[♪ Music & Voice Over
[♪ Music & Voice Over Welcome to Closer to Christ through General Conference,
[♪ Music & Voice Over where two friends who love Jesus Christ share our own approach
[♪ Music & Voice Over to studying the most recent General Conference talks.
[♪ Music & Voice Over This is Abby.
[♪ Music & Voice Over And Amy.
[♪ Music & Voice Over Let's jump into it.
[♪ Music & Voice Over Today we're talking about
[♪ Music & Voice Over Bonded to Jesus Christ,
[♪ Music & Voice Over Becoming the Salt of the Earth,
[♪ Music & Voice Over by Elder Jose A. Taxiera of the Seventy.
[♪ Music & Voice Over When Jesus Christ taught by the Sea of Galilee,
[♪ Music & Voice Over he often used everyday elements familiar to his audience
[♪ Music & Voice Over to convey profound spiritual truths.
[♪ Music & Voice Over One such element was salt.
[♪ Music & Voice Over Jesus declared,
[♪ Music & Voice Over You are the salt of the earth,
[♪ Music & Voice Over a statement rich in meaning and significance,
[♪ Music & Voice Over especially for the people of his time
[♪ Music & Voice Over who understood the multifaceted value of salt.
[♪ Music & Voice Over Did you have fun saying multifaceted?
[♪ Music & Voice Over Absolutely, Abby.
[♪ Music & Voice Over You did such a good job.
[♪ Music & Voice Over If you have listened for a while,
[♪ Music & Voice Over I'm sure that you've heard me mention
[♪ Music & Voice Over that two of my five children have cystic fibrosis,
[♪ Music & Voice Over which is a disease that
[♪ Music & Voice Over disrupts this fundamental balance within the body.
[♪ Music & Voice Over Just as salt is the essence of the earth,
[♪ Music & Voice Over bringing stability and life to ecosystems,
[♪ Music & Voice Over it's also critical in our own physiology.
[♪ Music & Voice Over So healthy bodies have the sodium chloride channels
[♪ Music & Voice Over that help maintain that delicate balance of salt and water
[♪ Music & Voice Over and the cells are allowed to function properly.
[♪ Music & Voice Over However, in individuals with cystic fibrosis,
[♪ Music & Voice Over those channels don't work like they should and it causes
[♪ Music & Voice Over a cascading number of challenges from thickened mucus
[♪ Music & Voice Over and the lungs to digestive complications.
[♪ Music & Voice Over So just as the earth relies on that balance to sustain life,
[♪ Music & Voice Over people with cystic fibrosis rely on breakthroughs in medicine
[♪ Music & Voice Over to restore balance in their own bodies.
[♪ Music & Voice Over And in my own lifetime, I've got to witness the power
[♪ Music & Voice Over where gene modulation helps fix that
[♪ Music & Voice Over sodium chloride channel and allow their bodies
[♪ Music & Voice Over to basically do the things that you and I come to naturally,
[♪ Music & Voice Over which has changed their trajectory.
[♪ Music & Voice Over It allows me to visualize my children in adulthood
[♪ Music & Voice Over and well into adulthood, a chance at a much longer life.
[♪ Music & Voice Over So it's important to the earth's balance.
[♪ Music & Voice Over It's important to the function of our own bodies
[♪ Music & Voice Over down to the very cellular level.
[♪ Music & Voice Over And in today's talk, I thought it was super fun.
[♪ Music & Voice Over We got to take a deep dive into the lessons
[♪ Music & Voice Over that we can learn as we consider this essential element.
[♪ Music & Voice Over Awesome, Abby.
[♪ Music & Voice Over So getting to the basics,
[♪ Music & Voice Over salt is made of two elements bonded together.
[♪ Music & Voice Over We can't be salt on our own.
[♪ Music & Voice Over If we are to be salt of the earth,
[♪ Music & Voice Over we must be bonded to the Lord.
[♪ Music & Voice Over I love that he's speaking from something
[♪ Music & Voice Over he's definitely experienced.
[♪ Music & Voice Over He's from Portugal.
[♪ Music & Voice Over They are very well known for their luxury salt.
[♪ Music & Voice Over And he laid out the process of harvesting salt
[♪ Music & Voice Over and points that it's simple tools that are used in the process.
[♪ Music & Voice Over Just as we like to reiterate time and time again
[♪ Music & Voice Over as we're considering how do we become bonded to the Lord.
[♪ Music & Voice Over with simple tools that we can do to make that process happen.
[♪ Music & Voice Over If we jump to the end of the talk,
[♪ Music & Voice Over it'll tie those thoughts together on some of the examples
[♪ Music & Voice Over of these simple tools that we might be using in our own lives.
[♪ Music & Voice Over He suggested making the house of the Lord central in our lives.
[♪ Music & Voice Over Intentionally strengthening others by living the gospel.
[♪ Music & Voice Over Accepting callings to serve
[♪ Music & Voice Over and using digital tools with purpose in an effort to
[♪ Music & Voice Over nurture of our spiritual vitality.
[♪ Music & Voice Over and
[♪ Music & Voice Over to do each of those things.
[♪ Music & Voice Over Alright, sounds good.
[♪ Music & Voice Over Why don't you do the,
[♪ Music & Voice Over what we're saying about the temples.
[♪ Music & Voice Over So keeping the house of the Lord
[♪ Music & Voice Over at the center of our devotion would be the first one.
[♪ Music & Voice Over Now the temples are closer than ever before.
[♪ Music & Voice Over Prioritizing regular worship in the house of the Lord
[♪ Music & Voice Over will help us focus on what matters most
[♪ Music & Voice Over to define the heart of our faith in Jesus Christ
[♪ Music & Voice Over and the soul of our devotion to him.
[♪ Music & Voice Over Yeah, making time for the temple is a sign
[♪ Music & Voice Over and then the lessons and the tools that we gather
[♪ Music & Voice Over as we attend the temple.
[♪ Music & Voice Over They're just going to naturally be part of our daily actions
[♪ Music & Voice Over and the thoughts and actions that we do.
[♪ Music & Voice Over Yes.
[♪ Music & Voice Over It helps us be more deliberate, which is the second point.
[♪ Music & Voice Over We need to strengthen our families
[♪ Music & Voice Over through consistent and intentional efforts
[♪ Music & Voice Over to bring gospel principles into our lives and to our homes.
[♪ Music & Voice Over I'm low-key obsessed with the word intentional.
[♪ Music & Voice Over Like if I'm going to bring something,
[♪ Music & Voice Over if I'm going to make something part of our process
[♪ Music & Voice Over and I want to be intentional about it.
[♪ Music & Voice Over Like maybe I, like what's my end goal?
[♪ Music & Voice Over I'm kind of thinking of that
[♪ Music & Voice Over I love the Abbey.
[♪ Music & Voice Over Accepting callings in the church.
[♪ Music & Voice Over You think that's as simple of a tool as there could be?
[♪ Music & Voice Over Sure.
[♪ Music & Voice Over Being willing to accept a calling and then serving in the church.
[♪ Music & Voice Over Service in our local congregations allows us
[♪ Music & Voice Over to support one another and grow together.
[♪ Music & Voice Over While serving is not always convenient,
[♪ Music & Voice Over it's always rewarding.
[♪ Music & Voice Over Going forward, I could definitely say I'm not sure
[♪ Music & Voice Over I'm equal to this task or whatever, but yeah.
[♪ Music & Voice Over It's always worth it.
[♪ Music & Voice Over It's always way more fun to look back on the experience
[♪ Music & Voice Over that we've gained from the service that we've done.
[♪ Music & Voice Over Lastly, he talked about digital communication
[♪ Music & Voice Over using those tools with a purpose.
[♪ Music & Voice Over He said today digital communication tools
[♪ Music & Voice Over allow us to connect as never before.
[♪ Music & Voice Over How we have access to these digital communication tools
[♪ Music & Voice Over and how we use them.
[♪ Music & Voice Over Like most of you, I use these tools to connect with brothers and sisters
[♪ Music & Voice Over in the church and with my family and friends.
[♪ Music & Voice Over As I connect with them, I feel closer to them.
[♪ Music & Voice Over We can minister to each other in times of need
[♪ Music & Voice Over when we cannot be physically present.
[♪ Music & Voice Over These tools are undoubtedly a blessing,
[♪ Music & Voice Over yet these very same tools can drag us away from the depth
[♪ Music & Voice Over of our purposeful activities.
[♪ Music & Voice Over Striving to be the salt of the earth
[♪ Music & Voice Over includes so much more than endless scrolling of reels on a 6 inch screen.
[♪ Music & Voice Over Why I call down on that one, because I was,
[♪ Music & Voice Over I can push play in the background for a conference talk
[♪ Music & Voice Over and then I go to whatever mindless thing I'm doing
[♪ Music & Voice Over flipping through reels and I was like, oh, he knows me too well.
[♪ Music & Voice Over I was like, I'm multitasking, but really I could have been doing
[♪ Music & Voice Over something better with my time.
[♪ Music & Voice Over So just like the, or I'm going to say,
[♪ Music & Voice Over Marnoto's put forth great effort to ensure they harvested
[♪ Music & Voice Over the highest quality of salt, so should we as the Lord's covenant people
[♪ Music & Voice Over always do our very best so that our love and example
[♪ Music & Voice Over are as much as possible a pure reflection
[♪ Music & Voice Over of our Savior Jesus Christ.
[♪ Music & Voice Over I thought there was a lot in there.
[♪ Music & Voice Over So there it is.
[♪ Music & Voice Over I spent some time.
[♪ Music & Voice Over Broke it down.
[♪ Music & Voice Over Yes.
[♪ Music & Voice Over Went on a side stream study on highest quality of salt.
testing research on salt in the United States.
Test process FF.
Sp piano hit boil with hope of getting to undelete Social
I like salt golf.
I could never find any.
in several ways. Solar evaporation is the type that he focuses on in this talk. Rock
salt mining is where salt deposits form underground from ancient seas and are mined using traditional
mining methods or by drilling wells, injecting water to dissolve the salt, pumping it to
the surface. You can imagine that being much less pure form. And vacuum evaporation, used
for table salt production. You dissolve underground salt deposits in water and then you evaporate
the brine in a vacuum to crystallize it. And then salt brine is like brine from salt lakes
or wells to pump to the surface and evaporate in these open air pans or in controlled evaporators
to produce these various types of salt. So each of these methods, you can imagine how
they would produce salt with distinct textures or flavors or have distinct mineral compositions.
And based on how we're mining or how we're coming about this salt is going to vary the
price that salt is going to be worth. The type, the origin, the processing, the packaging,
it's all going to contribute to at the end of the day, how salty that salt is.
So, okay. So salt was a vital preservative and a symbol of purity and covenant. The people
understood the grave implications of losing salt, having its saltiness or savor by becoming
contaminated or diluted. Again, that's not something that we generally talk about. Probably
because we have refrigerators and other ways of processing it seems like there are other
ways we get out of problems.
But in this day and age, the people he was talking about, they got it. I 100% believe
it's kind of like me when I look back now into the scriptures when Jesus was giving
parables, anything about chickens or farming and stuff like that. I understand it now.
I didn't get it before when I lived in the city and I didn't see these things every day,
all day, and they were part of my everyday life. So I can very much appreciate why salt
truly they understood it. They understood the importance.
Nicole Sadegw
Went off on a side tangent here. Table salt, usually worth 50 cents to a dollar per pound,
highly refined, often includes anti-caking agents and you add iodine to the table salt,
most of us buy here in America. Sea salt is typically two to $10 a pound and depending
on the brand and origin, it's minimally processed. It may retain trace minerals from the sea,
which can affect the flavor, usually for the good, I'd say. Sea salt is pretty yummy. Kosher
salt is generally affordable between one and $3 a pound. Corsair texture, popular for cooking.
It's got a clean flavor. It's large. It's easy to pinch grains. There's Himalayan salts,
more expensive, ranging from five to $15 per pound. This salt's mined from deposits in
Pakistan and has a distinct pink color for trace minerals.
Now onto the good stuff. The specialty salts, Flor de Sel or black lava salt. These premium
salts range from 10 to $30 a pound. They're usually hand harvested, have a unique mineral
content and are valued for their texture and flavor. So he is speaking about the Algarve's
sunny climate, the Atlantic location. This is the salt that he's talking about. These
all contribute to this distinct mineral profile and subtle oceanic taste, which enhances its
appeal as a premium product. So I spent a long time building the fact that in this talk,
he's referencing the most salty, most savory, least contaminated, most undiluted salt of
the earth. He's talking about stuff that he has witnessed be manufactured. And he makes
this beautiful point. Like salt can lose its essence, we also can lose our spiritual vitality
and our faith in Jesus Christ if it becomes casual. We may look the same on the outside,
but without a stronger inner faith, we lose our ability to make a difference in the world
and bring out the best in those around us. Probably you could lay out each of those versions
of salt. That pink Himalayan salt would probably be hard to camouflage as being the saltiest
of salt. But let's say general shades of white, you could lay yourself out there and like,
this is what I'm presenting to you. This is the salt that I have to offer. And at face
value, they might look very different. But if we get to the core of it, I think he's
teaching us that we can offer it. We can be the saltiest salt. We can be the most savory
salt. We can be the most uncontaminated if we work with Jesus Christ in the process.
If we're bonded. We can all look like that most expensive, desirable salt that everybody
would want. Absolutely. Okay, Abby question. How can we channel our energy and efforts
to make a difference and be the change the world needs today?
Yeah, and I'll answer that with a follow up. How can we preserve discipleship and continue
to be a positive influence? And I would just note, it is going back to the point that you
made it simple, little daily actions. We get to choose kind of what we have time for. But
if I go back to thinking on what I'm doing with my church callings, how I'm spending
my time with social media. Am I reflecting that the gospel of Jesus Christ is Christ
church or making those two separate identities? Do people know that I represent Jesus Christ
by the actions that I'm taking? What's my time in the temple look like? Do I have more
time to offer? Am I, you know, I definitely can go into the temple, like not the purest
form of myself. And I can shed some of those imperfections and leave a different salty
level. Right? It's a great place to go. If you can go into a church calling overwhelmed.
It's like, I didn't want to prepare that less than I didn't want to go to the next activity.
I could have that mindset. I feel like he, because he's the one that wants to be bonded
with in that if we choose to be bonded to him, he can sort out some of that. Oh, absolutely.
Did I answer that enough? Yes. Channeling my energy. I guess I'm saying I don't am
not my natural inclination is to not come at that with the best that I have to offer
always. Right? Because you're human. You have bad days, you have days that require more
in other areas. So we have kind of a fluctuating amount of energy and effort. Right. But when
I take my negatives and I take Christ's positives, and I have this ionic bond that such assault
is, he washes away the like he just he smooths out he neutralizes the things that I'm negatively
bringing to something. Absolutely. He does. Oh, from the prophet, God wants us to work
together and help each other. That is why he sends us to earth and families and organizes
us into wards and stakes. Isn't that cool? Like some people they, you know, family units
was the way that this earth was designed to work out in. But sometimes you get a crappy
straw dealt to you and you don't have the best family unit to look on to but you can
mimic in a very chosen family, beautiful way. Yeah, your words can become families for your
stakes can become an extension of your families. Absolutely. That is why he asks us to serve
and minister to each other. That is why he asks us to live in the world but not be of
the world. When our lives are deprived of divine purpose, meaningful service to others
and sacred opportunities for pondering and reflection, we gradually become suffocated
by our own activity and self interest, risking losing our own savor. The antidote is to continue
to be involved in service, being anxiously engaged in good works and the betterment of
ourselves and society we live in. We have unique opportunities in his church. I'd add
my testimony to that. Like the good things that I do most often are as a result of calling
that I've been asked to do. I do get pieces of inspiration on what I can do to minister
to others in specific ways as I'm really looking for that but just our general existence in
the church and the way that the structure is. You're taking care of the seven to 11 year
old's activity days right now. I'm taking care of a little primary class. The youth
are in your hands and the sisters are under your purview. Like we're all, all of us are
doing these important things and working together to make this very healthy system. Seeing how
sometimes we're designed to do things for ourselves but sometimes it's better to work
in these more family organizations, this order that can exist and each take a little share
of the burden. Sure. I love that. Also because since we all have an ebb and flow, when we
get more people together, it's more likely that the people that you're working with are
going to have higher days when you're on your low and they help to lift you. So that's always
a positive. So for action items, this would be like a self reflection. I think, you know,
if we're looking at something as our offering, what type of salt are you offering to the
Lord? Do you have the savor? Is it pure? Are you bonded with the Lord? I think those are
questions we could ask ourselves just as we read this. And with an understanding of the
atonement of Jesus Christ, knowing that if it isn't the best offering, he can make that.
He can help us make that a more pure offering. I love it. Definitely self reflection thing.
Consider those things for yourself. Consider the minor tweaks you would want to make. What
simple tools you would implement in your day to improve the saltiness in your life. I'm
going to close with his testimony. He said, salt in its purest form has the power to enhance
and preserve. So does our faith in Jesus Christ when it is nourished and protected by our
dedication to Christ-like service and love. Don't you love how we talked about it being
a preservation for me in that day? And that will enhance and preserve our bond and connection
to him. I love that. As we remain bonded to the Lord, our lives will naturally reflect
his light. We will become the salt of the earth. May we strive to maintain the bond
with the Lord. And I do this in his name, Jesus Christ. Amen. Amen.