What I learned from an apostle and his friends

Dear family,

It's kind of fun being the luckiest dad on the planet.  When I talked to Mark today I mentioned that I had a couple missionary-related impressions from the leadership meetings this weekend.  Here are some extracts from the notes I took:

Elder Dance on the importance of centering everything we do on Jesus Christ:

Don't teach faith.  Teach faith in Jesus Christ.

Don't teach repentance.  Teach repentance through the atonement of Jesus Christ and relying on Him.

Don't teach the plan of salvation. Teach the Plan of Salvation through Jesus Christ.

People need to feel the redeeming power of Jesus Christ in their lives.  This takes conscious and consistent effort.

Elder Gong answering a question from a Bishop about how we can deal with the challenges others face, hearing their confessions, and not become soiled or overcome ourselves:

A key to dealing with unpleasant issues that we have to help others with is our own daily repentance. Not that we have chosen evil, but it comes upon us.  Rely on the power of our covenants and let virtue garnish our thoughts unceasingly.

Elder Dance on obedience and leadership:

The degree to which you follow your leaders influences the degree to which you will be followed.  (Lesson Elder Dance learned from Pres. Hinckley)  Never let my faithfulness toward our leaders be hard to discern.  We are all volunteers doing the best we can.  And it's enough!

Elder Gong quoted John 15:1, that Jesus is the true vine and the Father is the husbandman.  As he said those words I was overwhelmed with the feeling of God's great love. He loves me, my family, my ward, and everyone in the world, with a love that is so powerful and deep that we simply cannot comprehend it.  I wish I could put that feeling into better words.

Sister Jones taught us to make the Savior Jesus Christ the center of the lives of the rising generation.  It's about receiving personal revelation, not completing a list of requirements.

Pres. O'Riordan (Provo mission president): It is a blessing for our sons and daughters to serve missions.  There are miracles available as they make promises to others in the name of Jesus Christ.

Elder Gong: We don't have to minister by bucketfuls; we can minister by the spoonful.  

Elder Dance drawing an analogy to learning to ride a motorcycle: We go where we look.  If we are focusing on our fears, we will end up where we don't want to be.  If we focus on Jesus, we will end up with Him.

Elder Gong promised blessings to those of us who come with specific questions and concerns, specifically mentioning sons and daughters serving as missionaries.

And here is my journal entry for tonight:

Monday, December 7, 2020
8:55 pm

Today was a pretty normal day.  This year we are changing the way we account for employee benefits.  Today I spent lots more time than I anticipated getting that ready.  It needed to be finished today to be ready for our December payroll since that will accrue for the expenses in January.

Another thing I did was devote some time to creative thinking.  That was a commitment from my last coaching session.  I turned my phone and light off, closed the interior blinds and opened the exterior ones, and worked on the couch at the west end of my office.  It was a change of "scenery," hopefully helping me think differently.  I think I came away with a good start, but the ideas are still pretty rough.

I enjoyed a short-ish visit with Mark this afternoon.  He said he's actually enjoying basketball on p-day; I want to know what he did with my son. ;-D  It's nice to visit with him and hear how he is doing.  His experience is similar but so different from my mission.  His and Jessie's missions are hard, but in different ways than mine was.  I am grateful for the experiences they are both having.

Tonight the missionaries joined us for FHE and shared a thought for the lesson.  They introduced the concept of "spiritual CPR" and asked us to guess what the letters meant.  I was so proud of my kids; they came up with lots of great ideas for what gospel-related concepts could start with those letters:

C – Choice, commandments, covenants, church

P – Promises, priesthood, power, prayer

R – Repentance, return, revelation, restoration, read (scriptures)

Thankful: I am so grateful that the gospel is a part of our culture.  Heck, it IS our culture.  Each of the kids had good answers for the missionaries' questions and participated in a good discussion.  What a blessing.

Ministering: I did some Bishop stuff today to try to bless our ward.

More later… 

Look who found a sucker!