Cindy: 0:06

Hello friends and welcome back to another episode of Primarily Scripture. I am your host, Cindy Young, and today I have got Isaac here with me. He might be a little bit of a familiar face to some of you who've been here from the beginning. He was one of my very first guests ever, but it's been like a year and a half since we've seen him. So he's grown up a little bit. He's 16 years old. He spends his time with schoolwork and taking care of the animals at his house. He's got a bunch of brothers and sisters, including one on a mission. And I'm so happy he's here. How are you, Isaac?

Isaac: 0:37

Doing good.

Cindy: 0:38

Are you ready to jump into the scriptures?

Isaac: 0:40

Let's do it.

Cindy: 0:40

Awesome. Okay, so we are in Doctrine and Covenants section 18 this week. I encourage you to go onto the website and find the free worksheets. They look like this. And they're available for anybody. Today we're on page two, and we're going to jump into section 18. Now page two, I love the way page two is set up, that it's got verses in the middle, and then room in the margins to make notes. And you can write sentences, you can put keywords, you can draw a picture. It doesn't matter. Any way you want to engage with the scriptures. I find personally, that when I actually am physically interacting with them by underlining, writing, coloring, things like that, that it's so much better. And like, I get so much more out of it. What about you, Isaac?

Isaac: 1:27

I like to define words.

Cindy: 1:29

Awesome. Just take that time and like go word by word and be sure that you understand it.

Isaac: 1:34

Yeah. And it can make multiple verses have different meanings. It can apply to different things too.

Cindy: 1:39

Yes. Okay. So we will try to do all those things as we study. Let's just start in verse 10 in section 18. And, uh, this is a super famous verse, super famous. Like you might even have it memorized, Isaac. No?

Isaac: 1:55

Maybe.

Cindy: 1:56

Do you have it memorized?

Isaac: 1:57

I have it memorized.

Cindy: 1:58

Yeah. Okay. Awesome. What's it say?

Isaac: 2:01

Remember the worth of souls is great in the sight of God.

Cindy: 2:04

It's not that many words.

Isaac: 2:05

Yeah.

Cindy: 2:07

Okay. If you have your scriptures in front of you, mark this verse. I mean, do whatever you want. They're your scriptures, but you should definitely have this verse marked! It is so important. So important. Why? Why is it important? The note on the side says why this is important to me. Isaac, why is this important to you?

Isaac: 2:28

Um, well, it shows that God's always going to be there for us. Like, no matter what's happening, if we have questions, we can always turn to him and ask. And no matter what, we're important to him.

Cindy: 2:40

Yeah. That's such important doctrine. Some people might feel like they're not lovable. Because they have made mistakes. Because they just feel down on themselves. Because life isn't perfect; they're not perfect. And they feel like there's no room for God to love them. No. This scripture says that's a lie. The worth of your soul is great. Now, that doesn't mean God loves everything you do, right?

Isaac: 3:05

Yeah, well, and there's been times that I kind of feel, you know, down, like I don't have any friends. This scripture talks about how God's there. He's your freaking best friend.

Cindy: 3:15

Yeah.

Isaac: 3:15

He's gonna be right there with you.

Cindy: 3:17

Oh, I love that. I just got goosebumps. Okay, the Lord is your best friend. I'm writing that down. And he really is.

Isaac: 3:25

Kind of reminds me of Samwise Gamgee from the Lord of the Rings.

Cindy: 3:29

Why is that?

Isaac: 3:30

Because there's a part in the movie when, like, Sam and Frodo are really close to destroying the ring, and he's like, " I can't carry your burden, Mr. Frodo, but I can carry you!" And like, he's just the homie who's there from the beginning, and will, you know, just drag you through.

Cindy: 3:48

Yes!

Isaac: 3:49

And get you past what's holding you back, so that you can, you know, do what you're meant to do.

Cindy: 3:55

Yes. Oh, I love it. And the lord is exactly that for us, right? He couldn't do mortality for each of us. We have to be here and go through trials and experiences We're all gonna get sick. We're all gonna have bad days. We're all gonna make mistakes

Isaac: 4:08

Yeah,

Cindy: 4:08

but he definitely carries us through and carries our burdens. Oh, that's so perfect. So fantastic, but let's go on. So after that verse the Lord kept talking and he explained a little bit more I'll read verse 11."For behold, the Lord your Redeemer suffered death in the flesh; wherefore he suffered the pain of all men, that all men might repent and come unto him." That just expands on what he did, right? Like, he's like, I love you. I love you so much that I did this!

Isaac: 4:40

Well, and back to the example of the best friend that loves us but not everything we do.

Cindy: 4:45

Yeah.

Isaac: 4:46

He's like, I love you. You messed up, right? You feel like crap. You feel like you're not worthy of love. But right here he's saying, you can fix it.

Cindy: 4:57

His Atonement does that for us. The reason He did it was so that we could repent and come unto Him. He made the path for us. Oh, I gotta highlight that one in yellow because that is so amazing.. So good! So good. Okay, let's skip to verse 13. Will you read that one?

Isaac: 5:18

"And how great is his joy in the soul that repenteth."

Cindy: 5:22

So why would his joy be great if you repent?

Isaac: 5:26

Cause he's happy. We're willing to talk to him again.

Cindy: 5:30

Have you ever had a friend that you thought was like giving you the cold shoulder and then they came back and you're like, Oh good. We are still friends!

Isaac: 5:36

Haha. Yep.

Cindy: 5:37

Thank goodness. That was a little bit hard for a minute there. Yay. We're friends. I feel like that's what the Lord is for us. He's like, Oh, please. I have so many blessings for you. There's so much I can do to help you. Just, just come and hang out with me.

Isaac: 5:51

Yep. He's kind of like the. The friend who has the party and he's just waiting for you to RSVP so that you can come hang out.

Cindy: 5:57

Yes! Are you coming or not? Come on! So what are your thoughts on repentance? In the margin there, it says my thoughts on repentance. It used to be that like back in the 90s when I was a teenager, when we talked about repentance, It was this scary thing like, oh, I have to go talk to the bishop and oh, I have to repent, but that's not what repentance is. What's your experience with repentance?

Isaac: 6:26

Well, just because of the way that like the world is right now, there's a lot of stuff that kind of makes things really complicated and messy, you know?

Cindy: 6:35

Yeah.

Isaac: 6:35

But it's very freeing. And, like, honestly, as soon as you pass the threshold, and like, you walk into the bishop's office, or just talk to your parents, or whatever, depending on what it is and how serious it is, but even the serious stuff. If it's not treated as a joke, and it's treated seriously, it feels so good, you know?

Cindy: 7:00

Yeah. Like having a backpack full of rocks and then you can finally dump it out like

Isaac: 7:05

Yeah,

Cindy: 7:06

that's so much better! You said it's freeing. That's just a beautiful thought All right. Let's go on. Why don't we look at 15?

Isaac: 7:15

Okay. Says, "and if it so be that you should labor all your days in crying repentance unto this people, and bring, save it be one soul unto me, how great shall be your joy with him in the kingdom of my Father!"

Cindy: 7:30

So you've got a sister on a mission. That's awesome. She's out crying repentance and trying to help bring souls unto Jesus. Have you heard any of her stories?

Isaac: 7:39

There was one that she was talking to me about recently, she called them an elect friend. And so it's someone that they just met, but they're like, can I be baptized now? And they're like, what? That's what, you know, cause they're just ready, you know?

Cindy: 7:56

Yeah. So when she was telling you about this elect friend, did it seem like she was experiencing joy over that friend?

Isaac: 8:04

Yeah, well, and I think it's also kind of like you were saying about, you know, hiking with a backpack full of rocks, the crying repentance is kind of like, dude, just take off the backpack. You don't need to be carrying around all this useless baggage, like, even like the prophet and the 12 apostles, they repent daily, you know, the smallest things because they know that repentance is a chance for them to become closer with God and a chance to Be more free, you know.

Cindy: 8:35

Yes. President Nelson recently said, um, he challenged us to discover the joy of daily repentance. The joy of daily repentance! But you can't discover that joy if you don't actually try it out. Awesome. So on the worksheet in verse 15, I circled a couple of words."Labor" is circled and"one soul" is circled. They stood out to me, but I don't want to like put thoughts into your head. I just wanted you to think about them more. Do you have any thoughts about those?

Isaac: 9:06

Um, I think one soul could represent anybody. And I think that even like includes ourself because if you labor to bring yourself to be converted truly, then, you're going to be happy. Like, that's the whole reason the plan of happiness is a thing.

Cindy: 9:23

Yeah, I agree. The Lord loves us so much! God loves us so much that he sent his son. Jesus loves us so much that he suffered and died for us. And he's given us this way. We can repent. We can turn to him. It's all about love. I like to put little hearts next to things that represent God's love. And this section is full of hearts. I just have a thousand hearts all over my scriptures because he loves us so much! So much. Okay. So we could go into a lot more things, but we do not have time. And I want to leave some things for our guests to go and find for themselves, because you can hear us talk about things, but your testimony isn't going to grow unless you feel it in your heart. Invite the Holy Ghost to teach you. That's his job, is to testify of truth. And if you invite the Holy Ghost to your study session, then you'll be able to gain a testimony and strengthen your testimony. It's so amazing. So everybody, please don't read your scriptures, study them. I'm Cindy Young. Thanks for being here on Primarily Scripture. I'll see you next week. Thanks for tuning in to Primarily Scripture with Cindy Young. Don't forget you can subscribe to the newsletter and download free worksheets on the website PrimarilyScripture. com. And if you like the channel, be sure to subscribe, like, share, and leave a review. See you next time!