Day 25 Exhorting with All the Energies of Your Soul

In Matthew 5:13, Jesus tells his followers that they are the salt of the earth, and in the same sentence offers a warning that savorless salt is good for nothing. Join me in an attempt to be savory salt as I share each day one verse of scripture and one small thought. Perhaps this small daily emphasis can lead to greater savor in your life and ultimately you and I can be savory salt.

Hello, my friends and family, wherever you're listening from. Thank you for joining me, and know that I'm cheering for your every success. Welcome to Day 25, the second half of 1 Nephi chapter 15, and perhaps a little bit of an energetic side of things from after yesterday's conversation with me.

If you are reading along the Book of Mormon on our 365-day path, today you will read 1 Nephi chapter 15, verses 20 to 36. Isn't this small and simple awesome, by the way? Like, this is—I mean, we've been reading, you know, 15 verses here, 18 verses there, 12 verses there.

Like, I love these small and simple things. It's been great. So today we're going to dive into verse 25.

See what Nephi's got going on with his brothers and with his family a little bit, and see what's happening with him. Let's dive into verse 25. It says, "Wherefore, I, Nephi, did exhort them to give heed unto the word of the Lord.

Yea, I did exhort them with all the energies of my soul, and with all that faculty which I possessed, that they would give heed to the word of God, and remember to keep his commandments always in all things." Now, that one's great because we know from the outside looking in how much Nephi needs to talk to his brothers in particular and the challenges that they face. And yet at the same time, if I'm trying to bring this into my life, I've got to admit, I've got to be honest with you. There are times in my life when I look at my own life and I wish, "you know what?

I wish I'd been a little bit better at exhorting with all my energies of my soul," right? I wish I would have better borne testimony about the things I believe. And that's kind of the point of the Savory Salt podcast: to give us a little bit of a mirror to look at and say, "Hey, you know what?

I think I can be better. Let's be a little more savory here." And this is one of those areas for me, I think, whether it's sharing my testimony with my family, whether it's talking openly with my friends—those that are both aware of the gospel and those that aren't. I think each one of those is an opportunity for me to better exhort them with all the energies of my soul.

You just feel excited when you do that. You just feel, maybe there's some apprehension to it, but there's definitely some positive energy on the backside of it. I got to thinking about a time in my life when I kind of watched this from the outside looking in, and I have to go back to a time when President Gordon B.

Hinckley, who was President of the Church at that time, he was going to have an interview. I think it was an interview with "60 Minutes." I have to go back. If I can find that, maybe I'll link that to this podcast episode.

But it was an opportunity for President Hinckley to be broadcast basically across the nation publicly, right? A chance for the Church to kind of get better known and for people to see the President of the Church speaking publicly about our beliefs. I remember him just having this smile and this energy about him and an opportunity for him to just bear testimony about the work of Jesus Christ and about the work that's going forward with the Church.

And that interview has always stuck with me as this kind of example of watching someone just exhort with their energies of their soul and encourage people to live the commandments. I want to be better at that in my own life. I know, as I mentioned, there are times in my life where I let that go, or I shied away from it, or I have not spoken out my beliefs the way that I know I can do so.

And I want to be better at that. If you're good at that, well done. That's awesome.

And if you're not, you need a little bit more savor in that area, then dive in with me and jump on that journey to have a little bit more exhortation with all the energy of your soul. So let's be more exhorting in our energies of soul. Fair enough.

And I hope you join me on that path. And that's a good one to dive into today. That's got me all fired up.

That's all I have for today. Remember that "by small and simple things are great things brought to pass." Keep it small, keep it simple, and always seek to be savory salt. I'll be here tomorrow. I hope you are too.