Teaching Children to see the Savior's Face

I had to give a talk a few weeks ago in church. I didn't want to lose it, so here it is. You don't have to read it if you aren't interested. I don't know that I'd read someone's talk... One of my favorite TV shows right now is the Big Bang Theory. The theme song for the show has a rapid succession of pictures that starts from the Beginning of the world all the way down through modern times. Caleb was by me one day while the show was on and he yelled “I see Jesus!” I had no idea what he was talking about. He was really excited and yelled again, “On TV, I saw Jesus!” I hadn’t even seen it. The images go by so fast I thought there was no way he could even tell what they were. So we rewound and paused several times to get it to just the right image. Sure enough, there He was. I was impressed that Caleb had even known the painting as it flashed by. It wasn’t one he’d seen before, but he could recognize the Savior’s face. We have several pictures of the Savior in our home. Our children see Him everyday as they eat their meals and every night when they go to sleep. They recognize Him, but do they know Him? Christ’s message on earth was to come to him, seek Him, get to know Him, and ultimately to follow Him. We’ve been taught as adults how to do that. We need to read our scriptures. We need to pray. We need to attend church. As parents and teachers, we have been entrusted with the Lord’s children. It is our sacred responsibility to teach them and bring them to the Savior. Joseph Smith recorded this revelation in the Doctrine and Covenants. Speaking of the saints he says “They shall teach their children to pray, and to walk uprightly before the Lord.” This command also comes with a pretty harsh warning. He tells us, “inasmuch as parents have children in Zion, that teach them not to understand the doctrine of repentance, faith in Jesus Christ the Son of the living God, and of baptism and the gift of the Holy Ghost by the laying on of the hands, the sin be upon the heads of the parents.” I don’t know about you, but that’s kind of scary to me. The scriptures, particularly the Book of Mormon, are full of histories that outline the importance of properly taught children. The very first verse in the Book of Mormon says “I Nephi, having been born of goodly parents, therefore I was taught somewhat in all the learning of my father.” and goes on from there. Nephi’s parents had given him a great foundation of truth. When Lehi’s vision was recounted, Nephi wanted to know the truth of it himself. From his parents he knew to turn to the Lord in prayer, seeking an answer, and having faith that he would receive it. The armies of Helamen were known for their valiance and obedience passed down from their mothers. Another great example is Joseph Smith. Young Joseph was very much like Nephi; He wanted to know the truth of the Gospel. Lucky for him, and all of us, his parents had taught him to pray. So, how do we, as parents and teachers, bring our children to the Savior? The first and most important thing we can each do, is have a knowledge and love of the Savior ourselves. We need to go beyond a testimony and truly seek to be converted ourselves. Elder Bednar said “True conversion brings a change in one’s beliefs, heart, and life to accept and conform to the will of God and includes a conscious commitment to become a disciple of Christ. Seeking for and obtaining a testimony of spiritual truth requires asking, seeking, and knocking with a sincere heart, real intent, and faith in the Savior. Fundamental components of a testimony are knowing that Heavenly Father lives and loves us, that Jesus Christ is our Savior, and that the fullness of the gospel has been restored to the earth in these latter days.” Once we have a testimony or are converted to the gospel ourselves, we live the principles we know to be true. We becomes examples to our children. They are always watching. They learn much more from what we do than they ever could from what we say. If they see us reading the scriptures, praying, doing our home and visiting teaching, and having charity for those around us, they will see the Lord through us. They will ask us questions, and have a desire to know what we profess to be true. Those are also easy opportunities to involve them. Take them home teaching or let them help in a service project. The more actively children participate in the gospel, the better. Lastly, of course, is teaching. In this most recent conference Elder Quentin L Cook said “Parents, the days are long past when regular, active participation in Church meetings and programs, though essential, can fulfill your sacred responsibility to teach your children to live moral, righteous lives and walk uprightly before the Lord.” And he’s right. The adversary isn’t after our children only on Sunday. He doesn’t take time off from trying to claim our children. Neither should we take time off from teaching them. Family Home Evening, family prayer, scripture study and gospel discussions can’t happen too frequently in our homes. Earlier this week, I had a practice what you preach moment in my home. My children were getting in bed for the night. They were sick and miserable. They wanted comfort and asked if I would read them a book. I had already turned the lights out so I told them I would share a story instead. I didn’t really know the direction I was going to go. Usually I just read them Harry Potter. I thought about what fairy tale I could tell that would help them go to sleep. My stories are generally a little on the louder, more boisterous side, which wouldn’t really help. While I was trying to come up with something, Levi said “about Jesus.” It was very humbling to me having my two year old remind me to teach. I told the story of the Jesus calming the tempest. It was actually really fun to hear my kids’ reaction. Adam had no idea that the Savior could, in his words, “control the earth.” His reaction was something like “woah.” Something I find myself forgetting to do, is bearing my own testimony. Our children need to know that we believe what we are telling them. My husband likes to emphasize HOW he came to his testimony and I think this is a really good practice. As opposed to saying “I know the church is true.” we should be saying “I know the church is true because...” By sharing how we acquired our testimony, we invite others to follow our example in obtaining it. The manner in which we teach our children is of vital importance. At Christmas time I read the New Testament for the first time. During the Savior’s mortal ministry, he spent most of His time teaching the apostles. My favorite apostle is Peter. He reminds me of me. He has to hear every lesson repeatedly for it to sink in. He forgets and he fails a lot, no offence to Peter. Jesus gives him the opportunity to walk on water. Halfway through, even though he is staring the Savior in the face, he has doubts and begins to sink. When Christ is suffering in the garden of Gethsemane, Peter falls asleep. Twice. Worst of all, he three times denies knowing Jesus. Through it all, Jesus is so very patient with him. He repeats himself over and over and He constantly shows his love for Peter. We need to be as patient with our children. They are so little and tender. And their attention spans are ridiculously short. With Easter around the corner, I think of the opportunities we sometimes miss to minister to our children. How often do we trade stories of the Savior for egg hunts, elaborate feasts, or presents? Those of course, are great traditions that we enjoy, but they need to be used as tools to teach and remember. This past Christmas, I did an advent calendar with my kids. This is a calendar with fun things to do every day to really enjoy December. We did fun things like drink hot chocolate, make cards, and watch movies. As I was preparing my calendar, and looking for ideas online, I ran across an advent calendar on lds.org. It was scriptures for every day in December; stories of Christ’s life and ministry. It was a great instrument to make sure our focus was where it needed to be over Christmas. Does that mean we actually read the scriptures every day? Nope. What it does mean is that the few times I remembered, my kids got to learn about Christ. The church gives us access to so many wonderful tools, if we will look for them. LDS.org has all the manuals and ideas we could possible want. There are apps designed so we have learning right in our pocket at all times. if your kids are anything like mine, they can sing you any radio hit you name. Why not put on primary songs they sing along to instead? I also love the Book of Mormon readers. Adam just learned to read and I find him curled up with it more often than I can take credit for. The greatest weapon in our arsenal is, of course, prayer. The Lord is willing to give us help and direction as often as we ask for it. No amount of reading parenting books can give us the same level of knowledge that the Lord can. One of my favorite quotes from conference came from Elder Anderson. He said, "the wisdom of the world, while in many cases very valuable, is most valuable when it humbly bows to the wisdom of God." The Lord knows our weaknesses. He doesn’t expect perfection in our lives because he knows we will come short. Sometimes, I have terrible mom guilt. I see other moms taking their kids to museums and parks and doing activities every other day and I feel like a big, fat failure. If you add the occasional forgetting of family prayer or Family Home Evening to that, I’m all but sure I’m screwing my kids up. The good news is, because of the Atonement, our honest, best efforts will do. The Lord, through His Holy Spirit, will teach our children things that we can’t. He will confirm truth to their hearts. All we have to do is get them to the point where they are open to hearing and accepting that truth. I had an experience recently in the temple. My husband and I were sitting together in the Celestial room, and I got a glimpse of what the Celestial Kingdom would be like. He and I would be together and our children, along with their families, would be nearby. It was such a happy, peaceful feeling imagining all of us there in the Savior’s presence. Until I imagined anyone missing. My spirit plummeted. What if a member of my family wasn’t there? I can’t imagine the heart ache of that. In fact, I sat there and bawled like a baby. My hope for all of us is that we may do our part to bring our children with us. May we give them a desire to know the Savior and teach them how to do it. My testimony is a very simple one. I know the Savior. Though my study, prayers, and mostly, my ever necessary repentance, I have come to recognize His face. King Benjamin said, “I would that you should be steadfast and immovable, that Christ, The Lord God Omnipotent, may seal you his.” I look forward with great hope to the day that the Lord will claim me, along with my children, as His.