It has been such a crazy hectic week, I haven't had the chance till now to sit down and blog. That's usually what happens the week after you go out of town. The days before are crazy mad getting ready for the trip and the week after is crazy mad getting back into everything. The leaving part wasn't as bad this time because I only had to back for one, myself!! That's right I left all the kiddies at home with Mike for a couple days last weekend. It was a girls weekend with my sisters and my mom and my little niecie. It was so much fun!!
The whole purpose of the weekend, besides some great girl time, was to go to my moms stake's women's conference. Sister Sheri Dew and Sister Wendy Watson Nelson(Elder Russell M Nelson's wife) were going to be the guest speakers. I've heard Sister Dew talk many times. I've always loved her. She is such a strong motivating speaker. But I don't think I've ever heard Sister Nelson.
My mom is the stake Relief Society Pres in her stake and she has been planning this for a year. She was so nervous and so excited and it turned out so great!! It was such an IN-credible experience. I took pages and pages of notes and definitely walked away touched and changed. My mom had heard Sister Nelson talk a long time ago at BYU and so she had asked her if she would come out and talk and after she said yes Sister Nelson said she could get Sheri Dew to come too if they invited another stake. How awesome is that. They talked on being spiritual prepared and Sister Nelson talked first.
I'll summarize, or else it would be super long, but it is something I think that is so important in our lives, we're all in need of a lift.
First of all let me say you could tell how great friends these women were. They live in the same ward and travel together regularly and you could tell they have a great relationship together.
Sister Nelson talked about the importance of a question. The importance of our questions, that we need answered, about anything, we need to take them to the scriptures and we WILL get an answer. She told a story about when she was 24 and she was engaged and she didn't know if she should really marry this man. It was right before general conference so she prayed about it and listened intently to conference and every single talk that weekend was on marriage. And she knew she wasn't suppose to marry him. Years later she found out why and not long after that she was asked to give a talk on marriage. So since she recorded the earlier conference she pulled out the tape from that time and listened to it again and she said not one talk was on marriage. Then she stressed the importance of the opportunity we have with general conference coming up. How we should take the next couple weeks to prepare that question we are in dire need to get answered. She said we should read Alma 5 and find which out of the 40+ questions are in that chapter that stir our soul. I think one of the crucial points in her talk was when she quoted Henry B Eyring saying "As the forces around us increase in intensity WHATEVER spiritual strength once was sufficient will not be enough" So 10 years ago 5 years ago, last year; we need to be stronger then we were then.
She also talked about our pre-mortal DVD, and if we had one and popped it in our DVD player what would our spirits be like? What is our "to do list" that we made for this life? Are we doing it? She said we came down here with goals and purposes and if we're not doing them our spirits will always be distressed. We need to pray, fast and go to the temple ti found out the answers to these questions. Then she challenged us all to take a question to the scriptures everyday for 30 days. The one question we most need answered each day. And then we should keep track of the questions, the answers and where we found the answer.
Sheri Dew is great too, she is such a "get to the point" kind of person. I guess she would have to be to be a CEO of a huge company. But I love that about her!! She talked about a trip she took with her nephews to Hawaii and they were at the beach and she was taking a picture of her nephew for him to put on facebook when a wave came up and caught her by surprise and soaked her. And in her pocket was her Blackberry. She said she had 5 days left on her trip and she thought about trying to go with out it, but she just couldn't. She had to many people she needed to be in contact with for important things. So she drove an hour to the closest cell phone store and waited in line for over an hour to get helped. Just for a little communication device. Then she asked how intent we are to communicate with our heavenly father as we are to communicate with others on earth. Then she talked about our pre-mortal DVD too. She said that we have one, we have a "to do list" and if we aren't doing what we were foreordained to do it's because we got sidetracked. We started thinking we were going to stay here. I think just that last sentence is such a powerful one. She said Satan's plan is to disrupt Heavenly Fathers plan. And the best way he can do that is through the women of this church. He knows, we raise up the children, we repetitively encourage our husbands. And through the women he can do most harm. So he tries it with 3 things...1 Confuse us of who we are. 2 Keep us from understanding the saviors sacrifice 3 Keep us from communicating with our father and receiving personal revelation. So we need to do the opposite of those 3 things. 1. We need to know who we are, we are daughters of God. And we need to understand the importance of being here in the latter days. The Lord had the confidence in US to send us in these latter days to build and defend the Kingdom Of God. We behave on who we think we are so we need to know who we are! 2 We need to understand the Saviors Atonement completely. She told a story of when she was 32 and she thought she was going to get married but it ended up not happening. She said she was in the depths of utter pain and so she threw herself into the scriptures. She said she's always had a testimony of the scriptures and she's always been strong in the church but it was that time that she learned the full meaning of the Atonement. Christ didn't just suffer for our sins but for our pain, our hurt. So when we are suffering we can use the Atonement to help heal. 3 Then she said we need to learn to hear the voice of the Lord. More specifically we need to learn what the voice of the lord sounds when it's talking to us specifically. She said feeling the spirit and getting revelation are two different things. And we can ask the Lord to help us know what it feels/sounds like when he is trying to talk to us. And the scriptures has everything we need to know to learn. She said the only thing that can effect our ability to hear our Father is our purity.
After, I was able to tag along with my mom and spend some time with Sister Dew and Sister Nelsen. They really are strong and amazing women. Sister Dew is such a believer that men speak with facts and women speak with feelings and I completely agree. And I think that because we women deal with feelings so much more it's easier for us to get worn and down. And we need the extra ups when ever we can get them. It's hard to feel the spirit and feel nourished every Sunday when the kids are crawling all over you and crying and tired and hungry. So when we have the opportunity to be nourished it's so important that we take those opportunities. Sorry this is such a long blog, I'm not really a fan of long blogs, but it was such a upper to go and hear these women then to sit and talk to them after. I'm so grateful that some women were given the power and talent to uplift and inspire, because with out them this would be a long confusing journey.
The whole purpose of the weekend, besides some great girl time, was to go to my moms stake's women's conference. Sister Sheri Dew and Sister Wendy Watson Nelson(Elder Russell M Nelson's wife) were going to be the guest speakers. I've heard Sister Dew talk many times. I've always loved her. She is such a strong motivating speaker. But I don't think I've ever heard Sister Nelson.
My mom is the stake Relief Society Pres in her stake and she has been planning this for a year. She was so nervous and so excited and it turned out so great!! It was such an IN-credible experience. I took pages and pages of notes and definitely walked away touched and changed. My mom had heard Sister Nelson talk a long time ago at BYU and so she had asked her if she would come out and talk and after she said yes Sister Nelson said she could get Sheri Dew to come too if they invited another stake. How awesome is that. They talked on being spiritual prepared and Sister Nelson talked first.
I'll summarize, or else it would be super long, but it is something I think that is so important in our lives, we're all in need of a lift.
First of all let me say you could tell how great friends these women were. They live in the same ward and travel together regularly and you could tell they have a great relationship together.
Sister Nelson talked about the importance of a question. The importance of our questions, that we need answered, about anything, we need to take them to the scriptures and we WILL get an answer. She told a story about when she was 24 and she was engaged and she didn't know if she should really marry this man. It was right before general conference so she prayed about it and listened intently to conference and every single talk that weekend was on marriage. And she knew she wasn't suppose to marry him. Years later she found out why and not long after that she was asked to give a talk on marriage. So since she recorded the earlier conference she pulled out the tape from that time and listened to it again and she said not one talk was on marriage. Then she stressed the importance of the opportunity we have with general conference coming up. How we should take the next couple weeks to prepare that question we are in dire need to get answered. She said we should read Alma 5 and find which out of the 40+ questions are in that chapter that stir our soul. I think one of the crucial points in her talk was when she quoted Henry B Eyring saying "As the forces around us increase in intensity WHATEVER spiritual strength once was sufficient will not be enough" So 10 years ago 5 years ago, last year; we need to be stronger then we were then.
She also talked about our pre-mortal DVD, and if we had one and popped it in our DVD player what would our spirits be like? What is our "to do list" that we made for this life? Are we doing it? She said we came down here with goals and purposes and if we're not doing them our spirits will always be distressed. We need to pray, fast and go to the temple ti found out the answers to these questions. Then she challenged us all to take a question to the scriptures everyday for 30 days. The one question we most need answered each day. And then we should keep track of the questions, the answers and where we found the answer.
Sheri Dew is great too, she is such a "get to the point" kind of person. I guess she would have to be to be a CEO of a huge company. But I love that about her!! She talked about a trip she took with her nephews to Hawaii and they were at the beach and she was taking a picture of her nephew for him to put on facebook when a wave came up and caught her by surprise and soaked her. And in her pocket was her Blackberry. She said she had 5 days left on her trip and she thought about trying to go with out it, but she just couldn't. She had to many people she needed to be in contact with for important things. So she drove an hour to the closest cell phone store and waited in line for over an hour to get helped. Just for a little communication device. Then she asked how intent we are to communicate with our heavenly father as we are to communicate with others on earth. Then she talked about our pre-mortal DVD too. She said that we have one, we have a "to do list" and if we aren't doing what we were foreordained to do it's because we got sidetracked. We started thinking we were going to stay here. I think just that last sentence is such a powerful one. She said Satan's plan is to disrupt Heavenly Fathers plan. And the best way he can do that is through the women of this church. He knows, we raise up the children, we repetitively encourage our husbands. And through the women he can do most harm. So he tries it with 3 things...1 Confuse us of who we are. 2 Keep us from understanding the saviors sacrifice 3 Keep us from communicating with our father and receiving personal revelation. So we need to do the opposite of those 3 things. 1. We need to know who we are, we are daughters of God. And we need to understand the importance of being here in the latter days. The Lord had the confidence in US to send us in these latter days to build and defend the Kingdom Of God. We behave on who we think we are so we need to know who we are! 2 We need to understand the Saviors Atonement completely. She told a story of when she was 32 and she thought she was going to get married but it ended up not happening. She said she was in the depths of utter pain and so she threw herself into the scriptures. She said she's always had a testimony of the scriptures and she's always been strong in the church but it was that time that she learned the full meaning of the Atonement. Christ didn't just suffer for our sins but for our pain, our hurt. So when we are suffering we can use the Atonement to help heal. 3 Then she said we need to learn to hear the voice of the Lord. More specifically we need to learn what the voice of the lord sounds when it's talking to us specifically. She said feeling the spirit and getting revelation are two different things. And we can ask the Lord to help us know what it feels/sounds like when he is trying to talk to us. And the scriptures has everything we need to know to learn. She said the only thing that can effect our ability to hear our Father is our purity.
After, I was able to tag along with my mom and spend some time with Sister Dew and Sister Nelsen. They really are strong and amazing women. Sister Dew is such a believer that men speak with facts and women speak with feelings and I completely agree. And I think that because we women deal with feelings so much more it's easier for us to get worn and down. And we need the extra ups when ever we can get them. It's hard to feel the spirit and feel nourished every Sunday when the kids are crawling all over you and crying and tired and hungry. So when we have the opportunity to be nourished it's so important that we take those opportunities. Sorry this is such a long blog, I'm not really a fan of long blogs, but it was such a upper to go and hear these women then to sit and talk to them after. I'm so grateful that some women were given the power and talent to uplift and inspire, because with out them this would be a long confusing journey.
6 comments:
Jill, you forgot to mention that they know you as the "sweet" daughter. (I guess that means that Amy and I are the not-so-sweet ones!! :)
Great job with the notes. I didn't take good notes and was sad that I didn't so reading your blog brought it all back to me. Thanks. They are amazing women. That's so cool that you got to hang out with them afterwards.
Well Laura, you said it not me ;)
I just wanted to thank you for putting your notes on your blog. I love Sheri Dew, her words have helped me so many times over the years. What an opportunity to be able to attend, and speak with them one on one afterwards, awesome. I know you don't really know me, but I'm in the ward and kind of shy, so I found some ward blogs and that is how I am getting to know some of the ward members. What a chicken huh. Anyway thank you, I appreciate your faithfulness and sharing, Lord knows I need all the help I can get. :)
How fun to have a girls weekend! That's awesome that you got to hear both of them speak. It sounds like their words were very powerful!! I'm glad you had a good time, and we always need that uplifting!!
So cool, thanks for sharing! I wish I could have gone too!
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