Elder David A. Bednar’s Regional Conference Talk

I have noticed that a few people have been finding my blog looking for Elder Bednar’s Regional Conference talk for the South Salt Lake Valley regional conference. Not sure if he has given another talk at a different conference since then, but I figured I should post the notes from ours. Our conference was on Sunday, October 23, 2011.

I actually found a website with an audio file and transcript. However, I am hesitant to post a link to it here because of a Church policy that says “Church members should not record the talks or addresses that General Authorities… give at stake conferences, missionary meetings, or other meetings. However, members may record broadcasts of general conference on home equipment for personal, noncommercial use.” I am going to send an email and figure out if it’s okay to post that, and I will get back to you.

Now I wish I had taken more notes. I am sure I took notes during the conference, but I can’t find them, and I am sure that I was more occupied with trying to make sure my children didn’t smash cheerios in the carpet of the Conference Center (our stake was invited – and encouraged – to attend at the Conference Center), or throw fits disrupting the people behind us. So I probably didn’t take very many notes anyway. However, apparently I either remembered a lot, or by some stroke of inspiration by the Holy Ghost I wrote here on the blog a lot of the things Elder Bednar said – most of the things I just mentioned in passing in another post, but I’ve collected them all here for you.

Sacrifices and Things That Matter

I made it home and we went to our Regional Stake Conference on Sunday where we listened to Elder Bednar. The first thing out of his mouth was a story about how his son chose not to play in a football tournament that was going to be on Sunday. And then how his sons gave up attending a college basketball game they wanted to attend – because it was going to be on a Sunday. Can I tell you how relieved I felt that I wasn’t driving up from Las Vegas during his talk? I don’t even know what those stories had to do with the rest of his talk (wrestling a four year old and two year old during conference might have had something to do with that) so I almost felt like his words were so that I would feel as if the Lord noticed my decision and approved of it.

Being With God

We had the privilege of listening to Elder David A. Bednar at our Regional Conference on Sunday at the Conference Center in Salt Lake City. He spoke about a lot of things, but one of the things that stuck with me the most was his admonition to study the life and character of the Savior, because we need to receive His image in our countenance – and in order to become like the Savior, we need to know the Savior.

I thought it was interesting that Elder Bednar specifically mentioned studying the gospels and 3 Nephi, because during the Relief Society Broadcast I felt a distinct prompting to study those exact scriptures – to really study the life of the Savior so that I could become more like Him.

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Elder Bednar pointed out the translation of verse 11: “Then the devil leaveth him, and now Jesus knew that John was cast into prison, and he sent angels, and behold they came and ministered unto him (John).” This translation is significantly different than the Savior having angels minister to Him. The Lord knew that John was in prison, and he had just been fasting for forty days and forty nights and had been dealing with the father of lies, and instead of worrying about himself, the Savior sent angels to minister to John.

The Time Shall Come

At our Regional Stake Conference yesterday, Elder David A. Bednar talked about this principle. We cannot be converted to programs, people, or policies. We are converted to the gospel of Jesus Christ – which is that He lives and that He atoned for our sins. Sometimes I think that we lose sight of the “most important message” of the Church. We need to remember that our message is of the Savior – and that is the message that we need to take to the world.

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Yesterday Elder Bednar testified that He alone does not have any of the capacity or ability to be an apostle – but that through the atonement of the Savior and through the power of the Holy Ghost, he is made to be more than he is. I loved Elder Bednar’s thoughts about that and I think they fit in with Elder Clayton’s testimony that this work is God’s work. We participate in God’s work as we allow the Savior to make us more than we are – and God does his work through us, but it is still God’s work. And we would do well to remember that.

In case my notes aren’t enough, I found a few other people who wrote about Elder Bednar’s talk:

Mormon Wookiee: Regional Conference with Elder David A. Bednar
Mormon Angst: A Testimony is Not Enough
LDS Freedom Forum: Notes from Jason

Here are some links to a few similar talks from Elder Bednar:

In the Strength of the Lord” (BYU speech, 2001)
“The Character of Christ” (BYU-I Symposium , 2003)

Is this what you were looking for? If you attended, did you have any other notes from Elder Bednar’s address? Please share them here if you did!

My Yoke Is Easy

This morning I read Matthew chapters 11 and 12 and while I was reading them I was trying to answer this question, “What do I learn about the character of Christ from these chapters?”

To be honest, it was kind of a hard task this morning. The Savior did a lot of teaching in these two chapters, but a lot of it was hard words to the Pharisees and others who were hard of heart. But then when I read Matthew 11:8-30 I thought about our baptismal covenants, and the Savior’s promise to us, and how we can use His promise as an example of how to keep our baptismal covenants.

In Matthew the Lord promises us:

Come unto me, all ye that labour and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest. Take my yoke upon you, and learn of me; for I am meek and lowly in heart: and ye shall find rest unto your souls. For my yoke is easy, and my burden is light. 

In Mosiah in the Book of Mormon, we learn about our baptismal covenants:

and now as ye are desirous to come into the fold of God, and to be called his people and are willing to bear one another’s burdens, that they may be light; Yea, and are willing to mourn with those that mourn; yea, and comfort those that stand in need of comfort…

Because we take Christ’s name upon us in baptism, we must learn to become like Him and do the things that He does.

Christ is “meek and lowly in heart” and bears our burdens. When we are baptized, we covenant to do the same for others – bear their burdens to make them feel light.

What does it mean to be meek and lowly in heart? A definition for “meek”  in the Merriam-Webster dictionary is “easily imposed on.” The Savior is easily imposed on – we don’t have to plead and argue with Him for Him to agree to take our burdens. He just does it when we come to Him and ask. And we barely even have to ask, because He already knows that we have a burden.

In our lives, there are always people around us with burdens to be born. There are those who mourn, and those who need comfort. We do not need to wait for them to plead with us to take their burdens – the Savior is easily imposed on for comfort, and we should be the same way.

Sometimes we may feel that we can only bear our own burdens, but I know that we can bring both our burdens, and the burdens of others which we bear for them, to the Lord, and He will lighten our load. In Elder Alonso’s talk from General Conference, he said, “When we serve our neighbor, we help those who are in need. In the process we may find solutions to our own difficulties.” So as we bear the burdens of others, often we can find that our burdens are lightened as well.

What things have you learned about the character of Christ from the scriptures? How do you keep your baptismal covenant to bear one another’s burdens? How do you feel your burdens being lightened by the Savior?

Refined Speech

Thought I would share this quote from one of my favorite Ensign articles about refinement. By Douglas L. Callister of the Seventy titled Our Refined Heavenly Home.

Being With God

We had the privilege of listening to Elder David A. Bednar at our Regional Conference on Sunday at the Conference Center in Salt Lake City. He spoke about a lot of things, but one of the things that stuck with me the most was his admonition to study the life and character of the Savior, because we need to receive His image in our countenance – and in order to become like the Savior, we need to know the Savior.

I thought it was interesting that Elder Bednar specifically mentioned studying the gospels and 3 Nephi, because during the Relief Society Broadcast I felt a distinct prompting to study those exact scriptures – to really study the life of the Savior so that I could become more like Him.

As I have been reading in Matthew (I have a goal to finish the book of Matthew by the end of October, but I’m only on chapter 5… I guess I have a lot of reading to do in the next few days!) I have been trying to be mindful of the footnotes, including the Joseph Smith Translation. Last week I got to Chapter 4 where Jesus fasts for forty days and Satan tempts him. The Joseph Smith Translation makes some really significant changes in our understanding of what happened.

“Then was Jesus led up of the Spirit into the wilderness to be with God.” The King James Version says that the spirit led the Savior up into the wilderness “to be tempted of the devil” which sounds really strange – because we know that it is foolish to put ourselves in the position of being tempted by Satan. He gets enough chances to tempt us as it is, so why would we give him more opportunity? And surely the Savior would want to stay as far away from Satan as possible. I don’t think He said “Let me go find Satan and let him tempt me so that I can show him how tough I am.” That the Savior went into the wilderness to be “with God” makes a lot more sense. It also teaches us about the character of Christ – He valued being away from the world for at least a time, so that He could commune with God.

As mothers, could our “wilderness” be escaping from our responsibilities as wives and mothers for a few moments? How often to we go “into the wilderness” (away from home) to be tempted of the devil? I can’t think of times when I have wanted to get away from home and my kids so that I can pursue worldly interests – maybe a career, maybe simply shopping. An example that comes to mind is the race I ran this weekend (more about that tomorrow). How often do we go “into the wilderness to be with God”? I can think of once when I left the kids at home with my husband so I could go to the temple. That one-on-one time with God was so healing for me, and so peaceful. When I came back home I was a much better mother. I need to spend more time in the “wilderness” with God rather than with other things. My wilderness comes in the mornings, usually, and sometimes it is hard to use those early morning hours for communing with God rather than reading news articles, “liking” Facebook posts, or  commenting on blogs, and before I know it, the children are awake and the opportunity is lost.

“And when he had fasted forty days and forty nights, and had communed with God, he was afterward an hungered, and was left to be tempted of the devil.” It is significant to me that the Savior communed with the Lord before he was left to be tempted. He had been with God first, which I am sure gave Him strength for when Satan came around. Do we commune with God often enough that we have strength for when Satan comes around to tempt us?

When the King James Version says “then the devil taketh him up” to the different places, the Joseph Smith Translation clarifies that it was actually the Spirit taking the Savior to the different places. This makes sense, of course, because the devil has not power over Christ. It is almost as if the Spirit was taking Christ away from Satan, and Satan just kept tagging along like a lost puppy.

Elder Bednar pointed out the translation of verse 11: “Then the devil leaveth him, and now Jesus knew that John was cast into prison, and he sent angels, and behold they came and ministered unto him (John).” This translation is significantly different than the Savior having angels minister to Him. The Lord knew that John was in prison, and he had just been fasting for forty days and forty nights and had been dealing with the father of lies, and instead of worrying about himself, the Savior sent angels to minister to John.

I am so grateful for the scriptures and the opportunity I have to seek the Lord and find Him and learn about Him. President Uchtdorf has said, “The truth is, those who diligently seek to learn of Christ eventually will come to know Him.” I hope that as I seek the Lord I can diligently seek Him and eventually, come to know Him.

How do you diligently seek the Lord? Have you studied the life of Christ? Do you study His life frequently? Have you found that you are coming to know Him? What gems from the Joseph Smith Translation have you found that have helped clarify the character of Christ for you?