Our temples, benefiting from centuries, even millennia of experience, are structured in such a way to help us have powerful revelatory experiences as we come closer to God. This week as we study the end of Exodus and selections from Lev, we look at what those specifics are and how we can both see them in our temple experience and incorporate them into our personal lives.

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Music: by Steve Oxen

This week we study a moment for Israel that taught them powerful truths about themselves and the Lord. Although they were not wrongly imprisoned like Joseph Smith, they had a "miserable experience" because of their own actions that brought them to "mourn". In that mourning, and in our own, we can see and learn truths about our Lord that can help us grow, heal, and change.

Show Notes:

Dieter F. Uchtdorf, "Continue in Patience," April 2010.

Neal A. Maxwell, "Patience," October 1980

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Music: by Steve Oxen

In this episode we study Exodus 18-20 but look, not just at the 10 commandments, but why they are worth thinking about in the first place.

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Music: by Steve Oxen

In our episode this week we study Exodus 14-17 and examine our relationship with our prophetic leaders. We'll examine miracles, murmuring, and mediation through rods and logs. Most importantly, we'll ask ourselves the question, "How can I draw more power from my prophetic leaders."

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Music: by Steve Oxen

Perhaps the most common question asked about God is, "Why does God allow bad things to happen?" One recent survey found that this question, in some form or another, is at the heart of almost every faith question or struggle individuals have. This week we tackle that question head on as we study the rising action of the Exodus in chapters 7-13, specifically the plagues the Lord sends to Egypt. If it's true that the Lord is all knowing, all powerful, and ever present, then we can look at moments of conflict and trial as prime opportunities to learn more about who He is and who we are.

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Music: by Steve Oxen

There were over 2,000 gods in the Egyptian pantheon. These ranged from Amun-Ra who was the god of sun and air, to Sopdu who was a god over a specific border and the forts on that border. In our episode this week we fast forward hundreds of years from end of Genesis and find the Israelites trapped in the land of these thousands of gods. The irony? It was in this place, surrounded by statues and symbols and sweating under the strain of servitude, that Israel would truly come to know their own god, the One God, or better said, the God is, actually, present everywhere and every time.

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Music: by Steve Oxen

Corrie Ten Boom survived the horrors of a WWII concentration camp. Years later she spoke widely of her experience of the power of forgiveness teaching, "Forgiveness is not an emotion. Forgiveness is an act of the will." After one such speaking event, one of her former camp guards recognized her, approached her, and stuck out his hand to shake hers. She recounted, "I, who had preached so often … the need to forgive, kept my hand at my side. And so … I breathed a silent prayer. Jesus, I cannot forgive him. Give me Your forgiveness. As I took his hand the most incredible thing happened. From my shoulder along my arm and through my hand a current seemed to pass from me to him, while into my heart sprang a love for this stranger that almost overwhelmed me. And so I discovered that it is not on our forgiveness any more than on our goodness that the world’s healing hinges, but on His."

This week we study Genesis 42-50 and one of the powerful stories of forgiveness in search of principles to guide our own efforts to forgive ourselves and others.

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Music: by Steve Oxen

Elder Holland once taught, "Every one of us has times when we need to know things will get better… For emotional health and spiritual stamina, everyone needs to be able to look forward to some respite, to something pleasant and renewing and hopeful, whether that blessing be near at hand or still some distance ahead… My declaration is that this is precisely what the gospel of Jesus Christ offers us." The story of Joseph of Egypt is exactly this: a story of good things to come despite difficult things we see. In fact, as we study this week we want to build on our study last week and learn how to not only let the Lord prevail, but let Him prosper us, our families, and those we love and serve.

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Music: "Beauty of Russia" by Steve Oxen

As with others before him, Jacob, son of Rebekah and Isaac, receives a new name from the Lord that indicates something the Lord desires or foresees he can become. Jacob's name change is an interesting one: from Jacob, which means "supplanter" or "one who grasps or clings", to Israel, which at least means, as President Nelson has taught us, "one with whom God prevails". This week we study Gen 28-33 and dig into the account, not just to see that letting God prevail is important, but to see exactly how to do it.

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Music: "Beauty of Russia" by Steve Oxen

BYU professor and artist Anthony Sweat wrote in his recent book, Repicturing the Restoration, about the [in]famous conflict between founding father John Adams and painter John Trumbull. Adams criticized Trumbull for painting the signing of the Declaration of Independence without depicting the arguments and debates that took place and without which, Adams said, Trumbull's picture was a fiction" under pretense of poetical or graphical licenses." Lin Manual Miranda, in his smash hit Hamilton originally proposed starting with a song called, "No John Trumbull."

Our study this week places us right in the middle of one of many complicated stories of the Bible. Far from trying to simplify or streamline it, we want to sit with it this week and allow ourselves time to consider just how our own paths and experiences in life are a lot messier than we might like. In short, what you're about to read is "no John Trumbull."

Show Notes:

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Music: "Beauty of Russia" by Steve Oxen