Episode 68
===
Lynnette: Hello, hello, my friends. Welcome to Stand with Lynnette. If you're new or if you've been here for a while, I'm so glad that you are here joining me on this journey and I hope you find value in what I share with you today. But I must apologize for the lateness in releasing this episode because normally I release them early on Thursday mornings each week, but it's currently Friday, midday, and I'm just barely recording this episode. And so I'm hoping to get it finished and ready to upload today, but we'll just see how it goes. But regardless, I'm sorry for being late. The reason for my tardiness is significant to what we're going to be talking about today, so let me tell you a little story.
On Thursday, yesterday, I spoke to a Relief Society group all about receiving personal revelation. And they asked me to do this maybe like a month or six weeks ago, and I was excited to do it. I love to speak, and this topic, I thought, I've got this covered. I have written and recorded several podcasts on revelation, different aspects of revelation in the book that I'm writing.
I wrote a whole chapter on personal revelation, and I thought I could just take all these sources and things that I had already written and kind of compile them into something unique for this group. And so I was praying to know, what do I need to teach this group? And then I sat down last week and, or actually it was this week I sat down.
I've been thinking about this for a long time, but on Monday, I'm like, okay, I've got to compile all of these things so that I'm ready for Thursday. And again, thinking this is not going to be hard. I have all this stuff already created. But I sat down and was compiling and I spent hours and it didn't feel right.
And so the next day, morning to night, all day long, I'm compiling, I'm tweaking, I'm looking for new sources. I'm, I'm rearranging things that are already there. And at the end of that day, all this great information, but it still just didn't feel right. And so the same thing again, the next day, just trying to tweak and figure out what am I missing as I'm praying to the Lord to help me know what does this group need?
I don't understand why I don't feel settled about this. And again, working late into the night after I got home from mutual, which is on Wednesdays, and I'm a young women's leader. Then I came home and, and until like 10:30 on Wednesday night, I was still trying to adjust things. And I went to bed thinking, well, I'm kind of out of time because on Thursday, I work at the temple.
I serve as an ordinance worker from 6am until maybe 12 or 1, depending on what time I get done with the things that I'm doing there. And then I was speaking that night. And so I just thought when I went to bed on Wednesday night, this is what it is because I'm out of time. And so hopefully the Lord will bless me with the Spirit and my delivery that I'll be able to say the things that this group needs.
So I went to the temple for my shift on Thursday and I'm still thinking about this. I'm still praying about, help me to know, like, how do I do this for this particular group? And normally I'm not, I don't know, I just felt a lot more worry about this specific presentation for some reason, and it was just weighing on me, but I wasn't sure what to do to, to feel more settled, I guess, with what I was saying to them.
So I had, five minutes to myself during my shift. I was a little bit early for one of the things that I was doing. And I was waiting by the, the initiatory booth for my turn to go in and serve there. And I just had a Book of Mormon. And I opened up the Book of Mormon, and it opened up to Mormon chapter one.
And I read this verse at the top of the page. And immediately I knew this is the missing piece. This is what I need for this presentation. And so I was thinking about that for the rest of my shift. How can I dive more into this? How can I explore this? What do I take out of my presentation to put this in and explore these ideas?
And I wasn't sure how all that was going to fit together, but I came home and I didn't get home till about between 12:30 and one o'clock. And I had to make two trips to the high school between then and when I had to leave about 6:30 to go and speak. And so I didn't have a lot of time, but I essentially just sat down and started writing out the thoughts that were in my mind, and it just flowed. It came so fast and so easily all of these thoughts. And I wrote them all out and then I adjusted the rest of the presentation to fit with these thoughts. And then I, I didn't even have time really to run through the entire thing.
And I was feeling a little unsettled about that because I wanted to be able to not read. I wanted to be able to just speak, but I didn't feel like I had a good enough grasp on these ideas just to speak, but I knew they were from the Lord. I knew it. And so I gave that presentation last night and I thought, well, maybe my podcast friends will also benefit from these thoughts that the Lord literally put into my mind hours before I needed to give this presentation.
So with that intro, that is what I'm going to talk about today. Like I said, I have talked about personal revelation before on several different podcast episodes. I dive into it a lot in episode six, and I actually taught some of the things I taught in episode six, I taught last night, the more practical ways to approach revelation, how to increase the likelihood that you will recognize a Spirit in your life.
And so if you are interested in practical tips, I invite you to go back and listen to episode six, because there are some good practical things in there. But today I'm mostly going to focus on what the Lord taught me through this one verse of scripture, but to kind of set the scene for you, let's just talk about the fact that this has been one of the things that President Nelson has talked about over and over and over in his ministry. In fact, his very first talk as President of the church. He pled with us to increase our spiritual capacity to receive revelation, warning that "in the coming days it will not be possible to survive spiritually without the guiding, directing, comforting, and constant influence of the Holy Ghost."
This is maybe one of the prophets most often quoted warnings, prophecies. I've heard it over and over since he said it several years ago, when he spoke very first as the President of the church at general conference. So how do those words make you feel when you hear them? Do you feel confident? Do you feel like I know how to hear the voice of the Spirit? I know when he is speaking to me and I can confidently move forward when I hear him, and so I feel like I will be okay spiritually. Do you feel confident? I hope you feel confident. If you don't feel confident, don't worry. You are not alone. You're in really good company.
Maybe you feel like I'm still trying to figure out this whole revelation thing. How do I know if it's a Lord speaking to me or if it's just my thoughts, or is he really even speaking to me or does he guide me at all? Or maybe those instances are so rare that they're anything but constant and you worry that maybe you might be one of the spiritual casualties. Well, wherever you fall on that scale, you are in good company.
There are people that feel confident and there are people that are still learning and there are people somewhere in the middle. And so all of it is okay. As long as we're trying to listen for and follow the voice of the Spirit. So, I want to tell you that it is possible for those of you who may not feel like the Lord ever speaks to you, or you maybe only hear Him once in a while, it is possible and probably even likely that you are receiving many revelations daily, as it talks about in Helaman chapter 11 verse 23.
And I love the description that The Lord gave to Joseph Smith in Doctrine and Covenant Section 121 verse 33. He said, "as well, might man stretch forth his puny arm to stop the Missouri River in its decreed course, or to turn it upstream as to hinder the Almighty from pouring down knowledge from heaven upon the heads of the Latter day Saints."
This is powerful imagery here. And because I don't remember my US geography all that well, cause I think I learned it in like elementary school or something like that, and it's long since left my brain. And so I did a little bit of research on the Missouri river so that I could remind myself the Lord might be using that in this analogy with Joseph Smith.
So in my research, I learned that the Missouri river is the longest river in the United States, and it travels more than 2300 miles. from Montana to St. Louis, where it joins the Mississippi River and then heads south to the Gulf of Mexico. It is considered the center of life for the Great Plains and has served as a major contributor to exploration, travel, food, and trade for thousands of years.
It provides water for one fourth of all of the agricultural land in the United States, which in turn produces about one third of the country's grain. So this is a massive river that fuels life for so much of our country. Yet the Lord decreed that it would be easier for a single man with his puny arms, which by the way, I love that description, his puny arms.
It would be easier for a man with puny arms to stop this massive life giving river in its tracks or entirely change its course, then it would be to stop Him, Heavenly Father, from pouring out revelation upon the heads of his people, including you and me. That is powerful imagery, but do we believe it? Do we believe that is possible for us as individuals?
So today I want you to leave this podcast feeling of the truthfulness of Elder Neal A. Maxwell's words, "for those who have eyes to see and ears to hear, the Father and the Son are giving away the secrets of the universe." This has become one of my favorite quotes because I have learned for myself that it is true.
I'm not sure that He's teaching me the secrets of the universe quite yet. I don't think I'm ready for the secrets of the universe, but He is teaching me to understand the things that I need to know in my life right now. And these are things like who I am, as his daughter, my identity, why that matters. He's teaching me things like what my purpose is, my unique purpose, why I am here on earth right now, and how I can accomplish that purpose with his help.
He's teaching me about my children, about their divine identity, about the work they're here to do, and how I can prepare them for that, and so much more. And these may not be secrets of the universe, but they are secrets of my own life. They are secrets that help me to cement my faith and to be successful in my purpose here on earth.
And if he can teach me those things, he can teach you those things. I promise he is anxious to do so. So the trick is to learn to hone in on his voice amid the chaos, the confusion, the commotion that characterizes our world. The Prophet Joseph Smith taught that the Holy Ghost is a revelator and no man can receive the Holy Ghost without receiving revelations.
So, if we were baptized, if we were given the gift of the Holy Ghost, we are not only capable of receiving revelations, but we are probably receiving a whole lot more of them than we realize. Because the Holy Ghost is a revelator. When we partake of the sacrament each week, we renew our baptismal covenants, which include always remembering the Lord and keeping His commandments.
If we are striving to always remember the Lord, to keep His commandments, to serve Him, to do our best, to repent when we make mistakes, to renew those covenants each week by partaking of the sacrament. Then, the Lord promises us in return that we will always have his Spirit to be with us. Always have his Spirit to be with us.
That means when we are doing our best, the Lord is bound, required, obligated to send us his Spirit. That is his promise. He always keeps his promises. Therefore, we do not need to stress about whether our good thoughts are revelations or not. We can move forward with faith that the Lord is with us, and is keeping his promise to guide us through his Spirit, even if we do not always recognize that.
So the simple formula for revelation is this, be good, do good, trust God. Be good, do good, trust that God is guiding you. This is receiving many revelations daily, or as Elder Bednar says, living in revelation. Even if we don't always consciously recognize that.
So I think it is important to emphasize that there will always be opposition to revelation because we are not operating in a spiritual bubble.
Mortality is distracting. And sometimes things beyond our control can make it difficult to hear the quiet voice of the Spirit. And there are many things that make it difficult to hear the quiet voice of the Spirit. This is part of living in a fallen world. But not only that, also the adversary knows, he absolutely knows that receiving heavenly guidance is vital to our spiritual survival, and he will do everything in his considerable power to stop us from seeking, from accessing, and from trusting in all of this revelation that we receive. He has had thousands of years to perfect his craft, and he is very good at what he does. He is expert in many things, including convincing God's covenant people like you and me to stop praying, maybe to stop believing that they are worthy of praying. Or to stop trusting that the Lord is listening to them when they pray, or that he is willing to guide them with his voice. They stopped trusting in their ability to hear his voice, or maybe even to believe that the revelations that they have had in the past, the experiences that they have had with God in the past were imagined or made up.
Ultimately, Satan wants us to walk in darkness, which will only happen if we stop seeking, seeing, trusting in, and living in revelation. But even amid the flood of darkness that the adversary is using his power to create in our world today, our prophets are teaching us that every single one of us who has made and strives to keep covenants with God at baptism and in the temple is "armed with righteousness and with the power of God in great glory."
In other words, we are armed with his light, meaning we cannot possibly walk in darkness. If we are wearing, as it speaks of in the New Testament, the armor of light, how can we possibly walk in darkness? That light will protect us from the slings and arrows and deception of the adversary because darkness yields to light every time.
If you, for instance, are on a camping trip away from the city lights, and it is very dark, and you turn on a flashlight, the darkness instantly yields to that light every time. The darkness has no more power, and the light reveals things once hidden and unseen. Ultimately illuminates the path to safety.
And the same thing is true for the light of revelation in a darkening world. It gives us the power to discern right from wrong, good from evil. It gives us the power to overcome fear and to live in faith, trusting that God will guide us through the darkness back to him. It gives us the power to have joy when the world is filled with increasing despair.
The Lord knows what we need to survive spiritually in this toxic spiritual environment. And it begins with learning to hear him. Does he know how difficult that is when the winds of deception that just a few years ago felt like a gentle breeze have now escalated to cyclone speed? Of course, he knows it is difficult to hear his still small voice amid the deafening noise of the world.
But will he help us to tune into his voice and to trust his voice? Again, yes, and he is a very patient teacher.
In last weekend's General Conference, Elder Michael T. Nelson from the Young Men's General Presidency said this, "The youth today are among Heavenly Father's most noble spirits. They were among the stalwart defenders of truth and agency in the premortal world. They were born in these days to gather Israel through their powerful witness of the Lord Jesus Christ. He knows each one of them. And knows their great potential. He is patient as they grow. He will redeem and protect them. He will heal and guide them. He will inspire them. We, their parents and leaders have been prepared to support them."
I know he was talking about the youth, but I believe his words also apply to us. Most of us who are here listening to this podcast are probably parents, grandparents, leaders, aunts, neighbors of the rising generation. We know of their valiance because of quotes like this. And President Nelson has also said similar things about them since becoming the prophet.
These kids were born into a world that is corrupted every wit. And the Lord has given us, their parents, their grandparents, their leaders, their friends, the responsibility to get them ready for their divinely appointed work of gathering Israel and preparing the world for the second coming of the Savior.
Yes, they have a great work to do, and the divine gifts that they will need to do it. But so do we. The Lord is trusting us to raise his finest spiritual warriors, which is no small task. And I know that we all feel the weight of that responsibility. It is no wonder that we need personal revelation, not only to survive spiritually ourselves, but to help the young people in our lives survive spiritually.
But as Elder Nelson in the quote from General Conference said, the Lord is patient with them as they grow. He knows it will be infinitely more difficult for our youth today to learn to hear the voice of the Spirit in these turbulent times than it may have been in times past. Yet he trusts them. He gives them time and space to learn, knowing that they will, like the stripling warriors of old, be wounded in battle. Every single stripling warrior was wounded in battle. And the same will be true of our youth today. They will be wounded. But he trusts them, and he trusts us. He is patient with us as we learn to hear and follow him. He is patient with us as we try to teach what we are learning to the young and vulnerable who do not yet understand.
He will arm us with his power as we seek him.
My children are now mostly grown, and four of them have left the nest, and I have one 15 year old left at home. And it astounds me to think of what has happened in the world in the 10 years since my oldest child was in my youngest's place. The things that my youngest now faces every day, the temptations and the ideas that threatened to destroy his faith were not yet commonplace when my oldest was in his shoes just a few years ago.
And when I dwell on that too much, then I start to feel a little fearful and anxious about what the world will look like when my 16 month old grandson gets to high school. But this is not the first time that faithful parents have been trying to raise children unto the Lord in a spiritually toxic environment.
The prophet Mormon tells us of such a time. He was 11 years old when such great wickedness prevailed upon the face of the whole land that the Lord took away his beloved disciples. The work of miracles and healings stopped because of the people's iniquity and the Holy Ghost did not come upon any because of their wickedness and unbelief.
In the midst of this great wickedness, Mormon at age 15, was "visited of the Lord and tasted and knew of the goodness of Jesus."
What does that say about how much the Lord trusts his covenant youth who are growing up in times of wickedness? Does he speak to them? Does he guide their parents and leaders as those parents and leaders seek to guide them?
Mormon, at age 15, tasted and knew of the goodness of Jesus when there was no goodness to be found in the world around him. At age 15, he tried to share his testimony, but the Lord forbade him to do so because the people had willfully rebelled against their God. But Mormon's experience with the Lord at age 15 set the spiritual stage for the rest of his life.
The world he lived in did not get better. It got worse. The people he lived among did not repent, despite his later attempts to help them do so. He lived his entire life among wickedness so great that he said it was "impossible for the tongue to describe or for man to write a perfect description of the horrible scene of blood and carnage."
Yet, he held on to his faith through the awful circumstances he was born into and had no control over because he had, in his youth, experienced the goodness of Jesus. This, my friends, is the power of revelation. Each one of us can experience the goodness of Jesus for ourselves. Our kids and grandkids can experience the goodness of Jesus, no matter what happens in the days ahead or how dark the world becomes. And that one on one experience with Jesus will change everything.
As Jeffrey R. Holland so beautifully said, "Sometimes we seek heaven too obliquely, focusing on programs or history or the experience of others. Those are important, but not as important as personal experience. True discipleship and the strength that comes from experiencing firsthand the majesty of his touch."
Our personal experiences with Jesus can act as anchor points for our faith and sustain us through the times of darkness, just as Mormon's experience did for him. So I invite you to think about those experiences in your life. When you have experienced the goodness of Jesus. Record them in as much detail as you can remember and reflect on those things when it might be difficult to feel the Spirit. When the world might be really dark for you and you wonder if the Lord hears you and you wonder if He cares, reflect back on those experiences and trust them. Don't allow Satan to convince you that they were made up or that they didn't really happen or that your memory is exaggerating the feelings of faith and peace and love that you felt then
Hold onto those as anchor points, just as Mormon did in the wickedness that we cannot even imagine. It was way worse for Mormon as far as the world was concerned than it is now for us. Even though it's bad, it was worse for Mormon. And so if he can do it, if he can hold onto his faith, then so can we.
How, then, can we experience the firsthand, the majesty of his touch on a more frequent basis? Mormon's son Moroni, taught us the formula. Now, remember that Moroni also lived his entire life in the same conditions that Mormon tried to describe for us by saying that they were impossible to describe, but he lived long enough to run for his life, alone, after all of his people, including his father were dead.
Can you imagine what Moroni's life was like? How did he find light and faith? Incidentally, this Moroni is also the man who calls us to the temple with his trumpet. But this is what he taught us about receiving revelation and experiencing the touch of the master's hand. He said, "Oh, then despise not and wonder not, but hearken unto the words of the Lord and ask the Father in the name of Jesus for what thing soever you shall stand in need. Doubt not, but be believing and begin as in times of old. And come unto the Lord with all your heart and work out your own salvation with fear and trembling before him. Be wise in the days of your probation, strip yourselves of all uncleanness. Ask not that you may consume it on your lust, but ask with a firmness unshaken that ye will yield to no temptation, but that you will serve the true and living God
You can find these verses in Mormon chapter 8, verses 27 and 28. But the phrases that stand out to me in these two verses, they are filled with invitations to act, to do something. Words like hearken, ask- revelation almost always comes in the form of an answer to a question. So do not be afraid to ask, bring all your good questions to the Lord. He wants you to ask.
Then there are phrases like doubt not, be believing, come unto the Lord, work, be wise, strip yourselves of all uncleanness, and again, ask with a firmness unshaken. These are all action words, which leads me to conclude that receiving revelation requires us to act. There are no free rides back to heaven.
Amid all of the talk about covenants and the temple at last week's general conference, I felt this underlying sense of urgency. I have felt that every time President Nelson has spoken since he became the President of the church, and I often wonder, what does he know that I don't know? But this time Elder Holland underscored that urgency when he said, " I bear witness that when Christ comes, he needs to recognize us, not as nominal members listed on a faded baptismal record, but as thoroughly committed, faithfully believing, covenant keeping disciples. This is an urgent matter for all of us, lest we ever hear with devastating regret, 'I never knew you,' or as Joseph Smith translated that phrase, 'you never knew me.' Close quote.
If that does not feel urgent, I don't know what does, but urgent is not the same thing as frantic. It's not the same thing as panicked. It doesn't mean that we are running around like chickens with our head cut off, because we're not going to get very far in that sense of panic. But what it does mean is that we don't have time to waste. We don't have time to be casual about our commitment to Jesus Christ. We've got to be intentional about it, but small, simple, sustained effort over time leads to dramatic increases in revelation, in testimony, in conversion. Our direction matters more than our speed. So we just need to start walking.
In Doctrine and Covenants section 88 verse 63, it says, "draw near unto me, and I will draw near unto you. Seek me diligently and ye shall find me. Ask and ye shall receive. Knock and it shall be opened unto you."
Again, notice the action words and the order in which they are presented. According to this verse, who makes the first move every time? We do. The Lord meets us after we start moving. He requires us to put in some effort to receive the guidance that we seek.
And because we're friends, It's you and me, and I can just say things as they are. Let me just say that we cannot expect that the Lord will fight our battles, calm our fears, help us to raise faithful children in an increasingly faithless world, and bless us with enough courage to endure temptation and navigate a minefield of confusion and doubt when we are only willing to dip our toes into the waters of discipleship.
The Lord is willing to speak to you and to me. He is willing to pour down many revelations daily upon our heads. The question then is, what do we need to start doing or stop doing to hear him more clearly? The answers to those questions will be highly personal, and I testify that the Lord will tell you exactly what you need to do, and to stop doing.
So, I invite you to ask him those questions. What do you need me to start doing to hear your voice more clearly? And what do you need me to stop doing to hear your voice more clearly? And then pay attention to the thoughts and feelings that come into your mind and heart after you ask those questions.
You may receive answers that you don't think have anything to do with receiving personal revelation, but trust them, because God knows you perfectly, and all things are spiritual unto Him. So if you receive an answer that doesn't feel spiritually significant, do it anyway. And then, Ask again in a little while, what do you need me to do? What do you need me to stop doing? And then ask again and do the things and stop doing the things that he invites you to do and to stop doing. And this is how we progress in revelation. This is how we become a believer, firmly anchored to Him by doing little things over and over, increasing our capacity to do those things over and over.
And He will help us. He will guide us. He is giving away the secrets of the universe to those who have eyes to see and ears to hear. So let's work on developing those eyes to see and ears to hear. And together, let's stand. Thanks for being here with me, my friends, and I will see you back here again next week.
