Be Prayerful

The last Be!!!  Woo!  So let's get this show on the road!  Ready?

Prep:

Lesson:  President Hinckley's last be is Be Prayerful.  The text is pasted below.  Read it with your family and discuss it.  It's not long, but it is great counsel.

You cannot do it alone. I look at this vast congregation, and I know that you are young people who pray, who get on your knees and speak with the Lord. You know that He is the source of all wisdom.

You need His help, and you know that you need His help. You cannot do it alone. You will come to realize that and recognize that more and more as the years pass. So live that in good conscience you can speak with the Lord. Get on your knees and thank Him for His goodness to you and express to Him the righteous desires of your hearts. The miracle of it all is that He hears. He responds. He answers—not always as we might wish He would answer, but there is no question in my mind that He answers.
You have such a tremendous responsibility, you young men and young women. You are the products of all of the generations that have gone before you. All that you have of body and mind has been passed to you through your parents. Someday you will become parents and pass on to succeeding generations the qualities of body and mind which you have received from the past. Do not break the chain of the generations of your family. Keep it bright and strong. So very much depends on you. You are so very precious. You mean so much to this Church. It could not be the same without you. Stand tall, proud of your inheritance as sons and daughters of God. Look to Him for understanding and guidance. Walk according to His precepts and commandments.
You can have a good time. Of course you can! We want you to have fun. We want you to enjoy life. We do not want you to be prudes. We want you to be robust and cheerful, to sing and dance, to laugh and be happy.
But in so doing, be humble and be prayerful, and the smiles of heaven will fall upon you.
I could wish for you nothing better than that your lives be fruitful, that your service be dedicated and freely given, that you contribute to the knowledge and the well-being of the world in which you live, and that you do it humbly and faithfully before your God. He loves you. We love you. We want you to be happy and successful, to make significant contributions to the world in which you will live and to the on-rolling of this great and majestic work of the Lord.

Activity:  Prayer is an art.  I know... what a weird sentence, but it's true.  Have you ever heard a truly eloquent prayer?  Temple dedicatory prayers come to my mind.  Now, we don't need to say fancy prayers or anything, but there is a pattern we should follow when conversing with our Heavenly Father.  Open the prayer in the name of the Father.  Thank Him for the blessings in your life.  Ask Him for the things you stand in need of.  Close in the name of Jesus Christ.  Simple.  Effective.  We have also been counseled not to give lengthy and preachy prayers.  If there is something we need to receive guidance for, those prayers are better served as private prayers.  Teach your family the appropriate way to pray and that there are different kinds of prayers that are appropriate for different situations.  (I know that's not much of an activity, but it is important).

Treat:  Mint Chocolate Brownies.  You can even point out how all the ingredients come together and make something yummy, just as all the parts of a prayer come together and make a great conversation with Heavenly Father.  =]  Get in all the teaching moments you can, right?!?

Be Humble

Only two more Be's!  Bear with me and we'll finish these up.

Preparation:  Set out a lump of play-doh or clay a few days before you teach this lesson.  Let it harden.  Have a batch of cookie dough or a tube from the grocery store in the fridge.

Lesson:  Read President Hinckley's next Be: Be Humble.  It isn't very long and, again, is pasted below.  Discuss what you read and make sure that your younger children understand what humility is.  You may also want to point out that Christ was the perfect example of all things, but especially of humility.  The Son of God hung on a cross for our sins.  I can't imagine how much humility it would take to be willing to do something like that.

There is no place for arrogance in our lives. There is no place for conceit. There is no place for egotism. We have a great work to do. We have things to accomplish. We need direction in the pursuit of our education. We need help in choosing an eternal companion.
The Lord has said, “Be thou humble; and the Lord thy God shall lead thee by the hand, and give thee answer to thy prayers” (D&C 112:10).
What a tremendous promise is given in this statement. If we are without conceit and pride and arrogance, if we are humble and obedient, then the Lord will lead us by the hand and answer our prayers. What greater thing could we ask for? There is nothing to compare with this.
The Savior, in the great Sermon on the Mount, declared, “Blessed are the meek: for they shall inherit the earth” (Matt. 5:5).
I believe the meek and the humble are those who are teachable. They are willing to learn. They are willing to listen to the whisperings of the still, small voice for guidance in their lives. They place the wisdom of the Lord above their own wisdom.

Activity:  For this activity you will need a lump of clay and a lump of hardened clay.  Invite each member of the family come up and try to mold a cube out of the lumps.  It should be fairly easy to mold the soft dough and near impossible to mold the hard on without it crumbling to pieces.  Explain that when we are humble we can be molded into the people the Lord needs us and wants us to be.  If we harden our hearts and become unteachable the Lord can't use us the way He needs to.

Treat:  Have cookie dough prepared ahead of time (or just a tube of cookie dough from the grocery store).  Have your kids help roll out the cookies.  Point out how easy it is to mold the dough... (another opportunity to get the point across).  Bake the cookies and enjoy warm cookies and milk.  Yummy!

Be True

"Pressing onward, ever onward..."  (That might make an appropriate opening song... =])

Prep:  President Hinckley's "Be True" portion of his talk.  It's posted below.  Watermelon Pops.  Recipe Below.

Lesson:  Read through "Be True".  It isn't long.

Said Shakespeare, “To thine own self be true; and it must follow, as the night the day, thou canst not then be false to any man” (Hamlet, I, iii, 78–81). You have a tremendous inheritance. You have a great background of noble ancestry. Many of you are descendants of the pioneers, who died by the hundreds and thousands in testimony of the truth of this work. If they were to look down upon you, they would plead with you: “Be true. Be loyal. Be ‘true to the faith that our parents have cherished, true to the truth for which martyrs have perished.’ ” They would say, “Faith of our fathers, holy faith, we will be true to thee till death” (Hymns, nos. 254 and 84).
And those of you who may not be descended from pioneer ancestry, you belong to a church which has been made strong by the loyalty and unwavering affection of its members through the generations. What a marvelous thing it is to belong to a society whose purposes are noble, whose accomplishments are tremendous, whose work is uplifting, even heroic. Be loyal to the Church under all circumstances. I make you a promise that the authorities of this Church will never lead you astray. They will lead you in paths of happiness.
You who are members of this Church must have a loyalty to it. This is your church. You have as great a responsibility in your sphere of action as I have in my sphere of action. It belongs to you just as it belongs to me. You have embraced its gospel. You have taken upon yourselves a covenant in the waters of baptism. This you have renewed each time you have partaken of the sacrament. These covenants will be added to when you are married in the temple. You cannot hold them lightly. They are too great a thing. This is the very work of God designed to bring about the immortality and eternal life of His sons and daughters.
Walk in faith before Him with your heads high, proud of your membership in this great cause and kingdom which He has restored to the earth in this, the last dispensation of the fulness of times. Why? To bring you happiness.
Be true to your own convictions. You know what is right, and you know what is wrong. You know when you are doing the proper thing. You know when you are giving strength to the right cause. Be loyal. Be faithful. Be true, my beloved associates in this great kingdom.

Talk about what it means to be true.  Who/what can you be true to?  Who is highest on your list of people to be loyal to?  Talk about integrity and how it helps you to maintain your loyalties.

Activity:  Pull out a board game.  You know that closet full of all those boxes that no one ever opens... go grab one, open it up and get to playing.  What does this have to do with "Be True"?  What better way to teach a principle than to let your family practice it?  I would choose something along the lines of clue or yahtzee... something that won't take forever and is relatively easy to understand.  Winner gets to be served treats first.

Treats:  No-Bake Nilla Wafer Cheesecake.  Click for recipe.