Brainstorming - D&C 41-44

My next lesson will be from this chapter of the Come Follow Me manual, which talks about D&C 41-44. I've read through the references and the manual chapter, and have started working up some ideas on how to teach. (If you're not familiar with how I approach planning lessons, this post provides some details.)

The core of D&C 41-44 is about revelations given to Joseph Smith during his early days in Kirkland, Ohio, in February 1831.

1. Chapter 41 is fairly short, and covers a decree regarding where Joseph will be housed.
2. Chapter 42 is the longest. It starts by calling upon the brethren to go and teach, and also touches upon a reminder of the Commandments (twice), and what will later become the Law of Consecration, where Joseph exhorts his followers to pool their property in the name of the church in order to share more equitably amongst everyone. It also touches upon the idea of receiving personal revelation. 
3. Chapter 43 deals with the issue of false teachings, and makes clear that any new church-wide revelations can only be receieved through approved channels.
4. Chapter 44 is short, and urges his followers to go forth, organise themselves and tend to the poor.

In reading these, the following parts stood out.

D&C 41:12 says "These words are given unto you, and they are pure before me; wherefore, beware how you hold them...", and the word pure stood out. It could be interesting to discuss concepts around chemical purity, and about just how difficult (and perhaps impossible) it is to obtain something naturally or artificially occuring that is 100% pure, without even a trace of any impurity, and to use this to get an idea of just how much weight this word carries. Perhaps we could discuss how we can look into materials with advanced equipment (optical and electron microscopes, mass spectrometers) to analyse their properties to deeper levels, and show that even at these levels, we can still find impurities. 

D&C 42: 6 says "And ye shall go forth in the power of my Spirit, preaching my gospel, atwo by two, in my name, lifting up your voices as with the sound of a trump, declaring my word like unto angels of God." Here, the word trump stood out. I found that this was short-hand for trumpet, and it could be interesting to talk about some acoustic theory about how trumpets create a loud and clear sound. I did a bit of reading up on how trumpet valves direct air through different sections of brass piping, which modifies the path length and results in different sounds. (This YouTube video explains the principle quite clearly.) Perhaps we could use this as an analogy for how, when we put our imperfect efforts in, they get guided along a path and the result is something loud and clear. 

The lesson manual had a nice idea based on a different part of D&C 42, where it references verse 61: "If thou shalt ask, thou shalt receive revelation upon revelation, knowledge upon knowledge, that thou mayest know the mysteries and peaceable things...". The manual adds the following idea: "Explain that God does not reveal everything at once; instead, He gives us a little bit at a time. Show how a puzzle is built little by little, or use something similar to help the children understand this principle." This could be a nice idea to explore through talking about the process of scientific discovery, and how significant new knowledge doesn't come at once, but through a series of small steps and experiments. It'd be particularly nice if there was a simple set of mini experiments that we could do together, to illustrate this concept. 

Those are my thoughts so far, and now I need to decide which to use, and to work them up into a more coherent lesson plan. If anyone has any thoughts or suggestions, please feel free to share through the comments below or via Twitter. 

Perhaps we could talk about how microscopes help us to understand materials in fine detail and how we're unlikely to find a material without any imperfections. Image is from Unsplash, the site for freely usable images, courtesy of Michael Longmire.