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Welcome to Closer to Christ, the General Conference, where two friends share our own approach to

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studying general conference. Today we get to talk about trust in the Lord. It was done

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by Elder Paul B. Piper of 70. So, just to sum it up, this talk is going to introduce

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us to ideas about our relationship with God and how it'll grow in degrees as we're willing

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to put more and more trust in Him. Is that sure and sweet?

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That's it.

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So, what approach did you take as you were preparing to talk about this talk, Amy?

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So, thank you, Abby.

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Oh, hey everybody, welcome!

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Welcome.

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Thanks for being here.

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Thanks for being here. So, the first thing that stood out to me was the type of relationship

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Heavenly Father seeks with each of His children. And it said the relationship that God seeks

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with each spirit child is one so close and personal that He will be able to share all

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He has and all He is. I love that. This tells me that He wanted to hold back nothing. The

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God of the universe and Heavenly Father to us all wants nothing to stand in between each

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of us and all that He is and has to offer. Which leads me to the second thing. He talks

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about how really the whole relationship He started based on trust. If you think about

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it, He has worked from the beginning to communicate absolute trust for the divine potential of

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His kids. So, number one, He would teach us eternal laws. Then He would create an earth

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for us, provide us with mortal bodies, give us the gift to choose for ourselves, and allow

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us to learn and grow by making our own choices.

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When you were talking, I was picturing us in the premortal existence and a chunk of

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these things happened there.

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Oh, yeah.

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And so, like, you'll see people, like, when they hear truth, this is a psychology thing.

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Like you'll hear this in college campuses and that, you know, there's this idea that

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truth that you hear isn't really the first time that you've heard it. It's a relearning

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of truth that you recognize. So, they're not really, they're not talking about, like, God

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when they're talking about it on a college campus necessarily. They're saying that, like,

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in these brains that we have, that those things are there and they're ready to be tapped into.

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But when I heard that, I was, like, thinking about God and I was like, yeah, I think you'll

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see that. People will experience the gospel and they're like, I feel like I knew that,

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or I feel like I knew you, or I feel like I knew that truth before, and, like, you just

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reminded me of something I knew.

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For sure.

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So, I was thinking, you know, as far as relationships go, like a lot of us, it takes us some time

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and some effort to build relationships that we have. And we may not remember the relationship

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that we had with God, but he remembers the relationship that he built over eons of time.

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And like, for us, our perspective, like, we got to watch the earth be created and then

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we weren't the first humans to be sent there, so then we got to maybe watch as...

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Oh, yeah, we had thousands of years to watch.

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So, that gives us even more trust. And that's a piece of, like, the testimony that I have

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of Eve and, like, the trust that he put into her knowing that she would be so intuitive

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and she would start the ball rolling on that plan. And maybe it took, like, a long time

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in the garden and passing that tree all the time, but I've seen women, like, push limits

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in the relationship, like the husband's like, no, we've got, you know, this set of things

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to follow by and she's like, I'm thinking there's something more and like pushing the

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limits and getting them as a team. This is nothing against her Adam, my Adam, you know,

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your Adam. Anyway, all these Adams we have. But I'm just saying, I came to understand

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this truth as I was considering Eve.

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Totally.

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There's trust, like, there was so much trust there. And then we got to watch Eve do it

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and like have children. Then we're like, okay, we could do that. We could go to earth and

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we could do that because we saw Eve do that.

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And then where did she learn it from? From Mother, right?

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Yes.

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So anyway, all of that resonated truth to me. So, we don't, it just didn't, it just

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didn't happen overnight. Like, we built a relationship with him over eons of time, I

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would say you would agree.

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And he modeled.

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Yes.

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Perfectly.

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So, we've established that trust is an important foundation to this relationship with our Heavenly

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Father. We were kind of incorrectly trying to quote something Elder Renlund said last

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time. But I know, yes, so the talk was this. Elder Renlund said his father's goal, his

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goal in parenting is not to have his children do what is right. It's to have his children

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choose to do what is right and ultimately become like him.

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So like, he's given us the perfect example of our Savior to mirror what it looks like

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to choose to do something right, rather than be told or forced into doing something right.

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And do something against our will or something that's like not part of us. That's totally

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contrary.

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So, contrary. So, let's ask a question. What if you're someone who's currently struggling

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with trust issues in general? It's difficult to trust authority or others, let alone God?

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Like what advice or like what would you say would kind of spur that process of getting

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the trust that we would need?

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I think it's interesting because, you know, God is someone who we don't remember. And

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we usually are going to base relationships that may seem nebulous, you know, like one

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with God, meaning one that's not physical. We might base that on our relationships here,

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right? Because that's what we have to work with. That's what we have. And so, if something

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has gone wrong, let's say with a father figure in this life, it's going to be harder to look

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at God and have that trust in him. So, I did appreciate that he talked about if a prior

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loss of trust is keeping you from trusting God, please consider these things. Patiently

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continue to learn more about Heavenly Father, his character, his attributes, and his purposes.

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This sounds familiar from President Nelson. Look for and record experiences in feeling

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his love and power in your life. This one's huge, right? If you're just looking for something,

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like we've said before, our brain's job or the ego part of our brain's job is to

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look for evidences of whatever it is that we tell ourselves. So, if we're looking for

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experiences of his love and his power in our life, that's what's going to come to us.

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And then our living prophet, President Russell M. Nelson, has taught that the more we learn

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about God, the easier it will be for us to trust him. I have totally felt that to be

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the case. I felt when he asked us to learn about God and how he works, that has been

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pivotal for me and for my life because it helped me to learn more about the nature of

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God, that he follows laws. He himself follows laws. And it's not just like on a whim, ah,

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you can do this or you can't, or I'm going to let you come live with me and maybe not.

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Like on a good day, if he's in a good mood, he's going to say yes. It's not that kind

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of thing. His nature is unchanging. His laws are unchanging. And that's kind of a breath

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of fresh air. Like we know what we're getting. There aren't surprises.

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And what he has to offer is an abundance. And there's not like a limit of how many people

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could achieve to have that ultimate thing of having all that the Father has.

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Yeah, there's no cap on that, huh?

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You were talking and I was thinking, the plan, the plan as it was put into play was established

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with the mindset that families would be the, I don't want to say the catalyst, but like

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the vessel for which we would learn these life lessons. So I did come from, I was born

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to a home where my parents lived. The gospel of Jesus Christ taught it to me and, you know,

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to the best of their ability, they raised me with these truths as they understood and

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knew them. And I know that's true of you too. I know that we're reaching an audience that

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that's not the case for everybody. Like you can't even trust the parents that you were

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born with. There might have been a bit of abuse or neglect or, you know, maybe there's

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an adoption situation or, you know, there's like such a myriad of whatever. But if we're

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talking about ideals, like he did mean to send us down in these family units and those

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parents are designed to mirror what he and mother were doing for us in these family units.

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Right. Like a laboratory.

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Yeah, right. Offering us like, that's like a glimpse of, you know, heaven. Like we were

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organized in like these family units there and then we restructured that here on earth

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because like you say, like we kind of, because of the veil, we forget the actual relationship

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with we have with father. But for those fortunate enough to be born to home with like a strong

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mother and father, they get to see those. And then for those that aren't, it's just

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another piece of their mortal experience and their learning. They have to recognize what

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they have isn't the ideal and then make the like the obvious choice to do completely opposite

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of what they're seeing. They don't mirror the thing that they're seeing. They look at

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the thing they're seeing and saying, something doesn't jive. This doesn't jive. Yeah. You

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haven't earned my trust as a parent in this situation and so for my own children, I'm

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going to make this change in our life. So it can go either way, but at the end of the

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day, you know, it resonates with us what that relationship should look like. So anyway,

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when I...

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I love that, Abby. That's really good. And also with, you know, I've looked back at the

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things that President Nelson has taught and as I've looked back to 2018, he really helped

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me reshape my prayers and I pray completely differently than I used to. One of the things

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I looked back in his is that over and over and over in his talks, he says, ask God, he

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says, ask him to tutor you in this thing. Ask him to help you see X, Y, Z. So in this,

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I would say, you know, if there is something where you are not wanting to trust authority

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figures or whatever, then I would just say, ask Heavenly Father to show you what a real

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father would do in this situation or what... When I say a real, I mean him, the true and

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perfect father. So I would just ask to go in prayer as far as that goes.

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So I don't really know how to phrase this question, but maybe it comes back to this,

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like, was there like a single most important message that you took from this talk, like

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an overlying theme, or do you feel like...

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Yeah.

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Did you already hit on that? Did you say what you wanted to say about it?

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No, I would say... So I feel like the first two things that we talked about were definitely

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like preparatory and they were the foundation of what we talked about. And then now, moving

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forward without a doubt, it would be finding the pattern of trust building experiences

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that God gives to us.

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Okay, I can see that. What did you get from that?

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So if I'm going to be vulnerable and share this real quick, I did have a misstep when

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I was going through my year of cancer. It really was like, while I valued the lessons

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that I was learning, I couldn't wait to wash my hands and just be done with the whole situation.

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Right? Like I was done with it. Leave it all behind. It was beautiful. It was great. Thanks

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so much, Holy Father. Tap out. And also to move on and to be trouble-free. It's not exactly

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what I experienced. What I found out was that God had provided me with one big experience

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to learn and to trust in His hand and His guiding spirit through this challenge.

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And Elder Piper in his talk puts it this way, God invites us to grow by trusting His spiritual

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tutoring through soul-stretching experiences. Therefore, we can be sure that whatever trust

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we may have demonstrated in God in the past, another trust-stretching experience lies just

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ahead. God is focused on our growth and progress. Because He's always stretching us to help

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us realize more of our divine potential, we will always include a future – sorry, it

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will always include a future invitation to trust in just a little bit more. That's what

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I love is the whole part on sometimes we're like, okay, I'm done with trials. You know,

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like I'm out of here. But really, it's just a preparatory thing. Everything is preparatory.

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And he did touch on Nephi, how he talked about – remember how he had to go back and get

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the plates? That was something that helped to build confidence in God. It certainly wasn't

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in his brothers. He got that done.

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God just getting an idea of if I ask you to go back for these plates, that doesn't seem

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like the nicest thing to make you do. You just left. Will you go back and do it? And

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they will. And then it wasn't the easiest thing. Maybe Laban would just have nicely

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given the plates, but that really wasn't the scenario. But they had some gold and stuff

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left behind that they kind of – I feel like they kind of took that to inspiration. Like

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how should we present this to Laban? Like we're going to trade gold for the plates.

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It should be nothing to you or whatever. He loved the gold, so he kept it. But then they

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ran him off. And so to have to go back into that situation again, like another matter

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of prayer, and it's like, he'll provide the way for you. So again, he just showed

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trust in Rui going back into this scenario and then delivered Laban into his hands.

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Exactly. And then you think of it like was that the end of Nephi's woes? Nope. We hear

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other stories like when he broke his bow and he asked his dad where to get ore and then

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he made the bow, right? So both of these things, again, Nephi chose to trust in God and the

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family was saved because he built his bow or built the bow and got food. And these successive

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experiences gave Nephi even stronger confidence in God for the enormous trust stretching task

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that he would have in doing what was the biggest thing that he did.

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It comes to the promised land where all that the father had to offer him was made available.

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And then the promise that he – I mean, I've read this in my – when I read the Book of

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Mormon quickly, I see this story unfold that it's like, you know the destruction of the

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Nephites and the Lamanites kind of comes, but the promise was that their ancestors would

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still have the word and I'm holding the Book of Mormon in my hand as I'm saying that. And

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in some way, I'm one of those ancestors, right?

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Yeah.

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Is that fair to say?

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I mean, we benefit from it for sure.

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Right. I'm like, I don't know how closely we're related, but maybe somewhere in there.

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But I was like, God fulfilled his promise because those words and the promise he made

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to you, like, whether that's me or whether that's somebody that I'm going to affect

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missionary work on too, they'll get these words back in their hands because he made

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that promise to them.

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Right. And we're all connected through being at the house of Israel.

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That's really what I'm saying.

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The promise is to them, the promise is to us.

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Yeah.

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Yeah. So that was the biggest thing.

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We're all ninth cousins.

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That's true. That's funny.

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That's the thing.

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Yeah. So building the ship was the biggest thing and I mean, that was preparatory for

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the next, just like you said, receiving all of the Father has.

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Well, we were having this conversation about this analogy with Nephi and like watching

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the way that the Lord builds trust with us with like more small, simple, achievable things.

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But if the Lord had told me how you're going to leave and then quickly after you get out

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there, I'm going to send your boys back.

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Your wife's going to be really mad at you.

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Then they're going to get the plates and they're going to come back.

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And then I'm going to send them for wives.

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And then, you know, just like the rundown of all that.

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Yeah. The rundown of the trials that they're going to experience and like wandering through

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the wilderness and having babies and figuring out how to build a boat that's never been

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built before.

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I think he would be overwhelmed with knowing all of those things at once.

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And so he doesn't throw like, he sees this perspective and he knows the steps that are

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going to lead us to, you know, what the end goal is eventually getting to the promised

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land.

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And I had a lot of beautiful years there.

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A lot of beautiful things happened, even though there was contention with siblings and Moors

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and things of this nature.

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There were a lot of beautiful things that happened also.

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And anyway, I think it's just like a generous way to look at it.

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Like we show trust in the Lord and he trusts us with what we're able to handle.

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And like it says, it gives us the tools necessary to handle it in the moment.

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And then that goes into the hard one lesson, like you've taught us about, you know, you've

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verbalized that enough times that it's like, he did me right in that experience.

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And so when he asked me to do the next thing, it may seem a little bit harder in comparison

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to the last one that I did, but it's just as achievable to do because of the experience

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that I brought with me from the last thing that I trusted him with.

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Absolutely.

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You know what's funny, you say that, those are some of the takeaways and questions we

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have.

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Okay.

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And like you said, it builds on things.

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Each time we accept and act on an invitation, our trust in God grows.

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If we ignore or decline the invitation, our progress stops until we're ready to act on

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a new invitation.

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I really like looking at it that way because again, it puts it back in our hands.

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The Lord doesn't operate in a way, but we're learning in the way he works.

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He doesn't just say, ah, you haven't been doing stuff anymore, cut everything off from

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heaven.

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No, it's us.

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When we accept his invitations, we get closer to him.

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When we accept more invitations, we continue it until we stop accepting and then it stops

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for the time being, until we start again.

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Like I love that.

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It truly is in our hands and to whatever degree we're willing to learn these laws and to live

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them, he will bless us.

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I think that's totally true.

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Elder Piper ended with this thought.

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It said, the good news is that regardless of the trust we may or may not have chosen

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the place in God in the past, we can always choose to trust God today and every day moving

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forward.

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So, in a way that sounds-

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That's positive.

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No, it sounds like a great action item in a way that assesses the level of trust that

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you have in him.

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And if you're pretty comfortable with where you're at or if you want to say, I don't know

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how I would verbalize this, but something to actually, what I think I would do is assess

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some of the times that he has just absolutely fulfilled his end of that trust, that relationship.

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Love that.

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Right?

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I would say, well, he gave me the things that I needed to weather that storm and so he's

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shown that trust.

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So, I would actually isolate some real solid experiences that nobody could take away from

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me that I've definitely experienced in my own life of why he deserves me to even put

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further trust in him.

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And then I would just say, what can I do to build an even stronger relationship with you?

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I love that question.

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It actually reminds me of you, like, Claire, back at the beginning, you were talking, let

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me see if I can verbalize it the way I was feeling it.

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I should have said it back then, but he knows us and he doesn't have the veil blocking his

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memories of the relationship that we have together.

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And so, for me, it was kind of like, he gives us, because of the piece of agency that exists

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there, he gives us the time that we need to develop the trust that we're willing to put

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into him.

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Oh, yeah.

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And so, just doing on that and thinking about that as we've been talking about the talk,

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that I'm like, he's already 100% invested in a relationship and it's us that have to

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let the barriers of trust or trust him to make ourselves equal partners in that relationship.

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Absolutely.

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I totally love that.

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You know, as we've been talking and as you have said things over and over and over in

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my mind, I'm like, oh, that's the gift of discretion.

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So if we know Heavenly Father and we want to learn more about him, he perfectly displays

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and models the gift of discretion.

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And discretion is knowing how much, when, and what to share.

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So it's kind of like he always strikes the perfect balance.

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He doesn't just vomit all these things on us.

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He doesn't vomit knowledge on us.

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He doesn't vomit blessings.

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It fits more than we know what to do with, do you know what I mean?

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Or more than we have worked up to.

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He gives us just the right amount, wherever we are, he meets us perfectly and that is

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the gift of discretion.

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So for me, again, knowing and having trust in God, knowing that he's perfect in that

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gift of discretion, it gives me more trust and confidence in him.

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So it nods back to just the last episode that we recorded with Elder Renland, like to be

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that perfect instructor, knowing exactly to insert yourself into what degree.

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Yes.

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And when and how much to say, right?

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Yeah.

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And we're wanting to grow in these experiences that we're having and he knows that there's

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the potential growth there.

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And so as a knowing father, I really do think when we pray for help and assistance, like

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we've shown our agency that we want them, it involves the equation.

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And then he gives us the tool that we need.

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That might be a person that he inserts into our lives.

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It might be a scripture passage.

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It might be, you know, something that's been spoken through the words of his prophets.

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I can't even list the number of ways that he can help us with those things that we pray

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to him for.

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All I can say is that I've tested that enough times in my life that he's given me just the

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thing that I need in the measure that I need it.

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Yes.

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So I just kind of wanted to add a way instead of that.

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I love the Abbey.

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Okay.

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Let's wrap this up with maybe some questions or action items that maybe we didn't cover

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already.

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Okay.

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You know, really quick, so with the gift of discretion, because there are a million other

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coupling gifts that Heavenly Father couples with it, but one of the big ones that he couples

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with it is the gift of love.

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I have never had Heavenly Father say, you know what, you're kind of stupid, Amy.

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Like he's never said that to me.

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He also hasn't said you should be ashamed of yourself.

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He's never said that.

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He's always said, you know what, you might be able to do a little bit better.

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He always leaves me with wanting to move forward and actually having the confidence that I

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might actually do this thing.

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You know what I mean?

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So I think that's another thing that when we're correcting or when we're having a conversation

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or just to know God is that if it doesn't feel like that, that's not from God, right?

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He always gives us hope.

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He always helps us to know you can do this.

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You can be better.

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Okay.

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So yes, with the questions, we're just going to leave you with a couple of questions and

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I would love for you to, if we're taking this and putting it into practice in our lives,

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what challenge are you currently facing that you'd rather not be dealing with right now

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and that you could just wish it was done for forever?

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Make a quick list of them.

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What are some of your past trials?

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Now some prayer questions, make a list now and then ask Heavenly Father to bring more

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to your mind as you live your life this next week and then revisit your list as Heavenly

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Father brings more things to your mind.

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A couple of questions you could ask would be, please show me what tools or spiritual

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gifts I've picked up along the way.

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Please help me to trust you and recognize the growth I've made to this point.

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And then this is the one that's really the springboard.

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Please help me to bring these gifts that I've just written down into the next season of

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my life as I leave behind this specific challenge.

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So that challenge will be in your past, but the idea is to bring what you've learned with

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you.

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Kind of like the, don't ask why this is happening, but what can I learn in this?

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So couldn't say it better.

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Just as you were talking, I was thinking that's when you really know that you learned the

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lesson you were supposed to is when you're able to share that lesson learned in the appropriate

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way as the instructor with the next person that's on their journey.

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And that next person might be you.

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It totally might be.

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It might be the springboard, like, you know, like Nephi's.

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It's like that trial leads him to better preparation for the next one that he's on.

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But certainly he passed those, that skill set down to his posterity that we're able

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to carry on in the gospel of Jesus Christ.

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And we see that in print.

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Okay, I loved it.

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Thank you so much for being here today.

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We hope you have a great week and we will see you next time.

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See you next time.

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Catch you next time.

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See you next time.