Integrity-Making a Case for Morality

This week for mutual, the girls learned about the value INTEGRITY. So to help with the lesson, we took out a book that was compiled for FHE based on the President Gordon B. Hinckley's book Standing for Something: Ten Neglected Virtues that will heal our hearts and homes. Here was the basic lesson plan of the night: (there is a link at the bottom of this post if you want a copy of the lesson)

Making a Case for Morality

(FHE based on the YW value of Integrity)

STORY:

            Many years ago President Hinckley worked in a Denver railroad office where he was in charge of the baggage and express traffic carried in passenger trains. One day he received a telephone call from another railroad in New Jersey who said that a passenger train had arrived without its baggage car. Three hundred passengers were angry because they had no luggage.

            They discovered that the train had left California and travelled to Utah and then to Denver and St. Louis with not problems. However, in St. Louis a switchman had mistakenly moved a piece of steel just three inches. That piece do steel was a switch point and the baggage car that should have been in New Jersey was in Louisiana, fourteen hundred miles away.

           

This lesson is similar to the workings of a heave farm gate. Such a gate moves very little at the hinges, but a long way out at the circumference. A very small movement at the hinge brings long movement at the end of the gate.

So it is with our lives. A careless poor decision can wreak havoc with consequences that reach farther than you could ever imagine.

We must stay away from that which leads to:

            1. Unclean thoughts

            2. Unclean language

            3. Harmful behavior

DISCUSSION:

            We can choose heroes and heroines with high standards to look up to-men and women of tremendous physical and moral courage.

President Hinckley has had several heroes to emulate throughout his life. They include:

            George Washington

            Thomas Jefferson

            Abraham Lincoln

            Charles Lindbergh-who flew over the Atlantic in a single-engine Spirit of St. Louis, landing 33 hours later.

            Admiral Richard E. Byrd- who commanded an expedition to the South Pole.

            Stephen Hopkins- an ancestor of President Hinckley who was a passenger on the Mayflower.

Think of men and women you know who are examples of moral courage to serve as your heroes.

What are some things in our lives that could have a harmful influence on us?

            Magazines, internet, Movies, Music, Television.

           

“It is native to believe that a steady diet of blatant immorality played out nightly in our living rooms has no effect on people. I am always curious when individuals insist that what they watch on television or in the movie theaters doesn’t affect them. It was interesting to note that the going rate for a 30 second advertising spot in the 1999 Super Bowl was 1.5 million dollars. Apparently a host of advertisers felt confident that in 30 seconds time they could influence their viewers to buy the products or services they were peddling. Are we really to believe that hours, leading to years, of television viewing will not affect attitudes about everything from family life to appropriate sexual relations?”  -President Hinckley

GAME:

            “What’s on your mind?”

PURPOSE:  To illustrate the importance of putting good things in our minds so the world does not fill it for us. Point out how easily our minds fill up with information when we see it regularly. Explain that if we just watch TV, that is what will fill our minds. More importantly, we need to fill out minds with scriptures, good books, games, and movies, so that our minds are not filled with the unpleasant.  

Read a phrase from the Commercial Slogans and see if they can identify the products:

“Yo quiero”………………………………………………………………………………………………..Taco Bell

“Like a rock”………………………………………………………………………………………….Chevy Truck

“Give us a week, we’ll take off the weight”…………………………………………………….Slim Fast

“Got milk?”………………………………………………………………………………………..Dairy Industry

“Just do it”……………………………………………………………………………………………………….Nike

“Melts in your mouth, not in your hands”………………………………………………..M&M Candy

“It’s your store”………………………………………………………………………………… …….Albertsons

“Always low prices”……………………………………………………………………………………..Walmart

“We love to see you smile”………………………………………………………………………..McDonalds

“The pain killer most recommended by hospitals”…………………………………………...Tylenol

“Mm Mm Good”……………………………………………………………………………...Campbell’s Soup

“What’s on your list today”……………………………………………………………………….Fred Meyer

 Click HERE for Word Doc download of lesson