The April 2018 general conference made history as President Russell M. Nelson was sustained as the new prophet of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. We saw the end of home and visiting teaching, the beginning of combined high priests and elders quorum, and the announcement of several new temples at the end of the Sunday afternoon session.
These changes were delivered with confidence and enthusiasm, and although some of the changes took some adjusting to, it was apparent that they came directly from God and were put in place to progress His work on the earth.
Each talk was truly inspired. They have blessed my life in so many ways and provided hope through dark times. The leaders of our Church don’t take speaking in general conference lightly, and they ponder and pray over exactly what God wants His children to hear.
As I read through the talks over the past couple of months, I wondered what words the speakers used most often. I compiled all of the talks and entered them into an online text analyzer, and I was touched but unsurprised at which four words were most frequently repeated throughout the talks.
Besides common words like “the,” “and,” and “to,” the four most frequent words were:
Lord
Christ
Jesus
God
Let that sink in for a minute. Out of all of the talks for the April 2018 general conference (not including the priesthood session), the most repeated words were Lord, Christ, Jesus, and God.
This conference was full of major changes, sustainings, and announcements, but the core of the gospel—the reason we are even on the earth today—remained the most frequent topic.
This Church belongs to the Lord. He sent His son Jesus Christ to atone for our sins so we can all achieve eternal life and be perfected in Him. We need to remember our Savior in our everyday lives, and listening to and reading past general conference addresses will help us develop the Christlike attributes we need to get there.
As you watch this upcoming general conference, listen for words and phrases that touch your heart or that you hear multiple times. The Lord has inspired our leaders to say exactly what we need to hear, and all we have to do is listen and let the spirit touch our hearts.
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