The following message was shared by Owen Stockton in the Worldwide Unified Facebook group.
“On the wall at the Little Rock Airport is this advertisement for the Second Baptist Church in Little Rock.
The tag line is “Expect an Experience”. It made me actually want to attend just to see/feel the experience – and then it got me thinking.
I watch General Conference for the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints twice a year and “expect an experience”.
The few times a general authority visits locally, I want to attend because I “expect an experience”.
However, more times than not, I attend regular Sabbath meetings because it’s Sunday, and I want to partake of the Sacrament, but do I attend each week “expecting an experience?”
I should always be “expecting an experience” as I worship God: the still small voice testifying that a given talk is teaching truth; feelings of comfort and peace as I take the Sacrament and show gratitude to Jesus Christ and renew my covenants with Him.
I definitely need to be more diligent in “expecting an experience” each and every week.”
Evelyn H. read Owen’s message and shared the following experience she was able to have upon attending church for the first time due to COVID-19 restrictions:
Thank you Owen for that great insight and invitation to all of us. It reminds me of something similar that Elder Bednar said in a 2010 training meeting.
Elder Bednar shared the following in regards to meetings – in this case specifically, a ward council meeting:
If I had the wish of my heart, I would remove from the vocabulary of the Latter-day Saints the word meeting. We have not been talking about a ward council meeting. We’ve been talking about a revelatory experience with the members of the ward council.
And if members of councils, if members of families, as they come together, would think in terms of “I’m preparing to participate in a revelatory experience with my family” instead of going to a meeting—a revelatory experience with the members of the ward council—I think we would prepare and act much differently.
In these latter days, given the forces of the adversary and the darkness, no one person in the family and no one person in a ward is going to be the conduit through which all of the answers come. So all of that speaks to the spiritual nature of this work and seeking for the inspiration to do what the Lord wants us to do.
May we all prepare for revelatory experiences whenever we are gathered together as Saints.