Connie

I've been seeing this video floating around facebook: Anyone ever heard this? Apparently this guy, Rod Meldrum, has written some books about this, too. I've been looking through some of the reviews, though, and they're pretty mixed.

I would recommend An Approach to the Book of Mormon by Hugh Nibley. It's very good. Here's a link where you can read it online: http://publications.mi.byu.edu/book/an-approach-to-the-book-of-mormon/

Hubby was telling me about this last night. Since he teaches astronomy, he keeps up on all the astro news. Sounds cool. I wonder if they will be able to find it, sounds like it's pretty far out there. I'm happy to see they used the phrase "gravitational dominance." That makes way more sense to me than "clearing the neighborhood."

Not that i'm aware of. The character names are completely different. Lex Murphy (the little girl) versus Claire Dearing.

I'm just really looking forward to Christ's reign. Does that make me a monarchist? or maybe more of a royalist?

There is only one person you should think of pleasing and that is your Heavenly Father. Continue to keep the commandments. Wickedness is not happiness. It brings only misery. Resist it.

Reverence (SMH, duh!). My list of "things related to knowledge" keeps getting bigger. I love it. So glad i decided to study this topic. I'm needing all these reminders. Love it. And that verse has some great ones in the footnotes, too. Like the example given later in 1 Nephi 17:3 or the famous one from Philippians about being able to do all things through Christ.

My verse this week was: D&C 136:32-33 “Let him that is ignorant learn wisdom by humbling himself and calling upon the Lord his God, that his eyes may be opened that he may see, and his ears opened that he may hear; For my Spirit is sent forth into the world to enlighten the humble and contrite, and to the condemnation of the ungodly.” Love this verse! I read this and was like, duh, why didn’t I remember this connection between humility and knowledge before. Being humble does mean, in part, being teachable. Some related verses I found were Mosiah 4:11-12, D&C 1:28, D&C 67:10 and D&C 112:10. Any thoughts on the connection between humility and knowledge?

I spent the majority of my singlehood in a family ward. But I am also a female and was kind of waiting for a missionary at the time. The few times I did go, it was ultra boring. I found it was so much nicer to have people around who had some maturity and life experience beyond what I had. I’ve always loved the things I have learned from the more seasoned members of a congregation. (I married my missionary two months after he got home. Admit it, you were curious.)

Lots. And more and more the more i read it.

My verse this week was: Alma 38:6 “…I would not that ye should think that I know these things of myself, but it is the Spirit of God which is in me which maketh these things known unto me; for if I had not been born of God I should not have known these things.” Mostly I chose this verse because of the intriguing, to me, connection between knowledge and “born of God.” It made me want to study that topic again and see what else I could glean of this relationship. There are some interesting things there to think about. I found this cool verse in Jeremiah that I really liked in 24:7. “And I will give them an heart to know me, that I am the Lord: and they shall be my people, and I will be their God: for they shall return unto me with their whole heart.” Some other ponderings on this verse: I wonder how often we think we need to gain spiritual knowledge on our own. Yes, we need to seek learning by study, but also by faith. How often do we let the Spirit be our teacher? I know the challenge for me is in discovering how the Spirit speaks to me. Thoughts?

JAG’s vaccination story put me in mind of one of ours. We were taking our two oldest to get vaccinated. The older one, like JAG’s, was not taking it well. “Weeping, wailing and gnashing of teeth” is a very apt description. When little brother’s turn came up, hubby and I were talking to him trying to distract him away from the needle. When he felt the first one his response was, “Ow, hey!” And then he went right on talking to us. The second one was the same. “Ow, hey!” That was it. We thought it was pretty funny. Stoic little guy. When our oldest was just a little thing, she loved popsicles. She would call them “spockitas.” We would try to teach her how to say it correctly, and this is how it would go for a long time. Us: “Say ‘pop’.” Little one: “Pop.” Us: “Say ‘sicle’.” Little one: “Sicle.” Us: “Now say ‘popsicle.’” Little one: “Spockita!” We still laugh about that one.

My verse this week was... Alma 37:6 “…behold I say unto you, that by small and simple things are great things brought to pass; and small means in many instances doth confound the wise.” This is a great chapter on many aspects of the topic “knowledge.” The verses immediately surrounding this verse, in particular, discuss the scriptures and the knowledge gained by them. I wanted to ponder this particular verse in the context of gaining spiritual knowledge. First, I pondered on what Alma was talking about in this verse. He is recalling the preservation of the record through the generations, it being passed from person to person, thus ensuring this spiritual knowledge being had for the people’s benefit through the ages. This made me think of the people who preserved and kept the Bible records, who worked to translate them into other languages and the eventual printing of the Bible. Just these “small things” that one by one culminated in this great thing—the Bible being mass produced for the people. And in an LDS context, that “small thing” lead to other small things, such as the migration of people looking for religious freedom which lead to the establishment of a free country and also the questionings of a young boy which eventually lead to the restoration of the gospel of Christ. In studying, I came across this wonderful little quote by Elder Richard G. Scott, “Precious truth comes a small piece at a time through faith, with great exertion, and at times wrenching struggles.” This reminded me of the line upon line principle. Knowledge is gained little by little. And all those small things we come to know add up into great knowledge. I’ve been missing this connection with knowledge in this verse. It is so easy for me to forget that knowledge comes by doing (John 7:17). It’s easy for me to think that theory is greater than experimentation, but that is definitely not true when it comes to spiritual knowledge. We can’t just read the scriptures; we have to do the things they tell us to in order to gain the greater knowledge even if they seem like small and simple things. I love how Alma ends this chapter with his discussion on the Liahona and relating it to the word of Christ. He says, “it is as easy to give heed to the word of Christ, which will point to you a straight course to eternal bliss, as it was for our fathers to give heed to this compass…” and then ends by saying, “…let us not be slothful because of the easiness of the way…” Perhaps these “small things” aren’t really as small as we sometimes think they are when they lead to such great things. Thoughts?

Good stuff. He reiterates a lot of the things from one of his Ensign articles from several years back. A great article on the gift of discernment. Here's a link for anyone interested: https://www.lds.org/ensign/2006/12/quick-to-observe?lang=eng

We haven’t had TV service for years. I’m not much of a TV person. Hubby gets his news from the Internet and has never cared for sports. No worries there. We have a Roku which gives us access to the shows and movies we already own on Amazon and Google. We can also rent things to watch. It also gives us access to the Mormon channel, Pandora and BYU TV. It gives access as well to things like Netflix and Hulu, but you have to have an account from those places for it to work. We did have a Netflix account for a while so I know that works quite well with the Roku, but I prefer not having accounts there so we don’t use those. It works well for us. We can use what we want and ignore the rest.

Lighthouses. My mom always gives me a calendar for the next year for Christmas. It’s not Christmas if I don’t get my calendar. She knows I like lighthouses, so that’s what I usually get.

Aloha. Welcome to the forum.

I don’t have super great expectations when it comes to Star Wars movies. I just need to see some Jedi kicking butt. The fact that it was a girl this time, and she was wailing on a whiny, wannabe-sith-lord, yeah, I’m good. I’m enjoying reading everyone’s commentary and conversation, though. Very entertaining.

Recently saw Pan. What a weird movie. I didn't like it.

I'm not sure if this will be helpful, but what keeps coming to my mind is the different ways of knowing something. Spiritual knowledge is different from scientific or logical knowledge. It relies much less on physical evidence and human reason and much more on how closely one is seeking the Spirit and revelation from God. Pres. Eyring talked about this in his last General Conference talk. I would recommend your son read and re-read that. Here's a link: https://www.lds.org/general-conference/2015/10/the-holy-ghost-as-your-companion?lang=eng Perhaps he could start a scriptural topic study on knowledge and see where that leads him. There are some deep connections between spiritual knowledge and other topics like faith, virtue, truth, testimony, etc. Here's what the bible dictionary says about knowledge: https://www.lds.org/scriptures/bd/knowledge?lang=eng&letter=k

What a fun tradition!

Revelation is one of those books that often needs to be read symbolically. Here is what Alonzo Gaskill has to say about the symbolic meaning of the number 7: "The most common of all symbolic numbers, it represents fullness, completion, wholeness, spiritual perfection, and totality. In Egypt it symbolized eternal life." (from The Lost Language of Symbolism)

Hiya. Welcome aboard.

Hi. Pleasure making your acquaintance.

Hello. Welcome to the forum.