Layne's Lunch

This week I decided to continue the theme of looking for scriptures that invite us to come unto Christ.  Matthew 11:28-30 would be high on anyone's list of scriptures on this topic.   28 Come unto me, all ye that labour and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest.  29 Take my yoke upon you, and learn of me; for I am meek and lowly in heart: and ye shall find rest unto your souls.  30 For my yoke is easy, and my burden is light. There is popular picture of the Savior with a caption on it that says “I never said it would be easy, I only said that it would be worth it”.   That statement does not align with this scripture.  In this scripture, Christ did say that his yoke is easy and his burden is light.  From a purely pragmatic view, if the yoke you are carrying is not easy, then, perhaps, you are yoked with the wrong person.   We have a tendency to make living the gospel harder than it is.   One of the most well-known ...

Recently I finished reading the book " The Infinite Atonement " by Tad R. Callister.  It is an excellent book and I highly recommend it. As I read the book I noticed the number of scriptures he referenced and I decided to annotate each one of them in my Kindle with the intent that I would go back an re-read all of the scriptures.  When I finished the book I downloaded a copy of my annotations in that book from Amazon.  It turned out to be quite a long list of scriptures. So, in the hope that this list might be a benefit to someone else, here is a list of all of the scriptures referenced in The Infinite Atonement by Tad R. Callister: 2 Nephi 25:26 Moses 5:58 D&C 5:10 D&C 1:38 Mark 4:38–39, 41 Moroni 7:27, 29 John 14:12 1 Kings 17:20–22. Acts 9:39–41; 20:9–13 2 Kings 6:5–6 JST, John 4:1–4 Acts 4:12 3 Nephi 9:21;   D&C 49:5; 76:40–42; Matthew 18:11; Mormon 7:6–7 3 Nephi 27:13–14 D&C 76:40–41 D&C 39:6 Moses 6:62 2 Nephi 2:8 Jacob...

The scripture I selected for the second week of January 2016 was Alma 5:33-34 .  The reason I selected this scripture was that relates to our stake theme of coming unto Christ. 33 Behold, he sendeth an invitation unto all men, for the arms of mercy are extended towards them, and he saith: Repent, and I will receive you.  34 Yea, he saith: Come unto me and ye shall partake of the fruit of the tree of life; yea, ye shall eat and drink of the bread and the waters of life freely; The Lord extends the invitation to all of us to follow him. This reminds me of the scripture that states that he stands at the door and knocks. ( Revelation 3:20 ).  It also reminds me of the picture of Christ standing at the door and knocking on the door with no handle.  His invitation is for us to come to him. We are all invited. The phrase that the arms of mercy are extended also brings up the image of the simile used several times in the scriptures where it states that he will gather us...

The scripture I chose for the first week of January 2016 was Helaman 5:12 .   I selected this scripture because our bishop selected it as our ward theme for the year. 12.  And now, my sons, remember, remember that it is upon the rock of our Redeemer, who is Christ, the Son of God, that ye must build your foundation; that when the devil shall send forth his mighty winds, yea, his shafts in the whirlwind,  yea, when all his hail and his mighty storm shall beat upon you, it shall have no power over you to drag you down to the gulf of misery and endless wo,  because of the rock upon which ye are built, which is a sure foundation,  a foundation whereon if men build they cannot fall. As I pondered this scripture several thoughts came to me. There is an important principle that we must understand.   The storms will come.  The scripture assures us that both those who are wicked and those who are righteous are subject to the storm.  We know that God’s...

For the last three years I have been using the Evernote Smart Notebook by Moleskine.  ( See my post about GTD + EN Power Tools) .  I have been through 12 of them. I am not dissatisfied with the Moleskin, but after reading the reviews of the Leuchtturm A5 dotted medium notebook on Amazon , I decided to give it a try. Here are my thoughts on the comparison between the two after using the Leuchtturm notebook for about a month. I really like the slightly wider pages of the Leuchtturm.  They are not that much wider, but that extra 0.8 inch is very nice when you are making journal type entries. I often carry it with my iPad mini. The two are perfect companions. I like the fact that the Leuchtturm comes in multiple colors. However, the cover is kind of bland compared to the designs on the Evernote Moleskine. The Moleskine has a bit more flair with it's green ribbon/elastic. I would often get questions about the Moleskine during meetings. The dot grid pages are perfect ...

I don't typically post pictures that I have not taken, but this one is worthy of posting. This is a picture of my son.  He is serving an LDS mission in the Uganda Kampala Mission. I love the colors and the expressions on the kid's faces.   

During the October 2015 LDS General Conference, Elder Devin G. Durrant gave a talk titled " My Heart Pondereth Them Continually " The scripture he was referencing in the title of his talk comes from 2 Nephi 4:15-16 "15 . . . For my soul delighteth in the scriptures, and my heart pondereth them, and writeth them for the learning and the profit of my children."  16 Behold, my soul delighteth in the things of the Lord; and my heart pondereth continually upon the things which I have seen and heard. After the  ponderize t-shirt fiasco  died down I started thinking about what he said and decided that the idea of memorizing and pondering a scripture each week would be an excellent spiritual goal for 2016. To help keep me on track I have decided so share some of my thoughts about my weekly scripture verses here on my blog.   I hope it is of some benefit to those who read it.