Teach How To Study Scripture
In Preach My Gospel, missionaries are taught to start scripture study with questions so they can “liken all scriptures unto [themselves]” (1 Nephi 19:23-24). If it is good for missionaries to study this way, it is good for people learning the gospel to study this way.
Start by asking your friends to come to lessons with a list of questions about religion to which they’ve not been able to find satisfactory answers.
When you understand their questions, think of chapters in the Book of Mormon that provide answers. Let them know you have a homework assignment for them, and ask that they schedule two hours to complete the assignment between now and your next meeting. Share that their assignment is to do the following:
- Kneel and pray out loud to begin the study session. In your prayer, ask God for help.
- Read the suggested chapters or passages.
- Using what you read in the chapters, write or type answers to your questions.
- Kneel and pray again. Explain to God the answers you wrote as if talking with Him face to face. Tell Him you’ll read the chapters again. Ask Him to bless you to understand as He understands, so you may answer the questions as He wants you to answer.
- Read the chapters again.
- Revise your answers. Your revised answers are what you’ll share during the next meeting.
- Kneel and pray a third time. Ask God if things you have written and read are true.
During lessons with full-time missionaries, don’t be afraid to spend a significant portion of time teaching investigators how to pray and study. Ask them to teach and testify to you and the full-time missionaries what they’ve learned and felt.
People are likely to judge the gospel as relevant to their lives—and take actions that convert them to the gospel of Jesus Christ—when we organize lessons and homework around what they want to know about religion.
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December 7, 2012 Principles, Teaching