Artwork for podcast Our Mothers Knew It
Book of Mormon [2 NEPHI 26-30] Creative Object Lessons with Maria Eckersley
Episode 21 • 10th March 2024 • Our Mothers Knew It • Maria Eckersley
00:00:00 00:14:41

Share Episode

Shownotes

Our Mothers Knew It with Maria Eckersley

A Creative Study of Come, Follow Me

Book of Mormon [2 NEPHI 26-300] Insights

“A Marvelous Work and a Wonder”

March 11 – March 17, 2024

WEEK 11: SUMMARY

=================

Lesson Summary:

Nephi saw the latter-days with clarity and power. He understood the strategies of the adversary and the incredible promises of God. This week, we’ll study the coming forth of the Book of Mormon well over 2000 years before Moroni delivers the plates to Joseph Smith. Nephi will help us understand that God’s promises are available to all of His children and that He has a plan to extend the blessings of salvation to each and every person in His time.

On the creative side of week 11, we’ll teach about the flaxen cords of the adversary with a simple book shuffling experiment. Next, we’ll reinforce how all are alike unto God with an epic Peeps taste test. Finally, we’ll create a bouquet of tulips to talk about the line by line process of revelation.

1) “He Bindeth Them with His Strong Cords”: Shuffled Book Experiment

2) “All Are Alike unto God”: Peeps Taste Testing Challenge

3) “Line upon Line, Precept upon Precept”: Origami Tulip Craft

Follow Maria on:

CHURCH OF JESUS CHRIST DISCLAIMER: This podcast represents my own thoughts and opinions. It is not made, approved or endorsed by Intellectual Reserve, Inc. or The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. Any content or creative interpretations, implied or included are solely those of Maria Eckersley ("MeckMom LLC"), and not those of Intellectual Reserve, Inc. or The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. Great care has been made to ensure this podcast is in harmony with the overall mission of the Church. Click here to visit the official website of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints.

Transcripts

Maria:

Welcome back, guys.

Maria:

It's time for the creative side of week 11.

Maria:

So I'm going to walk you through the supplies you need for these three

Maria:

object lessons, and then I'll take you through each one individually to

Maria:

help you know how you can pull these off with your classes or in your

Maria:

kitchens, whoever it is you're teaching.

Maria:

These tools should hopefully make it a little bit easier.

Maria:

First, we're going to talk about Satan's strategies, this idea of

Maria:

the flaxen cord and him finding ways to kind of bind us down.

Maria:

And one of my favorite ways to demonstrate this is just with two books.

Maria:

So they don't need to be special books.

Maria:

It does help if they're relatively close to the same size.

Maria:

And you want them to be paperback if you can, because those are a little

Maria:

more bendy and they work better.

Maria:

So just two books for this one.

Maria:

Second one, I wanted to put a big bright spotlight on that verse

Maria:

about how all are alike unto God.

Maria:

I think the prophet has taught us repeatedly about setting down

Maria:

prejudice and about seeing our fellow men with Christ like eyes.

Maria:

And I think we, we can't emphasize this verse too much.

Maria:

So I wanted some fun way to do it.

Maria:

And the way I came up with involves peeps.

Maria:

So since it's Easter season, you guys.

Maria:

go to the store.

Maria:

I want you to get a few different colors of peeps, ideally a few

Maria:

different shapes and colors, but you can make it work either way.

Maria:

Have those on hand.

Maria:

And then if you want to, you can actually up the ante on

Maria:

this one by using the printable.

Maria:

So since it's close to Easter, Violet and I worked together and

Maria:

made this adorable little bunny box.

Maria:

So if you want to have your kids go home with a peep so that they can teach

Maria:

this lesson to their family, you You want to grab the printable as well.

Maria:

Third lesson.

Maria:

This one involves teaching about that line upon line concept.

Maria:

It's beautifully illustrated by Nephi this week that revelation comes to us

Maria:

line upon line and precept upon precept.

Maria:

And for me, one of the best ways to teach that concept is to help your kids.

Maria:

Walk through an origami process for us this week.

Maria:

I decided to create something new So we're making these gorgeous kind of

Maria:

spring tulips but you also could do this with something really simple if

Maria:

you're teaching a class of Deacons and you're 13 and you're trying to

Maria:

teach you might create, you know paper airplanes if you have kids who love frogs

Maria:

Then you might create jumping frogs.

Maria:

But if you want to use the printable to create this one, then you're going

Maria:

to want to pull that up to create it.

Maria:

You really just need copy paper, just plain white copy

Maria:

paper to create the blooms.

Maria:

And then the, the leaves that have the verses printed on them, I found

Maria:

it was easiest to just grab green paper and print the printable on them.

Maria:

So if you want it to look just like mine, then you're gonna want white

Maria:

copy paper and some green copy paper.

Maria:

If you don't have that on hand, you also could just use whatever coloring

Maria:

tools you have around the house.

Maria:

There's a black and white version and a colored version

Maria:

so that you can make both work.

Maria:

Okay.

Maria:

Gather those supplies and then come on back and I'll teach you the details.

Maria:

One of Satan's favorite strategies is to bind you with a flaxen cord at first,

Maria:

something light and thin that you think you are in total power and control of,

Maria:

and then over the course of time you get comfortable with that, and then over

Maria:

time it becomes something much stronger.

Maria:

I think we see this with addictions all the time.

Maria:

We get this idea that we can control this and it doesn't affect me like it affects

Maria:

everybody else, and over the course of time we get comfortable and then we get

Maria:

to a point where we can't break free.

Maria:

I think that's what Nephi is trying to warn us about in the latter days,

Maria:

that there will be many opportunities to fall into Satan's traps.

Maria:

So I think we want to demonstrate for our kids what that looks like.

Maria:

And like I said, one of my favorite ways is just with two books.

Maria:

You just need two paperback books that are kind of similar size.

Maria:

And you're going to set them side by side and point out to your kids that,

Maria:

you know, I'm not using any glue.

Maria:

There's nothing fancy about this.

Maria:

I'm just going to combine these two books.

Maria:

So then you shuffle them to kind of like you would a deck of cards.

Maria:

You just want to make sure that the, maybe an inch or two into the books,

Maria:

like so that the, the outer two inches of the pages are getting shuffled together.

Maria:

You don't need to have the books completely together, just a couple inches.

Maria:

And you would kind of delicately shuffle them a few pages fall, and you.

Maria:

add some pages from the next book and then the next book and ask your kids like at

Maria:

any point, could I pull these books apart?

Maria:

And they'll be like, yes, obviously there's no staples, there's no glue.

Maria:

It seems pretty easy, right?

Maria:

And then you finish getting those books all combined and then you

Maria:

ask them to pull them apart.

Maria:

What's amazing is because of the level of friction that's built into every

Maria:

one of these pages, it seems so subtle that you wouldn't even notice it.

Maria:

But when you have that many pages, pushing against each other, the friction of those

Maria:

pages makes it impossible to pull apart.

Maria:

So you can hand it to your kid and have them put one hand on one spine and one

Maria:

hand on the other and they will tug and tug and those books don't budge.

Maria:

In fact, if you want to take it to the next level, you can invite a

Maria:

friend or a family member to pull on the opposite side of the book.

Maria:

So for us, I had Violet on one side and Sam on the other book and they're

Maria:

pulling as hard as they can to the point that Violet gets kind of dragged

Maria:

around the room and those books don't And you're going to talk about

Maria:

How this applies to the adversary.

Maria:

He loves to make you think that you're in control when you simply aren't.

Maria:

In fact, every time you step his direction and you let some You

Maria:

veer his way, he gains power, and he uses it against you, and that's

Maria:

what happens with the book as well.

Maria:

What I love is, especially if you go in the notes on the creative,

Maria:

you can find a lot of hope filled words from our prophet as well.

Maria:

That when we just, when we decide to repent, when we turn to God in any

Maria:

way, we increase in power, and he gives us the tools to escape those bonds.

Maria:

So this is when you're going to take those same books, and you're going

Maria:

to show them how to unshuffle them.

Maria:

You don't do it by pulling apart.

Maria:

You do it by bending down, and those two books will easily break apart.

Maria:

And that's kind of the idea of repentance.

Maria:

It seems hard.

Maria:

It seems, I think Satan wants us to think it's impossible and that it can't be done.

Maria:

What the Savior's atonement offers us is the power to break what Satan

Maria:

wants us to think is permanent.

Maria:

So these simple books can teach you both.

Maria:

What are the strategies, what are the strategies of the adversary and how does

Maria:

he trick me and how do I get out of it by using the atonement of Jesus Christ.

Maria:

Sometimes I wonder if Nephi could see either a racism that would occur in

Maria:

his day or in a future day for his people or maybe he's looking down at

Maria:

our day and saw some of the struggles that would come, not just with race but

Maria:

with divisiveness, that we would divide along lines, and so he tried to teach us

Maria:

What I think President Nelson has been trying to teach us, that we are all one.

Maria:

That there are these commonalities between us that should supersede

Maria:

any of our differences.

Maria:

And I wanted some way for my kids to get it.

Maria:

I really think that verse about, that we are all alike unto God, black

Maria:

and white, bond and free, male and female, That is a pivotal doctrine of

Maria:

our faith, and so I wanted some fun way to help my kids understand it.

Maria:

The visual that came to mind for me actually happened when I was at

Maria:

the grocery store, because I was looking at the vast aisle of Peeps.

Maria:

So if you've ever gone to a larger grocery store and you look in

Maria:

the Easter aisle, you will see that there are like 47 varieties.

Maria:

You know, all different colors, different animals, different shapes,

Maria:

different package arrangements.

Maria:

But essentially they're all the exact same treat, right?

Maria:

They even taste the same, and that's what prompted this object lesson.

Maria:

So I decided to create a taste testing challenge for my kids.

Maria:

I just wanted to teach them about how something that looks so different can

Maria:

actually have much more in common than it has different, and peeps were my example.

Maria:

So I created a simple taste test.

Maria:

You don't have to be as elaborate as this.

Maria:

You really could just let your kids cover their eyes and have

Maria:

them taste two different colors of peeps and ask them which color it

Maria:

was and they won't be able to tell.

Maria:

I just did it in a little more elaborate way.

Maria:

So I took many varieties of peeps, different shapes, different colors,

Maria:

and I cut them up and I put them into these little taste test cups.

Maria:

I numbered them so that Sam and Violet would taste, you know,

Maria:

the same piece at the same time.

Maria:

And then they had to make a guess for what they thought it was.

Maria:

What color do they think it is?

Maria:

What animal do they think that it was?

Maria:

And what part of the animal did they just eat?

Maria:

Was it a tail or a foot?

Maria:

Year or a head and then let them go through several cups.

Maria:

And then we pointed out their answers, right?

Maria:

What was laughable about it is they got none of the answers, right?

Maria:

I think Violet got one of the eight options, right?

Maria:

And we laughed about how Impossible that test was because

Maria:

peeps have so much in common.

Maria:

They all taste the same They all have that same texture on the outside No

Maria:

matter what part of the bunny or the chick you cut off it It's just fluffy

Maria:

and squishy in your mouth and you can't tell and so then I use that to help them

Maria:

understand Transcribed God's children that we have so much more in common that we

Maria:

than we have different from one another.

Maria:

I don't think that means our differences are bad.

Maria:

In fact, I think that's what makes peeps good, too.

Maria:

I love the variety of colors and shapes and sizes, but I think what he wants us

Maria:

to understand is what we have in common supersedes all those other labels.

Maria:

This is why I added President Nelson's thoughts on the back

Maria:

of the little printable box.

Maria:

So on the back, you'll see, on the bottom you have that scripture,

Maria:

on the back it says, Paramount and Unchanging Identifiers.

Maria:

This is what President Nelson taught about what holds us

Maria:

together, what we have in common.

Maria:

That we are children of God, children of the covenant, and disciples of Christ.

Maria:

And that those labels, should supersede all other labels.

Maria:

That is great if you label yourself based on your culture or if you find

Maria:

belonging in different groups based on other parts of your character,

Maria:

but none of those labels should supersede the Child of God, Child of

Maria:

the Covenant, and Disciple of Christ.

Maria:

That's what he wants us to understand.

Maria:

I think that's what Nephi was trying to teach his children, and

Maria:

us by extension, is that God sees all of his children uniquely.

Maria:

He made us unique and different, but there is so much more that we have in common

Maria:

with each other than, than is different.

Maria:

And as we seek to understand that, we find common ground.

Maria:

Sometimes line upon learning is frustrating, because we want it all,

Maria:

and we want it faster, and we don't understand why we need to wait.

Maria:

A lot of Nephi's teachings this week help us understand why line

Maria:

upon learning happens, because we need to prove ourselves.

Maria:

As we gain new light and new understanding, he lets us test it.

Maria:

And as we are obedient to that light and knowledge, he gives us more.

Maria:

And if we turn away from that light and knowledge, then we recede a little bit.

Maria:

And it's this constant effort of proving ourselves.

Maria:

One of my favorite ways to teach this understanding is

Maria:

with a simple origami craft.

Maria:

So like I said, I'm going to teach you how to do the tulips, but you really

Maria:

could do this with almost anything because the principle is the same.

Maria:

The nice thing about the tulips is it's springtime, they're pretty, and they

Maria:

have the scriptures printed right on them, but you could do almost anything.

Maria:

Basically what I would do if I was going to teach this object lesson is I would

Maria:

Talk your kids through folding the tulip.

Maria:

Maybe you give them the supplies, you know, each of them will have a little

Maria:

bloom, they'll have a piece of green for the stem and then another couple leaves.

Maria:

Maybe give them the supplies and then just talk them through the process

Maria:

without letting them touch their paper.

Maria:

And talk about how hard it is.

Maria:

to do it.

Maria:

If you just walk them through the steps or even described it to them without letting

Maria:

them actually touch the paper and do it, they will really struggle to pull it off

Maria:

because there's too many steps and it's too hard to keep it all in your head.

Maria:

I think the same thing happens with Revelation.

Maria:

Heavenly Father isn't holding back information hoping to kind

Maria:

of like tease us towards him.

Maria:

He's holding back some revelation because we need time to Put it to the

Maria:

test and to make minor adjustments.

Maria:

This is when you're going to actually walk your kids through the origami

Maria:

folding process step by step.

Maria:

So with the origami tulip, for example, you first start with the

Maria:

bloom and you're going to fold it on all those halfway lines, you know,

Maria:

diagonal and vertical and horizontal.

Maria:

You're going to walk through that process of folding it.

Maria:

You're going to check at each step how your kids are doing.

Maria:

If you're in a classroom of seminary students, you might walk around and make

Maria:

sure everybody got to that second step.

Maria:

And once everybody has it, then you move on to the third step.

Maria:

Okay.

Maria:

And then you talk about why there's mercy in that approach.

Maria:

That if you didn't, then their fourth step and their fifth step wouldn't take

Maria:

them the direction you want them to go.

Maria:

So if Heavenly Father didn't care about whether or not we honored the

Maria:

revelation you've given us so far, and he just keeps giving us more,

Maria:

we could get completely derailed and end up in a place where we're not.

Maria:

that he didn't hope for us.

Maria:

So, for me, that's why origami teaches this so well.

Maria:

I think you can actually teach the principle of repentance

Maria:

as you make corrections.

Maria:

If you have a kid who's struggling because their lines don't match up, you

Maria:

come back and you work with them one on one and you say, hey, let's fix this.

Maria:

Let's go back to step three and see if we can fix that triangle

Maria:

to be just the right shape.

Maria:

As you go through that process of building that tulip, they learn.

Maria:

It looks complicated.

Maria:

It's actually a really simple craft.

Maria:

You can make one in a couple minutes.

Maria:

You'll make the bloom first and then you'll roll up the stem.

Maria:

If you're in a hurry and you don't have time to make the stem you could use a

Maria:

straw or a pencil and then you're going to add the leaves on at the very end

Maria:

and have, have something they can carry home and talk about how they learn.

Maria:

That they learned this one step at a time with a guide who was right next to them.

Maria:

That they had a pattern to follow.

Maria:

Chances are you're going to bring in one that's already finished,

Maria:

all done and folded so that they can see why it's worth it.

Maria:

I think that's what you get when you see the scriptures and you

Maria:

see things like the Savior's life.

Maria:

That is basically our finished tulip that we can look at

Maria:

and say, that's what I want.

Maria:

That's what I want my life to look like.

Maria:

So you have pattern, you have guides, you have all the tools at your disposal, but

Maria:

it's going to be a line upon line process to figure out how to put it all together.

Maria:

And that's what this life is all about.

Maria:

If you go in the notes on the creative, you can find some beautiful quotes

Maria:

from prophets and apostles and some women leaders of the church throughout

Maria:

these object lessons to help.

Maria:

guide you through these and give you some maybe even conference talks you

Maria:

could listen to while you're crafting.

Maria:

Like for example this week if you're going to make the tulips it would

Maria:

be a great week to listen to Elder Eyring's talk from conference where he

Maria:

talks about line upon line learning.

Maria:

So I'll give you some links to all those in the notes so that you can pull it off.

Maria:

Thank you for being here, you guys.

Maria:

That's it for the creative side of week 11.

Maria:

I hope you have a really good week.

Maria:

Um, just remember, if you're part of the course, if you're a monthly

Maria:

subscriber or an annual subscriber, you'll have access to all the printables

Maria:

and all the notes over on gather.

Maria:

mecmom.

Maria:

com.

Maria:

But if subscriptions aren't your thing, and I totally get it, then you can also

Maria:

find the printables over in my Etsy shop.

Maria:

So just go in the YouTube description and you can find the

Maria:

link over to the Etsy shop and buy whichever ones you happen to need.

Maria:

But otherwise, I hope you just enjoyed this week of study.

Maria:

Extra help, you are welcome to join me on the live.

Maria:

So that's Monday morning at 10 a.

Maria:

m.

Maria:

Mountain Time.

Maria:

That again happens at gather.

Maria:

mechmom.

Maria:

com.

Maria:

So you just need to go there and RSVP and you can be a part of the conversation.

Maria:

But otherwise, I hope you enjoy your study, that you dive into your

Maria:

scriptures, seek for answers to these questions, and many, many more

Maria:

that are available to you this week.

Maria:

I think the Spirit will teach you beautiful things.

Maria:

Nephi's words are powerful and they'll set the stage for where

Maria:

we go next week in week number 12.

Links

Chapters

Video

More from YouTube