{"id":53048,"date":"2026-03-16T14:00:25","date_gmt":"2026-03-16T20:00:25","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/timesandseasons.org\/?p=53048"},"modified":"2026-03-15T16:15:42","modified_gmt":"2026-03-15T22:15:42","slug":"did-you-bring-an-umbrella-or-what-did-church-lead-you-to-think-about-yesterday-3-15","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/timesandseasons.org\/index.php\/2026\/03\/did-you-bring-an-umbrella-or-what-did-church-lead-you-to-think-about-yesterday-3-15\/","title":{"rendered":"Did you bring an Umbrella? (Or What Did Church Lead You to Think About Yesterday, 3\/15)?"},"content":{"rendered":"
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I remember hearing a talk by Boyd K. Packer years ago, in which he spoke about what happens in meetings. As I remember it (I haven\u2019t found the speech \u2014 perhaps someone know which one it is) he suggested that many speakers bring just a small thimble full of the spirit to their talks\u2014they simply aren\u2019t prepared. In contrast, he said that sometimes the audience is resistant to what is said, it\u2019s like they have brought umbrellas to avoid getting wet from what the speaker brought.<\/p>\n

While I don\u2019t always agree with Elder Packer, I do in this case. Its all about responsibility.<\/p>\n

Most of us are not the speaker. We\u2019re in the audience. Regardless of how much material the speaker brought, we have the responsibility to decide how to react. We can put up our umbrellas, dismissing what the speaker brought as \u201cnot good\u201d or \u201cout-of-touch\u201d or \u201cincorrect\u201d, or we can take what was said, process it, and find some way of profiting from it.<\/p>\n

Which approach do you think is best?<\/p>\n

In these posts I am trying to suggest that each of us can have better experiences at Church if we take responsibility for our experiences. We can choose to find ways to learn and benefit from what happens regardless of whether it fits our perception of what is \u201cgood.\u201d<\/p>\n

What we get out of any experience depends on how we look at it. Its not different from what many artists figure out\u2014they understand that how you see the \u00a0world before you is more important than what you see. You might call it \u2018active listening\u2019 or shifting perspective. It just means that you see differently.<\/p>\n

In my case, I tend to focus narrowly, thinking about groups of words or sentences, sometimes taking them out of context and thinking about what they say, even if the speaker didn\u2019t intend what I heard. It\u2019s not at all like what we\u2019re taught in school, where the focus is on understanding accurately and completely what the speaker or text says. Its about pulling out useful or inspiring thoughts in spite of what was said.<\/p>\n

So, if you aren\u2019t thinking this way, maybe try it next Sunday, or the next time you are in a class or meeting. If you have already thoughts inspired by what happened at church, what are they? How did you react to what happened in Church yesterday? What did you notice? Did you end up thinking differently? Do you think your reactions were what they should be? Were they looking for what God had to tell you? Did your reactions make things better?<\/p>\n

This is the latest invitation for reactions to local meetings, continuing the spirit of my post<\/a> on September 25th about how we receive what happens in Church meetings\u2014sermons, lessons and anything else\u2014and enter a conversation with them, magnifying what was said or adding what we think. In these posts I\u2019m asking us all to think about how we listen and receive what happens at Church. If we only listen for mistakes, or things that bother us, what does that say about us? Is it most important to criticize others? Or to try to change ourselves?<\/p>\n

The point here is that no matter how poorly prepared the speaker or teacher is, or no matter how what happens triggers us, or is objectively or doctrinally wrong, we can still find elements in what is said and what happens that inspires and edifies us. Even if church meetings aren\u2019t conducted in a way that reaches us, we can take responsibility and find a way to feel the spirit.<\/p>\n

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So please, write down reactions and thoughts to what happened in Church. You might keep your own \u2018spiritual journal\u2019, or, if you like, you can post your reactions below. I\u2019m adding my own reactions and thoughts as a comment to this post \u2014 instead of as a part of this post, because my reactions aren\u2019t any better than anyone else\u2019s.<\/p>\n

Let me emphasize that this is NOT a place to criticize what is wrong with church or your fellow congregants. The point is to post what you learned because of what happened at Church or how that led you to think. It\u2019s about the good things we can get out of Church, not the negative things that disturbed or upset us. It doesn\u2019t have to be orthodox, traditional or even on topic.<\/p>\n

If you like, make your response in the format, \u201cThey said or did this, and I said or thought that.\u201d Even the things you dislike the most can be turned into lessons for what the gospel teaches we should do.<\/p>\n

My hope is that these reactions serve as an example of a better way to treat what happens at Church instead of the perennial complaints about speaker or teacher preparation or ability, or complaints that the Church should do things differently.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

I remember hearing a talk by Boyd K. Packer years ago, in which he spoke about what happens in meetings. As I remember it (I haven\u2019t found the speech \u2014 perhaps someone know which one it is) he suggested that many speakers bring just a small thimble full of the spirit to their talks\u2014they simply aren\u2019t prepared. In contrast, he said that sometimes the audience is resistant to what is said, it\u2019s like they have brought umbrellas to avoid getting wet from what the speaker brought. While I don\u2019t always agree with Elder Packer, I do in this case. Its all about responsibility. Most of us are not the speaker. We\u2019re in the audience. Regardless of how much material the speaker brought, we have the responsibility to decide how to react. We can put up our umbrellas, dismissing what the speaker brought as \u201cnot good\u201d or \u201cout-of-touch\u201d or \u201cincorrect\u201d, or we can take what was said, process it, and find some way of profiting from it. Which approach do you think is best? In these posts I am trying to suggest that each of us can have better experiences at Church if we take responsibility for our experiences. We can […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":111,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[53],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-53048","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-latter-day-saint-thought"],"jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/timesandseasons.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/53048","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/timesandseasons.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/timesandseasons.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/timesandseasons.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/111"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/timesandseasons.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=53048"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/timesandseasons.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/53048\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":53049,"href":"https:\/\/timesandseasons.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/53048\/revisions\/53049"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/timesandseasons.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=53048"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/timesandseasons.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=53048"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/timesandseasons.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=53048"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}