PROSPERITY, Do You Have It?

Was the question asked last Sunday by Sis. Annie Emmertson during her fabulous talk in sacrament meeting. Actually, she may have said, "Do you consider yourself prosperous?" (My memory is not that great and I did not start taking notes till about half way through). Her talk derived from Mosiah 2:22, "And behold, all that he requires of you is to keep his commandments; and he has promised you that if ye would keep his commandments ye should prosper in the land; and he never doth vary from that which he hath said; therefore, if ye do keep his commandments he doth bless you and prosper you."

Since she has given that talk, there has not been a day, sometimes hour, that has gone by that I have not thought about it. I will try to paraphrase it a little, but don't hold me to being word for word. Remember I was listening and people hear things differently, but this talk touched me. I told her so, and she jokingly said, "You say that to everyone."

But I meant it. It really did. Well, I should not say it touched me, but the spirit touched me as she spoke. So much so that I want to journal about it so that as my memory wavers, I can have something besides my little scribbled notes that I took to look back on.

Annie in doing so, I hope I don't embarrass or offend you. I am writing it on my blog, b/c I really believe everyone can benefit from it--and you are too humble to post it on your blog.
Having said that, if you are reading this, I could not remember your talk word for word, so, I hope I am not misquoting you in anyway, I'm just saying things the way they came to me. So please forgive me if it is not all 100% verbatim).

I never thought about prosperity in the way she spoke about it, but as I said, the Holy Ghost bore witness to me of the truths she spoke about. The crazy thing is, the more I ponder it, the more crazy I feel that I had never taken the time to look at it in that sense. Perhaps I'm the only one, and if so I'm grateful to the Lord for having her speak to me that day.

For those of you who are still reading, and were not able to hear the talk, you are probably thinking, "In what sense was she speaking of it?"

She asked us to think about what prosperity meant to each of us and do we consider ourselves prosperous. When she asked the question, I did honestly answer, "Yes, I am prosperous." to myself. After all, we have a nice home, our health, the gospel, Mike has a job, outside of our home loan, we are debt free (I want to stop and say right now, that every one of these blessings are only with us because of the Lord. Somehow, he sees fit at this time to bless us with them. Without Him, we would have and be nothing).

Then, Sis. Emmertson gave us the definition of prosperity: the condition of being successful or thriving (I could not remember the definition word for word, so I looked it up again).

She then asked us to stop and think of prosperity in a different light, not from a monetarily or temporal view, but a spiritual view. She went on to say that when we keep the commandments of the Lord we will be and are a prosperous people. It was at this point that I began to realize that I am much more prosperous than I had ever imagined---prosperous in a more important sense---a spiritual sense.

Here are some of the examples she gave of how we are prosperous when we keep the commandments. (She recited scriptures that backed up each of these, which I did not write down, but trust me if you start searching, you WILL find them---many of them. Plus, if you stop to think in your own life how these things come to play, you WILL realize that you have a greater prosperity than money can ever bring even during harsh economic times.)

What we receive when we Keep the commandments:

• Constant Companionship of the Holy Ghost
• Promise of Eternal Life
• Joy
• A Testimony (Mosiah 23:9-10 I did manage to get that one jotted down)
• Prayers answered
• Success in missionary work
• Peace

As I have stopped and pondered the above gifts from our lovingly Heavenly Father, I have come to realize even the poorest of the poor can be prosperous. The opportunity to be prosperous is in everyones reach. It all depends on our actions. Are we striving daily to keep the commandments?

The above gifts are wonderful, aren't they? When we have these things , aren't we a prosperous people? I definitely think so, and joy comes to me in knowing that. A feeling of contentment.

As I have reflected on this talk so many times this week (I even brought it into our V.T. lesson) I have come to realize that we can find many more things to add to our list. One that I have received is:

• Personal Revelation

OH, this talk was great. I know I did not do it justice, and I am very wordy. I wish everyone had the opportunity to hear this talk. It truly has been a blessing in my life.

Bro. Jones finished up the sacrament meeting on prosperity too, but he helped me to remember the things we have and to show gratitude for them. People with very little have been very happy and content in their lives b/c they are grateful and they look at the glass as half full instead of half empty.

As I have reflected many things have come to my mind. Such as with Spiritual Prosperity we can feel like we are FULL. I was reminded of a 20/20 show that I saw about millionaires who do not believe they are "prosperous" b/c they are wanting to be like the billionaires. They don't feel like they are rich at all. And for some reason it hit me, with money, most people are always seeking for more, but never get to where they want or need to be. However, with the gospel and spiritual prosperity--we can all attain the highest degree, we are all on equal standing.

I'm rambling b/c as you can see I am still pondering about this lesson. I hope perhaps it will touch you, and make you stop to ask yourself, "Are you Prosperous?" It is my hope that we can all answer with a resounding, "YES"!

Thanks again Annie for always being in tune with the Spirit!