The Final Value Video of the Month: Virtue!

This is the last value video in the series of eight! Here are links to the rest:

Faith

Divine Nature

Individual Worth

Knowledge

Choice & Accountability

Good Works

Integrity

And now, for VIRTUE! There were so many options I couldn't decide! But I now present to you...

Stay Within the Lines

...as told by Elder Holland! I'm sure most of you have seen this one, but it has definitely made an impact on me!

And some bonus videos!

Return to Virtue

Guardians of Virtue

PS: Now taking ideas for another value 'serial' to begin in August!

A Journey's Ending...

Ready??

I GOT MY YW RECOGNITION AWARD!

I am so happy! 

So here is a recap of my Value Projects, if you guys need ideas (and a huge thank you to all the YW I know who suggested great projects that they did that inspired me!).

FAITH:

I memorized 'The Living Christ'! So cool! My testimony of the Savior and His life was really strengthened and solidified through this.

 

DIVINE NATURE:

I organized, coordinated, and participated in an annual Christmas Cousin Gift Exchange on both sides of my family. I was able to start it for the first time on my dad's side, and continue the tradition on my mom's side!

INDIVIDUAL WORTH:

Family History! I was able to do ten awesome hours of searching for and reserving names and performing or sharing ordinances for my ancestors! Throughout this project, I visited the Jordan River, Mt. Timpanogos, and Draper Utah temples, as well my 'home' temple, Columbia South Carolina.

KNOWLEDGE:

I read D&C 89 and committed to ten hours of exercise and preparing a healthy snacks and meals for myself. Many summer evenings, I'd grab my brother and a cousin or two and walk, run, scooter, or bike around the block for 20-30 minutes. And I ate lots of salad!!! :)

CHOICE & ACCOUNTABILITY:

I took a week-long tech vacation! This was an interesting one and harder than I expected. Even though I don't have a phone, tablet, or iPod, I was still tempted. For example, the TV show Granite Flats (which is, btw, phenomenal, and produced by BYUtv) is premiering on TV and my siblings and I were anxiously awaiting its release. However, because of my project, I had to be able to suggest not watching the new episode. That was probably the hardest moment throughout the week. (I have caught up on all the episodes now!) I stayed away from tech for the majority of the week, but I must admit to giving in for a total of probably 1 1/2 hours. But we are all human, right? Anyway, I spent the time I would have used on technology to get more sleep, read, or finish schoolwork. It was so cool! 

GOOD WORKS:

All right, I really loved this one! I put together a recipe book of my favorite recipes, as well as others I've never tried that sound great! I still have lots of room for more as I grow up, but I have enough to give me a start. This is one way to ensure that my future college student self and her roommates won't be eating Chinese takeout every night! :) I think it will also be awesome for a mission. 

INTEGRITY:

You saw this, but I'll link to the post here:

Integrity, YW in Excellence, and Things People Hang on Their Walls!!!

VIRTUE:

I also posted about my reading of the Book of Mormon here. I love this book!!!

So, there's my Young Women's journey for you, project by project! Please tell me about yours in the comments, whether completed long ago or not yet through. I'd love to hear from you! 

The Book of Mormon: Another Testament of Jesus Christ

mormon.org

I finished my Value Project for the value of VIRTUE last night!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! I was beyond excited! I LOVE the Book of Mormon! I love to read overall, but this is definitely my all-time favorite book! It gives me the best feelings ever. The Spirit testifies to me that what I read is true and that if I follow its teachings I will be blessed! It contains the fulness of the gospel and, as Joseph Smith said, it is the most correct book on the face of the earth! (I'll get back to this in a sec--I've got some thoughts on it.) It is the keystone of our religion. (I'll talk more about this too.) It was written by prophets of God who taught His principles. It is God's word and a second witness to the Bible. The Book of Mormon does not replace the Bible and the Bible does not replace the Book of Mormon.

Now, as I said a minute ago, Joseph Smith said that the Book of Mormon is the most correct book on earth. But in Mormon 8, Moroni tells us that, even though it is from God, he used man to bring it forth and no man is perfect. Moroni says that there are faults in the text, but they are the faults of man, not God. There are people who would say, "Wait! Joseph Smith said that the book was the most correct on earth! But Moroni says that there are faults! Who is right? Who is wrong? Isn't God an unchangeable God? If so, wouldn't his prophets be consistent?" Well, the Book of Mormon is the most correct book spiritually speaking. Remember, the Book of Mormon often reminds us that there is a difference between spiritual and temporal. The same is true here.

I also said I would expound my thoughts on 'the keystone' concept. Many times the Book of Mormon has been compared to a keystone. The arch in this analogy is our religion--that of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. Anyone who knows anything about arches knows that without the keystone, the arch will fall. But what about the other stones of the arch? Aren't they important, too? The other stones in an arch represent all of the other concepts of our beliefs. Families can be together forever, the Word of Wisdom, repentance, tithing, the list goes on. And without these stones, there literally would not be an arch. These principles make up our religion. So they are important--very! But the keystone is what holds the arch together. (If there are any engineers reading this right now, please tell me in the comments how that works!) If we didn't have the Book of Mormon, all of the other principles we listed would fail. They would crumble, and what would we have then? _____________ You couldn't fill in this blank with anything. We would have nothing, nowhere to turn. No iron rod to guide us!

The Book of Mormon is SO important! I urge you, as prophets have urged, to read and study the Book of Mormon if you haven't already, no matter what age, and no matter how long it takes you. Don't give up. And if you have read it, STUDY it over and over and over and over. You only get the important stuff  by STUDYING! Never stop! Don't let anything deter you from studying this Book day after day after day, for the rest of your life! It truly is the most correct book in principle on the whole face of the earth!

Happy reading studying!

Now Serving!

This is a wonderful video produced by the Church! Please take the time to watch it.

While we are on the topic of service...Personal Progress has tons of ways to serve! Just a small listing below:

You need Faith that your service will bless you and the recipient of your service.

You have to know of your Divine Nature and the potential you both nurture and gain when you serve. 

Remembering the Individual Worth of the person you're serving can help you to serve them more personally, knowing that you are both Children of a King!

When you've made gaining varied Knowledge and experience a priority, you can serve people in more unique and personalized ways.

Choice and Accountability - you can choose to serve or not, but you will be accountable for that choice!

Good Works and service are the same. Service can only be good works. Good works is defined as service!

Integrity is required to do the service well and to do it with a pure heart, with no intent of personal gain. 

And finally, Virtue is needed because, as one 2009 MormonAd put it, "Virtue [is] the Gold Standard". And how can we achieve the 'Gold Standard' without serving others as Christ did? Christ led a virtuous life, and thus we can look to HIM as our Gold Standard.

I hope we can all remember how our Savior lived and how much He served everyone during his life and through His Atonement!

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Note: I found this video on my cousin Lily's blog. Please read her many informative and fun posts on family history and the Spirit of Elijah here. Don't forget to comment!!!

For Who Can Find a Virtuous Woman? For Her Price is Far Above Rubies

Yesterday was a gorgeous, sunny, spring day here in the Southeast! We were all so excited, especially since we've been having odd weather here lately--one day it's 80 degrees and the next it's literally back to 45 or 50. So we're happy whenever there's a halfway nice day out. 

Well, yesterday it was 80 or so degrees and we were all settling into our seats for our Beehive lesson when someone said, "Why don't we go sit outside and have class on the steps?" It was a novel idea and everyone happily agreed. So we headed out into the sun and started our lesson. 

Once every month or two, my Beehive teachers will look for a Personal Progress experience that correlates directly with their topic and use it as their lesson. Yesterday was one of those days. Our lesson was on repentance and was taken entirely from Virtue Experience #4:

Because the Savior loves you and has given His life for you, you can repent. Repentance is an act of faith in Jesus Christ. Read Moroni 10:32–33, the book of Enos, and the section on repentance in For the Strength of Youth. The Savior’s atoning sacrifice has made it possible for you to be forgiven of your sins. Read the sacrament prayers in Doctrine and Covenants 20:77, 79. Determine to partake worthily of the sacrament each week and fill your life with virtuous activities that will bring spiritual power. As you do this, you will grow stronger in your ability to resist temptation, keep the commandments, and become more like Jesus Christ. Determine what you can do daily to remain pure and worthy, and write your plan in your journal.

We read the scriptures in Moroni and Enos together and discussed what they meant to us. Then we read the Repentance section in the For the Strength of Youth to ourselves. In my pamphlet, I underlined some things that stood out to me:

Repentance is more than simply acknowledging wrongdoings. It is a change of mind and heart. It includes turning away from sin and turning to God for forgiveness. It is motivated by love for God and the sincere desire to obey His commandments. This kind of came as a slap in the face, to be honest. Up to that point, I hadn't really thought about this. I had only been acknowledging my wrongdoings and apologizing...but then the same thing would often repeat itself later and I would again apologize. This is NOT a true change of heart! I wasn't truly changed if I was still doing the same thing over and over. This is something I am going to work on in my life.

Then it continues: If you have sinned, the sooner you repent, the sooner you begin to make your way back and find the peace and joy that come with forgiveness. If you delay repentance, you may lose blessings, opportunities, and spiritual guidance. Again, I am guilty. Sometimes I feel like, 'Oh, I can repent of this when I say my prayers tonight. It'll be fine. I mean, it's not like I'm gonna die or anything between here and then.' Do you see the problem? Rationalization and delaying are not part of the repentance process! Who knows? Maybe I will die before the day is over!

When we finished reading, we had a nice discussion about what we learned, and others pointed out what I had noticed. 

We were going to read the sacrament prayers, but somebody suggested that we try and recite them from memory. We didn't think we'd make it all the way through, but guess what? We did it! It was kind of cool to note the differences between them that you wouldn't normally notice if you were just listening to the priests as they blessed the bread and water. I won't tell them to you here, but you can read them yourself and let me know in the comments what you notice. 

Blessing on the Bread | Blessing on the Water

Finally, we wrote in our journals our plans to remain pure and worthy. Mine was heavily based on the eye-openers I received as I read about repentance. This was the first experience I've done in Virtue, but it was a good introduction and a perfect lesson on repenting!

See you later! (Or in the comments☺)

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