Cast Not Away Thy Confidence

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Cast Not Away Thy Confidence

• Promptings 101

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Pictures from my home ward Nursery Leaders
after church
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Look, its the Sunbeams!
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Deacons Quorum After Church
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Nursury Kids- during church
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8 year old boyafter church
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Priests-at the Stake dance
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Elder David B. Haight

• Arturo Toscanini, the late, famous conductor of
  the New York Philharmonic Orchestra, received a
  brief, crumpled letter from a lonely sheepherder
  in the remote mountain area of Wyoming
• "Mr. Conductor I have only two possessionsa
  radio and an old violin. The batteries in my
  radio are getting low and will soon die. My
  violin is so out of tune I can't use it. Please
  help me. Next Sunday when you begin your concert,
  sound a loud 'A' so I can tune my 'A' string
  then I can tune the other strings. When my radio
  batteries are dead, I'll have my violin."
• At the beginning of his next nationwide radio
  concert from Carnegie Hall, Toscanini announced
  "For a dear friend and listener back in the
  mountains of Wyoming the orchestra will now
  sound an 'A.'" The musicians all joined together
  in a perfect "A."
• The lonely sheepherder only needed one note, just
  a little help to get back in tune . . . he
  needed someone who cared to assist him with one
  string after that the others would be easy.
• ("People to People," Ensign, November 1981,
  p. 54.)

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President Eyring,

• One of the most valuable forms of personal
  revelation can come before private prayer. It can
  come in the quiet contemplation of how we might
  have offended, disappointed, or displeased our
  Heavenly Father.
• The Spirit of Christ and the
  Holy Ghost will
  help us
  feel rebuke and at the same
  time
  the encouragement to
  repent. Then prayers asking
  for
  forgiveness become less
  general and the chance to
  have the Atonement
  work
  in our life becomes greater.
• (I am a Child of God, BYU Devotional)

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New Missionary in England
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Elder C.S. Lewis

• If you will here stop, and ask yourselves, why
  you are not as pious as the primitive Christians
  were,
• your own heart will tell you, that it is neither
  through ignorance nor inability,
• but purely because you never thoroughly intended
  it. 
• William Law, A Serious Call to a Devout and Holy
  Life (London J. M. Dent New York E. P. Dutton,
  1920), p. 13

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Common Question

• What happens when we follow the Spirit- and then
  things get worse??

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Natural Man Plan for Damage Control

• Step 1. Your Plan Is Thwarted You Become Baffled
  and Questioning
• Step 2. Faith Doesnt Bring the Desired Results
  You Become Hurt and Doubtful
• Step 3. You Set Conditions
• Step 4. Your Desire Is Not Met You Become Angry,
  Bitter, and Rebellious
• Sis Wilkenson, BYU Devotional, May 2009

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The Lords Plan for Damage Control

• Step 1. Your Plan Is Thwarted You Trust God and
  Ask Different Questions
• Step 2. Faith Doesnt Bring Desired Results You
  Ask for Strength
• Step 3. You Are Not Consumed with the Trial You
  Focus on the Good Things in Your Life
• Step 4. You Consecrate Your Life to God You Draw
  Closer to Him

• Step 1. Your Plan Is Thwarted You Become Baffled
  and Questioning
• Step 2. Faith Doesnt Bring the Desired Results
  You Become Hurt and Doubtful
• Step 3. You Set Conditions
• Step 4. Your Desire Is Not Met You Become Angry,
  Bitter, and Rebellious

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New Convert in Nauvoo

• The Prophet Joseph Smith was at the
  pier. At first glance I could tell it was
  him, by his noble expression. He came on
  board to shake hands and welcome us by
  many encouraging words, and express his
  thankfulness that we had arrived in safety.
• As he could not stay with us, he sent
  Apostle Geo. A. Smith to preach on board.
  What did you come here for? asked he.
• To be instructed in the ways of the Lord,
  answered someone.
• I tell you, he responded you have come to the
  thrashing floor, and after you have been thrashed
  and pounded you will have to go through the
  fanning mill, where the chaff will be blown away
  and the wheat remain.
• (Carol Wilkenson, BYU Devotional, March
  2009)

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• Prophet Joseph Smith
• You do not know how to pray and have your
  prayers answered."
• You must make yourselves acquainted with those
  men who like Daniel pray three times a day toward
  the House of the Lord" 
• Truman G. Madsen, House of Glory,

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Using the Temple Prayer as a Template for our own
prayers

• Step 1
• We first remind ourselves, and the Lord, of our
  commitment to keep sacred covenants weve made.
• Rememberthe temple prayer is the only prayer in
  the church that comes at the end of the
  ordinance, not the beginning.

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Question

• Can praying towards the temple help in our
  pre-prayer?

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Using the Temple Prayer as a Template for our own
prayers

• Step 2
• Are we carrying any unkind feelings towards
  anyone?
• Do we have a longstanding grudge or bitterness
  that might be robbing us of the spirit?

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Top Reasons for NOT forgiving

• They havent suffered enough yet..
• They havent admitted it yet
• If I forgive, then what happened to me wasnt a
  big deal!
• If I forgive them, I might get hurt again
• What happened to me wasnt fair

Remember, If it was fair it wouldnt be a
test, would it?
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Using the Temple Prayer as a Template for our own
prayers

• Step 3
• Under divine direction, we are then taught what
  to pray for.
• Romans 826 JST
• Likewise the Spirit also helpeth our infirmities
  for we know not what we should pray for as we
  ought
• but the Spirit itself maketh intercession for us
  with strivings which cannot be expressed.
• And he that searcheth the hearts knoweth what is
  the mind of the Spirit, because he maketh
  intercession for the saints according to the will
  of God

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Watch, however, for Satans patternMoses 1

• First, The Vision
• Look, and I will show thee the workmanship of
  mine hands. . . .
• And . . . Moses . . . beheld the earth, yea,
  even all of it and there was not a particle of
  it which he did not behold, discerning it by the
  spirit of God.
• And he beheld also the inhabitants thereof, and
  there was not a soul which he beheld not. 
• Second, The Attack
• Moses looked upon Satan and said Who art thou?
  . . . where is thy glory, that I should worship
  thee?
• . . . Where is thy glory, for it is darkness
  unto me? And I can judge between thee and God. .
  . .
• Get thee hence, Satan deceive me not
• Finally, The Doubt and Fear
• And now, when Moses had said these words, Satan
  cried with a loud voice, and ranted upon the
  earth, and commanded, saying I am the Only
  Begotten, worship me.
• And it came to pass that Moses began to fear
  exceedingly and as he began to fear

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Elder HollandCast not away thy confidence

• I wish to encourage every one of you today
  regarding opposition that so often comes after
  enlightened decisions have been made, after
  moments of revelation and conviction have given
  us a peace and assurance we
  thought we would never lose
• That is the way it has always been, Paul said,
  but don't "draw back," he warned. Don't panic
  and retreat. Don't
  lose your
  confidence. Don't forget how
  you once felt. Don't distrust
  the experience
  you had. That
  tenacity is what saved Moses
  when the adversary confronted
  him, and it is what will
  save you.

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Tough Question

• When revelation finally comes, do I immediately
  act on it,
• or do I tend to hesitate, waiting for something
  more to my liking?

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Caution
Guilt Ahead
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William James

• If I doubt you are worthy of my confidence, I
  keep you uniformed of all my secrets just as if
  you were unworthy of the same. If I doubt the
  need of insuring my house, I leave it uninsured
  as much as if I believed there were no need
• There areinevitable occasions in life when
  inactionmust count as action

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Therefore

• When an answer comes and we know it was from God,
  and we fail to act (or do something else)
• A) We are really saying Heavenly Father
  doesnt understand that His way will not be
  as good as our narrow view of things. Or
• B) We are saying that He doesnt really
  know our true needs, capabilities or
  circumstances.
• In either case, if were honest, we are
  saying we dont trust Him.

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DC Section 9Oliver Cowdrey

• And, behold, it is because that you did not
  continue as you commenced, when you began to
  translate, that I have taken away this
  privilege from you.
• Behold, it was expedient when you commenced but
  you feared, and the time is past and not
  expedient now
• For, do you not behold that I have given unto my
  servant Joseph sufficient strength, whereby it is
  made up? And neither of you have I condemned.
• Do this thing which I have commanded you,
  and you shall prosper. 

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President Eyring

• You must listen to the spirit with the
  intent of doing what you are told. If
  you do, then after you have been
  obedient you will be told more.
• Joseph Smith described it this way "Happiness is
  the object and design of our existence and will
  be the end thereof, if we pursue the path that
  leads to it and this path is virtue,
  uprightness, faithfulness, holiness, and keeping
  all the commandments of God.
• But we cannot keep all the commandments without
  first knowing them, and we cannot expect to know
  all, or more than we now know unless we comply
  with or keep those we have already received."
• To Draw Closer to God A Collection of
  Discourses ( 1997)

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Elder Holland

• Sister Holland and I were married about
  the time both of us were reading poems
  like that in BYU classrooms. We were as
  starstruckand as fearfulas most of you
  are at these ages and stages of life. We had
  absolutely no money. Zero. For a variety of
  reasons, neither of our families was able to help
  finance our education. We had a small apartment
  just south of campusthe smallest we could find
  two rooms and a half bath. We were both working
  too many hours trying to stay afloat financially,
  but we had no other choice.
• I remember one fall dayI think it was in the
  first semester after our marriage in 1963we were
  walking together up the hill past the Maeser
  Building on the sidewalk that led between the
  Presidents Home and the Brimhall Building.
  Somewhere on that path we stopped and wondered
  what we had gotten ourselves into. Life that day
  seemed so overwhelming, and the undergraduate
  plus graduate years that we still anticipated
  before us seemed monumental, nearly
  insurmountable. Our love for each other and our
  commitment to the gospel were strong, but most of
  all the other temporal things around us seemed
  particularly ominous.
• On a spot that I could probably still mark for
  you today, I turned to Pat and said something
  like this Honey, should we give up? I can get a
  good job and carve out a good living for us. I
  can do some things. Ill be okay without a
  degree. Should we stop trying to tackle what
  right now seems so difficult to face?

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Elder Holland

• In my best reenactment of Lots wife, I
  said, in effect, Lets go back. Lets go
  home. The future holds nothing for us.
• Then my beloved little bride did what
  she has done for 45 years since then. She
  grabbed me by the lapels and said, We are not
  going back. We are not going home. The future
  holds everything for us.
• She stood there in the sunlight that day and gave
  me a real talk. I dont recall that she quoted
  Paul, but there was certainly plenty in her voice
  that said she was committed to setting aside all
  that was past in order to press toward the mark
  and seize the prize of God that lay yet ahead. It
  was a living demonstration of faith. It was the
  substance of things hoped for, the evidence of
  things not seen (Hebrews 111).
• So we laughed, kept walking, and finished up
  sharing a root beerone glass, two strawsat the
  then newly constructed Wilkinson Center.
• BYU Devotional, Remember Lots Wife 2009