Thoughts from Dane

by Dane Stevenson

Institute has provided me with the opportunity to understand the scriptures on a deeper level. With a busy school schedule I noticed that I don't take the time to dive into the scriptures like I had in the past. Sometimes I will read just a little to maintain the daily habit of reading, but this only does so much. Receiving instructions from teachers and other students has helped me to have a deeper incite on spiritual topics, allowing me to strengthen my testimony in the scriptures and the power they have to point us to Christ.

A good example of this comes from a class I took last quarter on the Book of John. It was amazing to learn and see how John builds upon his testimony to teach us about Christ, and to help us remember this; we were constantly referred to verses 30 - 31 of John chapter 20. In these verses John tells us the reasons why Christ performed the miracles he did and why John chose to write them down. Each of the 7 miracles that John testifies of teaches us about different ways we can apply Christ's atonement in our lives and he lays them out in order of importance. Of course, the last miracle that John teaches us about is the resurrection.

With out the class room setting I probably would have never taken the opportunity to dive that deep in to one book of scriptures.

*PS. He's graduating Institute along with many others on June 4th at 6 pm!
If you wish to attend please email us at williamsd@ldschurch.org, or call us 206-633-2955, because space is limited and we want to get the right amount of food for this nice dinner. If you have already reserved a seat but find that you are unable to attend after all please cancel your reservation so we can open your seat to someone else. We must have RSVPs by May 27th, 2011.

It's going to be fancy and great with Seattle Temple President being our feature guest speaker.

the last of the funnies until we find more!

come to Institute! We're prescribing it!

and the funnies continue

Understanding Mormonism

by Kendahl

This week I was asked to prepare some words on the Church's Humanitarian efforts for our Understanding Mormonism that was being held. In preparation for this I took some time to read my scriptures and search lds.org in order to understand what it was I was supposed to discuss. As the day approached the lesson on the Book of Mormon ended up taking longer than expected (which was totally fine for it was for a good reasoning-trying to help a nonmember understand its principles) But afterwards I walked out with a guy who was interested in discussing more on the principles of the church. I got to experience a missionary moment and help someone come to understand what we as Latter-Day Saints stand for. I know its because of the Lord's help that I was prepared to discuss this topic with him because of my efforts in preparing for my other lesson. I am very thankful for being able to talk to this young man about our church, it helped strengthen my testimony of the gospel and gave me a chance to share the gospel that I love!

more institute funnies

a funny institute-made ad to go to the closing social!

the institute funnies

thanks to amit and marinda for the link!

the marriage class

Amit & Marinda

Last quarter we had a chance to get personal marriage counseling at the institute. For some reason, 8:30 in the morning during the middle of winter is not a popular time for institute class, so when we took Book of Mormon 2 and Church History 3 with Brother White (at 8:30 Mon-Thurs) it turned into our own private marriage class! We can’t remember exactly what the lessons were supposed to be about, but ended up learning valuable life lessons from those classes. For example, we learned about not ‘keeping score’ in a relationship, where you do things not so you can say ‘you owe me because I did this’ but because you truly have become unified as one, and lifting your companion’s burden is equivalent to lifting your own.

A lot of people think that institute is for when you’re single. But we can tell you that taking institute classes together was one of the best things we did to get our marriage started off on the right foot. We feel closer as a couple from studying the scriptures and from standing in holy places together. We can also feel a positive spirit in our home as we’ve strived to center our lives around Christ and the scriptures. We love institute and we plan to keep coming until they kick us out!