Feast upon the Words of Christ

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2 Nephi 32-33

• Feast upon the Words of Christ

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• SAMPLE

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• GORGE

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• TASTE

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• NIBBLE

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• FEAST

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(No Transcript)
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• Sample, gorge, taste, nibble, snack, feast
• Which of these words associate with
• Thanksgiving
• Christmas Dinner
• When you have the flu
• Fast Sunday
• Day after your breakup
• Scripture study

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2 Nephi 32

• Read 2 Nephi 321-3
• Do you think feasting on scripture refers to (1)
  the amount of scripture you read, (2) the types
  or passages of scripture you read, (3) the speed
  at which you read, or (4) the frequency of your
  scripture study? Why?
•  
• Share a time when feasting on the words of Christ
  helped you know what to do in your life
• What little things do you do to make study
  meaningful?

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 To feast means more than to taste. To feast
means to savor. We savor the scriptures by
studying them in a spirit of delightful discovery
and faithful obedience. When we feast upon the
words of Christ, they are embedded in fleshy
tables of the heart. 2 Corinthians 33. They
become an integral part of our nature.
Russell Nelson, Living by Scriptural
Guidance, October 2000
If you and I are to feast upon the words of
Christ, we must study the scriptures and absorb
His words through pondering them and making them
a part of every thought and action.
Robert Hales, Healing Soul and Body, October
1998
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Are you feasting?

• Personal scripture study _____________________
• Sacrament meeting _________________________
• General conference _________________________
• Family scripture study _______________________
• Seminary _________________________________
• Family home evening ________________________
• Priesthood meeting or Young Women class _______
• Sunday School ______________________________
• Personal prayer ____________________________

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2 Nephi 32

• Prayer must accompany scripture study 2 Ne 328-9

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2 Nephi 32

• Elder David A. Bednar In morning prayer, after
  expressing appropriate thanks for blessings
  received, we plead for understanding, direction,
  and help to do the things we cannot do in our own
  strength alone. 
• During the course of the day, we keep a prayer
  in our heart for continued assistance and
  guidance. 
• We will notice during the day that there are
  occasions where normally we would have a tendency
  to speak harshly, and we do not or we might be
  inclined to anger, but we are not

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2 Nephi 32

• At the end of our day, we kneel again and report
  back to our Father. We review the events of the
  day. We repent and, with the assistance of the
  Spirit of the Lord, identify ways we can do and
  become better. Thus our evening prayer builds
  upon and is a continuation of our morning prayer.
  
• Morning and evening prayersand all of the
  prayers in betweenare not unrelated, discrete
  events rather, they are linked together each day
  and across days, weeks, months, and even years.
  This is in part how we fulfill the scriptural
  admonition to pray always (Pray
  Always, Ensign or Liahona, Nov. 2008, 4142).

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Invitation

• Pray always for 24 hours. 

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2 Nephi 321-3
Elder Holland, The Ministry of Angels, October
2008
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Elder Holland

• May I suggest to you that one of the things we
  need to teach our children, and one of the
  things which will become more important in their
  lives the longer they live, is the reality of
  angels, their work, and their ministry.
• Obviously I speak here not alone of the angel
  Moroni, but also of those more personal
  ministering angels who are with us and around us,
  empowered to help us, and who do exactly that.

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Elder Holland

• Perhaps more of us could literally, or at
  least figuratively, behold the angels around us
  if we would but awaken from our stupor and hear
  the voice of the Spirit as those angels try to
  speak.
• I believe we need to speak of and believe in
  and bear testimony to the ministry of angels more
  than we sometimes do. They constitute one of
  God's great methods of witnessing through the
  veil CES Symposium on the Book of Mormon 9
  August 1994

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 I will go before your face. I will be on your
right hand and on your left, and my Spirit shall
be in your hearts, and mine angels round about
you, to bear you up (DC 8488).
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Alma 32

• And now, behold, I say unto you, and I would
  that ye should remember, that God is merciful
  unto all who believe on his name therefore he
  desireth, in the first place, that ye should
  believe, yea, even on his word.
• And now, he imparteth his word by angels unto
  men, yea, not only men but women also.

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www.lds.org Angels

• The word angel is used in various ways. A
  person who is a divine messenger is called an
  angel (Moroni, John the Baptist, Peter, James,
  John, Moses, Elijah, and Elias all ministered to
  Joseph Smith as angels).
• The scriptures also speak of another class of
  persons who, because of failure to obey the
  gospel, will not be exalted and will become
  angels in eternity.
• Angels also has reference to the heavenly
  messengers sent forth to minister to the
  inhabitants of the earth.

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Elder Enzio Busche

• At a Christmas social once, I was sitting next
  to a woman from a recently opened country in
  Eastern Europe. She was in the west for the first
  time and was helping with the translation work.
  She was a convert of a little over a year.
• She told me about her branch and the poor
  circumstances they were all living in and how
  difficult it was for the members to get to their
  Sunday meetings These new members could not say
  enough about the love and the gracious care of
  the Lord.
• Then she said, Once in awhile, we have holy
  angels visit and comfort and strengthen us. She
  added with a smile, Can you imagine? I have
  found people in Salt Lake City who have never see
  an angel. She laughed as if that were the
  strangest thing she had ever heard.
• Yearning for the Living God, p. 234

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• When They speak to youand They willit will
  not be in the wind, nor in the earthquake, nor in
  the fire, but it will be with a voice still and
  small, a voice tender and kind. It will be with
  the tongue of angels. (Elder Jeffrey R. Holland)

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Joseph F. Smith

• When messengers are sent to minister to the
  inhabitants of this earth, they are not
  strangers, but from the ranks of our kindred,
  friends, and fellow-beings and fellow-servants...
• Our fathers and mothers, brothers, sisters and
  friends who have passed away from this earth,
  having been faithful, and worthy to enjoy these
  rights and privileges, may have a mission given
  them to visit their relatives and friends upon
  the earth again, from the divine Presence
  messages of love, of warning, or reproof and
  instruction, to those whom they had learned to
  love in the flesh.
• (Gospel Principles, p. 435)

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Joseph Smith

• Enveloped in flaming fire, they in the spirit
  world are not far from us, and know and
  understand our thoughts, feelings, and emotions,
  and are often pained therewith. History of the
  Church, 652

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What questions do you have about the role of
Angels?
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Who is the angel that most commonly speaks to
us?
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Through the Aaronic Priesthood ordinances of
baptism and the sacrament, we are cleansed of our
sins and promised that if we keep our covenants
we will always have His Spirit to be with us. I
believe that promise not only refers to the Holy
Ghost but also to the ministering of angels, for
"angels speak by the power of the Holy Ghost
wherefore, they speak the words of Christ" (2 Ne.
323). So it is that those who hold the Aaronic
Priesthood open the door for all Church members
who worthily partake of the sacrament to enjoy
the companionship of the Spirit of the Lord and
the ministering of angels. (Elder Oaks, "The
Aaronic Priesthood and the Sacrament," Ensign,
Nov. 1998, p. 39)
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2 Nephi 331 The Holy Ghost carrieth it unto the
heart
2 Nephi 331 When a man speaketh by the power of
the Holy Ghost
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2 Nephi 331
31

• Elder David A. Bednar Please notice how the
  power of the Spirit carries the message unto but
  not necessarily into the heart. A teacher can
  explain, demonstrate, persuade, and testify, and
  do so with great spiritual power and
  effectiveness. Ultimately, however, the content
  of a message and the witness of the Holy Ghost
  penetrate into the heart only if a receiver
  allows them to enter. Learning by faith opens the
  pathway into the heart (Seek Learning by
  Faith, Ensign, Sept. 2007, 61).

2 Nephi 331
32

• Elder Gerald N. Lund Why just unto the heart?
  Individual agency is so sacred that Heavenly
  Father will never force the human heart, even
  with all His infinite power. Man may try to do
  so, but God does not. To put it another way, God
  allows us to be the guardians, or the
  gatekeepers, of our own hearts. We must, of our
  own free will, open our hearts to the Spirit, for
  He will not force Himself upon us (Opening Our
  Hearts, Ensign or Liahona, May 2008, 33).

2 Nephi 331-2
33

• Work hard to gain your own salvation
  Buddah
• I love you more
• Michael Jackson
• Oh Lord, my God
• Joseph Smith
• Im shot
• John Lennon
• I hope I havent bored you
• Elvis Presley
• Tomorrow, I shall no longer be here
• Nostrodamus
• I am a dead man
• Hyrum Smith
• I must obey
• Nephi
• (2 Nephi 3315)

Famous Last Words
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The objective of seminary is to help youth
understand and rely on the teachings and
Atonement of Jesus Christ. What principles
from todays scriptures point you the teachings
of Christ? What part of the lesson can help you
rely on the Atonement?
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2 Nephi 32-33

• Feast upon the Words of Christ