Involve the Lord in the Process

Councils are important for every level of group to feel united, heard, and even appreciated. Elder Ballard shared some important insights about marriage and family councils. We attempted to apply them in our home as much as possible this week. We decided to hold a marital counsel last week, so I could seek my husband’s help in knowing what I could do to help improve the communication on our home. Our communication has really begun to get out of control, and I wanted to apply the things I was learning in my class to help improve not only our marriage relationship, but also to help my family.

I created an agenda, set a sacred time and place to meet, began by expressing love and offering prayer, and discussed the matter of importance: communication in our home. I was trying to reach consensus regarding the Lord’s will on the matter.

• We have had a real problem this school year with the way we communicate in our home and felt the need to change/improve. I had been feeling the need for change in our home and with the Coronavirus affecting the world and requiring my children to all be home together for days on end, I knew we needed a good action plan. I asked my husband if we could have a marital council to discuss what we could do. We agreed to meet Friday evening at 10 PM in our bedroom.
• We had a council in our bedroom. Began with prayer and we had an agenda, were both able to discuss the problem thoroughly, with suggestions and a desire to further involve the Lord.
• We went to the temple on Saturday, prayerfully asking the Lord what we could do to improve. Although the temple was closed, we sat in the parking lot discussing ideas.
• Met with the children on Saturday night to open our fast and counseled with them what we had been feeling.
• We came with an agenda and had family council on Saturday evening. My husband led the discussion for the family and tried to let each child have a contributing effort. We have 5 rules in our home – spell GLORY. G-good communication is number one and we were failing. If we are to build a house of God, which is what we actively seek to do, we must follow and focus on the first rule. For if we break the first rule, we break the rest.
  • G – Good Communication
  • L – Love One Another
  • O – Obey with Exactness
  • R – Respect home and family
  • Y – Your best efforts
• We invited them to think about what that means to them, then followed up with that on Sunday evening after our fast was ended. We counseled with our children and tried to apply the words and counsel from Elder Ballard with counsels – making sure to hear everyone out.
• The kids suggested a code word to use to help keep us in check without taking offense to the subtle reminders. (Pride and Prejudice – “Precision of Language”.) We talked about crude adjectives that are not in the dictionary, replacement words, tone of voice, body language. Also, adding the word “Prince” or “Princess” to their name. Lords and Ladies, etc, according to rank in the family. The kids had many suggestions on how if we remember “who we are”, it will make a difference in conversation.

I have had several people come to me sharing problems in family and what would I do. I always point them to the Lord and the temple, but now I can share with them the value of counseling together in marriage, then with children, and making a unified decision.

I have one daughter who struggles to see her unfavorable communication and how it affects others and the spirit in our home and reflects lack of respect. This was a good way not to single her out and make sure we are keeping the spirit in our home.

It was wonderful to ensure everyone had a voice in the matter and could discuss openly their thoughts and desires. Most importantly, it was great to involve the Lord in the process.