It's All Relevant

For the month of April, our topic of study for the Youth at church has been The Apostasy and the Restoration.
The introduction lesson went over the different events of The Restoration, and I was given this picture and asked to tell about it:

{Joseph Smith receives the gold plates from Angel Moroni}

This has been on my mind all month.  

It was my turn to teach the lesson yesterday, and my topic was "Why Do We Need the Book of Mormon?"

Basically, the answer to the question, that doubles as the lesson title, is found in an awesome talk given by President Ezra Taft Benson in 1986:

"There is a power in the book which will begin to flow into your lives the moment you begin a serious study of the book." 

What kind of POWER?

{Thanks for asking!}  I made a handout to give to my Young Women based on all the powers I found in a talk titled, "The Power of the Word."  if one will immerse themselves in the scriptures.

 

{These are NOT mild promises!}

THIS talk has been on my mind for TWO MONTHS, ever since it was mentioned in our February Stake Conference.

And THEN, tonight, I was going through our old photo files that are saved on our computer in preparation for a scrapbook retreat I am going to this weekend.  Coincidentally, I left off scrapbooking our Fall 2007 photos last time, so I pulled those up to send them to the photo lab to print.......and guess what photos they were?

It was the photos from a trip we took to upstate New York (Palmyra), namely the Hill Cumorah, to visit Matt's parents when they were serving a mission in the area.

 

(don't mind my closed eyes! It's good of everyone else!)

LOOK AT MY BABIES!  They DO look like mere babies in these photos!  Oh Dear.

It was such an awesome & beautiful feeling there on The Hill that day.  I remember it felt so good in the SUN - it just added to the good feeling from the SPIRIT.  Especially since the Autumn chill was beginning to creep into the air in other places - especially in the trees.

NO WAY!  I seriously haven't looked at or remembered these photos FOR YEARS (ever since I downloaded them 5 1/2 yrs. ago.  I thought it was just too incredible that these photos came back right when I was deep in my pondering and study of these events of The Restoration.

It's come full circle for me this month:

 {THEN}

{NOW}

BUT, SERIOUSLY....can you believe my children?  They were little, little (except for their chubby faces!)  It makes my heart go into a tiny bit o' shock!