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[00:00:00] So when I was a little kid, there was a magazine that I looked so forward to getting in the mail and it was a United States magazine. I think, I don't know, for those of you listening outside of the U S if you got this magazine, let me know. It was called the children's highlights magazine. I loved it so much because.

In it, of course, I didn't read any of the articles. I don't even know if there were articles. I went straight to the picture that had, it was called seek and find, and it was pictures that had items hidden in the picture with a list of all the things you had to find. And I would pour over that picture trying to find every single item.

And you know what? They still have them, by the way. My daughter, who's 15, wanted one while she listened to General Conference and I bought it. I had to. I love a seek and find. Now, the reason I bring this up is because this episode is kind of unlike any other. It's sort of a seek and find episode. I called it that because I asked my guests to seek and find answers to questions that Honestly, no one really knows the answers to this episode required them and myself to truly follow Nephi's instructions to search, to ponder, and to pray.

And I am really looking forward to seeing what they were able to find. Welcome to the Sunday and Monday study group, a Deseret Bookshelf plus original brought to you by LDS living, where we take the come follow me lesson for the week. And we really dig in the scriptures together. I'm your host, Tammy Usilac Hall.

If you're new to our study group. Please follow the link in our description and it's going to explain how you can best use this podcast to enhance your come follow me study. Just like my really good friend, Trish Hart. Oh my gosh. She is the sister of one of my dear friends, Jody Hart Wilson. So ladies, I love you and your family.

Now another incredible thing about our study group is each week we're joined by two of my friends. So it's always a little bit different. And today I am so excited to introduce you to Charmaine Howell, who you know and love. Hi Char. Hi, Tammy. Coming in live from Minnesota. Yeah. Five years. Five years strong.

Okay. And Char and I are excited to introduce you to our collective friend. Her name is Patti Howard. Hello, Patti. Hello. Good morning. Okay. This is so fun. Char and I have met Patti through the podcast and for all of you listening, Patti is a diehard. She's been listening to this podcast since we started five years ago, 2019, right Patti?

Right. Right. Right. Yep. And she has just sent us the greatest messages over these years that I was like, why hasn't she been on yet? Yeah. It's a no brainer. And here we are. Not why I sent the message. No, it wasn't. I wanted you on the podcast, but he's like, I'm never sending anyone a message. Exactly. How do you tell us a little bit about yourself?

Where are you from? What can our guests learn about you?

Wow. Okay. So I live in Spokane, Washington currently, but I grew up in Orem, Utah. So I'm a Utah girl. And actually even funnier than that, this is probably one of my favorite things to tell people when you go to a party and they say, tell us something that nobody else will know about you.

I'm a missionary baby. What? Exactly. So, um, okay. See, I got your attention. My father was serving a labor mission in New Zealand. And so he was working on Church College of New Zealand, and my grandparents were there also. And my mother was a student, and that's where they met, had a romance, got married. I was born, I was three months old when the mission was over, and then they returned back to Utah, hoping that he was going to go back to BYU.

But life happened, kids came, and anyways. Where we are and my mother is still in Utah. She has lived in Utah all these years. She left her home and big family, but we go back, um, often for family reunions. In fact, we're going, um, this January again for another reunion to New Zealand, back to New Zealand.

Yeah. So, uh, how cool. And actually I have, I have three boys and. Two of the boys get to come with us. So I'm really excited. The third boy decided to have a baby, which we're having a baby in November. So it's November. We're super excited to, um, have another boy. So I have three boys. This will be three grandsons.

I have three brothers. My husband's one of three boys. I don't know how I eat. out. But here I am. Wow. What a cool story, Patty. None of them live in Spokane. So I'm a grandma on the road. I love to go see my kids. We have a motor home and that's where the motor home goes. San Diego and Mesa, Arizona. Wow.

They're not even close, but yeah, that's a long road

trip. Okay. How

fun. And that is such a fun story. You are a missionary baby. Wow. Okay. That's, that's a very good story. Oh my goodness. Patty. Love it. And how fun. Have fun in New Zealand. I want to hear about it. Send us pictures. That would be awesome. Oh yeah.

It's pretty fun. Oh, neat. Neat. Neat. Okay. Well, did you guys, did either one of you know the highlights magazine? Do you remember that when I said it? [00:05:00] Shari, you might be too young.

No, I told, I don't think there were articles in it. It was just a seek and find page, wasn't it? That was

it. Who cared about the stories?

I'm kidding. Yeah. I love

that. That seek and find page. And the funny thing is, is now I'm looking at them and I'm like, they're not even done that well. I mean, yeah.

And yeah, I see him in

like

kid doctor, pediatrician office, like front rooms, I feel like, and my kids just like, wow, this is so cool. Oh my gosh, look, I found the carrot.

I'm like, yup, there's the carrot.

Then there's always a spoon in every picture. Oh, that is so funny. Okay. Would you agree today's episode is for sure a seek and find episode then did you have to seek and find?

I feel like I kind of did. I mean, there's, there's a lot of stuff in these, but it's, it's only two and a half pages, right?

That's not very much like actual words to read. So I know that it's like a lot of really good stuff, but it's very, um, concise. And so it's like, okay, what can we learn from this outside of these words? I felt like I did have a lot of like, Prayerful, pondering, thinking, like, what else can I get out of this?

Like I had to keep kind of coming back to like, is there something else? Am I missing something? You know, how can I apply this better? So I thought it was great that, for

me, it was, I kept going, why, why, why did he do this? Why, why, why now? Why? Yeah.

Why? Oh, I was the same way. I would be driving and I would be asking that same question, like, why, why did he put these?

That was my question to you. Why? So I am really excited to have this discussion with you to maybe that's why we're so nervous. All three of us are very nervous about this episode because there's not a lot written on the answer to the why. And so we're going to come up with our wise. I wish we were all together so that we could all just discuss this as a large group of friends because I want to know everyone's answers.

I would love for people just to post on Instagram or Facebook. But mostly Facebook is where you can do it. Tell us your whys. What did you find? And go seek these chapters and find some answers, because it's a really great way to approach these. Like you said, so concise, Char. There's not a lot there. So it's going to be a fun discussion.

And I will say this about my guests. If you want to know more about them, by the way, I promise. Go to our show notes. You can find those at ldsliving. com slash sunday out monday and you can see pictures and read a little bit about them. So there's some reading. There's not going to be a seek and find about these two unless you can make a picture.

I don't know. So grab your scriptures and let's dig into Moroni chapters one through six. Okay, you two, right out of the gates. Tell me, what did the Holy Ghost teach you as you read these two pages?

Well, I'm, I'm the new girl, so I was like, okay, this is, come on, what do you got for me? And I kept coming to, even last night we, it was Halloween.

So this is when we were recording this. It was Halloween last night and we always go to the temple on Halloween. We go do work for the dead on Halloween. Oh, that's so fun. And after we did seedlings and afterwards, I walked into the, I just went into the celestial room. We have a small temple here in Spokane and it's literally just around the corner.

So I am so lucky and I was the only one in there. It was so great to be the only one in the celestial room. And I opened up the scriptures and I'm like, okay, come on, Heavenly Father, I need the Holy Ghost to teach me something. And again, the way he teaches me is, You already know this. I've told you this before.

And so the first thing I, I read was in this first chapter when the first time I read through these scriptures and it's verse four. I mean, I'm just, I'm so sad that Mormon and Moroni had to just have this awful, awful way to live and to be all alone, but their hearts had to be so pure. There's, there's no doubt in my mind that the Savior ministered to them because.

This, this is awful. And how do you, how do you stay true without having that constant something wonderful? So this is verse four, chapter one, verse four, wherefore I read a few more things contrary to that, which I had supposed for, I suppose not to have written anymore, but I read a few more things that perhaps that they might be of worth unto my brethren, the Lamanites.

He still loves these people they're whacked and he still loves them and he wants them in some future day To know the will of the Lord That just, I don't know how he does it. I just don't know how he does it. And that just really humbled my heart that when people offend you over and over and over, you have to still love them.

And the only way you can do that is with the help of the Savior. The only way.

Patty, I think that is so awesome. In fact, I'm going to give us a scripture reference because you brought this up. We were talking about it later, but let's do it now. Right next to verse four, put Mormon chapter eight verses 34 and 35, because you are not wrong in your thinking about Mormon and Moroni and the savior, because this is perfectly going to set up [00:10:00] our discussion today.

So Patty, we read Mormon chapter eight verses 34 and 35

behold, the Lord has shown unto me great and marvelous things concerning that which must shortly come at that day when these things shall come forth among you. Behold, I speak into you as if you were present and you are not, but behold, Jesus Christ has shown you unto me and I know you're doing.

I mean that right there, that connection between the savior and Moroni. You're not wrong. Absolutely. They had experiences with the savior. And so I like how you set that up, that their hearts were in such a place where they could love someone who was so awful to them. So thank you, Patty. That's great.

Great.

What about you,

Char?

Um, surprisingly, I, um, same verse stood out to me, but for a little different reason.

Hey.

So, and earlier this year, my family, we drove from here and did the church history, um, driving tour, uh, for spring break and it was beautiful. It's a beast of a drive, but it's really awesome.

And we showed up in the sacred grove on a really snowy day and walked up the hill Kamora and there's snow everywhere and it was super cold. And I just couldn't help but think of Moroni walking around and these feelings of just like, Um, like here I am, here I still am. What am I doing? You know? So in verse four, Patty already read it, but I just love the phrase that he says, wherefore I write a few more things contrary to that which I had supposed, or I had supposed not to have written anymore.

And those two sentences really stood out to me. He just was like, well. I didn't suppose I was going to be here. I thought I was done with all my writing. I actually probably supposed I'd be dead by now. I suppose, you know, that I'd written enough and that I had written all the right things because he ended, you know, his writings earlier, um, and he's just, but I guess I suppose that Lord needs me to do something else.

And I think sometimes in our life, we, um, You know, we suppose that we've learned the lesson that we've been trying to be taught this whole time or we feel like we've gotten through the trial and now we should be moving on or maybe we don't think we should still be enduring something and that we just suppose a lot about the path of our life and we have agendas and schedules and we want to time map out our day and we want it to fit perfectly and our schedules to be what we want, but sometimes what we suppose is the best for us.

There's a different plan and he says that at the very end he says but I will keep writing According to the will of the Lord second. I'm not quite sure why I'm still here but I'll just keep doing it and sometimes we just need to keep going on and And what we're doing, even though we might not think it's, that we should keep doing it.

Right?

Yeah. Absolutely.

What else do I have here to offer? What else can I share? Like I think he's just like trying to pull it out. Like Heavenly Father, what did I miss? Like right. Did I miss something? Like I, I thought I had it all, you know, and I think sometimes that's like us in life. Like what am I missing?

Like is there something I should be learning more? Like have I missed it? You know?

Yeah. Why am I still going through

this?

Connecting the thing that both of you said, then how cool is this? Because I'm just now seeing this. I'd never noticed this before, but he's at that moment where he's like, didn't turn out like I thought.

So how can I serve somebody like he turned his heart outward rather than thinking, cause I don't know that I, I mean, well, it didn't turn out like I thought. So here we are. And, and I love how his thought is, okay, well, so now how can I be of worth to somebody else? To somebody else. Yeah. And then he's like, according to the will of the Lord, like put me to work.

And so those are great insights. Both of you. I am going to always remember that. I'm going to write that down because nothing in my life is how I thought I would be. I can put that. Now that should be on my tombstone, not as I supposed, yet here I am.

Well, and so many times we talk to our friends and our family when we're going through hard things and a lot of the time the answer is, like in trials, is to look outward.

And that's what will get us through to the end. And like you were saying, Tammy is to serve somebody and to, you know, if you feel like the unwelcomed person in a ward, then be the one that says, hi, like that's always the go to kind of answers we give to people, but that,

like

that it actually works when we're not sure what we're supposed to be doing, then let's look outside of ourself and do something for somebody else then.

Yeah. And it does work. And it works so well for Moroni because now we will benefit from him saying, okay, according to the will of the Lord, what can I write that will be of worth and not just worth for the Lamanites, but of worth for all of us. So in the next segment, we're going to dive in [00:15:00] then to Moroni's situation and the things that he decided to include.

We'll do that next.

So one of the things I noticed. Over Halloween, the month of October on social media, and my kids showed this to me is there was this challenge and they called it the Halloween murder challenge, which was you would have someone running down the street behind you and you were running to see if you could get to your front door and unlock it.

Before the person and you knew the person who was chasing you, but you would it was a family member. Yeah And so we decided we should do that We should do the stranger danger challenge and run and see if you could unlock their front door in time to get in But then we realized

run somebody who was trying to catch you.

That's like the point of it. Oh my gosh Nike had a

commercial about that at one time and i'm like just kill me i'm dead Can't

run. Yeah, like that's my question. Could you run for your life? I don't know I don't think I could, and I certainly couldn't unlock a door. No way. Oh my gosh. I thought of that when I was reading the scenario for Moroni.

I don't mean to make light of it, but it kind of made me think of like I had to put my place, try to put myself in his position because here's what we read in Moroni and here's what we know about him. He's alone. We learned that from our episode when we were in Mormon where he said, I have no family. I have no friends.

Like he is. completely alone. And then we get into Moroni chapter one, verses one and two, and we're going to discover how, let's discover the situation that Moroni is in. And so Char, can you please read verses one and two?

Now I Moroni, after having made an end of abridging the account of the people of Jared, I had supposed not to have written more, but I have not as yet perished.

And I make not myself known to the Lamanites lest they should destroy me. Where behold, their wars are exceedingly fierce among themselves, and because of their hatred they put to death every Nephite that will not deny the Christ.

Highlight that. So every Nephite that will not deny the Christ they are putting to death.

He is literally running for his life and trying to stay out of harm's way. And so then Patty, will you read verse three so we can read how Moroni reacted to this conflict?

Sure. And I, Moroni, will not deny the Christ. Wherefore, I wander with us however I can for the safety of my own life.

Okay. Thank you.

Right there. Verse three. I want you guys to tell me as you read this, like, what did, what does it tell us about Moroni and how he's reacting to this conflict of running for his life? What does it tell you about his faithfulness?

That must feel the flame for him. I will not deny the Christ. So here I go.

It's the only option, I guess. I, I can't, I can't fathom it. I just soon crawl up in a ball and just, okay, I'm done. Lord, take me. This is stupid. I'm not doing this anymore. I'm done. Yeah.

I mean, even the prophet ether, In the book of ether hid in a cave like he hid in a rock for people who wanted to kill him because he believed in Christ.

And I find this fascinating that Moroni doesn't give us any information about. So I hide. Of course he's hiding, but I like how he boldly is like, I will not deny the Christ.

Yeah. You know, and what touches me about that is his father was Mormon. I mean, we saw, we have seen Mormon go from a record keeper to a, to a prophet.

So your father's the prophet and you saw my heart breaks when I think about how he saw a whole. Civilization vanish, and then what does he do in his time? Because he supposes that he should do something. He, he translates the book of ether. And again, it's, it's another really sad story.

Yeah. And

I'm like, what a bummer of a, what do you, what do you, what would he have to find every day to find joy?

He'd have to do something to find joy. And you almost

feel like it's easier just to say, well, you can't beat him. Let's just join them. Like, that's where I would be at if I was in his situation. I'd be, I'd be like, Oh, in my heart, I believe in Christ, but I'm going to just go live in the city.

I'm just, I'm not going

to, I'm not going to do this, but like you're saying, Patty, that's so true.

It's just like, how do you find that joy when you're like, everything around me is falling apart. Everyone around me is. against me, but I can find this joy and happiness through Christ. Right now. How do you do that? Right?

Well, apply this to the world we live in right now. Because Patty, I like how you said, what does he find every day that brings him joy?

What, what gets him up in the morning to put on his pants, you [00:20:00] know, or his His little dress, whatever he's wearing. I don't know. Yeah. I want to know from the two of you, like, how do you do that? Because we live in a place where it's not popular to announce that you believe in Christ. What gives you joy?

What gives you the fortitude to get up and, or go to church on Sunday?

I would have to say it's probably the same thing. I will not deny the Christ. And I would hope for his sake that he had some nice conversations with Christ to buoy him up. I just, I don't know how he. Could go on without that. Maybe he had joy.

I hope he lived at least in a beautiful place. Hopefully there were flowers and trees and waterfalls and Not like

Minnesota.

No Okay, Minnesota

is beautiful. All you Minnesotans listening. It is gorgeous here. I love it Don't get me wrong. I I mean I'm thinking about this question. You just asked Tammy like what gives me joy The drive to like wake up and have joy even if it's like difficult in life and and the world around us seems Like it's on fire, right?

Yeah,

I don't know It's it's hard, but I do feel like my thought just keeps coming back to I'm just happier I'm just happier when I when I think about Christ I'm just happier on a daily basis when I focus on him when I give You My worries to him when, you know, and I'm, I'm, I'm imagining Ro and I did that.

He had to let go of his worry and his, and his struggles and just say, here, take this from me and Christ actually can do that. And sometimes I don't know if we believe that we, um, I am happier even, um, even if things don't seem like they're going fantastic or just seems, um, just like whatever in life.

Yeah. I mean, I'm happy to wake up and go to church and I'm happy to go drive a half an hour or 45 minutes to go to the temple in the snow. I'm happy to do it because it makes me happier. So I want that in my life, right? And that's like, all I can think of is that. You know, Christ gives us something that we just can't have on our own.

I think too, maybe that other piece of hope to have hope is what gets us going day to day. So I'm sure there was a great deal of hope for, um, Marona. Why else would he do this? Then he has hope that these, this record is going to come forth and it's going to change many people's lives, which it has. So there's that, that piece of hope, I would think.

Oh, I

like that connection to hope in 2020 general conference, elder Neil L. Anderson gave this really great quote about how all of us right here can seek Christ and not deny the Christ. He gave us an idea of maybe something we should do. We're going to read this quote and then I'd love to know your thoughts.

I'm going to go ahead and read this quote and I just want you to consider maybe this idea of what we can do. To truly be able to say, I will not deny the Christ while some are neglecting their faith. Others are searching for the truth. We have taken upon ourselves the name of the Savior. What more are we to do?

You and I speak of Jesus Christ, but maybe we can do a little better. If the world is going to speak less of him, who is going to speak more of him? We are, along with other devoted Christians, as the world speaks less of Jesus Christ, let us speak more of him. As our true colors as disciples are revealed, many around us will be prepared to listen as we share the light we have received from him.

His light and his transcendent saving power will shine on those willing to open their hearts. Jesus said, I come as a light into the world. Tell me your thoughts.

I love that. Um, I love that it said, well, a lot of people are denying Christ. A lot of people want him and, um, that makes me feel like I can have a little bit more confidence in sharing my testimony.

Sometimes I don't want to be like, Hey, listen to my testimony, or I want to try to help you with, with my thoughts because I feel like I'm putting myself out there, but actually like, let's just put Christ out there. Right? Yeah, like, how can we speak more of

him?

Right, you don't need to look at me, like, let's just look at, right, at him.

Yes. Let's put him out there and he will be the one to draw people in and it doesn't need to be about us, right?

Right, absolutely. That's, that's my favorite scripture is we talk of Christ, we preach of Christ that our children may know. And I did have this moment where I went, well, other than my children, how much am [00:25:00] I talking about Christ?

And I have a friend who, you know, she's very, um, she's very open about how her, her beliefs, her savior, she saved. And I, I served a mission in Georgia. I should, I should know about these people. I mean, they, it happened and it happened in that field and it happened two days ago. And so I don't know if maybe that made me shy away from talking more of Christ because anyways, back to my friend, she just, she just talks about Christ.

She's I'll pray for you. I'll. And I thought, well, why am I not like that? I can pray for people. And so that's been my goal actually this year. I have a book by my bedside that, cause you know, I go to say my prayers and then of course I forget all the people I'm supposed to pray for. So I have an actual prayer list next to my bed and I'm sure many people do, but I, I have to look at that to be reminded and, um, and I can tell people, Oh yeah, I'm going to pray for you.

Or I did pray for you. And honestly. Have done it because, um, and I love just the other week I had a friend text me, Hey, we, we need help expect miracles. Okay. How do we do that? We ask for them. And if I'm not asking for them, it was such a great thing for her to ask me to pray for a situation. And it was so great to say done.

I can do that. So those are kind of some of the ways I think that we can rally with people. Hey, you're, you're having a really hard time. I love when you have Tammy on here. She'll, she'll drop it at a moment's notice and pray with somebody. And I love that example. I need to be more like that.

We have our, um, our, one of our managers here that works for us who's not a member of the church.

Um, we text all the time because we're constant communication with her and my husband and I and her on a thread and we, we've shared of Christ and we've invited her to stuff and, and she's great, but she's even better at sharing with us. I feel like she'll, you know, she's learned our lingo a little bit.

So she'll say stuff like, Oh, I've had a prompting today and she'll send us a text all the time that. That's like, Oh, here's my quote for the day. And she'll like send like a quote about Jesus and God to us and she'll be like, I'm holding on to hope you guys are giving, you know, and so like she's constantly like just shooting it out there.

Do you see these thoughts? And the latest one she sent this week was when God doesn't work as fast as you would like, a delay is not a denial. And she's just like, this is my thought today. Let's hold on to this. You know? And so she's constantly sharing and we can do that too. Right? I can do that. And I think that would be great.

Oh, what I love Char about your friend is that she does it in such a natural way. Yeah. I don't know why we get hung up on, Oh, I've got to get them into the font.

We do. We go from friendship to font in like 30 seconds and that's exactly what God's asking us to do. Exactly. Right? It's like when

you're dating and you're like, is this the one?

And you've been on like a half a date. You're like, wait a minute. Let's just chill out. Let's just get to know each other. Yeah. Yeah. It's the same when just share, just share Christ. And it doesn't have to be this big deal.

I don't

know if you listened to the BYU devotional speeches, but in October, The guy who wrote the Dallas Jenkins was on the BYU devotional in October, and it was fantastic.

And he's not a member.

And it

just like so powerful how God is working through so many people to bring about his work. And we're all sharing about Christ. So we don't have to jump to that. Like you're saying, Patty, of like, Oh, I can't share. Cause what if they don't get baptized? Like, let's just share about Christ.

Let's talk about him. Let's rejoice in him and preach of him, right? Baptism cannot be the end goal.

Jesus is the end goal. And if any of us can play any role in bringing someone to Christ. Wow. Cause I love in this quote, elder Anderson said, we are along with other devoted Christians, but I think other devoted Christians are almost Jesus saying us out like they're so good at it.

In fact, I think I'm going to take your challenge Patty, because you said this year you've been trying to remember people and you have a prayer journal on the side of your bed. I think this is a great time of year cause it's December. I think we should set a goal of having not deny the Christ moments.

Like throughout the rest of this year, take the challenge to not deny the Christ any chance you get. And I think for me that has been able to say something like, what a blessing. And we've learned this year that when we say I was so blessed or what a blessing it wasn't, it's not necessarily me saying I'm so much more blessed than anybody else.

It's acknowledging it's because of God that I've been given this. So that's sort of my LDS way of saying, praise Jesus. Like, yeah, I, that's what we're going to do this year. Next year, you guys, let's have, do not deny the Christ moments and share them. Oh, that would be awesome.

Yes. To me, denying means just like keeping my mouth shut.[00:30:00]

Yeah. Right. Is that kind of what you were saying, Tammy?

Yes.

It's

kind of like, you know, I think when I think of deny, I think of Peter, like those kind of go hand in hand. And he just was like, kind of kept his mouth shut. He was just kind of like, Oh, I don't need anything. I don't know. Not act.

Yeah.

Yes.

And that's the other thing is I have loved.

When you get these thoughts in your head, and at least I have, somebody gave a great talk or, or just last Sunday, we're starting to sing the new hymns. And so I'll shoot a text to the course or thank you. That was such a beautiful him or our choir saying something. And then we sang the last verse and it's like.

And we have a face award Facebook page, so it was like, I just put on there our words that our choir sound is so beautiful today and it was so good to see others come in and it's I know that the when you say

something versus not say something, it means a lot,

right? Yes. Other people are wanting to maybe say the same thing or they, then they will agree with you and so it's compounding and it's just really beautiful.

Let's, let's talk of Christ.

Let's talk of Christ. Oh, in 2025, we're going to talk of Christ. Yeah. In fact, the scripture about rejoicing, talking of Christ and preaching Christ 2025 at second Nephi chapter 25 verse 25 and 26. Oh, that's cool. That's our theme for 2025. High five. High five. ladies. Oh, that's so cool.

Look how much fun we've had and we only just discussed three verses. Okay. So here's what we're gonna do then. Moroni, he is just like he said, he's going to write a few more things, which he didn't suppose at all. And it is surprising to me what he did take the time to write. So in the next segment, we're going to begin our dig into some of the final words of Moroni.

So we're just going to put these chapters into context, which I think we've brilliantly done up to this point. But what we want to know, and at the very top of my page, I've written in very big letters because here's Moroni running for his life and he writes chapters two through six, and they are strictly about, and here's what I wrote at the top of my page, administrative details of the church.

That's what these are titled. The administrative details of the church. Now this is where we get the seek and find. You too. Why do you think he would bother to write about the administrative details? He writes about the sacrament, baptism, gift of the Holy Ghost, and priesthood ordination. Here he is writing for his life, but he's going to take some time to give us tips about this.

Why would he take the time to give us administrative details? I

think he's being hopeful right now. I think he's saying one day there will be more than just me and you'll have to do stuff together. You'll have to take the sacrament and you'll have to ordain each other. Right now it's just me.

I like that.

There's a lot of hope in these chapters. There's a lot of

hope that somebody will want to do this again one day. And, and I think he probably was inspired by, you know, the spirit and heavenly father saying they're going to need this. And they don't have it. It's kind of like in third Nephi where we saw when Jesus Christ was like, Hey, did you write about this?

Cause you should, you know, I'm, I'm sure he was prompted like, Hey, this is why you're still needing to write because they don't have the way to do it. And you have to have an organization. You have to know how to run it in order to bless the lives of so many people. There has to be. a way to do it. So teach them the way to do it, right?

Wow,

great

answer. I like how you thought that through. I agree. I totally think these scriptures weren't written anywhere else, or at least maybe they were, but they weren't in the book that he's carrying around to bury his ego. And maybe Christ said, Oh yeah, remember I did that sacrament thing. Or remember those apostles.

Disciples, they call them here, but we're virtually the apostles. The one thing they wanted was the Holy Ghost, the one thing. And you need that before you can move on to any other thing. I mean, as I read these, it was such a progression. I just, but before anything you need the Holy Ghost. So I love that's how we, how we talked about that.

And I, I loved something that I haven't shared, but you know that I was in the Book of Mormon videos. The video that filmed third Nephi and the film I was there the day that they filmed when they were praying for the one thing that they desired most and then the angels come down and, and they, their countenance turns white and it just was, it was amazing to think they got, they got this gift and I still get this gift.

I, it didn't look like this, but I got that gift and I think he's being reminded here that, well, in the scriptures, it says. Yeah. Patty, will you read that verse for us, please? Okay. So I am in chapter two [00:35:00] and this is the words of Christ, which he spake unto the disciples, the 12 whom he had chosen, and he laid his hands upon them.

So we know that he did that back in third Nephi. And go watch your book of mora video because it shows that and it's really sweet and it called them by name saying you shall call him the father in my name in mighty prayer and after you've done this you shall have power that to him upon whom you shall lay your hands ye shall give the holy ghost and in my name shall ye give it for thus do mine apostles that was a big deal they first and foremost they needed the holy ghost first and foremost i think we need the holy ghost that's why you know we're baptized and that's the first thing that happens

Why do you think he, why do you think he talked about the Holy Ghost though, before baptism?

That really struck me. Like, why didn't he do this in order of first you take the sacrament, well actually you could do six. First you join the church, then you get baptized, then you get the gift of the Holy Ghost, then you can take the sacrament. Why do you think he started with the Holy Ghost as the first administrative detail?

Maybe because he's assuming that in order to get the Holy Ghost, you have to be baptized first. So he doesn't have a lot to write on. So maybe that's why he's just

Yeah, maybe he didn't know he had so much time and he yeah, I like kind of like what we're already saying though Like it's so important to have the Holy Ghost when you're administering any of these things that maybe that was it or maybe he thought You know, we've already written about baptism.

I've already wrote about that when Jesus came So let's get to this part because in chapter 2 verse 3 He said Christ spake these words unto them but the multitude heard it not so maybe he's thinking. Oh, maybe this isn't as well known You Let's write about the stuff that people don't really know yet.

Oh, yeah. And then the

baptism was like, and don't forget, I know you already know this, but you should also always remember about baptism.

Oh, I like that. No, you're totally right. The multitude didn't even hear it was happening when they got the gift of the Holy Ghost. And then it said, and as on many as laid their hands, fell the Holy Ghost.

It's fascinating how in this, it starts out by saying he laid his hands upon them. So he's teaching you even how to give the gift of the Holy Ghost. Like if you follow everything in detail in these chapters, it's giving you the exact instructions on how to do these things. It's not just teaching you about the importance of it, but here's the particulars of it.

This is awesome. You know, something going back to that, how we started, where I was thinking, why, why, why? Something I learned that I did not know until I asked the question, why here's my seek and find moment with these chapters is the book of Mormon would have been the only thing that the early members of the church had.

They did not have the doctrine and covenants yet because you can read the sacramental prayers in doctrine and covenant section 20, but they didn't have it at the time. So the only account of the sacramental prayers are right here. Yeah. What I didn't know is that there is no actual record of the exact number of visits from Moroni to Joseph Smith, but at least 22 have been documented.

22 visits! I always just assumed it was the three and then the times on the hill. Like five, six, maybe seven, not good at the math, um, 22 times. Now I want to know what happened every time Moroni came. Do you, because do you think it was Moroni? He's like, Oh, Hey, by the way, Joseph, I wrote about this. So if you want to know how to do the sacrament and how to give the gift to the Holy ghost, I wrote it down for you.

I just think of all of the prophets and apostles from the book of Mormon that could have come to teach Joseph how to start the church. Here we have it in Moroni chapters one through six.

Yeah. So cool. I love that. I love that connection from this end of this book to the next thinking that it was Moroni connecting that and connecting that for Joseph Smith and being the one to bring it to him and being like, Oh my gosh, it's making sense while I write why I wrote all that, you know, because like, you know, maybe like what we're saying is maybe they had this written down in other gold plates and things of like, here's the prayers and I don't know, maybe they did.

This is just assuming, but he's like, I feel like I should put it in this book. You know, and I don't know why, but I'm supposing it should go here. And so I just love that connection. He's giving this way to administer it to Joseph Smith. And he's like, Oh, you need, you need the whole Book of Mormon, but you actually don't know how to run it.

So here's some actual ways of. How to do it in your church as you're studying it.

Oh my gosh. And then it goes back to how you shared with us in chapter one, he's doing it according to the will of the Lord. Yeah. Just so if, just in case anybody didn't catch that when Patty said that Patty is in the book of Mormon videos.

We've got an actress in our midst, but that is not really how did you get to do that?

That is so funny. Um, so when they first started doing it, I mean, cause I live in Spokane and I, I think I saw something on the church's website or I don't know how I saw it, but I thought this sounds really cool. I'd really love to do it, but Oh, [00:40:00] that's Utah.

I won't, but you know, my family's still there and, and, but it just seemed like it was too And so then, um, when that first video came out, I'm like, oh, you blew it. You totally should have done it. And then they didn't hear about it for a while, and then I saw something again. They need people. Uh, that's great.

But I had braces on at the time. I thought, that's not gonna work. a mortgage. Yeah, but you know how many youth they have. On set, just don't smile. So then it was 2020 and I was, and my hair was pretty long at that point. And I was wanting to go get a cut actually. And I thought, but wait, let me see if they're still doing this.

And because of COVID, they didn't get to film third Nephi. And so they were, they were accepting applications. So I put it in and I heard back from them right away and said, yeah, you're in the first tier. So keep growing your hair. We don't know when it's happening, but we'll let you know. And so, Oh, okay.

That's great. And. Then it finally happened. It was July of 2021 and 3rd Nephi, mind blowing is, and they, they have, which is kind of like a core cast. They're the ones that they're, they were there day after day after day, and then they have people coming in and, um, it, it was magical. I, I will never. Read Third Nephi the same again.

I mean, I watch these videos and I see all my friends that are scattered in the dirt with me and it was real. It was so real. And I was only 8 days, but 1 of them was the Beatitudes, the healings. Um, I was really hoping to be there for the sacrament, but, um, that didn't happen. I mean. Then, but the Holy Ghost was pretty cool.

I mean, all of it. I, I'm in bits and pieces and you, unless I point you out, you probably won't ever see me because I was so nervous because, you know, I'm at the time I was in my late fifties and I didn't know how I deal with the heat. So I was like, Heavenly Father, please help me be like the people of Alma that I won't feel the burdens that will be placed on me.

So you see all this gorgeous dark hair. And I get a braid, I'm like, seriously, why did I grow this hair? But by day four, women are like, I'd give body parts for a braid. I'm like, thank you Beth.

So I have a braid.

You have a braid. I have a braid, so I'm not the flowing hair, you'll, that might be a clue.

Well, okay.

Then can you describe in detail for me what it was like to be there for the gift of the Holy Ghost moment? What was that like? Like, what do you remember from that as we're talking about these verses?

And I really, I love this because it actually, it flows into chapter six. At the time I was the early state president, we had just, um, our stake added two new wards.

So we were a brand new ward. They took three pieces of each ward. And combined us and I knew right away. My, my number 1 job was to unify. I just felt that so strongly and then right. We were going to have a birthday party and shut us down. It actually closed on my birthday, March 13th and so I was the Relief Society president during cobit and.

When we were doing the Book of Mormon video filming and those angels come down and the director says, I need you to walk through and he's saying to the, the apostles, he's saying to the angels too, as they're walking through the apostles, I need you to walk through like you're ministering to them. And of course being the, at least our president, that's a buzzword for me, minister.

So I stopped everything I was doing and I just watched these angels weave in and out and touch and, and talk and, um, Just, it was beautiful because I'm like, this is what I have to take back from this experience back to my home ward and teach ministering. Because when, when I had to get a brand new ward, that's the first Herculean task that I had was to assign everybody ministering sisters and everything.

Everybody was new. You didn't have companions that you can match up and maybe change. It was, this is this, this is this, this is this and, and go for it. And so that moment taught me more than anything. They are where they were literally ministering angels, and that needs to equate to what we do as saints.

We need to be ministering angels.

Wow. Well, Patty, when you spoke, you absolutely answered my question, which when I asked, why did he start with the Holy Ghost and not other things? And when you talked about the angels as ministering, the word for angels in Hebrew is Malachim, and that word also means servants.

Yeah. And it's, it's us. Every one of us. Like we sometimes read angels in the scripture and we think it's, it's only holy and it can be those [00:45:00] beings, but it can also be us. And so now here we are connecting the gift of the Holy Ghost to every one of us. And the first thing we do, we're asked to do is minister.

That's how God's church gets set up. That's how it works is by ministering. I love this connection now, like give the gift of the Holy Ghost because from here on out you can now then have the gift, you can have the priesthood, you can give the ordinance of the sacrament, you can baptize members of the church and we can minister to each other.

It all makes sense to me now. Patty, I'm so glad you shared that story. Oh my gosh. That's

so funny because this is, this is what I wrote. I don't know if you could see the progression. It was the Holy Ghost. The ordination of the Aaronic priesthood is what it seemed like to me. Then we have the sacrament and then we go to, we have meetings and that's, that's our continual round.

Yes. That's what we do.

And we can't minister or be angels or be servants without the Holy Ghost first. So thank you, Patty. That answered my question. Okay. So let's go in with Patty's progression that she's drawn. We have the gift of the Holy Ghost. So in the next segment, we're going to talk about the priesthood.

So thank you for pointing that out, Patty. We'll do that next.

All right. Here's my, here's a big seek and find. And here's what I want to know from the two of you. Go right to Moroni chapter three. We have four verses, very short. And it talks about, if you look at the top, elders ordained priests and teachers by the laying on of hands. It is solely about the priesthood right here.

And I asked you to look for, seek and find what in this chapter can help someone prepare to be ordained to the priesthood. What did you guys find?

Um, I was excited that question because, um, my third James is getting ordained and beginning of January. It's so crazy. It's just a little

guy. Oh yeah. And you all are mothers of sons.

I don't have any sons, so this will be, I want to know your answers.

Yeah. So I was like, Oh, what should I do to help him prepare to be ordained? You know, and I was as I was reading in verse 3, so Moroni 3 3 It says this is what they're supposed to say when they lay their hands on their head in the name of Jesus Christ I ordain you to be a priest or if he be a teacher I ordain you to be a teacher to preach repentance and remission of sins through Jesus Christ By the endurance of faith on his name and to the end.

Amen. So, you know, I was like, hmm, that's interesting You This is a big, it's a big step to be, um, ordained into the priesthood and have to know what your responsibilities are going to be. You need to know what you're getting into. So my first thought was I should teach him these things, what his duties are.

And I know you can go into DNC chapter 20, and it talks about all the duties of the different priesthoods. And so I kind of was looking at that and thinking of like, wow, my little 11 and a half year old is going to be having some responsibility soon. And does he know that that's what this priesthood means?

And it's this wonderful responsibility that he has to. In this scripture, in this verse in Moroni, it says to preach repentance and remission of sins through Jesus Christ. I'm like, how does an 11 year old do that? That is, that's a big, that's a big thing to do that. That's what he's getting, uh, the ordained to do.

So my first thought was just teaching him what that means. Like let's, let's have talks about what does it mean to have a remission of sins? I love in DNC 20, the one that really stood out to me of one of their, um, duties is And it's like 53 down to 57, but. Um, see that there is no iniquity in the church, neither hardness with each other, neither lying, backbiting nor evil speaking.

And I was like, Oh, that will be easy for him to comprehend. No more lying. No more talking bad about your brothers. No more being mean. I'll be like, look at buddy. It says right here. You can't do that. No, he's such a good kid. But I mean, like, You know, teaching them like that, what responsibility and greatness comes with, um, having that name of Christ on you and having that you be the representative of that.

Wow. Sure. Thank you. Thank you for pointing that out and giving us that cross reference. That's awesome. Love that. What about you, Patty?

So having three boys, I just kind of dad's going to take care of it.

Right.

And if yet, thank goodness. I'm grateful that I have a husband that. That did assist in that, but I went straight to the handbook.

So here we've got these little chapters from Moroni, but then you can go into our, you know, the church's website and you've got this big old handbook that gets updated now and then. And, um, I thought it was interesting how it talked about conferring the priesthood and ordaining somebody to the priesthood.

And, but what really stuck out to me though, was these are Aaronic [00:50:00] priesthood positions. Teachers and priests, um, you know, it doesn't really talk about the deacons, but it talks about the teachers and priests. And I thought, wow, I have never really heard about the Aaronic priesthood being in the book of Mormon before.

I love, I love that our young men. Get the opportunity to grow. I remember taking our children to Salt Lake City, and we took them to the welfare square, and they had a tour there. And this was back in the day when you went every Sunday morning. Well, every fast Sunday, and you gave the, the, you collected fast offerings.

Yeah,

for so for them to visually get to see. Um, what those fast offerings were doing was a lesson. So I love that, um, this is an opportunity to teach our boys to be men. And I'm sure that Moroni was taught these things by his father, Mormon. And he's, he's trying to keep going forward with that teaching. I think.

And you can tell that

Moroni takes his ordination. As a, as a priesthood holder, very seriously, because he knows what this means to hold the priesthood. And that's what he's doing, right? He's teaching, preaching repentance and remission by endurance of faith on his name to the end. So he's like, I am living this.

Enduring by my faith to the end. I love that endurance takes a serious thought. Yeah. Yeah.

I just, I underline that endurance of faith. Mm-Hmm. on his name to the end. And when he says that, like, I, Charlotte, like you point that out, he's literally doing that. Mm-Hmm. , you almost wonder if he added that part in like Yeah.

Do not deny the Christ to the end.

Yeah. He's like, if I have to do life, you have to do it and yes,

yes, absolutely. I appreciate your words. And Patty, I wrote next to all of these verses also when you said it teaches our boys to be men. And I think that is profound because this is, this is not the message the world is teaching our boys.

This is not the kind of men they want them to be, but how powerful if we teach our boys to be men, here's what it looks like to endure a faith on his name to the end. So really we're teaching our men, we're really teaching our boys to be men of God. And that is what Moroni was. So wow. Thank you. You can see how important this chapter was.

These four simple verses, Moroni, thank you. But wherever you are out there for including these in, he's on

top of the temple. That's where he is. Yeah.

There is shout out to Maroni. Yeah. Shout out to Maroni. Okay. So that is the end of chapter three. So now we have more administrative details in the next segment that Joseph just would absolutely need to know and very specific wording.

Talk about that next.

Let's turn to Maroni chapter six, verse six, before we read four and five. Okay. Maroni chapter six, verse six. Because years ago we could not do this. So chapter six is all about how to run the church and the people and the meetings and all of that. And chapter six, verse six, shall we read that?

And they did meet together oft to partake of bread and wine in remembrance of the Lord Jesus.

Thank you. Now go back to Moroni chapter four. And you can cross reference it to Moroni chapter six, verse six, because chapters four and five are going to be the sacramental prayers, and they have to be very specific in their wording. If it gets messed up, they have to repeat it. I appreciate when priests do mess up a little bit and go back and redo it because my kids always go, Mom, why did we have to do that?

And then you get teachable moment right there where you're like, cause it's a sacred ordinance where the wording has to be specific. And then they'll look, then they really do listen. So I want you guys to tell me though, because I said, You know, four years ago, we were not allowed to do this specific administrative detail.

We were not allowed to meet together off to partake of bread and wine in remembrance of the Lord Jesus. And we did it in our homes. I want to know from the two of you, because here are the sacramental prayers in chapter four and chapter five. What was it like for you during COVID? What was the sacrament like?

Do you have an experience that stands out?

Short. It was really short because it's just my husband and I on fast Sundays. He'd give us a bigger piece of bread.

It's very generous.

But yeah, I, that's what I really missed is I missed having that quiet to reflect upon the Savior. It was like, done, done, done, done, okay, you want to come follow me now?

Like, no, no, I need it to be quiet. It was, it was rough. I, a lot of people would love to go [00:55:00] back to it. Maybe if I had my children, I would, but I love meeting with the saints and um, having that time. I love watching the priesthood do their thing. So cute to watch these, these boys feel the responsibility to make sure that everybody has that piece of bread.

Wow. Wow.

Patty, I've never once considered that space of time. While you're waiting for everyone to take. Oh, yeah.

No, that's an interesting space of time for me. Especially because this is something I was a gospel doctrine teacher a while ago, and I always felt like Peter, James and John got such a bad rap in the garden because they were always falling asleep.

And then I realized I for 10 minutes. I fall asleep. I mean, I don't literally fall asleep, but I'll start looking. Oh, those are cute shoes. Or, oh, I wonder what we're going to cook for dinner. Or I, I felt sympathy for Peter, James and John, because I was no better than they were. My mind was asleep during the sacrament.

And, and ever since that, um, thought came to my mind, I really have to reign it in because I don't want to be chastised for falling asleep. I want to be awake for the Savior for those 10 minutes. And when it was only one minute, it wasn't enough. I was wide awake, but it wasn't enough to really process my thoughts and my love for Him.

for sharing that.

Yeah.

Um, our, our COVID experience with sacrament was a little different cause we have kids at home during that. I felt like it was really special and I really loved it. Um, I had a son who was old enough to bless the sacrament and so he and my husband would bless it each, each week and just kneel at our little piano bench.

We'd all sit on the couch and, um, And I felt like it really brought it home to my oldest, especially like what he was doing. It wasn't just this rote thing that he just sat up there and he said it in front of the ward and tried not to get nervous. He was like, Oh, I got it. This is, this is so important that I would do it just for my siblings and my parents.

Like, let's think about this. Right. And it just became very, um, special. And there wasn't all the announcements at the beginning of church that we kind of all like. Get in our zoned out sleepy brains, right?

Yeah.

And so we sat, you know, we sang a song and had the sacrament and it was, it just felt like it brought it to the point very quickly what we were doing and why we were there.

And um, you know, then we'd have one of our kids bear a little testimony. And like you said, it was short, but I loved, I actually loved it because it was like, this is like the most powerful thing and we're doing just this. Yeah. We're not going to be filling in this whole meeting with a million other things.

We're just doing this. This is the most important thing we're doing. And so I felt like for us, we were able to really just focus on the importance of the sacrament and having my son hand it to each of his siblings. And that was it. And it just felt like. You know, Christ was in our home and no matter where we went, no matter what happened to the world, that we couldn't go to church, we could still receive these ordinances.

And it felt really special. And I, and I loved it at home. I felt like it was like a dream. I mean, not that like sacrament is too long, but like my kids, like the length of it was Fantastic. Oh, we loved that .

It was perfect. Yeah. Very good. No finding

church shoes, none of that. It was just come and sit and like, let's do the most important thing we're gonna do all week.

Oh, wow. So I, I loved it, but I totally see what you're saying, Patty, about missing. Yeah.

Both

missing that time and, and the community. I can totally see it. Tammy, how was it for you guys?

Well, since I don't have any boys, my husband, he would do all of it. But I remember we had the conversation about how the words have to be very specific.

And so one of the things we did to engage our daughters a little bit more was they each took a turn on a Sunday being the, being the quote unquote Bishop. who would read along with the words to make sure dad said him exactly as they should be said. And, and it, they look forward to the time when they, when it was their turn to do that.

And so that we would open up our scripture. So they know it's in the book of Mormon and they would follow along with these words. And we'd look at them before we'd partake of, and whoever was in charge, they'd give a wink like, or a thumbs up. Messed up though. I don't think he ever did, but it was just a neat time.

But [01:00:00] looking back on it, I, I do think, like, I did miss the sense of community. I did miss that because it was such a short amount of time that we had. And then we would do a come follow me lesson. And we did get to the point where we're like, okay, how, you know, how much longer are we going to do this?

Because I miss people teaching my kids.

But what I love about our discussion for the three of us is I want everyone to be kind of be thinking like coming this next Sunday when you go to church. What can you do from here on out to make the sacrament the spiritual highlight of your week? Because we have just had three wonderful examples of how to do that.

I'm forever Patty going to think of that 10 minute, 15 minute period when the sacraments being passed. I fall asleep all the time by your description

or just by Patty's description. Yes.

I mean, I'd like to lay down on the, on the, that'd be highly inappropriate. I'm much too old, but by your definition, Patty, oh my gosh, how many times do I fall asleep or real quick, check my phone to see if somebody messaged me or, you know, I just, I want to teach that to my kids.

Like, what are you thinking about? They know I pray. I always do say a prayer to touch base with Jesus and the kids know not to bug me while I'm praying. But as soon as I opened my eyes, they've got a million questions for me. I'm like, can we just finish the sacrament? But I'm sure what I learned from you is just this idea that that make that the focus of why we're there.

Like, okay, kids, put everything away. Let's just think about Jesus for the next 10 minutes. Like

put away your coloring pages, whatever it is. So, you know, it's been really cool again, back to the Book of Mormon videos is when you do listen, watch the videos about the sacrament, I was so excited to watch them, but the prayers are different

and

I love that.

So I've written it down because it reminded me a couple of weeks ago, you talked to us about the him reverently and meekly now first person.

Yes,

these prayers that he says in the Book of Mormon video are first person. And so I will sometimes read those. I have them written in my scriptures. Oh God, the eternal father, we ask you to bless and sanctify the bread to the souls in remembrance of my body.

Um, so he's, he's changed it to be first person. So I love, wow. I love mixing it up a little bit, but it's then I feel like it's the savior talking to me and he's actually the one that's giving me. I mean, I'm not changing the way the sacrament is going to happen, but it just, it just reeled it in for me. It just brought him from being out there, right?

Close to my heart. You're doing this in remembrance of my body. Patty, this is you. This is me. And it made it really personal to me.

I'm gonna highlight that in remembrance of the body of the Thy Son. But in the Book of Mormon videos, he says, my body,

my body. And I mean, there's other things, you know, 'cause we say, oh God, the eternal Father, we ask, see in the name of thy son.

He doesn't say that. Mm-Hmm. . We ask thee to bless and sanctify this bread, um, willing to take upon the name of Jesus Christ and always remember me. And keep my commandments, which I have given. And so it just totally just kind of shifted for me. This is a moment just between me and him.

One other thing that stood out to me as I was kind of connecting all these chapters together, and when you had asked that question, like, how do we prepare for the sacrament to be a very special moment?

I love that way of thinking about it, Patty. I'm going to try to do that this next Sunday. But something else that stood out to me was in chapter two, verse two, and he's talking about that Holy Ghost again. He says he, they prepared for it by calling. He says, you shall call on the Father in my name in mighty prayer.

I love that way of talking about mighty prayer. And then in chapter three, when they prepared to give the ordination, it says after they had prayed unto the Father in the name of Christ, then they laid their hands. So each time that they were about to do one of these things, they're praying for the Holy Ghost, right?

This mighty prayer so that their heart can be in the right place. And as I was kind of connecting that to the sacrament, I should approach the sacrament with a mighty prayer. I don't know why that is an aha for me. You know, it's more of like a hustle and bustle and rush to get there and sit down. And our church is set up right now that we have class time first and sacrament second.

So everyone's kind of walking into. Sacrament, like talking to their friends that they were in class with, and you hurry and sit down, and everyone's trying not to talk, and then sacrament starts, and it's really, you know, we're trying really hard as a ward to be reverent. That's our ward goal, be reverent, but, um, like having that mighty prayer when you sit down and feeling like, you know, this is my time.

In the [01:05:00] Garden of Eden, my 10 minutes, like, I'm gonna pray to have the Holy Ghost with me to hear. And then one other thing that has always stayed with me is we had a Come Follow Me during COVID. We were talking about the sacrament with all of our kids at home, and my husband just said, All right, guys, what can we do to make sacrament a little bit more special?

Like, what's some ideas? And my My, uh, then seven year old Tommy said, well, we could just think about all the things Jesus has done for us this week.

Hmm.

And, and I have never forgotten it. And every week. Um, I try to do that during the sacrament and I try to think how he has blessed me, where he has been in my life, how I've seen his hand and trying really hard to write that down and to think about that each week.

But I think approaching it with prayer before can really bless us to have the Holy Ghost.

Wow, Char, thank you. Thanks for pointing that out. Both of you for the things that you pointed out in this segment as we talk about the sacrament and, and how we're going to. Truly make the sacrament this week, the highlight of our spiritual week.

So thank you. Thank you. Thank you to both of you. So let's do this then in our last segment, speaking of mighty prayer and praying, that's one of the instructions that Moroni gave is part of the administrative details. So in the next segment, we're going to dive into where we say these prayers. We'll do that next.

So we've been talking about the administrative details of the church. So I had to look up the word administrative because I wanted to know what the etymology was. You know, I love this kind of stuff. So the word administrative comes from the word administer, and it's an old French word meaning help, aid, be of service to, which I thought was pretty cool because I've always think of administrator as an administrator, somebody who's mean and in control and cracks the whip.

But also something neat about this word is it's directly from Latin administered. Um, which means to help assist manage, but then this is really cool because if you take add and then you add minister a, it means to serve, to attend, to wait upon. So now we have the administrative details of the church.

I've reframed it. The service attending, waiting upon details of the church, which is what the whole point and purpose of the church is. Let's turn to Moroni chapter six. Moroni chapter six is how we serve, how we assist, how we wait upon and how we are of service to the members of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter day Saints.

And so I asked my guests to read this chapter in conjunction with the talk that was given by Elder Dallin H. Oaks in 2021. And it's called The Need for a Church. And I want to know, Kate, go to chapter six of Moroni. Tell me what you marked about the church and how it's set up and how we're supposed to organize it and do stuff in it.

What do you, what

stood out to you? I think the first thing that stuck out to me is he's writing this while he's completely alone. So I don't know if he's winging it, or maybe is he remembering a better time when he went to church or, or maybe he's been, again, being prompted. That's, that's the first thing that stuck out to me.

I kind of had to chuckle because, again, It was all about ministering to me. I think I still have that. That's still a buzzword for me after being a release site president, and maybe I'll release site presidents that have ever had that calling. That's, that's a buzzword for them. And so when I read and after that, this is verse four and after they had been received unto baptism and were wrought upon and cleansed by the power of the Holy ghost, they were numbered among the saints of the church of Christ and their names were taken and that Be remembered and nourished by the good word of God, to keep them in the right way, and to keep them continually watchful unto prayer, relying alone upon the merits of Christ, who is the author and finisher of their faith.

To me when I read this, and I don't mean to make light, but it says, uh, see, they were numbered among the church of Christ and their names were given to the resociety president so that she could assign them a ministering sister. It's a great way to translate that. The way I read that because they, you just, you gotta have a connection.

You just, and that's, that's what I, that's what jumped out to me.

Well, of course, now that we know the meaning of the word minister and you gave us minister, that's exactly what this is. And so the Relief Society president or the elders quorum president so that they can be remembered and nourished by the good word of God.

I mean, what, what do you think the good word of God is? It's Christ. It's what we're doing for him. It's, it can only, they can only be nourished by us. The people who are willing to say, I will not deny the Christ. [01:10:00] Shaar, what about you?

I just love that he talks about meeting together off to, to minister in verse four and to fast and pray in verse five, um, with one another concerning the welfare of their souls.

So fasting and praying for each other, not just for ourselves, but for somebody else. And then, and then at the end of nine, it says, And as the power of the Holy Ghost led them whether to preach, or to exhort, or to pray, or to supplicate, or to sing, even so it was done. Like, and then the Holy Ghost taught us everything we should do, and so we did that.

But I just love how the administration of the church was to bless each other. And sometimes I think we get caught in like the, why do I need to go to church? Yes, about strengthening our testimony of Christ and, but it's also about strengthening others. And I think that's an important part that we miss sometimes about the point of church is we're there as a community.

We're there for each other. We're not just showing up to say, I need my testimony strengthened. And if it's not, I don't know why I'm coming because we can show up for other people too.

Yes. I thought that was so cool in this talk, uh, why we need church because it talked about that. Like even the most wonderful, spiritual, righteous human being will never be able to get out of worship on their own.

Like you have to go to church. You have to be with the community of saints. And what struck me, I'm glad you brought up verse nine. And I'm just going to do this real quick, little shout out right here, because you brought this up, Patty, about how you can read all of this in the handbook, general handbook of instructions for the church.

Shout out to our stake relief society president, Courtney cultural. You are going to love this story so much because if you go and read about how the meetings are to be conducted right here, it says to preach, to exhort, to pray or to supplicate or to sing. Even. So it was done by members who are. The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter day Saints baptized members.

It says in the handbook that baptized members of the church can pray and give talks. So in our state conference last week, the opening prayer was given by a primary age child, a little nine year old grade. And then two talks were given by primary age kids in state conference. I loved it. Like we need more of that little kids in state conference.

And boy, were we exhorted and we. I felt like the spirit was so strong with that sweet little prayer was given to open up state conference. It was awesome. And I just think that right there, you can't get that in the mountains. Now listen, I love the mountains. I love hiking and I feel the spirit when I'm there.

Not the same way I did that Sunday when that little boy prayed. Oh, so cool.

Oh, I love that. That's so cool.

Tell me also then, from what you read, why do we need a church? What stood out to you

in these talks? Well, this is Elder Renlund's talk, the one, the dynamite talk, which I love this last conference and he says, the gospel is perfect, but a divinely commissioned church is required to preach it, maintain its purity, administer its sacred ordinances with the Savior's power and authority.

Boom. Dynamite. That just, that was great. Yeah. Why do we need both? That's a great quote. That is dynamite. It is. Another quote from him. He said, church was not a location or a building, nor is it today. The church is simply ordinary people, disciples of Jesus Christ gathered and organized into a divinely appointed structure that helps the Lord accomplish his purposes.

Right after, um, well, I'm grateful that I was in a ward and a bishop that was anxious to get us back to church. And so we started back to church in September of 2020. So, you know, we had a few months off at 2020. And so who do you ask to Be the 1st speaker. It was the release site present, which was me. So what do you tell people?

But I felt very strongly that my job is a release site present was I was the gatherer. I kept it was my job to bring people in and. You know, sometimes I'd knock on somebody's door. I'd take a few steps back. Are you good? How are things and then they'd welcome you in or so that stay on the porch and you keep your distance I was respectful of whatever their wishes were but it's Interesting to me that I had a friend Just say to me last week, because since that time, our ward has been split again.

And so some of those saints went away and, and one of our sisters asked another sister, how are you doing? She says, well, it's a little tough because they got sent to the other ward. She goes, we just don't have sister Howard's just not coming and making her visits. And now that I make visits anymore, cause it's not my calling to do that.

I mean, I'd love to minister, but, um, I felt really strongly. So that was my talk was. About gathering and why we gather. And then, of course, it's all about gathering. That's what Jesus wants us to do. We're we're gathering and we really had a moment. There were. We really got to feel firsthand of what that [01:15:00] must have felt, what it does feel like to gather the saints.

And, and I feel like some of us are still trying to come back, but again, the need for the church. I love, that's why I loved elder Redlands talk is because he nailed it on the head. It's not that the church, we're not going to the building. We're going to be together. Patty, you

absolutely are correct. And so I have a follow up question, but this is for Char.

So, Char, here's what I want to know then, because based on everything that Patty said, which is true in Elder Wendland's talk, what did it mean for you to gather those first Sundays when you moved your family to Minnesota?

Yeah, it was everything because we moved in September 2020 from Utah to Minnesota and knew not a single soul.

And so we really needed that gathering and the people, we needed people in our life. And, um, it was really important to do that because, you know, we needed to feel that Connection, and we needed to know that we were going to be okay and You get that feeling when you're with other saints, and it's really special to have that.

Um, I, I also was thinking about just that administrative aspect, though, of the church and how it's important to help. Think in the quote you read from Renlund, it talked about how it helps us to administer the ordinances to each other. And, you know, and that's all we're talking about in all these chapters is all these ordinances we want to get out to everybody, right?

And I had the opportunity of For the first time in my life, I decided to be, um, I was a, I'm a temple worker and I went, I've, I've gone one time and it was so great and, um, I think for a while I kind of was, I dug my heels in, I'm like, no, I don't, it's just kind of for old ladies, people who have a lot of time on their hands, no offense to temple workers because I am one now, but, um, I just have felt really strongly this year when my kids went back to school that I should, something I should do.

And so I went and, um, it really opened my eyes because, you know, before when you go to the temple, it's just this calm, this wonderful, you know, you just get ushered right in. It's just so smooth and wonderful. And then I got to see the background as a temple worker of, you know, actually there's people here that are working really hard to make sure it is.

Perfectly smooth and peaceful and reverent and that you're getting the experience you need without them even being noticed as a worker. Like that's, you know, and so in the very first, um, little, we had like a little prayer meeting before with all the temple workers, our temple president said, your job is to not be noticed and is to provide the spirit and, and the opportunity for the people coming to have their own experiences with Christ.

But not to have you be noticed. And so I was like, Oh, that is so important. That's so cool. So as I was able to go through that, um, first day as a temple worker, it just really stood out to me the importance of having administration in our church, because without those people willing to, to do the things to help administer those ordinances, it wouldn't happen.

We wouldn't be able to do it. We wouldn't be able to do all these, those work for the dead in the temple and to have the sacrament on Sunday. And these are the, these are the experiences that are letting us have experiences with Christ. And I think it's so, so important. And the second thing I just have to say that I learned that one time I served so far, Is that, uh, women have the priesthood and I know we talked about the priesthood in the chapter three and we talked about our men, our boys like learning to be men and, and, you know, just like the prophet has said, if, if you ever doubt that women also have the power of the priesthood in their life, just go to the temple and it was just, it So profound to me, and I just am grateful that I have the opportunity now to kind of be on more of that administrative side sometimes when I get to go to the temple now, because it's really important to, to be able to offer these saving ordinances to each other.

You know, as friends, you know, whether we're bringing our friends to the temple with us or whether we're, you know, passing the sacrament as a priest or whatever we're doing, we are bringing these ordinances to each other and that's drawing each other closer to the Savior.

And that, my friend, is what it means to administer.

Right there. The administrative details is to bring people to Christ. So thank you. Char. Well, thank you. Char and Patty. That was, that's it. We're done. That's the end of our discussion. That was so good. Okay, so gather your thoughts and tell me what did you write down? What is going to be your takeaway from today's discussion?

I wrote down a big at the top of my page. Let's talk of Christ.

I really

love that discussion of how 2025, I guess we could even start now. I mean, it wouldn't be bad, but let's talk of Christ. Let's do it. [01:20:00] Let's not, let's not keep our mouths shut. Um, we have great things to share and great things to say because it's about him.

That is awesome. Especially when you think what President Nelson's talk was, he's coming. Yeah. That's a great segue into something fun. He's coming. He's coming. So

let's talk about him. Oh, that's awesome. Very cool.

For me, I think, gosh, and I'm sure when I listen to this, I'm like, Oh, I should have picked that instead.

But I really loved, well, I always love when you teach Hebrew so that the angels are servants and we get to be the servants. But what a gift that he has given us and, and when we think about how we have, um, angels on this side and on the other side, and as we, as we serve in the temple and help those beautiful angels, um, to have access to them in our life and to recognize their hand.

I'm so grateful that, um, our Heavenly Father has help. And we get to be part of that help. So I love that Hebrew word. I look forward to writing it in, in the show notes of what it really was. But, um, Angels are servants and we get to be those servants. I just love that it's, it's order. He has provided order for us.

Boy, that's a great way to define these, the, the, the order of the churches in these chapters. Thank you. Um, for me, I loved the quote that you shared, Char, back when your friend who was not afraid to Speak of Christ. Um, when God doesn't work as fast as you would like, a delay is not a denial. That was so cool.

Thank you for sharing that and, and sharing the example of how easy it is to speak of Christ and for our goal to not deny the Christ in 2025. speak of them. So thanks for that quote. And then Patty, I loved it when you said that these, that Moroni chapter three teaches our boys to be men. And what it means to be a man of God and to minister.

So that's so cool. And how, and then how you tie it into women too, who are ministers and we're all ministers and we're all trying to bring people to Christ. And that is the goal of these chapters to bring people to the Savior. So thank you. That's it.

We're done. Thank you. That was so great. I love studying these chapters.

It was fun.

So fun.