It’s finally GENERAL CONFERENCE SEASON!! Okay, the semi-annual General Conference actually happened last weekend… but it’s so important to reflect on, no matter how much time has passed 🙂 In the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints (otherwise known as the Mormon Church), leaders address the entire world from the Conference Center in Salt Lake City, Utah. The talks (sermons) are transmitted via internet and can be viewed on YouTube or the LDS Church website. Today we are recapping our thoughts on the October 2021 General Conference of the Church of Jesus Christ. If you haven’t listened to the talks already, check them out online! What was your favorite talk? Let us know in the comments below!
Transcript:
Justin: But then it was cool, because it would’ve been easy for him to say, “As a member of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, you need to go to the church because it’s the true church.” He could’ve just said to everyone, blanket statement, “You all need to go to our church.” But he was like, “No, you just need to go to church. You just need to worship and have a community.”
Justin: Welcome guys, to our recap of General Conference. This weekend, you hopefully had the opportunity to tune in and see the prophet, President Nelson, the apostles, and other leaders of the church address us with talks that they’ve been preparing for the last six months?
Kaitlyn: Yep.
Justin: And we just kind of want to go over our favorite parts, the things that we thought were interesting, and also just kind of, what is it? Ruminate? That’s a terrible word, but just the fact-
Kaitlyn: I think that works.
Justin: Yeah, it works. Just the fact that they receive revelation for our time. This is modern day scripture, and they’ve been working on these messages for the past six months. And then it’s amazing to see themes come up. They don’t talk together, they’re not strategizing and planning like, “Okay, you say this and then that’ll make my thing sound cooler.” No, they all just-
Kaitlyn: No, it’s just… and every time, we see some kind of pattern.
Justin: Every time, yeah. And so-
Kaitlyn: It’s so interesting.
Justin: We’re just going to talk about the things we saw, and hopefully invite the spirit.
Kaitlyn: One thing that I thought was cool about this conference is they did it in the conference center this time.
Justin: Yes, that was so cool, and the choir-
Kaitlyn: It’s really good no matter what, but yeah, the choir, and they actually had the choir there.
Justin: Yeah. My wife was like-
Kaitlyn: That made me so happy, because-
Justin: A couple weeks ago she was like-
Kaitlyn: It felt normal-ish.
Justin: Like, “What ever happened to the choir?” She was like, “Are they okay? Are they fine? They’re just gone.” But no, that was a big… and they even had kind of an audience, too.
Kaitlyn: I think so, because you could kind of hear… like if they said something funny, you could hear a little bit of laughing.
Justin: Which is nice.
Kaitlyn: And I was like, “Oh, who’s there? Who got to go?”
Justin: Yeah, I know. One of the camera angles was far enough out, and there’s at least the first couple rows.
Kaitlyn: Maybe some of their families or whatever were just chilling out there in the audience, but that was kind of nice.
Justin: That was. And then they started off really strong. Saturday session was Elder Holland on the first talk.
Kaitlyn: Oh my gosh. Yes.
Justin: It’s kind of funny because-
Kaitlyn: It was so good.
Justin: We were joking about how some people watch General Conference with specific speakers in mind, like I can’t wait for Elder Holland or Bednar, those are our favorites, but everyone’s a favorite to someone, right?
Kaitlyn: Yeah.
Justin: And so I think they were being tricky by putting Elder Holland first, knowing that a lot of people are going to miss Saturday morning. So then people will-
Kaitlyn: I actually thought about that.
Justin: Yeah. So now people are going to watch the rest of conference being like, “When’s Holland going to speak? When’s Holland?” And they’ll watch to the very end and be like, “Wait a second.”
Kaitlyn: “Wait, I missed it?”
Justin: Yeah. They’re being clever. I don’t think they actually do that, but…
Kaitlyn: Yeah. I sometimes wonder though, because it seems like they put him at the beginning a lot and at the end. I don’t know. Maybe that’s just-
Justin: Either way, it’s like a strategy to get people to watch the whole thing.
Kaitlyn: I know. But that first Saturday session I would say was my favorite. That whole session I was just like, ah. Maybe it was just me. Maybe I was just getting revelation that I needed, but that first session for me was just…
Justin: Do you have any specific, what’s the word? Quotes, or…
Kaitlyn: Specific? Yeah. So I like Elder Holland’s talk, like you talked about. He talked about being very united, and he kind of addressed division, and I thought that was a good topic that needed to be talked about. Bonnie H. Cordon, I liked hers. So you know how President Nelson talked at the beginning? He said look for these three things, pure truth, pure doctrine of… I think is was pure doctrine of Christ, and pure revelation.
Justin: I’m glad you wrote that down, because I’m like, “Yeah, he said things. Yes.”
Kaitlyn: I wrote it down. I was like, “I’m going to look.”
Justin: Yeah no, that’s awesome. Yeah, okay.
Kaitlyn: And I noticed that people throughout, and maybe it was just because I was looking for it, but people were saying like, “Here’s a truth.” They identified that. And Bonnie Cordon said that, and she said, “Two truths, the youth need to know who they are, and they need to know their purpose.” And that stood out to me, because I’m about to be a mother in two weeks. And I was like-
Justin: Yeah, you’re going to have a youth.
Kaitlyn: I’m like, “Shoot, I don’t know what I’m doing.”
Justin: Or are you a youth?
Kaitlyn: Just any help would be great. But just to help your child, or help others know who they are, which is a child of God.
Justin: Yeah, that’s really cool.
Kaitlyn: I just was like, “Aw, nice.”
Justin: And that applies to all of us, right?
Kaitlyn: Yeah, it does.
Justin: Even if you’re 100 years old, you’re still a child, right? To somebody.
Kaitlyn: And then loved President Oaks, Elder Christofferson.
Justin: Yeah, always.
Kaitlyn: There’s just so many. I’m just going off.
Justin: No, you’re good.
Kaitlyn: But did you have any-
Justin: No, I’m just agreeing, because they’re all great. I think I really like the idea of unity that was given over multiple talks. Of also just being kind to others and being service oriented. The idea that it doesn’t matter what you’re… and they didn’t specifically say your political beliefs, but it was just like regardless of your opinions, don’t judge other people, just serve them because we all fall into that.
Kaitlyn: Yeah, totally.
Justin: Like, “Oh, I’m righteous.” That, oh man. If I could remember the quote. But it was just like we want people, once they agree with me then we’ll be good.
Kaitlyn: Yes.
Justin: This was at the last session and it was like, once you agree with me and we’re on the same page, then we’ll be happy and we can be peaceful. And it was like no, we just need to serve regardless.
Kaitlyn: I know what you’re talking about. You don’t have to be the same to be united or something.
Justin: No yeah, and then another talk talking about church, but I don’t think it was… it was Elder Oaks.
Kaitlyn: The importance of going to church?
Justin: Yeah.
Kaitlyn: Yeah.
Justin: That was Oaks, right?
Kaitlyn: Yep.
Justin: Okay, that.
Kaitlyn: That was good.
Justin: That was awesome. I mean of course because going to church is important, but what I thought was really cool is how he specified church in general, all religion. And that’s something that has been spoken before, where the quotes about the fall of religion is the decline of a country, a nation, right? And Elder Oaks is very much about the constitution, the United States. He’s a lawyer, he’s very involved. But then it was cool, because it would’ve been easy for him to say, “As a member of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, you need to go to the church because it’s the true church.” He could’ve just said to everyone, blanket statement, “You all need to go to our church.” But he was like, “No, you just need to go to church. You just need to worship and have a community.”
Kaitlyn: Totally. He’s seeing the patterns in the world that are happening by the decline of people going to church in general, and religion.
Justin: And I’ve heard that, the quote that he said, where people are like, “I have spirituality in my life. I have a personal relationship with God, so I don’t need to go to church.” I’ve heard that a lot, and it was cool that he had just addressed it. And not in a chastising way, not in a mean way. Just like, well you need to serve people. You need a community, a family. You don’t go to church to… when he’s like, “I go to Sunday school and I don’t learn anything.” He’s like, “That’s not why you’re going. You’re going to serve.”
Kaitlyn: You’re going to worship and to serve.
Justin: Because I’ve heard that a lot in the singles’ ward I’m in right now, where it’s like a lot of return missionaries come home and they’re just like, “Well, I just served a mission. I know everything.” And I’m like, “Well that’s not why you’re here.”
Kaitlyn: You don’t always get something out of it every time. That’s just how it is.
Justin: And sometimes yeah, sometimes church can be more stressful and uncomfortable than it is edifying, right?
Kaitlyn: Yeah, it can be.
Justin: Because service can be a little uncomfortable. But that’s how we grow. That was also a theme in some of… I think there’s two or three talks that mentioned adversity.
Kaitlyn: Yup, adversity for sure was a big one.
Justin: Growing through adversity-
Kaitlyn: Was a big one, and taking adversity, and taking life on kind of bit by bit.
Justin: Yeah, that was-
Kaitlyn: [crosstalk 00:08:06] touched on that.
Justin: That was great.
Kaitlyn: Landmarks. The guy that talked about the 1% increasing.
Justin: The bicycle.
Kaitlyn: The bicycle analogy.
Justin: Yeah, and then when he started setting that I was like, okay, this is very specific.
Kaitlyn: It was way specific.
Justin: Like England, bicyclists, and-
Kaitlyn: It was the whole talk.
Justin: But when he went to the final, when he was like, “And now England has won all the gold medals,” I was like, “That’s so cool. They did it.” That definitely was motivating, because I was like, they didn’t win a gold medal for over 100 years and now they’ve won all of them.
Kaitlyn: Yeah, isn’t that crazy?
Justin: So I was like, I guess I can work 1% of the time.
Kaitlyn: Yeah. They started with the basics like bike riding, and I just thought that was so funny. It worked.
Justin: But then I think one thing, and we were talking about this, is a theme that we kind of saw through the whole conference, and it was a quote from Elder Nelson from a previous conference. And it’s cool because he’s the prophet, and so it’s just fun that all of these apostles are pulling from a quote from a recent prophet, and the different…
Kaitlyn: Yeah. I like to see them quote him, but he’s also there.
Justin: Yeah, I just think… I’m waiting for the day where Elder Nelson quotes himself, and it’s like that meme of Obama giving himself a medal.
Kaitlyn: Oh my gosh.
Justin: But no, and it’s, the quote is…
Russell Nelson: My dear brothers and sisters, the joy we feel has little to do with the circumstances of our lives, and everything to do with the focus of our lives.
Justin: And that was hands down the most recurring theme. And I think you could take any of the talks and find a way to figure out how it ties into that. Finding joy by focusing on the savior, not necessarily comfort. Not even necessarily happiness, in the sense that wow, I have no stress right now.
Kaitlyn: Yeah. It’s in the sense that you’re doing what you can do. Do right now what you can do, whether that’s starting where you are, taking incremental steps to come closer to Christ, and finding ways that you can find joy. And they all gave good, practical applications on how we can do that, so that was nice. Honestly, it was very-
Justin: Yeah, I definitely got a little emotional.
Kaitlyn: Helpful.
Justin: Yeah.
Kaitlyn: It’s always fun that President Nelson touches on temples. I feel like he really emphasizes temples a lot, and he really emphasized them this time. Temple covenants-
Justin: Oh, right. And then the foundation, yeah.
Kaitlyn: The foundation.
Justin: The whole video there going through the Salt Lake City temple. Well, and then the fact that he kind of does this thing where at the end of conference… other prophets have done it different where they announce new temples, but I think he consistently does it at the end of conference.
Kaitlyn: He does, yeah. I noticed that.
Justin: Which is kind of cool. It’s like, “By the way, this is the biggest thing,” right? So there were 13 new temples announced, and then also the reconstruction of the Provost… not the city center temple, but the old Provost temple that looks like a birthday cake, so hopefully they make it look a little bit cooler. As much as we love-
Kaitlyn: A more modern birthday cake.
Justin: Yeah, exactly. But yeah, so the temples that were announced; Kaohsiung Taiwan, Tacloban City Philippines, Monrovia Liberia, Kananga Democratic Republic of the Congo, Antananarivo Madagascar, which is pretty crazy.
Kaitlyn: That is crazy.
Justin: Madagascar.
Kaitlyn: Is that the first… that’s the first one in Madagascar for sure.
Justin: Well, I mean Madagascar’s just…
Kaitlyn: Madagascar, I don’t know.
Justin: I just feel like you just forget that it is its own country, right?
Kaitlyn: For sure.
Justin: Culiacán Mexico.
Kaitlyn: And then we’ve got Vitória Brazil.
Justin: You did an accent, and I didn’t do an accent.
Kaitlyn: La Paz Bolivia, Santiago West Chile. I served my mission in Chile, so that was exciting.
Justin: That’s really cool.
Kaitlyn: Fort Worth Texas, Cody Wyoming, Rexburg North Idaho, and Heber Valley Utah. I’ve got some family in Heber Valley, so they’re very stoked.
Justin: That’s pretty fun. And Rexburg North, that’s pretty funny. It’s such… I mean, it’s the same thing as Provost, but-
Kaitlyn: It’s such a Rexburg thing.
Justin: It’s such a small town.
Kaitlyn: Yeah, exciting stuff.
Justin: So let us know in the comments first of all what stood out to you in General Conference. What talks touched you, or what things you just loved. Also about the temples, how you feel about the new temples, if they’re in where you live. Maybe you can put a comment out of where you hope the next temple is, and then the spirits will, the spiritual powers will align. I feel like that happens sometimes, right? You put it in social media and then God takes it from there?
Kaitlyn: Yeah.
Justin: Yeah, thanks for watching guys, and we’ll see you in the next episode.