Week 12

Okay, so I skipped last week, but I'm back this week and ready to write!

This week I had the opportunity to read in John 11-17 and learn about raising Lazarus, the triumphal entry, the last supper, the Holy Ghost, joy, and the intercessory prayer.

I'm going to write this post on the intercessory prayer because before this week, I didn't know what the intercessory prayer was. I learned that the prayer is found in John 17, and then looked up what it meant in the LDS New Testament teacher manual (it can be found here: https://www.lds.org/manual/new-testament-teacher-manual/the-gospel-according-to-st-john/lesson-27-john-17-19?lang=eng).

The manual states that "An intercessor is someone who intercedes, mediates, advocates, or pleads in behalf of another." I love this because Jesus is the person who pleads for us. God has the obligation to fulfill the law of justice, but Jesus brings in mercy. God holds us accountable for what we did wrong, but Jesus reminds him of the good and the repenting that we did. Jesus Christ intercedes, mediates, advocates, and pleads in our behalf. He is the only way to gain eternal life.

In the intercessory prayer, Jesus prays to Heavenly Father to keep us from evil, that we might believe on His name, and that we might know that God loves us just as he loves Christ. I love that he prayed for all of these things because the are things that I need to be reminded of daily. I am not perfect, and never will be in this life, but with Jesus Christ on my side, I cannot fail.

When you are feeling down, or having a hard time, just remember that your God and your Savior love you and they are rooting for you. They will help you with whatever you need; you just need to ask.

This week's study principle:

Context- Make sure that you know when and where a chapter, verse, excerpt, etc is taking place. This will help you to understand what it happening. For example, if you didn't know that that intercessory prayer happens right around the time of the atonement, it wouldn't make much sense. But to know that is is taking place right when He is suffering for our sins, it has so much more meaning.

Week 10

This week we read about Jesus' resurrection in Matthew 27 and 28, Mark 16,  and Luke 24. We also read John, chapters 1-3. I would like to focus my post today on a verse that is found in John 1:5.

When I read this verse, I immediately loved it. I thought that it was profound and that it described the life of Jesus Christ perfectly. The verse reads:

 "And the light shineth in darkness; and the darkness comprehended it not."

The simplicity of this verse is also something that caught my attention because most things in the bible are not simple. They are hard to understand because the language is so much older than the words that we use now or because Jesus taught in parables, so this verse was something that was refreshingly simple.

What I love about this verse is that it talks about Jesus being the light of the world, but that the world didn't comprehend it. Jesus was a light to us because, as Elder Dallin H. Oaks stated, "Jesus Christ is the light and life of the world because all things were made by him. Under the direction and according to the plan of God the Father, Jesus Christ is the Creator, the source of the light and life of all things."

From reading this verse, I learned that we need to do our best to comprehend the light of the world, to see Jesus Christ in our lives and in the lives of the people around us, and to do our best to honor Him and His sacrifice.

This week's study principle:

Principles- When we read the scriptures, we need to look for things to learn and apply to our lives so that we can better live in the way that Heavenly Father would have us live

Week 9

This week I had the opportunity to read about the last days of Christ's mortal ministry, and that is always something that inspires me to change. I read about Christ's suffering on the cross, and also in the garden, and I want to be better, to avoid sin so that His suffering would be just a little less. 

I would like to focus my blog post this week on the part of the atonement that takes place in the garden because I think it is a part that is overlooked by many people, but is extremely important.

Christ suffered on the cross, yes that is true, but He suffered for our sins in a tiny olive grove called the garden of Gethsemane. What was so amazing about this experience was that Christ, the son of God, our Savior, the one who from the beginning knew that this was what he had to do, asked God if he would remove "this cup" (Luke 22:42) from Him. In our class discussion, we talked about this part of the scriptures and discussed why Jesus Christ would ask that. We came up with two answers that could possible be the reason:

1. He was prepared mentally for what he had to do, but knew nothing of the physical side of His sacrifice. He was half mortal, and had never done this before, thus he was unprepared for the pain.
2. He knew that the story of Abraham sacrificing Isaac was a type of His life, and was hoping against hope, that some "cosmic ram" (the words of my teacher) would appear and He wouldn't have to go through with it.

"Nevertheless," Jesus said, "not my will, but thine, be done." (Luke 22:42) Although Jesus asked that he not have to make this sacrifice, He knew that the will of the Father needed to be done. This is the ultimate example of obedience because it was the ultimate sacrifice to be made and even though Christ would rather not have done it, He did it anyway because the Lord asked Him to.

Christ's suffering in the Garden was excruciating. His pain was so great that he bled from every pore. Every. Pore. According to a website that I found, there are about 2,016,000,000 pores in the human body. I can't even imagine what that would have felt like, but Christ knows. He knows what it feels like to bleed from every pore, and He knows what it's like to be you, to be me, to be anyone that has ever existed, exists, and will exist. Christ is the ultimate empathizer because he's been there. I find that amazing.

To end my blog post for this week, I would like to share the lyrics to a song by Jenny Phillips called, "Gethsemane"

Jesus climbed the hill
To the garden still
His steps were heavy and slow
Love and a prayer
Took Him there
To the place only He could go

Gethsemane
Jesus loves me
So He went willingly
To Gethsemane

He felt all that was sad, wicked or bad
All the pain we would ever know
While His friends were asleep
He fought to keep
His promise made long ago

Gethsemane
Jesus loves me
So He went willingly
To Gethsemane

The hardest thing that ever was done
The greatest pain that ever was known
The biggest battle that ever was won
This was done by Jesus
The fight was won by Jesus

Gethsemane
Jesus loves me
So He gave His gift to me
In Gethsemane

Gethsemane
Jesus loves me
So He gives His gift to me
From Gethsemane

I know that Jesus Christ lives and loves me. I know that He is my savior, and that He has felt everything that I feel. One day, I will able to throw myself down at His feet and thank Him for what He did. He is my Redeemer and it is thanks to Him that I even have a chance to live with God and my family forever.

This week's study principle:

Conference talks and commentaries- To answer questions and gain insight on what you've read, you an look up conference talks and commentaries on the internet that will expound and add on to what you were able to learn by yourself.