YOUTH LESSON ACTIVITY. FIRST VISION Memory Match Game or Tell-the-Story cards. Youth can start by reading James 1:5 which motivated Joseph Smith to pray in the Sacred Grove to ask God which church was true. The Father and the Son appeared to him to restore the gospel of Jesus Christ again upon the earth.
USE FOR: COME FOLLOW ME, Primary and Home lessons, Family Home Evening, Activity Days, Sunday School, Book of Mormon Study
POST-AND-PRESENT Activity
FIRST VISION Memory Match Game or Tell-the-Story Cards
ACTIVITY: Help youth learn the story of the First Vision how Joseph Smith as a boy read James 1:5 to learn he should “ask of God” going to the Sacred Grove to pray. Here Jesus Christ and Heavenly Father appeared to him. This is called the First Vision. Have youth tell the story in JSH 1:14-20, 25 (below) using the story cards or play a match game.
TO MAKE: This activity can be used in 2 different ways: Memory Game- Print two copies of the visuals making a total of 44 cards (22 pairs) and 4 “Extra Turn” cards. Story Cards- Print one copy of each visual to create 22 story cards.
TO PLAY THE MATCH GAME:
1. To set up, lay all cards out in a big grid (system), mounting the cards on the board facedown or on a table.
2. Divide players into teams or play individually. Players take turns turning two cards over at a time to make a match. Matches are the identical cards that tell a portion of the FIRST VISION story. If a player makes a match, player can turn both cards face-up and remove from grid setting aside. Each match gives the player/team one point. If a player does not make a match, then the cards are placed in their original position facedown and it becomes the other player’s turn.
3. If a player turns over the EXTRA TURN card, they can remove the card from the grid and keep to use for a turn when they do not make a match. The EXTRA TURN card can be used on their immediate turn or a turn in the future and the card can only be used once.
4. Once all the matches are made you can place the matches in order, to tell the story.
TELLING THE STORY USING THE CARDS: Reading from Joseph Smith History JSH 1:14-20, 25 (detailed below), place the cards on a board or on a table top as that part comes up in the story (story starters are below the pictures). You can also test your memory and see if you can put the story in order without the scriptures. You can also teach someone else the First Vision story by placing the story starters in order and tell the story in your own words.
THOUGHT TREAT: First Vision Leaf Cookie. Make or purchase sugar cookie dough, roll out 1/2″ (between two sheets of waxed or parchment paper) and cut out leafs using a leaf-shaped cookie cutter or a knife. Bake and frost. Think about Joseph Smith visiting the Sacred Grove of trees and how his prayer was answered.
SONGS ABOUT THE FIRST VISION: Sing or read the words to these songs using the song visuals you can DOWNLOAD (below). Click on the title or posters for details.
• On a Golden Springtime (CS 88)
• The Sacred Grove (CS 87)
• This is My Beloved Son (CS 76)
DOWNLOAD song visuals to teach these songs below.
ARTICLES OF FAITH
#1-13 BUNDLE
SCRIPT FOR THE “FIRST VISION” STORY
(showing matching picture-cue cards)
QUOTE SCRIPTURES (FIRST VISION SCRIPTURE STORY):
14
So, in accordance with this, my determination to ask of God, I retired to the woods to make the attempt. It was on the morning of a beautiful, clear day, early in the spring of eighteen hundred and twenty (SHOW CARD). It was the first time in my life that I had made such an attempt, for amidst all my anxieties I had never as yet made the attempt to pray vocally (SHOW CARD).
15
After I had retired to the place where I had previously designed to go, having looked around me, and finding myself alone, I kneeled down and began to offer up the desires of my heart to God (SHOW CARD). I had scarcely done so, when immediately I was seized upon by some power (SHOW CARD) which entirely overcame me, and had such an astonishing influence over me as to bind my tongue so that I could not speak. Thick darkness gathered around me, and it seemed to me for a time as if I were doomed to sudden destruction (SHOW CARD).
16
But, exerting all my powers to call upon God to deliver me (SHOW CARD) out of the power of this enemy which had seized upon me, and at the very moment when I was ready to sink into despair and abandon myself to destruction—not to an imaginary ruin, but to the power of some actual being from the unseen world (SHOW CARD), who had such marvelous power as I had never before felt in any being—just at this moment of great alarm, I saw a pillar of light exactly over my head (SHOW CARD), above the brightness of the sun, which descended gradually until it fell upon me.
17
It no sooner appeared than I found myself delivered from the enemy (SHOW CARD) which held me bound. When the light rested upon me I saw two Personages, whose brightness and glory (SHOW CARD) defy all description, standing above me in the air. One of them spake unto me, calling me by name (SHOW CARD) and said, pointing to the other—This is My Beloved Son. Hear Him! (SHOW CARD)
18
My object in going to inquire of the Lord was to know which of all the sects was right, that I might know which to join. No sooner, therefore, did I get possession of myself, so as to be able to speak, than I asked the Personages who stood above me in the light (SHOW CARD), which of all the sects was right (for at this time it had never entered into my heart that all were wrong)—and which I should join (SHOW CARD).
19
I was answered that I must join none of them, for they were all wrong (SHOW CARD); and the Personage who addressed me said that all their creeds were an abomination in his sight; that those professors were all corrupt; that: “they draw near to me with their lips, but their hearts are far from me, they teach for doctrines the commandments of men, having a form of godliness, but they deny the power thereof (SHOW CARD).”
20
He again forbade me to join with any of them; and many other things did he say unto me (SHOW CARD), which I cannot write at this time. When I came to myself again, I found myself lying on my back, looking up into heaven (SHOW CARD). When the light had departed, I had no strength (SHOW CARD); but soon recovering in some degree, I went home. And as I leaned up to the fireplace, mother inquired what the matter was. I replied, “Never mind, all is well—I am well enough off.” I then said to my mother, “I have learned for myself that Presbyterianism is not true.” It seems as though the adversary was aware, at a very early period of my life, that I was destined to prove a disturber and an annoyer of his kingdom; else why should the powers of darkness combine against me? Why the opposition and persecution that arose against me, almost in my infancy?
25
So it was with me. I had actually seen a light, and in the midst of that light I saw two Personages (SHOW CARD), and they did in reality speak to me; and though I was hated and persecuted for saying that I had seen a vision (SHOW CARD), yet it was true; and while they were persecuting me, reviling me, and speaking all manner of evil against me falsely for so saying, I was led to say in my heart: Why persecute me for telling the truth? I have actually seen a vision; and who am I that I can withstand God, or why does the world think to make me deny what I have actually seen? For I had seen a vision; I knew it, and I knew that God knew it, and I could not deny it (SHOW CARD), neither dared I do it; at least I knew that by so doing I would offend God, and come under condemnation.
