Hello and welcome back to another episode of Primarily Scripture. I am your host, Cindy Young. It has been a couple of weeks since I have posted an episode and also a few weeks since I have had worksheets for you to do. Life does get crazy sometimes, doesn't it? I appreciate so much those of you who reached out. People I don't even know sent me messages and emails telling me how much they look forward to the worksheets and the podcast and that they're hoping everything is well with me. I assure you, everything is well with me. Things have just been crazy. So thank you for your patience and for your loyalty. Thank you for coming back and being here with me today. Now, I know it's not the full video podcast, but I wanted to get something out there for you guys. This week we are studying Doctrine and Covenants, sections 60 through 63. But remember, this podcast isn't just to go through the Come Follow Me lesson. This is supposed to help you learn how to study it on your own. So we use Come Follow Me and I show you some of the tools that I use in order to more effectively study the scriptures. So I have two tips for you this week, and both of them are things that you can do every single time you study the scriptures. When we study, there are things that the Lord gives to us directly that are just there. All we have to do is look for them. And then there are other things that we have to do the work in order to find them. And I'll show you what I mean. So the first one is what the Lord gives to us. On the worksheet, there's an activity called Search for the Order. And this is something that the Lord gives us, very clearly sometimes, and sometimes it's a little bit hidden. But if you start paying attention to this, you're going to see it everywhere in the scriptures, I promise- that the Lord gives us the order to do things. In your elementary school English or language arts lessons, you might have talked about order and finding words like first, next, then, before. And those words are also in the scriptures, not quite as often as it would be in a second grade lesson in elementary school, but if you watch for them, you will see orders laid out for us that help us to know the order that the Lord wants us to do things or needs us to do things. For instance, let's turn to Doctrine and Covenants section 63 versus eight through 10. And this is talking about signs and people who are looking for signs. Sometimes we classify signs as like big and small, and we would think of big signs as things like, angels appearing or miracles like the Children of Israel crossing through the Red Sea on dry ground. These are huge signs that show that the Lord is real and that he is doing his work. Then we think of other signs as being kind of small. Things like little daily miracles, things happening at just the right time or in just the right way. Small little whisperings of the Holy Ghost, things like that. Okay, so let's look at these verses. Section 63 verses nine and 10."But, behold, faith cometh not by signs, but signs follow those that believe. Yea, signs come by faith, not by the will of men, nor as they please, but by the will of God." So can you find in these verses what we need to do first? It doesn't have words like first and next. But the word follow gives us an idea of what would be first."Signs follow those that believe." So the first step is to have that faith. And verse 10 reminds us of that." Yea, signs come by faith." So faith is first, and then we can have those signs. And it's not always gonna be the big things like an angel appearing. I have never had an angel appear to me. But you know what I have had happen? I have had my prayers answered. I have had things happen in just the right way. I have had whisperings of the Holy Ghost telling me that the Lord is aware of me. And those signs have strengthened my faith, but I didn't get them until after I acted in faith. So as you read, look for the order. And ponder that. The Lord gives us this information in the scriptures all the time. But again, because it doesn't have words like first, next, and then... because those words aren't there every time, we don't always recognize it the same way we would recognize it in the second grade school lesson. Now in verse 23, it says this, "but unto him that keepeth my commandments, I will give the mysteries of my kingdom and the same shall be in him a well of living water, springing up unto everlasting life." Okay, so there's an order here in this verse. Did you see it? If we keep the commandments, he will give to us the mysteries of the kingdom and we'll have in ourselves a well of living water. So if you look on the worksheet, I explained it this way, those people who do keep the commandments. To them, the Lord will give them more knowledge and more guidance about his kingdom, and the Holy Ghost will be with them like water giving everlasting life. So we can find mysteries of the kingdom. Now what does that mean to find mysteries? Well, just the same way that there are certain things given to us directly in the scriptures. Uh, for instance, the order to do certain things is one of them. It's right there. We just have to find it. There are things that the Lord wants to teach us that can only come through the Holy Ghost and through pondering. So let's move on to the second thing that I want you to do - to ask questions. And one way to ponder is to create study questions in your own mind, and then as you think about those questions and you question the things that you're reading, then the spirit can answer the questions! And so then you are receiving the mysteries of the kingdom because you're pondering what the Lord has given us in the scriptures. So if you turn to the second page of my study worksheets, I have on there for you a Beginner's Guide to Creating Study questions. Now, there are a million different ways that you can ask questions, and it depends on your own situation, your own life, and every day that I study, I ask different kinds of questions, but there is this pattern that I follow when I'm stumped and I'm like, oh, I'm not sure how to ask questions. What should I do? I go back to this pattern and it helps me to create questions that I can then ponder. Let's try it. Let's turn to verse 47 and we'll try to create a question about verse 47.

"he that is faithful and endure shall overcome the world." That's a pretty straightforward verse. It gives us a few steps. Be faithful and endure, and then you can overcome the world. Wonderful. You might be tempted to just read it and say, oh, that's so good, and then move on. But by asking questions and pondering, you'll get so much more out of the verse. So let's try my study guide. Let's look at these five steps. Step one, choose which part of the verse your question will be related to. So I like to choose important words. That's the first place that I start. So we could choose either faithful or endure or overcome. Now, if I had a guest here today, I would let them pick, but since I don't, I will just pick for myself. Let's look at the word endure. Okay? Now Step two, choose a question word, and I gave some options here. Who, what is where, when, why, how, if, which. You know all these question words. Again, we learned these in what, second grade? So if I'm going to ask a question about enduring, maybe I'll do how, okay. Now, step three is to relate the question to yourself or another gospel principle or the Savior. This time I will relate it to myself so I can use me, mine, my, I... any of those words that refer to myself. And now let's see if we could create a question using these three elements that we just pulled together from my guide. So now my question is how can I endure? That's a really simple question that we created using the first three steps. Step four is to now ponder the question, listen to the spirit, and if necessary, I can use gospel truths to find the answer. Some questions will have a specific answer that is gospel related, like should I pay my tithing? Well, the answer is yes. Yes, you should pay your tithing, and we can find doctrine to support that in the scriptures. But sometimes when you're relating it to yourself- how can I endure?- That answer is going to be different for me than it is for you because it depends on the trials that you're going through, depends on your circumstances, where the Lord wants you to be focused. I can think of different trials that I'm going through. I can think of things in the gospel that are hard for me that I want to focus on, and the spirit can then speak to you and help you know what you should work on and what is most important for yourself. I love doing this because then I receive revelation. Just by asking the question- how can I endure- I receive revelation for my personal life directly from the Lord through the Holy Ghost, and you can do it too! And reading the verse is such a great thing to do, but if you don't ponder it with questions, then you could miss out on this revelation that the Lord wants to give you. So after I've pondered how I can endure, and maybe I'll write down a list, maybe I'll write a few thoughts in the margin of my scriptures, and then I move on to step five. Pray to know if there is more to learn right now. And if yes, then repeat the process. Richard G. Scott was an apostle and he taught this principle. After you ponder, pray to know if there's something else to learn. So, let's repeat this process. Let's go back to step one and choose a new part of the verse to question. Overcome. Let's do overcome the world. Okay. Step two is to choose a question word, and step three will relate it to ourselves or the savior or another gospel principle. Okay, so overcoming the world, how can I create a question about overcoming the world? Well, what if this time I try to relate it to the Savior? How can the Savior help me to overcome the world? There we go. We just created a question out of thin air. I promise I didn't write these down beforehand. I just used these steps. How can the savior help me to overcome the world? He promises that I will if I'm faithful and I endure, but how can he help me do that? So let's ponder that. What do the scriptures teach? Didn't he say himself that he has overcome the world? So maybe if I'm faithful - keeping my covenants- then I'm connected to him. And since he has already overcome the world, then he can give me power and strength to do the same in my life because he's already done it. I love asking these questions and praying to know is there more, is such an important step. So don't skip step five when you do it. The Lord wants to speak to you. I promise He does, and proof of that is the scriptures! He gave them to us so that we can learn and so that we can hear his voice. Sometimes he gives us things directly, like the order- we just have to be watching for it- and other times answers will come because you put in the work to find the mysteries of the kingdom. He will share them with you. I promise he will. I love the scriptures. I testify that you can hear the Lord's voice through the scriptures. Remember, you can study the gospel so many different ways, but you should be studying primarily... scripture. So go search, ponder and pray, and the Lord will speak to you. I am Cindy Young. Thank you so much for being here with me on Primarily Scripture. Have a great week, guys! Bye! Thanks for tuning into primarily Scripture with Cindy Young. Don't forget you can subscribe to the newsletter and download free worksheets on the website, primarily scripture.com. And if you like the channel, be sure to subscribe, like, share, and leave a review. See you next time.