I love seminary.

My friend Joan told me something that’s held true all these three years.  She said, “There’s nothing worse than a bad day at seminary, but there’s nothing better than a good day at seminary.”  I think I’ve shared that before, but it’s only truer with age.

This morning we had two devotionals.  The first one was given by Kalala and she spoke on Doctrine and Covenants 31:3.  It says, “Lift up your heart and rejoice, for the hour of your mission is come; and your tongue shall be loosed, and you shall declare glad tidings of great joy unto this generation.”  She said that we never know when our mission may come so we should be prepared.  She said that there are kids at school that ask her questions and that sometimes she remembers scripture mastery or other verses that we’ve talked about in seminary and can answer the questions.  Sometimes she can’t remember where they are and sometimes she’s stumped by their questions, but she testified that if we continue to prepare ourselves that we will be able to answer the questions with the help of the Spirit and the scriptures.

Anna gave the second devotional on motivation (a great tie-in).  She used Moroni 7:6. “For behold, God hath said a man being evil cannot do that which is good; for if he offereth a gift, or prayeth unto God, except he shall do it with real intent it profiteth him nothing.”  She talked about what our motivation should be for sharing the gospel or when saying our prayers.  She testified that our Heavenly Father knows what our intent is when we ask for things so we should be sincere when we pray.

As part of the lesson, I asked the kids what their favorite verses were from their reading of Ether 3 last night.

Dallen chose verse 13.  “And when he had said these words, behold, the Lord showed himself unto him, and said: Because thou knowest these things ye are redeemed from the fall; therefore ye are brought back into my presence; therefore I show myself unto you.”  He said that he liked this verse because it talked about how much faith the brother of Jared had.  He had so much faith that Jesus showed himself to him.

Kalala chose verse 9.  “And the Lord said unto him: Because of thy faith thou hast seen that I shall take upon me flesh and blood; and never has man come before me with such exceeding faith as thou hast; for were it not so ye could not have seen my finger. Sawest thou more than this?”  Ironically, she chose it for the same reason that Dallen chose verse 13.

Anna chose verse 26.  “For he had said unto him in times before, that if he would believe in him that he could show unto him all things—it should be shown unto him; therefore the Lord could not withhold anything from him, for he knew that the Lord could show him all things.”  Anna said that she chose that verse because it showed how much faith he had and it also shows what the Lord can do with us when we have faith.

I’ve seen them all pick the same verse for different reasons before.  I’ve seen them pick the same verse for the same reason before.  This is the first time that I’ve seen them pick completely different verses all for the same reason.

I love my kids – all five of them.  It’s a small class this year and it’s been a really blessing to be able to have so much time to spend with them.  They are really good kids who try their best to make good choices.  They have strong testimonies that are getting stronger and they really are trying to get to know their Savior better.  They want to be good.  They want to do what’s right.  I pray that they will always remember how to slow down and let the Spirit in to teach them.