What's Most Important?

Yesterday at church we discussed a talk given by Julie B. Beck on how we need to have priorities and when we don’t have priorities we will lose sight of what’s really important.

Now I am a woman who loves lists. I love checking off my to-do lists because it gives me a feeling of accomplishment, so of course, when the teacher said there were three types of lists that helped Sister Beck keep her priorities in order, I perked right up.

The three lists are: The Essential Things, The Necessary Things, and the Nice-to-do Things.

Some of the things on her Essential list were revelation, prayer, making and keeping covenants, going to sacrament meeting and repenting every week, going to the temple, giving service, and sharing the gospel. Of course each list will be different for each person, but one thing that struck me was the way Sister Beck approached prayer in her life and its utmost importance. She shared that she took a paper and pencil with her to pray so that she could ask questions of the Lord like, who needs my help? How can I strengthen my family? What do I need to correct in order to be more worthy to receive His spirit? and she knew He would tell her. I had honestly never thought about taking paper and pencil to my prayers. It’s definitely given me a new perspective on what praying could, and maybe should, be in my life.

Her necessary list had things like having a home where the spirit of the Lord could be present, which means she tries really hard to have a house of order. She makes meals, tries to be happy, has family home evenings, has fun with her family, and tries to be self-reliant and debt-free.

The Nice-to-do list included things like crafts, hobbies, recreational reading, travel, and lunches with friends. They are things that give variety to our lives, but aren’t really essential in an eternal scheme of things. (Although I don't know if I agree about the reading and lunches. Reading seems necessary to me and lunches could be building eternal relationships, right?)

Of course the point of the lesson was to keep the essential things as our first priorities and so on.

I’ve been thinking a lot about what items would be on my own lists and I jotted down some ideas in my journal. I think that in my own life there are so many things I want to do and think I can do, but the reality is, I probably can’t do them all. In order to keep the important things in my life from getting less than my best, I think I need to make sure the things I’ve written on my lists stay in the forefront so I can always remember what’s most important in my life.

What would be on your essentials list? Do you make priority lists?

What We’re Doing For Family Night Tonight

Tonight we’re going to talk about the creation from Genesis (there are pictures for it on lds.org that you can access here) We’ll talk about what God created on which day and I’ll have each child with a blank piece of paper and some crayons/colored pencils so they can draw the world as its being created/talked about (and doing a little creating of their own).

Once we’re finished, we’ll do a little quiz like, “Man was created on what day?” “Birds were created the same day as what? “What did God create first?” “What did God do on the seventh day?” “What day was the sun, moon, and stars created?" etc.

Then we’re all going to go out in our garden and work/play together. It’s going to be messy and fun! Of course our FHE treat will be a dirt cake (chocolate oreo cake with gummy worms on top.)

What We’re Having For Dinner

Bacon Wrapped Chicken in the Crockpot

4 boneless, skinless chicken breast halves
1 can cream of chicken soup
8 oz sour cream
1 Tbsp flour
bacon slices

Directions:

Wrap one uncooked bacon slice around each chicken piece and put them in the crockpot. Mix sour cream, cream of chicken soup and flour and pour over chicken. Cook on low 6 hours. Serve with rice.