done everyday, at least once.

Just as the wife described in Hosea had to chose to put away her lovers and cleave to her husband, we can not cling to our agendas and lusts and expect the Lord maintain us.

The lesson referenced Julie B Beck’ April 2007 General Conference talk, Remembering, Repenting, and Changing.

Sacrament Service

Genealogy

None of us can be an expert in genealogy without first being a novice.

Hope

Hope is not a wish. Hope is a level of expectation.

Temple

If we want to visit our neighbor we go to his house. If he is not home we can go back. The more often we go back, the more likely we are to find him. If we want to have spiritual temple experiences and we only go a couple of times a year, then we are less likely to find them. The more we go, the more likely we are to find what we seek.

Church Services This Week at Ridge Crest Ward Northridge Stake Layton Utah 7 September 2014

Elders Quorum

The lesson was based on President Henry B Eyring’s April 2014 General Conference talk, A Priceless Heritage of Hope

"Whoever you are and wherever you may be, you hold in your hands the happiness of more people than you can now imagine. Every day and every hour you can choose to make or keep a covenant with God. "

What’s our purpose here?

Abraham 3:24-26

24 And there stood one among them that was like unto God, and he said unto those who were with him: We will go down, for there is space there, and we will take of these materials, and we will make an earth whereon these may dwell;

25 And we will prove them herewith, to see if they will do all things whatsoever the Lord their God shall command them;

26 And they who keep their first estate shall be added upon; and they who keep not their first estate shall not have glory in the same kingdom with those who keep their first estate; and they who keep their second estate shall have glory added upon their heads for ever and ever.

First estate = coming to earth /mortality.

Second estate  = making and keeping covenants that bring eternal life.

The results of a father praying for his son.

Mosiah 27:8-15

Gospel principles don't add up by the world's standards because they take God out of the algorithm.

Sunday School

Old Testament Lesson 33

Micah 7:18

18 Who is a God like unto thee, that pardoneth iniquity, and passeth by the transgression of the remnant of his heritage? he retaineth not his anger for ever, because he delighteth in mercy.

God delights in being merciful, so he wants to be able to bless us. He wants to be able to forgive us.

Nineveh was the capital of Assyria.  Assyria was an enemy of Israel. Assyria would take the northern kingdoms captive. It was prophesied that they would do this.

How hard would it be right after world War II for American missionaries to go to Germany or Japan on a mission? Or in the 1980s for someone to be called to Russia. Or today if we were called to be missionaries in Iran or Iraq or Afghanistan or Syria? These are nations that have tried to conquer us.  What if we were called to a nation that had succeeded in conquering us?

Is it hard to accept someone who has wronged us? Is it hard to accept someone that has made bad life choices? When we have witnessed their decisions, is it hard to accept that they have repented?

What a horrible thing to be swallowed by a big fish.

Jonah 2:2

2 And said, I cried by reason of mine affliction unto the Lord, and he heard me; out of the belly of hell cried I, and thou heardest my voice.

"Belly of Hell"

Does God ever allow hard things to come upon us to teach us or to build our character? He does this because he loves us and knows that struggles are for our eternal good.  It may be hard on our physical bodies or our physical things, but these are not eternal.  These harms disappear when this life is over, but if we endure them we are rewarded with God like character.

You can not receive mercy if you are not giving mercy.

Matthew 5:7

7 Blessed are the merciful: for they shall obtain mercy.

Sacrament Service

The stake theme for the month is to find and prepare or help someone else find and prepare a name to go to the temple.

Isaiah 2:2

2 And it shall come to pass in the last days, that the mountain of the Lord’s house shall be established in the top of the mountains, and shall be exalted above the hills; and all nations shall flow unto it.

The Savior's death had to happen to fulfill the plan. We should remember as we go through trials that our life experience must also happen.  There are things that must happen to shape us and to shape others.

Was it cruel of God to let him go through that?  It was a horrible thing and yet a wonderful thing.  Could our trials be classified similarly?