Hank Smith: 00:00 Hello everyone. Welcome to followHIM Favorites. I’m your host, Hank Smith. I’m here with my co-host, John Bytheway. Hello John.

John Bytheway: 00:06 Hi Hank.

Hank Smith: 00:07 And we are here with someone we both love and respect and adore. His name is Dr. Robert Milletet. Welcome Dr. Millet. Bob.

Dr. Robert Millet: 00:15 Thank you.

Hank Smith: 00:16 Yep. We are excited to be here. followHIM Favorites is where we choose one favorite from this week’s lesson, which is sections 106, 107, and 108 of the Doctrine and Covenants. You get to choose one thing. John, you go first. I’ll go second. And Bob, you go third.

John Bytheway: 00:30 Oh, I’ll do it. I am just intrigued with things that the Lord has us repeat. And we take the sacrament, how merciful, every single Sunday. I’m looking at section 108 verse three, where this man named, Lyman Sherman is given this council: “…arise up and be more careful henceforth in observing your vows.” And the problem with repeating something over and over again is it might get casual. And I remember President Hinkley once saying something to the teenage boys, the priests at the priest table. He said, when you as a priest offer up the prayer, kneel at the sacrament table and offer up the prayer, which came by revelation, you place the entire congregation under covenant with the Lord. Is this a small thing? He said, it is the most important and remarkable thing. And I love that because if we do it so often, it may seem like this is just what we do.

  01:27 And here’s this advice. Be more careful henceforth in observing your vows. So young men and young women and old men. One time one of my kids said they have young women’s, do they have old women’s? All of us be more careful. But, boy, savor that time with the sacrament. And, even though it’s repeated be more careful with observing our vows. And what a blessing you can always have His Spirit to be–we can always have His Spirit to be with us. What a beautiful thing. So, I want to take that advice. Be more careful. Take more time. Think about that.

Hank Smith: 02:02 I like that, John. I can’t see the Lord saying, arise up and be more casual. Be more casual with your vows.

John Bytheway: 02:08 That’s the opposite.

Hank Smith: 02:10 Right? Yeah. No, be more careful. My followHIM favorite comes from that same section, section 108 verse seven. He says to Lyman Sherman: “Therefore, strengthen your brethren in all your conversation…” I think if we were to translate that, it would say, in the way you talk, build people up. And so that’s my message to anyone listening is how do you build people with your words? Your parents need your building words. Sometimes we tear our parents down with our words. Let’s build them up. Let’s text them, tell them how great they are. Our siblings. We can build up our siblings with our words, right? We can build up our friends with our words. And one other thing, we need to build up ourselves with our words.

  02:55 This is from Jeffrey R. Holland. He says, I suppose it goes without saying that negative speaking often flows from negative thinking, including about negative thinking about ourselves. We see our own faults. We speak or at least think critically of ourselves. And before long, that’s how we see everyone and everything. No sunshine, no roses, no promise of hope or happiness. Before long, we and everybody around us are miserable. That’s what he says. He says, the spirit of the gospel is optimistic. It trusts in God and looks on the bright side of things. And then this, speak hopefully speak encouragingly, including about yourself. So, in strengthen your brethren in all your conversation, I’m going to add, strengthen yourself in the way you talk about yourself. Alright, brother Millet, we’re here for you. Tell us your followHIM favorite.

Dr. Robert Millet: 03:48 Yeah, I especially like section 106, this is a Revelation to Oliver Cowdery’s older brother, Warren Cowdry. To him, the Lord said, I say unto you, verse four: “…the coming of the Lord draweth nigh, and it overtaketh the world as a thief in the night. Therefore, gird up your loins that you may be the children of light, and that day shall not overtake you as a thief.” You hear a lot and I hear a lot about the Savior’s Second Coming and you hear about how close it is or how far off it it is. And when I read this particular set of verses here, I find myself thinking the most important thing is not to know the details about the Lord’s coming. The most important thing is to be ready for his coming. And so this idea that the Lord’s coming as a thief in the night, this section says he comes as a thief in the night to the world, to the world.

  04:51 On the other hand, Latter-day Saints who are living as they should, who have the Holy Ghost with them, who are listening carefully to the prophets and the apostles and valuing their words, those are the people who become the children of light. We live in a world that’s desperately in need of light and desperately in need of people who bring light into the world. And so, if you and I can become children of light, then we certainly won’t be overcome or overtaken like a thief in the night when the Lord does choose to come.

Hank Smith: 05:26 Absolutely. Absolutely. We hope that you will join us on our full podcast because we know you’re listening right now and you said, Hank John, I only have time for followHIM Favorites. Well, we hope that you will give us a try. You can find the followHIM podcast wherever you get your podcasts from. Give us a try. You’ll wanna hear the full episodes, right John? With Dr. Millet. It is definitely worth…

John Bytheway: 05:53 Absolutely.

Hank Smith: 05:53 Definitely worth your time.

John Bytheway: 05:54 I’m gonna listen to it again.

Hank Smith: 05:56 All right, well, we’ll see you there. If not, join us for our next followHIM Favorites.