Important Dates
- June 9-11: Stake Priest High Adventure
- June 15: Father's Day
- June 24-27: Stake Girl's Camp
- June 29: "The Lamb of God" Stake Musical Presentation, 7pm at the Stake Center
- July 10-12: Youth Conference
June 2014 Lesson Schedule
See June 2014 Calendar HERE
Lesson Review
President
Joseph Fielding Smith served as the Church Historian and Recorder for almost 50
years, and was instrumental in procuring original documents of historical
significance to the Church. One of these
documents was a hand-written testimony signed by David Whitmer, one of the
three special witnesses of the Book of Mormon, and he was also privileged to
handle a handwritten testimony of Oliver Cowdery. Although President Smith felt these written
testimonies were significant enough to share, he spoke more frequently of
another testimony of the Book of Mormon:
his own. To this end he said:
“I
started to read the Book of Mormon before I was old enough to be a deacon, and
I have been reading it ever since, and I know that it is true….I have read it
many, many times….I have not read it enough.
It still contains truths that I still may seek and find, for I have not
mastered it, but I know it is true.”
Questions
to ponder: Why is it important to read
the Book of Mormon cover to cover? Why
is it important to re-read the Book of Mormon over and over again?
President
Smith said, “…No member of this Church can stand approved in the presence of God
who has not seriously and carefully read the Book of Mormon.”
As
to the three and eight special witnesses of the Book of Mormon, President Smith
said the following: “Joseph Smith…was
alone in the first vision, alone when Moroni brought the message to him, alone
when he received the plates; but after that he was not alone. The Lord called other witnesses. Grandmother Smith [Joseph Smith’s mother,
Lucy Mack Smith] in her history says that the Prophet came home weeping for joy
after the witnesses had beheld the plates under the direction of an angel of
God, because, he said, ‘The load has been lifted and I am no longer alone.’”
Question to ponder: How can we stand as additional witnesses of
the Book of Mormon?
In
answer to this question, President Smith said, “It seems to me that any member
of this Church would never be satisfied until he or she had read the Book of
Mormon time and time again, and thoroughly considered it so that he or she
could bear witness that it is in very deed a record with the inspiration of the
Almighty upon it, and that its history is true….”
The
following scriptures remind us of other witnesses of the Book of Mormon:
2
Corinthians 13:1: “…In the mouth of two
or three witnesses shall every word be established.”
2
Nephi 33:11: “And
if they are not the words of Christ, judge ye—for Christ will show unto you,
with power and great glory, that they are his words, at the last day; and you
and I shall stand face to face before his bar; and ye shall know that I have
been commanded of him to write these things, notwithstanding my weakness.”
27 And I exhort you
to remember these things; for the time speedily cometh that ye shall know that
I lie not, for ye shall see me at the bar of God; and the Lord God will say unto
you: Did I not declare my words unto you, which were written by this man, like
as one crying from the dead, yea, even as one speaking out of the dust?
28 I declare these things unto the fulfilling of the
prophecies. And behold, they shall proceed forth out of the mouth of the
everlasting God; and his word shall hiss forth from generation to generation.
29 And God shall show unto you, that that which I have
written is true.
30 And again I would exhort you that ye would come unto
Christ, and lay hold upon every good gift, and touch not the evil gift, nor the
unclean thing.
Question to ponder: How has reading and studying the Book of
Mormon changed your life?
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