It's been an interesting couple of months and I haven't done a very good job or journaling events or thoughts or feelings. I was released as YW President at the end of November. I served just over 3 years, but I had served for almost 4 years as a counselor. So in just over a month after I was released, I would have been in YW for 7 years. Jackie Simper was called as the new YW President, and she will do a fantastic job. But I would be lying if I said I wasn't sad. I love the YW so very much, and YW has been a huge part of my life for a long time, so it was a sad adjustment for me.
I was called to be a Gospel Doctrine Teacher. Sharon is also a gospel doctrine teacher, so I will teach once a month. Interestingly, months ago, Sara and I were talking about callings we would love to have and I mentioned that I would love to be Gospel Doctrine Teacher. So that's fun. It's been a long time since I taught adults, but I'm excited for the opportunity. And a tiny bit nervous because it is Old Testament.
I teach for the first time on Sunday. We are studying Moses 1 and Abraham 3. Here's my outline for what I plan to cover.
First, introduction to the year and my goals for Old Testament and ask class what they HOPE to learn/accomplish.
*Point out that the Come Follow Me Manual gives the following suggestions for studying the Old Testament: 1. Find personal meaning, 2. Seek the Savior (the manual says: "If you seek greater faith in the Savior as you study the Old Testament, you will find it." I love and WANT/NEED this promise!), 3. Remember that the Old Testament was divinely preserved. The manual says, "Maybe God preserved these ancient writings because He knows you and what you are going through."
Second, each time I teach, I want to share a teaching idea...one thing that might help them as they are studying that week's or the next week's scriptures with their families. And have them share what worked for them that week or any ideas they have.
*My ideas for this first time: have children make a list of how they are like Mom and how they are like Dad. Then read a few verses that describe God and see how they ARE like God and also how they can BECOME like God/their Heavenly Parents.
*For the second week, as you are reading about creation, have family make pictures of what happens on each day of creation. Alternately, you could find photos to represent each day of creation and hang them up.
Launch into the actual lesson.
One of the things that I love about the Old Testament is that it deals with the covenants God made with Israel. (In fact, the word testament is a synonym for covenant.) In October 2020, President Nelson gave a beautiful talk entitled Let God Prevail. He explained that one meaning of the word Israel is to "let God prevail" and so anyone who chooses to let God prevail in their life could be considered part of Israel. He then issued this challenge:
"As you study your scriptures during the next six months, I encourage you to make a list of all that the Lord has promised He will do for covenant Israel. I think you will be astounded! Ponder these promises. Talk about them with your family and friends. Then live and watch for these promises to be fulfilled in your own life.
My dear brothers and sisters, as you choose to let God prevail in your lives, you will experience for yourselves that our God is “a God of miracles.”23 As a people, we are His covenant children, and we will be called by His name."
While more than a year has passed, one of the things I hope we can continue to do as we study the Old Testament this year is to add to our list (or begin our list!) of these promises and watch for these promises to be fulfilled in our lives. So I want to start there today.
Promises I noticed in these two chapters: (Have someone read each of these):
Moses 1:26 "Lo, I am with thee, even unto the end of thy days, for thou shalt deliver my people from bondage, even Israel my chosen."
Moses 1: 35 "all things are numbered unto me, for they are mine and I know them."
Numbered: counted, known, reckoned, assigned
Abraham 3:14 "I will multiply thee, and thy seed after thee, like unto these; and if thou canst count the number of sands, so shall be the number of thy seeds."
Abraham 3:17 "There is nohting that the Lord thy God shall take in his heart to do but what he will do it."
*Discuss the promises and also ask if anyone has an example of a time they have seen God fulfilling that specific promise in their life.
Then move to the Second half of the Lesson: What do these two chapters teach us about God? About ourselves? About Satan? (write these 3 on the board and add to the list as we go):
Moses 1:1-3 What do we learn about God from these verses? In addition, do these verses help us know anything about ourselves? ....face to face, talked with Him, glory, Almighty, Endless, Lord God
Abraham 3: 11-12 What do we learn about God from these verses? About ourselves? ...talked with God, face to face. Abraham called his son. Great multitude of creations.
Moses 1:4-8 God/self...workmanship of mine hands, endless words and works, full of grace and truth. Know all my works.
my son, I have a work for thee. Thou art in similitude of Only Begotten.
What do you think it meant for Moses to know that he was a son of God? Why is this knowledge so important for us today?
I just finished reading Elder Edward Dube of the Seventy's book called Beyond the Shade of the Mango Tree. He tells of his introduction to the church. After attending church and seeing the people there, he felt intimidated. He was young, spoke little English, and felt like he had little to contribute and was out of place. But then he heard Primary children singing "I Am a Child of God" and he was touched by the words.
Elder Edward Dube writes, "As I looked at the faces of those children and listened to them sing, I felt the words of their song lift me above the dust of the world. I realized for the first time that I was a son of God and He had a plan for me. This song gave me courage to progress toward baptism. Why did a little Primary song have such a profound impact on me? Because it helped me see what God saw in me. He saw me as His child, endowed with the great potential to become like Him....I had been worried whether I belonged with the members of the branch. This song helped me connect with them, but it did more than that. It inspired me to connect with my Father in Heaven, to begin to see what He saw in me."
President Dallin H. Oaks said, "Consider the power of the idea taught in our beloved song "I am a Child of God"...Here is the answer to one of life's great questions. 'Who am I?' I am a child of God with a spirit lineage to heavenly parents. That parentage defines our eternal potential. That powerful idea is a potent antidepressant. It can strengthen each of us to make righteous choices and to seek the best that is within us. Establish in the mind of a young person the powerful idea that he or she is a child of God and you have given self-respect and motivation to move against the problems of life."
Abraham 3: 22-25 What do we learn about ourselves and about God from these verses?
Moses 1:10-12... Moses is exhausted after visit with God. (*Discuss divine investiture of authority.) Then Satan comes tempting him. Vs. 12 he calls him a son of man. What do we learn about God, ourselves and Satan in these verses?
*Charlie Chaplin entered a Charlie Chaplin look alike contest in Cleveland, Ohio. He figured he'd be a shoo-in and that it would be funny. He placed 20th. Now, obviously, NO ONE is a better Charlie Chaplin than Charlie Chaplin. But in the words of Come Follow Me Daily, "If we let the world judge who we are, they will get it wrong....Satan attacks worth first. Because if we doubt it, we are crippled. And when we understand it, we can do anything."
Moses 1: 13-16 What do we learn?
In October 2019, Elder Peter M. Johnson of the Seventy gave a talk about 3 tools that Satan uses: distraction, deception and discouragement. The talk is wonderful and I encourage all of you to review it. In the section on deception, Elder Johnson recounts this story of Moses and he says, "The adversary was relentless in his attempts to deceive Moses, but Moses resisted, saying, “Depart from me, Satan, for this one God only will I worship, which is the God of glory.”6 Moses remembered who he was—a son of God.
The Lord’s words to Moses apply to you and to me. We are created in God’s own image, and He has a work for us to do. The adversary attempts to deceive by having us forget who we truly are. If we do not understand who we are, then it is difficult to recognize who we can become."
In the same conference, October 2019, TWO other talks spoke about the tactics of the adversary. It seems like this is something our leaders want us to understand...and perhaps even something that is crucial for our spiritual survival!
One of the talks was by Elder Gary E. Stevenson. He began by telling two humorous stories of his children...his son tried to paint the dog with black spots so it would be a dalmation. And his children, while visiting a relative, seeing a "cat" that was black with a white stripe down it's back.
The Great Deceiver
These stories about innocent children discovering something about life and reality may make each of us smile, but they also illustrate a more profound concept.
In the first story, our young son had a beautiful dog as a pet; notwithstanding, he grabbed a gallon of paint and, with paintbrush in hand, determined to create his own imagined reality.
In the second account, the boys were blissfully unaware of the unsavory threat they faced from a skunk. Unable to properly identify what they had actually encountered, they ran the risk of suffering some unfortunate consequences. These are stories of mistaken identity—presuming the real thing to be something else. In each case, the consequences were minor.
However, many today grapple with these same issues on a much larger scale. They are either unable to see things as they truly are or are unsatisfied with truth. Moreover, there are forces at play today designed to deliberately lead us away from absolute truth. These deceptions and lies go far beyond innocent mistaken identity and often have dire, not minor, consequences.
Satan, the father of lies and the great deceiver, would have us question things as they really are and either ignore eternal truths or replace them with something that appears more pleasing. “He maketh war with the saints of God”2 and has spent millennia calculating and practicing the ability to persuade God’s children to believe that good is evil and evil is good.
He has made a reputation for himself convincing mortals that skunks are just kittens or that, with an application of paint, you can turn a Labrador into a Dalmatian!
Elder Stevenson then turns to this account in Moses and shows how Satan tries to persuade Moses that HE is a dalmation, rather than a labrador. Or in Moses' case...a son of man rather than a son of God.
In other words, Moses said: “You cannot deceive me, for I know who I am. I was created in the image of God. You don’t have His light and glory. So why should I worship you or fall prey to your deception?”
Now pay attention to how Moses further responds. He declares, “Get thee hence, Satan; deceive me not.”7
There is much we can learn from Moses’s mighty response to temptation from the adversary. I invite you to respond the same way when you feel influenced by temptation. Command the enemy of your soul by saying: “Go away! You have no glory. Do not tempt or lie to me! For I know I am a child of God. And I will always call upon my God for His help.”
The adversary, however, does not easily abandon his destructive motives to deceive and demean us. He certainly did not do so with Moses, instead desiring to cause Moses to forget who he was eternally.
As if he were throwing a childish tantrum, “Satan cried with a loud voice, and ranted upon the earth, and commanded, saying: I am the Only Begotten, worship me.”8
Let’s review. Did you hear what he just said? “I am the Only Begotten. Worship me!”
The great deceiver said, in effect, “Don’t worry; I won’t harm you—I’m not a skunk; I am just an innocent black-and-white kitty cat.”
So what can we do when Satan tries to tempt and deceive us?
Moses 1:16-20
Moses 1:21-22
**If time, move to Moses 1: 35-39
Kerry Muhlestein said he thinks verse 39 is one of the MOST important verses in all of scripture. It explains WHY Earth was created and gives context for EVERYTHING else God has created and commanded and said and done.
**If time, share Kerry Muhlestein's 4 keys to understanding the Old Testament:
1. The Old Testament records warts and all. Not everyone or everything you read about is meant to be admired or followed. It records the good, the bad, and the ugly.
2. Their culture was based around symbolism, including symbolic ACTION. So for example, if you are upset and feel heartbroken, you rend your clothes as an outward symbol or sign of your inner emotions. Some of the things that today we perceive as God being vengeful are just Him teaching these people through symbolic action in THEIR language and to THEIR understanding.
3. Look at the whole story and you'll see God's love and mercy. He is patient and forgiving and GOOD. Things are often messy or difficult in the middle of stories, but if you look at the whole story, you will see how He keeps forgiving and keeps gathering and keeps restoring and keeps helping.
4. Recognize the importance of the Abrahamic covenant or the new and everlasting covenant. Much of the imagery and the experiences recorded relate to the covenant.
