Relating to Lehi.....

When I read the Book of Mormon, I usually focus on Nephi and the children of Lehi and Sariah, or even Sariah, but I seldom think about Lehi and how he felt about all the events of his life.

  I have always identified with Nephi and the children in this story, but this morning I was realizing that I am the age now that Lehi was, or at least closer to his age than any of his children.  I started thinking about how I can identify with Lehi.  First of all, I love this scripture in 1 Nephi that Nephi included, which is the testimony of his father, Lehi.

1 Nephi 1:14,15:

14 And it came to pass that when my father had read and seen many great and marvelous things, he did exclaim many things unto the Lord; such as: Great and marvelous are thy works, O Lord God Almighty! Thy throne is high in the heavens, and thy power, and goodness, and mercy are over all the inhabitants of the earth; and, because thou art merciful, thou wilt not suffer those who come unto thee that they shall perish!

15 And after this manner was the language of my father in the praising of his God; for his soul did rejoice, and his whole heart was filled, because of the things which he had seen, yea, which the Lord had shown unto him.

Also, he received revelation through dreams and because of that, the dynamic of his family changed greatly.  I have had this experience too.  I had a recurring dream for a long time. Combined with other forms of revelation and inspiration, it culminated in my going back into teaching children with special needs when my kids were still all in school.  This changed my life and the lives of my family.  

It also reminds me that God usually will whisper, but if He really needs to make a point or emphasize something, He uses more than a whisper.  I still ponder over that recurring dream which consisted of my being either getting ready to go on a mission or being in the MTC and then telling someone, “Wait- I can’t do this.  I have a young family.”  It never gets resolved before I wake up.

I don’t know what correlation this dream had to my going back into special education and working full-time outside the home, but the dream stopped after I was obedient and I have always felt, because of the dream, that this was a “mission”.  I always thought I would understand why at some point, but it has been almost 12 years and I’m still not sure why this was an important component of my life.  I have had some hard and some great experiences, but nothing that would help me to understand why I needed to do this.  My plan had always been to be a stay-at-home mom and I identified with that.  This has had an impact on the lives of my family, too.  Some has been negative, but some has been positive.  My 3 youngest girls were all involved in some way, with the kids I worked with.

I want to look at this journey from Lehi’s perspective.  I don’t think I have done this before, in all my reading of the Book of Mormon.  He always seemed like an old man that was a prophet and I couldn’t find much to relate to with that. 

Also, the loss of the 116 manuscript pages, which was the Book of Lehi, is another example how life gets messy, and it doesn’t always feel like a plan.  But God  knows our strengths and weaknesses and works with us, and knows it is never a straight line in life from point a to point b and makes allowances for that.  The point isn’t to get from point a to point b quickly and efficiently.  It is to get to point b with a lot of experience, lessons learned, and wisdom and understanding.

I also liked the insight of the person who does Come Follow Me Daily: She posts on Instagram and Facebook.

Come Follow Me Daily

About two years ago, I lost my keys at the park.

I was locked out with two kids during lunch/nap time.

I knelt down and prayed. Got up, looked for two hours, and still didn’t find my keys.

The next day, after locking the house up and getting the kids in the car, I lost my husband’s keys—the only other set.

Kids were losing it.
I was losing it.

I told Michael he would have to walk home and I knelt down and prayed again. Thirty minutes later, I found Michael’s keys (in the door of the car 🤦🏻‍♀️🤦🏻‍♀️🤦🏻‍♀️).
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Then, Michael came walking down the street with my keys in his hand. He had found them on his walk home when he took a shortcut through the park.

Steve Jobs once said “You cannot connect the dots looking forward. You can only connect them looking backward. So you have to trust that the dots will somehow connect in your future.”
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This silly experience taught me a lot about God—things it seems Nephi also knew:

The Lord works in mysterious ways.

Why didn’t they just get the plates and Ishmael’s family when they left Jerusalem the first time?

Why did they have to back track?
Then, why did they have to go back and fail—then give away all their precious possessions and fail again?

The truth is, we don’t know the answers.
But God does.
And every step they took led them to eventually being successful.

Maybe Lehi’s sons needed to fail twice to eventually get the plates.
Just like I needed to lose the second set of keys to find my first set.

I would have never guessed it, but God knew.

God has connected all the dots.

So when the dots don’t seem to connect,
Keep acting
Keep praying
And don’t give up.
Eventually, all the dots will connect.

Art by @caitlin_connolly_

Power and blessings from the Priesthood

 How do I receive the power and blessings of the Priesthood?

What is the priesthood?

God’s power given to men to men to act in His name.

 The same power that was used to create the earth we live on.

 From the Come Follow Me Curriculum:

Through the priesthood, we can receive the ordinances of salvation, including baptism and confirmation and temple ordinances that seal our families eternally. Keeping the covenants associated with these ordinances brings priesthood power—the power of God—into our lives.

We can recognize this power operating in our lives as we sincerely repent and receive forgiveness, become more sensitive to the promptings and guidance of the Holy Ghost, and draw strength from the ordinances of the gospel.

Through the priesthood we can also receive special blessings of comfort and healing, including father’s blessings and patriarchal blessings. The promises in these blessings are realized through our faith.

Elder Hales video: Blessings of the Priesthood

Baptism, confirmation and gift of the Holy Ghost

Sacrament

Temple covenants and sealing power

Patriarchal blessings

Father’s blessings

Healing the sick

Many other kinds of  blessings:

Dedicating countries for preaching of the gospel

Dedicating graves

Giving a baby and name and a blessing

Being set apart for a calling

A collection of stories that talk about blessings of the Priesthood:

·       MAY 2015·       THE PRIESTHOOD—A SACRED GIFT, Thomas S. MonsonI was ordained an elder, and on the day of my departure for active duty with the navy, a member of my ward bishopric joined my family and friends at the train station to bid me farewell. Just before train time, he placed in my hand a small volume titled Missionary Handbook. I laughed and commented that I wasn’t going on a mission.
He answered, “Take it anyway. It may come in handy.”It did. I needed a hard, rectangular object to place in the bottom of my seabag so that my clothing would stay more firm and would thus be less wrinkled. The Missionary Handbook was just what I needed, and it served well in my seabag for 12 weeks.The night before our Christmas leave, our thoughts were of home. The barracks were quiet, but then the silence was broken by my buddy in the adjoining bunk—a Mormon boy, Leland Merrill—who began to moan in pain. I inquired concerning the reason, and he said he felt really sick. He did not want to go to the base dispensary, for he knew that doing such would prevent his going home the following day.He seemed to grow worse as the hours passed. Finally, knowing that I was an elder, he asked me to give him a priesthood blessing.I had never before given a priesthood blessing, I had never received a blessing, and I had never witnessed a blessing being given. As I prayed silently for help, I remembered the
Missionary Handbook in the bottom of my seabag. I quickly emptied the bag and took the book to the night-light. There I read how one blesses the sick. With many curious sailors looking on, I proceeded with the blessing. Before I could put everything back into my bag, Leland Merrill was sleeping like a child. He awakened the following morning feeling fine. The gratitude each of us felt for the power of the priesthood was immense.
The years have brought me more opportunities to provide blessings to those in need than I could possibly count. Each opportunity has found me deeply grateful that God has entrusted to me this sacred gift. I revere the priesthood. I have witnessed its power time and time again. I have seen its strength. I have marveled at the miracles it has wrought.

Pres. Monson, Priesthood session, May 2016During World War II, a friend of mine was serving in the South Pacific when his plane was shot down over the ocean. He and the other crew members successfully parachuted from the burning plane, inflated their life rafts, and clung to those rafts for three days.On the third day they spotted what they knew to be a rescue vessel. It passed them by. The next morning it passed them by again. They began to despair as they realized that this was the last day the rescue vessel would be in the area.Then the Holy Spirit spoke to my friend: “You have the priesthood. Command the rescuers to pick you up.”He did as prompted: “In the name of Jesus Christ and by the power of the priesthood, turn about and pick us up.”  Within a few minutes the vessel was beside them, helping them on deck. A faithful and worthy bearer of the priesthood, in his extremity, had exercised that priesthood, blessing his life and the lives of others.

 Pres. Russell M. Nelson, The Price of Priesthood Power, May 2016In my last conference message, I related my devastating experience many years ago when, as a heart surgeon, I was not able to save the lives of two little sisters. With permission of their father, I would like to say more about that family.Congenital heart disease afflicted three children born to Ruth and Jimmy Hatfield. Their first son, Jimmy Jr., died without a definitive diagnosis. I entered the picture when the parents sought help for their two daughters, Laural Ann and her younger sister, Gay Lynn. I was heartbroken when both girls died following their operations.¹Understandably, Ruth and Jimmy were spiritually shattered.
Over time, I learned that they harbored lingering resentment toward me and the Church. For almost six decades, I have been haunted by this situation and have grieved for the Hatfields. I tried several times to establish contact with them, without success.Then one night last May, I was awakened by those two little girls from the other side of the veil. Though I did not see or hear them with my physical senses, I felt their presence. Spiritually, I heard their pleadings. Their message was brief and clear: “Brother Nelson, we are not sealed to anyone! Can you help us?” Soon thereafter, I learned that their mother had passed away, but their father and younger brother were still alive.Emboldened by the pleadings of Laural Ann and Gay Lynn, I tried again to contact their father, who I learned was living with his son Shawn. This time they were willing to meet with me.In June, I literally knelt in front of Jimmy, now 88 years old, and had a heart-to-heart talk with him. I spoke of his daughters’ pleadings and told him I would be honored to perform sealing ordinances for his family. I also explained that it would take time and much effort on his and Shawn’s part to be ready and worthy to enter the temple, as neither of them had ever been endowed.The Spirit of the Lord was palpable throughout that meeting. And when Jimmy and Shawn each accepted my offer, I was overjoyed! They worked diligently with their stake president, bishop, home teachers, and ward mission leader, as well as with young missionaries and a senior missionary couple. And then, not long ago, in the Payson Utah Temple, I had the profound privilege of sealing Ruth to Jimmy and their four children to them. Wendy and I wept as we participated in that sublime experience. Many hearts were healed that day!

Boyd K. Packer, Counsel to Youth A Wartime MiracleDuring World War II, in the early part of 1944, an experience involving the priesthood took place as United States marines were taking Kwajalein Atoll, part of the Marshall Islands and located in the Pacific Ocean about midway between Australia and Hawaii. What took place in this regard was related by a correspondent—not a member of the Church—who worked for a newspaper in Hawaii. In the 1944 newspaper article he wrote following the experience, he explained that he and other correspondents were in the second wave behind the marines at Kwajalein Atoll. As they advanced, they noticed a young marine floating facedown in the water, obviously badly wounded. The shallow water around him was red with his blood. And then they noticed another marine moving toward his wounded comrade. The second marine was also wounded, with his left arm hanging helplessly by his side. He lifted up the head of the one who was floating in the water in order to keep him from drowning. In a panicky voice he called for help. The correspondents looked again at the boy he was supporting and called back, “Son, there is nothing anyone can do for this boy.”“Then,” wrote the correspondent, “I saw something that I had never seen before. This boy, badly wounded himself, made his way to the shore with the seemingly lifeless body of his fellow marine. He put the head of his companion on his knee. What a picture that was—these two mortally wounded boys—both . . . clean, wonderful-looking young men, even in their distressing situation. And the one boy bowed his head over the other and said, ‘I command you, in the name of Jesus Christ and by the power of the priesthood, to remain alive until I can get medical help.’ ” The correspondent concluded his article: “The three of us, [the two marines and I], are here in the hospital. The doctors don’t know . . . [how they made it alive], but I know” (Ernest Eberhard Jr., “Giving Our Young Men the Proper Priesthood Perspective,” July 19, 1971).Miracles are everywhere to be found when the priesthood is understood, its power is honored and used properly, and faith is exerted. When faith replaces doubt, when selfless service eliminates selfish striving, the power of God brings to pass His purposes.

 Every law and principle and power, every belief, every ordinance and ordination, every covenant, every sermon and every sacrament, every counsel and correction, the sealings, the calls, the releases, the service—all these have as their ultimate purpose the perfection of the individual and the family, for the Lord has said, “This is my work and my glory—to bring to pass the immortality and eternal life of man.”Boyd K. Packer, The Power of the Priesthood