Friday night we were treated to a wonderful message from Jason Wright. He talked to us about walking through life with our eyes wide open to the opportunities to serve others. His message had us laughing and crying. He reminded us that we are here to serve each other and that it doesn't have to be something big and momentous in order to matter. Every act of service is great in the eyes of our Heavenly Father.
Jenny Oakes Baker treated us to several songs from her new Disney album. She is an amazing violinist. I had heard of her, but never really appreciated just how talented she is until watching her perform live. In between songs she would tell stories about each song she was about to play and this made the music even more real. She is currently living in Virginia and so she brought her family along with her to this performance. Her three daughters are all learning to play instruments and she had them do a "little piece" they had been working on. I will tell you now that if I hadn't been in that room witnessing this performance first-hand I would not have believed that there was a 1o-year-old on the violin, an 8-year-old on the piano and a 6-year-old on the cello. They were absolutely amazing and inspiring.
Here we are eagerly awaiting the first speaker.Back at our hotel that night it didn't take us long to fall asleep. The next morning we were up bright and early so we could get back to the convention center and have good seats for the day.
I am glad we got there when we did because our seats were about a quarter of the way back and it was perfect. Our first speaker was Virginia Hinckley Pearce. She told us three important things her father (President Hinckley) taught her.
1. Be your best self, but be yourself! It is a gift.
2. The sisters of the church should know the history of the Relief Society as this will help us withstand adversity. Eliza R. Snow's life is inspiring even today. Her motto was "Be useful in the cause of Zion."
3. There are three things in life that you should know/do and in this order. 1. What is essential? Personal revelation. 2. What is necessary? Creating a home as a place the Spirit can be available. 3. The rest is really nice to have and do.
She has such a sense of humor about life and I loved learning how to put things in perspective. She said that adversity is an opportunity to use faith and trust God.
Mariama Kallon is a war refugee from Sierra Leon and she was both heart-breaking and heart-healing at the same time. She told us some of the horrific things she had to endure while in Sierra Leon and how her faith in God kept her strong through all of it. Her story was truly inspiring. Here are some of my favorite quotes from her talk.
"When we ask the Lord for help we can't just wait. We need to go out and search."
"She who is too busy to pray is busier than the Lord wants her to be."
"Service is the way to happiness. If you are sad, look outside yourself. LDS really stands for Let's Do Something."
I LOVED THIS ONE!!! "We become what we want to be by consistently being what we want to become." Isn't that one good!?
Linda Eyre and Shawni Eyre Porthier talked about finding holiness in all the chaos. You have to decide to be more holy. Have faith during tribulations. Glory in your tribulations. Look for the good and/or lesson in the tribulation.
They also reminded us that remember is a very important word.
1. Remember who your children really are.
2. Remember who you really are.
3. Remember who the Savior is. Show him how much you love Him and remember how much he loves you. Let you kids see your love of Christ.
4. Remember Helaman 5:12. Have your kids memorize it.
5. Remember to ask yourself "How can I take the Savior with me in my daily routine?"
Brad Wilcox talked about the importance of the atonement in our lives. Through the atonement we can be transformed. This life is about learning to become better. Could Christ see his countenance in us? The love of God plus His enabling power = motivation.
Merilee Boyack - Blaze your own trail.
She started off by telling us a heart-wrenching story about one of her friends who should not have happened. She shouldn't exist and yet she thrives. By the time she showed us a picture of her friend we were almost in tears for this poor person and all the adversity that was in their life. It turns out that her friend was a tomato plant that was growing out of a water main valve in the middle of the sidewalk. Her humorous story proved the point that we can blaze our own trail.
B - bold
E - eternally-minded
C - creative
O - outward-focused
M - meek
E - enlightened
U - unique
Don't conform or compare because you are unique.
Follow the Spirit - "What would You have me do today?"
Laurel Christensen was the concluding speaker of the day. She talked about letting faith work in our lives.
Pray with faith. Know what is "right" and then pray with with.
Think with faith. She told a story of going to a fitness boot camp and every time she wanted to give up her coach would get right up in her face and say, "Don't you dare be the one thing to stand in your way." It kept her going during the camp and keeps her going even now.
Live with faith - when you have a vision of what you can become, your power to act increases exponentially.
Hope - wanting what I want
Faith - wanting what He wants
Beware of the tempation to give up. (This came right at the time when I was seriously considering sending the kids back to school. I needed to hear this.)
Interwoven throughout the speakers were performances by Jericho road, a group of four guys who sing in perfect harmony. They did some spiritual songs that had us crying and thinking and also some fun songs, like a medley of songs through the years. It was a great time. None of us wanted to leave when it was all over.
Somewhere in the middle of all this excitement we had a lunch break. There were no definite plans for a certain restaurant or anything. We just went where the mood took us and we ended up at a quaint little restaurant off the beaten path. Karilee said it reminded her of the restaurants in New York City. We sat on the balcony and sunned ourselves while eating wonderful food.
Tracy and Tabitha
Amy looking all stylish in her shades. 
Karilee
Jericho Road performing their boy-band medley. I am so glad that I took the time out to come to this event. It was wonderful to be reminded that we are daughters of a loving Heavenly Father and he wants us to succeed. He not only wants us to succeed, but He will help us if we will let Him. The theme of the conference was "Choose to Become" and we were challenged, individually, to come up with one thing we were going to work on to become the person we need to be. Some of the speakers had physical goals and some had spiritual goals. I love this challenge and will take it to heart as I prayerfully think about what the Lord needs me to become.
No comments:
Post a Comment