Being Influential for Good in the Lives of Others

Lets read 1 Corinthians 9:1,16,20-23.

What does Paul say about his position in the church?

Paul is an apostle in the Church. He is a special witness of Christ.

What does Paul say about being influential in the lives of others?

Paul teaches us that we need to be compassionate and empathetic toward others so that they may be able to be happy. If we can relate we can make other's happy.

Please comment to keep this conversation going.

Paul's Cousel to Members

The scriptures we are going to look at this week are:
1 Thessalonians 3:12-13; 4:1-12, 5:1-22
2 Thessalonians 3:1-6,11.

Let's compile a short list of attributes Paul asks of the members:

• Abound in love
• walk and please God
• Know the commandments
• Live the law of Chastity
• Love one another
• Study
• Work
• Be Honest
• Children of Light
• Watch and be sober
• Peace
• Rejoice
• Pray
• Abstain from all appearance of evil

Now that we have a list we need to pick a few that we can work on:

1. Walk and Please God
• Sometimes I find it hard to remember Christ throughout the day, so that is one thing that I will work on is to try and walk and please God all day.
2. Peace
• I need to have a little more peace in my life. I have a very busy schedule, so I need to find time to relax and find some peace.
3. Abstain from all appearance of evil
• I need to be an example in all things and I need to go though and do an inventory on things that may be considered and appearance of evil.

Paul's Second Mission

Hey all!

Well this weeks blog post is, as you could tell by the title, about Paul's (aka Saul's) second mission. We can read about this in Acts chapters 16 and 18.

A small list of the places that Paul visited on his journey (from Bible Map 13):

• Corinth-Epistle to the Corinthians
• Philippi-Epistle to the Phillipians
• Thessalonica-Epistle to the Thessolonians
• Ephesus-Epistle to the Ephesians

In Acts 16:6-10;18:9-11 we learn about how the Holy Ghost spoke to Paul and his companions. On there way to Asia the Holy Ghost forbade them to preach the gospel there. The spirit also "suffered them not." The spirit also gave Paul a vision to go to Macedonia.

The Spirit has always directed the missionary efforts. It is interesting to experience when you are teaching and the Spirit just takes over and you don't remember what was actually said during the lesson. One way that I will strive to allow the Spirit to help my missionary efforts by praying for a missionary experience every day.

The next question I want to pose is why was Paul so effective? Let's read Acts 16:9-33.

• He immediately followed the Spirit's promptings
• He prayed and sang praises unto God

Paul always did everything he could to teach the people. It didn't matter where he was. I can learn that we need to make the best of our experience and look for the missionary moment. The jailer is a true convert because he truly wanted to know how he can be saved and followed through. Let's compare Mosiah 4:9-10 with Acts 17:30-31. Mosiah helps clarify that in order to fully repent we need to forsake our sins. What can we do to better prepare ourselves to share the Gospel? I think the main thing is to study the gospel, and when we are prepared the Lord will place people in our path.

An Introduction and Overview

There are two objectives for today's post: 1) to give an overview of what I am doing and 2) to give an overview of the section I read for this week.

I am taking an online religion class, and for this class I get to choose one activity and then I get to choose from a list about what to write about. We will be using the LDS version of the King James Version of the Bible.

The class assignment: Read Acts 1-8, 10-12.

1) Read the chapter headings and list some of the main themes for Chapters 1-8, 10-12 and in the Bible Dictionary, "Acts of the Apostles."

Main themes:

• Testimony
• Holy Ghost
• Miracles
• Repentance
• Organization
• Missionary work

2) Make a list of what peter was doing according the chapter headings in chapters 2-8, 10-12:

ch 2 Peter testifies of Jesus' resurrection
ch 3 Peter and john heal a man and peter preaches repentance the second coming and christ
ch 4 Peter is arrested and brought before the counsel
ch 5 Peter is arrested with John and freed from prison and testify of christ
ch 6 no account
ch 7 no accout
ch 8 Peter confers the gift of the holy ghost and rebukes simon
ch 10 peter is commanded to bring the gospel to the gentiles
ch 11 peter is teaching the people
ch 12 peter is freed by an angel from prison

Gospel Principles Chapter 6

"The Fall of Adam and Eve"

The Fall. This one is always a little tricky. There's so many different views on what actually took place and if it was symbolism or not. The way I like to look at it is that this record is an account, or in other words, what actually took place; also that everything can be taken as a symbol--especially for our day. So we can take out of this event is both literally what happened and that there is going to be some application for our day. So back to what happened. In a nutshell, God placed Adam and Eve in the Garden of Eden and gave them two commandments. One, multiply and replenish the earth aka have kids, and two, don't eat of the fruit of the tree of knowledge of good and evil. They knew the consequence of eating the fruit and that was if they ate they would die, and be cast out of the garden. One day a serpent, Satan, came and tempted Adam and Eve to eat of the fruit. He told them that if they ate they would "be as gods, knowing good and evil," and that they wouldn't die, which is where the lie came in because God said that they would and he doesn't go against his word. Anyway, they decided to eat of the fruit and they were both cast out. This brought in two types of death, physical and spiritual. Physical is pretty self-explanatory, and spiritual death is the separation of us and God. Many people think that this was a bad thing, that they transgressed the law and partook of the fruit, but like all things great things happen when we make mistakes. And this mistake was needed for all of us to be able to come here to the earth. The prophet Lehi explains in 2 Nephi 2:22-25,
             "And now, behold, if Adam had not transgressed he would not have fallen, but he would have remained in the Garden of Eden. And all thigs which were created must have remained in the same state in which they were after they were created. ...
             "And they would have had no children; wherefore they would have remained in a state of innocence, having no joy, for they knew no misery; doing no good, for they knew no sin.
           " But behold, all things have been done in the wisdom of him who knoweth all things.
       "Adam fell that men might be; and men are, that they might have joy."
I love this explanation of why it was necessary for the Fall. So many other great blessings have happened because of this one act. It was truly a great blessing.

Gospel Principles Chapter 5

"Creation"

Many of us, if not all of us, in the world love to create. I personally love it; whether it is something that I can actually make or something in my head. I know that eventually I will be able to see that come to pass. Today we have all kinds of technology to help us create, but we still can't be as great as the Master Creator: Jesus Christ. We know that Jesus Christ under the direction of Heavenly Father created the earth and all of its inhabitants and everything else on and in it. If we look around, there has to be a reason as to how this all got here. One of my favorite analogies is about this. Someone once said that without God it's like having a tornado go through a junk yard and end up with a Boeing 747 as the outcome. It's just not possible, but if there is someone directing this tornado, it might just actually work. I love being able to enjoy the warm summer nights. Now that I'm home and summer is fast approaching I will be able to do that once again. I remember one evening with Elder Parr in Bozeman. We went out into the courtyard after we got our planning done and we laid on the tables and looked at the stars and just talked about how great it is to be able to know the things we know and have the assurance of things to come. Just remember that this was created for you, and for me. This world is given especially to us and we need to make the best of it. Jesus love you. He loves everyone of us and if he had to suffer for only one person, He would. That is what makes all of this so great.

**The picture of the airplane is of a Boeing 747. Just to show how complicated it is.

It seems like life revolves around sports...

Today's world seems to always have some connection to sports. People just seem to want to give their money away to these sports teams. On a personal note, my favorite sport is volleyball, as a lot of you know. I've been thinking of ways to try to associate the gospel to the game of volleyball. The most obvious way is kind of the same with any team sport: the team is your family, and just like on earth where your family is the most important support system that we have; the team is just as vital to your success on the court. Teamwork. Without everyone working together it is impossible to win. For example: the other day we had a couple of volleyball games. There was only four of us that showed up to play and we were playing against teams of 6. We won 2 out of the 3 matches that we played. I accredit the wins to team work and some skill. My friends and I knew how each other played and it helped us work together. The team that we lost to was just a little bit more tight knit and had a little bit better players, but overall it was a great day. Remember that we all need to work together in order to succeed. I love you all. Jesus loves you.