2012 January 26

Last night at Institute I talked about the 2060 Stripling Warriors.  I am especially fond of the story because it’s about boys who listened to their mothers!  Momma’s Boys! But I am sure there were daughters, too, and they must have been just as valiant because valiant sons help daughters to be valiant and valiant daughters help sons to be valiant.  These kids weren’t just valiant, though.  They were “exceedingly valiant.” (Alma 53:20) Exceedingly!!!!

Some of you have probably heard me tell about my experience with the story…..when Gina started school I decided to read the Book of Mormon every day.  I was especially touched by this story, which, by the way, starts in Alma 53.

Back in the day, armies chose who they wanted to be their military leaders and these boys (ages 14-20 approx.) chose Helaman, who was only about 33 himself.  I have never realized it before, but Helaman was the president of the Church!  (Good choice, boys!)   He called them his sons and they referred to him as their father.

Where were their real fathers?  Well, remember that their fathers are the ones who made an oath to never shed blood again and buried their weapons of war – the Anti-Nephi-Lehies.  After 14 years under the protection of the Nephites, they wanted to contribute to the war effort. Since they couldn’t actually fight, they became the support system for the Nephites.  They worked in the fields to supply food and helped however they could in other ways.  There were so many Lamanite prisoners to feed as well as the families of the Nephite soldiers that it required a lot from them and they were away from their homes for a long time as the wars went on and on.

I thought and thought about those families and those righteous children.  How had the parents done such a good job of raising them?  How?  I wanted children fit for the army of Helaman, too.  So I started praying about it and continued praying about it for a long time.  My prayers were answered in many, many ways over a long period of time.

Here, in a nutshell, is what has God told me.  Those Mothers (and fathers) didn’t know anything we don’t know!  We have prophets and apostles and scriptures, and the Ensign, and the programs of the Church, and every opportunity and ability to know what God would have us do as parents.  The only thing the people of Ammon had (their name was changed to that from Anti-Nephi-Lehies) was more doing!

Sometimes we even think that what we are told to do is so inconsequential that it won’t make a difference.  But “by small means the Lord can bring about great things.”  1 Nephi 16:29

Follow the prophet, read scriptures every day, have FHE, say your prayers!  I promise you those are the very things those mothers did…..but they did it with exactness and soberness and consistency. They were firm and undaunted, faithful and obedient and believed God.  Their children did not doubt that their mothers knew it (Alma 56:47-48), and then the children knew it, too!

Those 2060 young men went into battle and they weren’t afraid to die!  They didn’t want to die, but realized that some things are important enough to give your life for so they went forward with courage and faith!  Alma 57:25 says that

“two hundred . . . fainted because of the loss of blood; nevertheless, according to the goodness of God, and to our great astonishment, and also the joy of our whole army, there was not one soul of them who did perish; yea, and neither was there one soul among them who had not received many wounds.”

They ALL received many wounds.

I have a poster that says:  “God will not look you over for medals, degrees, or diplomas, but for scars.”

Scars show that you were in the fight, believed in something and took a stand!

We cannot be passive today!  We have to fight with the same conviction and energy as those families did.  We live in the time of war…..war that has been going on since the pre-existence….physical wars and wars for our spirits and those of our children.  We have to fight! And our weapons are the scriptures and FHE and prayer. They are also our armor.

Would you call yourself “exceedingly valiant?”

This is the testimony of your mother/grandmother, mother-in-law….. the Church is true and it matters that you do these things to strengthen yourself and keep yourself safe!  It’s worth dying for, yes, but also worth every courageous sacrifice you can make all through your life to keep the commandments!

I just couldn’t give that lesson last night and not join with those righteous families in Helaman’s time to let you know that your Momma knows it, too, and I pray for all of us to be exceeding valiant!

I love you all.  You are my valiant Saturday’s Warriors!

MOM/Pat/Trish/Grandma

2011 September 27

Have you heard about this????

“One Million Moms (an organization) has been frantically emailing ABC to let them know they don’t want Chaz Bono or any LGBT “subjects” being forced into their homes.”   …..via Dancing with the Stars.

What’s your position on this?

Do the One Million Moms email about the Underwear Problem on Survivor?  Or the nuclear proliferation of swear words.  Or the blatantly sexualized plots of most sit-coms.  Or the ubiquitous beer and other unmentionable advertisements.  They should! And how do they feel about the teeny-tiny costumes worn by the women?

Maybe they do….I just don’t know.

AND THEN THERE’S THE DUDE (dud) ON THE X-FACTOR.  Apparently, we almost saw what was underthere beneath the underwear.  (Poor, poor Paula.)  …………..TV’s gonna have to go in the closet, soon!

What new TV shows are YOU watching?

What better way is there to unwind and spend your time?

I might suggest studying the scriptures.  Don’t laugh!  It’s pretty fun.  (Also, I have that fear, you know, the one about the frogs!)

You know what the iron rod represents, right?  Sing it with me….”the iron rod is the wo-rr-rrd of God….”  Scriptures!  And prophets!  We have 15 of them who will speak this weekend.  Yesterday, our home teachers challenged us to be able to remember and relate what they are suggesting we remember and do for the next 6 months. Dad had a good idea….jot down a sentence or two beside each of the brothers names that will remind you what they say.  Make yourself an insert page for your scriptures!  Look at it often.  Evaluate yourself.  Change.  Do better.  Be consistent and six months from now you will be happier!  It’s a promise.  Who’s with me and the Brewster?

I’m a General Conference FAN!  Are you?

Have a spectacular week, everybody!

Mom/Pat/Trish/Grandma

“MARKING YOUR SCRIPTURES”   

January 26, 2012 7:00 – 7:45 p.m. MST   This was a great success!  Thank you to all who joined us.

REPLAY of this webinar is available here:

Learn the secrets to good scripture marking. Bruce will cover multiple techniques and the pros / cons of each. Learn about colors, pictures, sticky notes and so much more!

These techniques fit perfectly with Bruce’s

  ScriptureKIT Book 1 Information Pages  and

  ScriptureKIT Book 2 Cross Referencing System

Studying and marking your scriptures go hand in hand. Both are important in remembering insights you’ve received. But HOW you do it makes ALL the difference in the world.

“Join me as I open up a whole new world of scripture study enhancement for your use.”

“Have you put your scriptures in the oven?? and turned up the heat to see how different markings in your scriptures with pens, pencils, and crayons look afterwards? I hope not – but I have. It’s like having your scriptures in the car on a hot day. And I’ll share the results with you. I introduce some pretty amazing tips and techniques to marking and studying. There is a reason why over 103,000 people have bought my scripture study products. I’ll share those reasons with you online and at these FREE webinars.”      

 Click here to Register!

Download your FREEBIE  here 
→  “Finding “3” in the Scriptures”  ←
(Get a glimpse of what you’ll learn) 

Our first Video Tutorials will be posted soon!

Keep watching for clips on everything from product demos to technical advice on ezFIND!

What to use in marking scriptures

Product Recommendations

TIPS:

The following  items are just a sampling that Bruce has personally tried. (click on any image to see an enlarged photo)

Recommended

Colored Pencils

Red and blue marking pencils in particular are a must have!

Recommended Brands:  Standard, American Scholar, Crayola, Quill and Pentel.

The Pentel 8-color automatic pencil is very good.  It is refillable and the individual lead colors last quite a while. One disadvantage – the cost.  It varies from $17 to $25.  Also, there is a plastic tip used to select the different colors.  It can break if you’re not careful.

 Pens

Zig Millennium

  Highlighters

Canyon Red no trace highlighter is our favorite, but we can’t seem to find it sold anywhere!  Let us know if you find where to buy them.

Not Recommended

Col-Erase colored pencils are very hard lead and mark too sharply on scripture pages.

At first Sharpie fine point seemed to work well, but after more extensive testing, it was discovered these pens will bleed through scripture pages.

GlideStik highlighters are waxed based.