Teaching Children to Feel the Spirit
When this doctrine catches you will notice that your children will become governed by what they know is right. The do it from the inside out. The Spirit talks to us in what we need.
We need to make doctrine more than knowledge. Most of us ‘know’ the gospel, but do we believe it. Do we take it in to our heart? Do we know the Savior or do we believe the Savior? It goes to a different level. He cares…not to condemn me, but to help me. The feeling governs you.
Do you feel joy regardless of your situation because you ‘know’ Him? Do we know that He cares?
Class member: There was one talking about missing the mark, but if you are seeking that knowledge more than taking the Savior into my heart.
There were a lot of talks on the Book of Mormon. Reading the Book of Mormon every day is the avenue. You have to read it ‘with real intent’. You don’t just read it. When we study it we have to do it with the intent to come unto Christ so as you read the stories of the wars what does it teach you about coming closer to Christ. It’s the intent to find the Savior.
How do we get our children on that track? We have to teach them testimony. We have to teach them that it’s more than knowledge. It’s that belief that governs. When they stand in a hard place they will know where they need to stand.
We underestimate the Holy Ghost. The Holy Ghost is the medium that sanctifies us. It is the partnership we have that takes us back to our Heavenly Father. It is through the Atonement, but through the Holy Ghost that becomes the conduit from the Atonement to us that creates sanctification. We have to learn to live by the power of the Holy Ghost.
One of the problems with teaching our children to live by the Holy Ghost is that we don’t do it ourselves. We can’t teach them something they can’t see. They need to be able to feel it.
How much do you live with the Holy Ghost?
Ponder Questions:
How you answer those questions is a good indicator of how you are living by the influence of the Holy Ghost….particularly #4. This means to serve your spouse, your children, your visiting teaching, and your calling. This is when you are anxiously engaged in something you want to be engaged in. Do you respond to that interruption joyfully or with irritation?
***She changed the topic from here on down. She said that she would come back and teach this topic next week though***
This requires you to examine the condition of your heart and we try to avoid that. As we honestly look at the condition of our heart and seek to change/repent and invite the Holy Ghost in that is the beginning of sanctification. The Holy Ghost takes us closer to becoming Christ-like. Do you see how important it is that we learn to live by the Spirit and then teach our children to live by the Spirit?
Class member: When I serve my husband he serves me back. I don’t get that same response if I don’t do it first. I know that’s the Holy Ghost working on both of us.
That is a perfect example, but the key is…she did it because she was prompted by the Holy Ghost, but she didn’t do it for feedback. You have to give the gift through the prompting as a free gift. If nothing comes back you do some more. You don’t live by payback. That is Satan. It’s not about payback. It’s about you living a Celestial life regardless of the people around you. It’s not about him. Your exaltation is about you. Are we keeping score? That’s not what it’s about.
Class member: Does anyone feel like it’s the woman in the home feel like it’s my responsibility and that my attitude affects my family? If I’m critical the whole mood in my family changes. Can everyone else just move on without being impacted by my mood/attitude?
Class member: The woman is responsible for the weather in the home. When I wake up and I’m grumpy everyone else takes from me. When I have focused on it before I can make it sunny or I can make it gloomy. Just to try and put out a little bit of sunshine.
President Howard W. Hunter (Teachings of Howard W. Hunter, pg 139)
" I suppose you would say it is a man's viewpoint to throw a burden upon a woman to maintain the stability and the sweetness of marriage, but this seems to be her divine nature. She has a superior spirituality in the marriage relationship, and the opportunity to encourage, uplift, teach, and be the one who sets the example in the family for righteous living. When women come to the point of realizing that it is more important to be superior than to be equal, they will find the real joy in living those principles that the Lord set out in His divine plan."
Most of your gifts have to do with feelings. Women are insightful and intuitive. They see the big picture. If Satan can get your feelings on a negative downward spiral that blocks your access to the Spirit.
Mosiah 4:30
But this much I can tell you, that if ye do not watch yourselves, and your thoughts, and your words, and your deeds, and observe the commandments of God, and continue in the faith of what ye have heard concerning the coming of our Lord, even unto the end of your lives, ye must perish. And now, O man, remember, and perish not.
PTàPFàPAàPHàPC
Positive ThoughtsàPositive FeelingsàPositive ActionsàPositive HabitsàPositive Character
Depression & Discouragement (Parenting Class Links for more detailed info)
We think it starts in your actions, but what gets you into the Celestial Kingdom is the condition of your heart. My thoughts are about my duty. It creates the feelings behind the action. If my thoughts are about the Savior and all he gave them my feelings are about how he served. We try to change behavior without changing thoughts.
Example: I’m going to do kind things for my husband, but I’m going to do something nice because I’m supposed to be nice to him so I do it. He doesn’t say thank you. I say…I’m not doing that again. In the whole process my thoughts didn’t change so my heart couldn’t change.
The place to change your heart has to be in your thoughts.
Sometimes our thoughts are positive, but out thoughts are willing. I’m inviting the Savior in to make the difference.
Class member: I’ve learned the power of thought through another book I read. It starts with thinking. When we think negative thoughts you create a well worn path. It’s the easiest way to take. We have to take a machete and wack our way through. Eventually the ‘positive’ becomes our well worn path. You have to go through the process of actually changing the thought from negative to positive.
If we change at the ‘thoughts’ we invite through the Atonement the power of the Spirit to help us change.
When we entertain those thoughts it invites Satan in.
Gene R Cook said you have 8 seconds to change your thoughts before your thoughts become feelings.
That’s your window of agency.
How many of you live in discouragement?
Watch yourself---to pay attention to the thoughts you are thinking. We are choosing our thoughts. Look at what you are thinking about. You look at where you are and take inventory.
Watch your thoughts---that’s the first thing you look to. What are you thinking? Change those thoughts.
Watch your feelings---Your thoughts create feelings. Your actions flow from how you are feeling. You feelings flow from what you are thinking.
Watch your deeds---You talk according to how you feel.
Observe the commandments of God---we were observing those in our thoughts and wanting to just serve Him ourselves
What does it mean to perish? It means to lose the reward. You are losing the reward…peace, joy, contentment in your family.
Lord’s side of the line:
Love, joy, peace, hope, gratitude, clarity, energy, compassion, comfort, light
Satan’s side of the line:
Despair, confusion, burdened, heavy, darkness, fear, depression, heartache, hatred, lack of energy, hatred, blame, victim
Satan cannot cross over to the Lord’s side. He cannot give you light. The Lord will not cross over the line because of agency. If you are feeling despair who is moving across the line. If you feel hope and joy who is moving? You are. The entity that moves is you. Will Satan entice you to cross the line? Will the Spirit entice you to stay on the right side of the line? Yes. Who makes the choice? You make the choice.
If you are feeling the things on Satan’s side of the line who are you choosing to hearken to? Satan. How do you cross back over the line? You have to change your thoughts. Changing sides of the line doesn’t happen in an instance.
Right now all I can do is desire to be happy. I need to desire to be happy and sometimes that’s all you can do. If you go to the Lord and tell him that you desire to be happy and will he empower you. Then you invite the Spirit. At that invitation the Holy Ghost will come and will help you rise above your own weakness.
Class member: “Your crazy is showing you might want to tuck that in.” Tucking it in is that invitation.
The way to repent…
Stop
Turn
Act
Using the Atonement (Parenting Class links for more detailed info)
Regardless of what you are experiencing….Stop what you are doing, thinking, or what you are doing that is wrong. Turn to the Savior. Pray for forgiveness and direction and the enabling power. If you do that with real intent you will be told something to do in that moment. You take that and act upon it immediately. By doing this you will have repented. That is why we use repentance 100x a day.
If you act on the prompting you are given in that moment (you have to act first) then you will receive the strength and the power and the Holy Ghost. Your willingness to act is the initiation for the Holy Ghost to empower you.
When we partake of the Sacrament, one of the things we want is to remember Him always. This process (Stop, Turn, Act) is the process of remembering Him always.
It is simple to understand and so hard to do!
Class member: What happens when you feel stuck on the “Satan side”?
How do we allow ourselves to be hurt more? I feel more vulnerable. All of the Jews hated the Savior, but he served them. What makes us vulnerable? I found as I worked through it that I had an unreal expectation. If I treat you nice you will learn to like me. That was an unreal expectation. When she said unkind things it couldn’t hurt me anymore. When the Spirit says serve I would pray for a greater understanding of her heart it’s because inside of her there may be a lot of pain. Allow her to have that problem without making it yours.
When you do something you do it as a gift. It’s for you to change your heart. It’s not for them. You have to do it with no strings attached and praying you will come to understand them. You don’t dismiss the prompting you act on it with no ‘unreal expectation’.
If the unseen agenda in the prayer is “Heavenly Father what do I need to do to change her?” that’s wrong. We don’t get to do that. Heavenly Father will work with you about you.
Class member: There is a book called the “Anatomy of Peace”. He talks about when our heart is at war when we aren’t living up to our own expectations.
HOMEWORK:
Can He See Me? Theresa Star
If you look to Him and invite him you will feel His divine smile in your soul. That divine smile will come to you as you read the Book of Mormon with real intent and invite Him into your heart.
When this doctrine catches you will notice that your children will become governed by what they know is right. The do it from the inside out. The Spirit talks to us in what we need.
We need to make doctrine more than knowledge. Most of us ‘know’ the gospel, but do we believe it. Do we take it in to our heart? Do we know the Savior or do we believe the Savior? It goes to a different level. He cares…not to condemn me, but to help me. The feeling governs you.
Do you feel joy regardless of your situation because you ‘know’ Him? Do we know that He cares?
Class member: There was one talking about missing the mark, but if you are seeking that knowledge more than taking the Savior into my heart.
There were a lot of talks on the Book of Mormon. Reading the Book of Mormon every day is the avenue. You have to read it ‘with real intent’. You don’t just read it. When we study it we have to do it with the intent to come unto Christ so as you read the stories of the wars what does it teach you about coming closer to Christ. It’s the intent to find the Savior.
How do we get our children on that track? We have to teach them testimony. We have to teach them that it’s more than knowledge. It’s that belief that governs. When they stand in a hard place they will know where they need to stand.
We underestimate the Holy Ghost. The Holy Ghost is the medium that sanctifies us. It is the partnership we have that takes us back to our Heavenly Father. It is through the Atonement, but through the Holy Ghost that becomes the conduit from the Atonement to us that creates sanctification. We have to learn to live by the power of the Holy Ghost.
One of the problems with teaching our children to live by the Holy Ghost is that we don’t do it ourselves. We can’t teach them something they can’t see. They need to be able to feel it.
How much do you live with the Holy Ghost?
Ponder Questions:
- Do I invite the Spirit into my day through prayer?
- Do I daily read the scriptures?
- Do I read and make a “to-do” list from the current conference talks?
- Do I find joy or irritation in being interrupted to serve others?
- Do I record the daily “tender mercies” of the Lord in my life?
- Do I live in the spirit of gratitude?
How you answer those questions is a good indicator of how you are living by the influence of the Holy Ghost….particularly #4. This means to serve your spouse, your children, your visiting teaching, and your calling. This is when you are anxiously engaged in something you want to be engaged in. Do you respond to that interruption joyfully or with irritation?
***She changed the topic from here on down. She said that she would come back and teach this topic next week though***
This requires you to examine the condition of your heart and we try to avoid that. As we honestly look at the condition of our heart and seek to change/repent and invite the Holy Ghost in that is the beginning of sanctification. The Holy Ghost takes us closer to becoming Christ-like. Do you see how important it is that we learn to live by the Spirit and then teach our children to live by the Spirit?
Class member: When I serve my husband he serves me back. I don’t get that same response if I don’t do it first. I know that’s the Holy Ghost working on both of us.
That is a perfect example, but the key is…she did it because she was prompted by the Holy Ghost, but she didn’t do it for feedback. You have to give the gift through the prompting as a free gift. If nothing comes back you do some more. You don’t live by payback. That is Satan. It’s not about payback. It’s about you living a Celestial life regardless of the people around you. It’s not about him. Your exaltation is about you. Are we keeping score? That’s not what it’s about.
Class member: Does anyone feel like it’s the woman in the home feel like it’s my responsibility and that my attitude affects my family? If I’m critical the whole mood in my family changes. Can everyone else just move on without being impacted by my mood/attitude?
Class member: The woman is responsible for the weather in the home. When I wake up and I’m grumpy everyone else takes from me. When I have focused on it before I can make it sunny or I can make it gloomy. Just to try and put out a little bit of sunshine.
President Howard W. Hunter (Teachings of Howard W. Hunter, pg 139)
" I suppose you would say it is a man's viewpoint to throw a burden upon a woman to maintain the stability and the sweetness of marriage, but this seems to be her divine nature. She has a superior spirituality in the marriage relationship, and the opportunity to encourage, uplift, teach, and be the one who sets the example in the family for righteous living. When women come to the point of realizing that it is more important to be superior than to be equal, they will find the real joy in living those principles that the Lord set out in His divine plan."
Most of your gifts have to do with feelings. Women are insightful and intuitive. They see the big picture. If Satan can get your feelings on a negative downward spiral that blocks your access to the Spirit.
Mosiah 4:30
But this much I can tell you, that if ye do not watch yourselves, and your thoughts, and your words, and your deeds, and observe the commandments of God, and continue in the faith of what ye have heard concerning the coming of our Lord, even unto the end of your lives, ye must perish. And now, O man, remember, and perish not.
PTàPFàPAàPHàPC
Positive ThoughtsàPositive FeelingsàPositive ActionsàPositive HabitsàPositive Character
Depression & Discouragement (Parenting Class Links for more detailed info)
We think it starts in your actions, but what gets you into the Celestial Kingdom is the condition of your heart. My thoughts are about my duty. It creates the feelings behind the action. If my thoughts are about the Savior and all he gave them my feelings are about how he served. We try to change behavior without changing thoughts.
Example: I’m going to do kind things for my husband, but I’m going to do something nice because I’m supposed to be nice to him so I do it. He doesn’t say thank you. I say…I’m not doing that again. In the whole process my thoughts didn’t change so my heart couldn’t change.
The place to change your heart has to be in your thoughts.
Sometimes our thoughts are positive, but out thoughts are willing. I’m inviting the Savior in to make the difference.
Class member: I’ve learned the power of thought through another book I read. It starts with thinking. When we think negative thoughts you create a well worn path. It’s the easiest way to take. We have to take a machete and wack our way through. Eventually the ‘positive’ becomes our well worn path. You have to go through the process of actually changing the thought from negative to positive.
If we change at the ‘thoughts’ we invite through the Atonement the power of the Spirit to help us change.
When we entertain those thoughts it invites Satan in.
Gene R Cook said you have 8 seconds to change your thoughts before your thoughts become feelings.
That’s your window of agency.
How many of you live in discouragement?
Watch yourself---to pay attention to the thoughts you are thinking. We are choosing our thoughts. Look at what you are thinking about. You look at where you are and take inventory.
Watch your thoughts---that’s the first thing you look to. What are you thinking? Change those thoughts.
Watch your feelings---Your thoughts create feelings. Your actions flow from how you are feeling. You feelings flow from what you are thinking.
Watch your deeds---You talk according to how you feel.
Observe the commandments of God---we were observing those in our thoughts and wanting to just serve Him ourselves
What does it mean to perish? It means to lose the reward. You are losing the reward…peace, joy, contentment in your family.
Lord’s side of the line:
Love, joy, peace, hope, gratitude, clarity, energy, compassion, comfort, light
Satan’s side of the line:
Despair, confusion, burdened, heavy, darkness, fear, depression, heartache, hatred, lack of energy, hatred, blame, victim
Satan cannot cross over to the Lord’s side. He cannot give you light. The Lord will not cross over the line because of agency. If you are feeling despair who is moving across the line. If you feel hope and joy who is moving? You are. The entity that moves is you. Will Satan entice you to cross the line? Will the Spirit entice you to stay on the right side of the line? Yes. Who makes the choice? You make the choice.
If you are feeling the things on Satan’s side of the line who are you choosing to hearken to? Satan. How do you cross back over the line? You have to change your thoughts. Changing sides of the line doesn’t happen in an instance.
Right now all I can do is desire to be happy. I need to desire to be happy and sometimes that’s all you can do. If you go to the Lord and tell him that you desire to be happy and will he empower you. Then you invite the Spirit. At that invitation the Holy Ghost will come and will help you rise above your own weakness.
Class member: “Your crazy is showing you might want to tuck that in.” Tucking it in is that invitation.
The way to repent…
Stop
Turn
Act
Using the Atonement (Parenting Class links for more detailed info)
Regardless of what you are experiencing….Stop what you are doing, thinking, or what you are doing that is wrong. Turn to the Savior. Pray for forgiveness and direction and the enabling power. If you do that with real intent you will be told something to do in that moment. You take that and act upon it immediately. By doing this you will have repented. That is why we use repentance 100x a day.
If you act on the prompting you are given in that moment (you have to act first) then you will receive the strength and the power and the Holy Ghost. Your willingness to act is the initiation for the Holy Ghost to empower you.
When we partake of the Sacrament, one of the things we want is to remember Him always. This process (Stop, Turn, Act) is the process of remembering Him always.
It is simple to understand and so hard to do!
Class member: What happens when you feel stuck on the “Satan side”?
How do we allow ourselves to be hurt more? I feel more vulnerable. All of the Jews hated the Savior, but he served them. What makes us vulnerable? I found as I worked through it that I had an unreal expectation. If I treat you nice you will learn to like me. That was an unreal expectation. When she said unkind things it couldn’t hurt me anymore. When the Spirit says serve I would pray for a greater understanding of her heart it’s because inside of her there may be a lot of pain. Allow her to have that problem without making it yours.
When you do something you do it as a gift. It’s for you to change your heart. It’s not for them. You have to do it with no strings attached and praying you will come to understand them. You don’t dismiss the prompting you act on it with no ‘unreal expectation’.
If the unseen agenda in the prayer is “Heavenly Father what do I need to do to change her?” that’s wrong. We don’t get to do that. Heavenly Father will work with you about you.
Class member: There is a book called the “Anatomy of Peace”. He talks about when our heart is at war when we aren’t living up to our own expectations.
HOMEWORK:
- Read April 2016 by Mary Durham “A Child’s Guiding Gift”
- Do those ponder question on pg 20 of the syllabus
Can He See Me? Theresa Star
If you look to Him and invite him you will feel His divine smile in your soul. That divine smile will come to you as you read the Book of Mormon with real intent and invite Him into your heart.
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