God surprised me by answering my request to teach me to protect myself against evil forces. The way He did this was to inspire me to read specific writings from early LDS prophets and apostles that would teach me doctrinal principles about Satan’s tactics. God was very specific in His teaching method: The name of a book and a keyword or page number would appear in my mind. Then I would locate the book and find the passage that God wanted me to read. (Sometimes I would have to go to a specific library and find a person’s name or event on microfilm that I had never heard before.) I would think about that passage and then God would allow me to have experiences that taught me what the passage meant. This “experience phase” could last days or weeks or months. Then the next book and keyword would appear in my mind and I would repeat the process of finding the new passage and learning from it. This line-upon-line learning continued for several years until I could see how the many separate doctrinal principles fit together.
I can’t express how grateful I am that God would take the time to teach me in such a personal way. I am also very thankful that all of the principles came from writings of LDS prophets and apostles, so I felt at ease in trusting past leaders of my church.
In this blog, I will share those many doctrinal puzzle pieces and my understanding of their interconnections.
