Week Links (plus a little tangent)

I wasn't able to do much listening this week. My job was a bit more interactive, a little less just me and a computer. But I did stumble upon a few wonderful links.

Conference Talks:
Look to God and Live- Elder Jeffrey R. Holland. Just looking at the title and the speaker can hint at how powerful this talk is. There is a very sweet story at the end. This talk is almost 20 years old but still so applicable. I listened to it twice to make sure I got everything and then I read it (I really enjoy when I can listen to something delivered by someone else and also read it for myself. When we listen we often hear things the way the speaker would have us hear them, with the emphasis on their emphasis. It is wonderful to hear something from another perspective; to hear in a speakers voice what matters most to them. I love the opportunity to hear the gospel taught through another's experience and feelings. 

However, I also love when it can be just me, the words, and the Holy Ghost. When I am left to emphasis and interrupt however and wherever I fancy. This is why reading is so powerful. There is a point where the words become yours; where the meaning becomes personal and unique to you. I don't mean that the words can totally change and become something far from what they are intended to be. There are certain boundaries and guidelines placed in by the author of the words; their words cannot mean what the author didn't want them to mean. Yet, through interpretation they can mean even more. With a little effort they can become more than letters typed on a page, they get life. Like I said before, reading is powerful. 

I am going to go one step further though and explain an incredible ingredient that I only casually mentioned before. When we add the companionship of the Holy Ghost,  a companion that we can have constant access to as result of covenants and righteous living,  reading, listening, and even just general living have an even greater power. Our knowledge and our insight can, and will, exceed mortal limitations and we can tap into the limitless, eternal, endlessly personal power of God. 

Sorry, I just really love learning with The Spirit. Back to the talk, these were favorite points:

"Furthermore, many of the social and political medicines of our day regularly miss the mark, so those would-be physicians stand by the bedside of “feverish and delirious humanity—outwitted, discredited, dumbfounded … not knowing in which direction to seek delivered” (Charles Edward Jefferson, The Character of Jesus, Salt Lake City: Parliament Publishers, 1968, p. 17)." 

Angels and ministers of grace to defend us? They are all about us, and their holy sovereign, the Father of us all, is divinely anxious to bless us this very moment. Mercy is his mission, and love is his only labor. John Donne said once: “We ask our daily bread, and God never says, ‘You should have come yesterday.’ … [No, he says,] ‘Today if you will hear [my] voice, today I will hear yours.’ … If thou hast been benighted till now, wintered and frozen, clouded and eclipsed, damp and benumbed, smothered and stupefied till now, God yet comes to thee, not as in the dawning of the day, … but as the sun at [full] noon, to banish all shadows” (Collected Sermons).

Another talk with a similar theme, It Is Better to Look Up by Carl B Cook, is a more recent conference talk. I went looking for this one because for whatever reason it came to mind. I enjoyed this talk when I first heard it and I enjoyed it again. 

Gospel Solutions for families this week was called Becoming One in Marriage. This a topic that is very much on my mind as a newlywed. It seems to me if you understand the Godhead you can understand this and if you understand this you can better understand the LDS doctorine on the Godhead. However, understanding something and living it are two different things and while I think we are right on track it will, of course, take time before we have really perfected this principle in our marriage. 

Blog Links: 
I liked reading Maggie Mason's Might List. It is like a bucket list but has a much better ring to it, don't you think? Something about the phrase "bucket list" is very off putting to me. Her list made me think more about some of the things that would be on my list. Maybe I will make a Might List; I do love a good list. 

Music:
I am counting down the days for this album.