A bit of an extended version of a talk, or sermon, that I shared today with some added sections that I did not use due to time limitations. I share many thoughts on prayer and end with a personal story about my mother’s best day and some Grosbeak birds as well.

There is a line in the Hymn, "Thy Will, O Lord, Be Done," that is beautiful and tells me much about the atonement of Christ and the nature of Christ.

I have found it helpful to see how Nephi laid out his themes into chapters. I find more nuance and more meaning by thinking about the "how" as well as the "what" Nephi is telling his descendants (and us of course) on these plates.

I find it very rewarding to not only imagine the life of the people in scriptures, but to try the best I can to understand their life, their culture, their history, and how they lived. This gives me much greater insight into what they are writing, what their prophecies may mean, what message they are sharing, and what I could gain from that message. It also opens my heart to the spirit of the Lord where I can gain my own personal insight.

On Christmas Day this year, I was struck by how important remembering is. Christmas is a time when families and individuals repeat long used traditions. It is a time when we remember the times we were young, or when our children were young. We remember good Christmases and bad ones. There may be pain and sadness as well has joy and laughter in those memories. Remembering is such an important part of the holiday.

We should all learn to give greater attention and work harder to remember and to implement all the good things that we learn in this life. From good books, great art, from our teachers, parents or friends, or any other source of wholesome and righteous materials we gain great insight and ideas.

In my professional life, I have spent the last decade or so asking and teaching my co-workers to "fall in love with the problem." At times it feels like I'm preaching to them. I have worked hard to try to be better at this myself as well, as it is always a struggle. This process was recently shaken for me. Combining a faith approach to this took some thinking.

I have found myself stuck in prayer many times, not knowing what to say or how to approach my thoughts. In the moment I can lose any connection to God or to my own thoughts. Here are some tips I’ve picked up to help.

“God uses the weak and the plain to bring about His purposes. This truth stands as a testimony that it is God’s power, not man’s, that accomplishes His work on the earth.”

While I was taking a walk today and thinking about this, the thought came to my mind that small deviations from what we should do today have a large effect on what we want to be in the future. That effect will only grow larger in the next generation.

We need to see our homes more as the training grounds, the place to learn of Christ. Churches are there to support those efforts. The home is where it becomes real.

Computers can perform what is known as context switching very quickly. All humans do this very poorly and I'm no exception.

Darkness cannot exist in the presence of light. Add light and darkness ceases to be. The more light, the more darkness is removed. The opposite of darkness is light. In the same way the opposite of fear is faith.

Whether you know it or not, your life was changed drastically by John Warnock. All of our lives were. He passed way recently, but we all owe him more than you may know.

Malcolm Gladwell pretty much branded the concept of "10,000 hours of practice" rule in his book "Outliers." He is a respected author and can be very influential. In no way will I dispute his writing or his expertise. I have gained much from his work over the years. But the more I have thought about the 10,000 hour rule the more I have been depressed by it.

Our prayers are the daily verses. The story of our personal lives, the struggles we feel, the help we need, and the joys and the gratitude we feel all are written into our daily verses. The chorus becomes the weekly Sacrament Prayers

Elijah had shut the heavens and caused a three-year drought which caused much hunger and suffering. Elijah meets a widow and asks her to make him some food. She only has enough flour to make one more cake for her and her son, at that point she assumes there will be no more to be found, and they will starve.

I have argued for a long time that 1978 was the greatest year in popular music. There are so many reasons way.

Look and pray for more questions, not just for answers. Questions are way more powerful than answers.

All of us are in this together and all have the same issues. We are all human. We all get colds, we all cry, we all feel love and pain, we all stink if we don't shower or wash up, we all poop, we all stub our toes, we all get old and get pain in our joints, we all have family that we struggle to get along with . . . no matter who you are.