Sunday, October 02, 2011

spiritual 'jeopardy'

it's 1:56 a.m.  i just got home from school after being there for more than 12 hours today.  i'm tired and starving and annoyed that tonight is the first time that i can ever remember not attending the priesthood session of conference.  my desk is cluttered with mail that needs attention, i have a week's worth of homework due on monday that i have not yet touched, and i'm eating a bowl of steamed  vegetables in penance for many days of malnutrition.

i did get to see more of conference than i originally expected.  had i my act together, i could have seen more, but i'm trying to repent and be better in many ways.  and the few talks and portions of talks that i did see were incredible.  already i have two or three that seem have been the talks that were given just for me.  i'm very excited to listen to them on my ipod next week, as well as the talks i have missed, and to read and study them in next month's ensign.

as i said, i have brought two questions to conference this time.  and today as i was pondering about what i'd heard and what i'd learned, i was reminded of something i learned a d&c class many years ago.  brother bott was talking about section 132, which, like nearly all of the sections in the doctrine and covenants, was given as an answer to a question joseph brought to the Lord.  what stood out to me, thought, was that the Lord didn't really answer the question joseph had, but rather gave the answer to the question he should have asked.
and that is an interesting principle that brother bott taught us: that if you ask God the wrong question, He'll give you the answer to the one you ought to have asked.  kind of like jeopardy: you get the answer and have to come up with the question.

something to think about there....

and i think that's what's happened to me today.  i still need some more time to ponder and think about things, but i think i got a bit of an answer to one question and an answer to the question that should have been my second question.

conference is pretty great like that.
and i'm so very, very grateful for sunday being a day of rest.

the provo tabernacle thing is seriously dang amazing, too.

2 comments:

kwistin said...

gosh, conference is great.

and i'm gonna stick this your "questions & answers" thought in my head and let it simmer with all the other conferency goodness i've received. then i'll have some good thought-stew for when we next talk.

...i'm obviously kind of hungry.

ps, i think he understands you've done your best this conference session.

The Former 786 said...

As President Monson was speaking, I got the feeling he was going to announce a new temple in Provo (based on what he was saying), so when my kids started yelling right when he started to say it, I yelled at my kids to shut up and covered my son's mouth as he cried. Not my best moment.