Hank Smith:                      00:02                   Welcome to followHIM Favorites. This is where John and I are sharing a single story to go with each week’s lesson. John, I have a story for you in section 108 of the Doctrine & Covenants. Verse seven. Great verse here. The Lord says, strengthen your brethren in all your conversation, all your prayers, all your exhortations, all your doings. All is a pretty high percentage word. He’s saying, I want you lifting people everywhere you go. But what happens when things go wrong? Can you still strengthen people in your conversations, in your prayers and all you’re doing? I’m gonna tell you a story, actually it’s a series of stories about Thomas Edison. I know you’ve heard of him, brother Edison of the 70, he invented quite a bit of what we use today. Did you know when he was 12 years old, he lost 90% of his hearing, and his parents were devastated, thought, that’s it. His life is over. He said, quote, I like it. It helps me concentrate. When he is in his late thirties, he’s trying to create a light bulb that will be available to the general public for pretty cheap. It’s not working year after year after year. He’s trying this model and this model and this model, and it doesn’t work. And some newspaper wrote, Edison has failed. He wrote back, John, he said, I have not failed. I have found over a thousand ways in which it will not work.

John Bytheway:               01:26                   Great outlook.

Hank Smith:                      01:27                   Yeah, try that with your math teacher. I didn’t get that wrong. I didn’t fail. I found a new way to get that wrong. I bet you’ve never seen that before. When he’s in his late sixties, his New Jersey factory burns to the ground. Burns to the ground, $3 million in damages. Did he have insurance? Yes, he had $250,000 worth of insurance. He’s out $2.75 million. When his son got to the fire, this is what he said. He said, I saw him. My heart broke for him. He was an old man. He would not live to see this rebuilt, but when he saw me, he shouted, where’s your mother? I think his name was Charlie. Charlie. Where’s your mother? And he said, father, I don’t know. And he said, Charlie, find your mother fast and bring her here. She’ll never see a fire like this as long as she lives. He’s excited watching this fire. The next day when the employees showed up to see the damage, listen to what he says. He says, there is great value in this disaster, my friends, because all of our mistakes are burned up. Now we get to start brand new. This idea of I can take something negative. You know what? There’s actually a good thing in this. I’m gonna strengthen you in all my conversation, all my prayers, all my exhortations, all my doing.

John Bytheway:               02:47                   I’m not Thomas Edison. You know we had a house fire contained to just our kitchen, very small. My father-in-law said, this is gonna be a big challenge for Three Day Kitchen and Bath. My attitude was, too soon. Too soon, too soon.

Hank Smith:                      03:01                   Too soon. Don’t joke. Too soon. Don’t joke about that.

John Bytheway:               03:04                   And here’s Thomas Edison saying, go get your mother.

Hank Smith:                      03:07                   Wow. She’s gotta see this fire. All of our mistakes are burned up. Now there’s a time to accept something went wrong. But I like what the Lord is asking of us here. Use good times as well as bad times to strengthen each other in everything you do. Do you remember when Jesus is giving his great intercessory prayer in John 17, he’s just giving compliments left and right about his apostles. They are not of the world. They are wonderful. They are just like me. I’d be in that prayer going, yeah, I like this prayer. Keep going. Maybe we could do that, John. Maybe when we pray for our families, we could say, aren’t these people amazing? Aren’t I so lucky to have these wonderful children and this wonderful spouse?Strengthen people in prayers.

John Bytheway:               03:50                   It doesn’t leave us a lot of wiggle room for gossip or tearing people down does it? None. All your doings, comings, goings conversation.

Hank Smith:                      03:58                   Strengthen your brethren. I love it. We hope you’ll join us on our full podcast. It’s called followHIM. You can get it wherever you get any podcast. We are with Dr. Brent Top this week. He’s really fun. He’s been with us before and he walks us through sections 106, 107, 108 teaches us about the history, kind of the structure of the church and the priesthood organization of the church. It’s really fun. It’s really interesting. And then come back here next week, we’ll do another followHIM Favorite.