How I Gained My Testimony

At the age of 8 years old my parent's tradition was to give me a full set of scriptures.  This is my parent's baptismal gift.  I loved them from the very beginning.  I remember taking them to church with me and the person next to me having their scriptures "colored" or marked in.  I told my dad I wanted to do that.  He said I could only do that if I read through the entire Book of Mormon. So, I set off, at the age of 8.  I started reading the scriptures that young!  I don't know if you remember the first time you read through the scriptures, but do you remember how hard they were to understand?  I do.  I remember how hard and that I basically didn't understand a thing.  But I kept on reading.  It took me 4 years to read through the entire Book of Mormon.  Can you believe that?!  It was so hard for someone so young as me to understand it, so I took my time.

But I remember, very distinctly.  My parents always had us turn off the lights at a certain time at night and go to bed.  And at this time, it was nearly midnight, I was under the covers (with a flashlight!) reading The Book of Mormon.  I had entered the book of Alma, which is an easier book to understand.  And I remember reading that book and feeling the Spirit so strong, so overpowering.  I stopped, I said a prayer, and I thanked God because I knew at that moment without a doubt that this book was true.  It was something remarkable actually.  That someone so young as I was, could understand even without completely understanding the book itself that it was true.  That what this book contained was something that made me feel good, made me want to be a better person.  And I will love it with all of my heart.

As I have grown older, every single Family Home Evening that I conducted as a child I would talk about the importance of praying and reading the scriptures.  That is because I believe it is so important to my very core!  If you think about it, Lehi and his family as they were leaving the city Jerusalem God asked them to turn around and get the book of their ancestors of the prophets (or the scriptures!).  Why would God think it was so important for them to turn around and go back?  I could go into details of the physical, but I feel the spiritual is much more important!  Because God wanted them to learn His gospel, and to apply it into their lives.  Remember in this blog:  http://religioussideofme.blogspot.com/2017/08/when-we-have-knowledge-of-christ-are-we.html
how I shared the importance of knowing what our Savior's life was like so we too could learn to become like Him?  The scriptures are a very important aspect in becoming such. And so is prayer.  These two things are SO important!!