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"Deceive Me Not" by Elder Gary E. Stevenson was definitely one of the more memorable talks from General Conference. My children still talk and laugh about it. That’s what so great about stories- they stick and teach gospel principles. Keep scrolling for ideas on how to teach this lesson.

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Questions to Ponder

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Name some skunks or extra dalmatians in your life.
How do you know you are a child of God? How did you come to know this truth? How has this knowledge blessed you?
How can you draw upon the knowledge of your divinity to avoid being deceived?
How can you strengthen your resistance to temptation?
When have you asked for help to resist temptation?
Why does Satan strive to deceive us?
What are some temptations you may face in the future? How do you plan to resist them?
How has having home-centered gospel instruction strengthened you and your family?
How do you see the new children and youth program strengthening you and/or members of your family?
How are you being vigilant and faithful?
What helps you properly identify threats and temptations?
What can help us unmask skunks in our lives? How can we help others do likewise?
How does Satan try to deceive us today? What are some ways he has tried to deceive you?
How do the commandments help you avoid deception and altered realities?
How do we sometimes try to alter our realities in a dangerous way?

Use this coloring page to remind your class of the fun stories in Elder Stevenson’s talk. They need can write down ways Satan deceives us with imagined realities and disguises by the dalmatian and skunk.

Discussion Ideas

What are some ways we my try to create an imagined reality? You can show this by drawing a basic picture of a person on the white board. Add a necklace or bowtie to show they are sophisticated. Add a large wallet or purse to show they are well off. Put them in a nice big house with flowers and grass to show a perfect life. This is the way we might tend to imagine other people’s realities. Ask your class for more examples- they can even come up and draw it too (This goes with the dalmatian story). How do we break these imagined realities?
Bring an orange or round potato dipped in chocolate or caramel like a caramel apple might be. Try to disguise it enough so people think it’s an apple. Ask someone to come to the front of the room. Ask them what you are holding in your hand and if they would like to take a bite of it. The goal here is to surprise them not make them eat something gross (This goes with the skunk story). How might Satan use a similar tactic to deceive us? What are some specific examples you have experienced? How did you figure out it was an orange instead of an apple? What helped you see clearly? Note you can tie in Elder Stevenson’s talk from two years ago about a Spiritual Eclipse here. There is a great object lesson in his talk that you can duplicate here.
Write some gospel truths on the board- you can bring a list that you prepared ahead of time or ask your class some of the gospel truths they know. Then go back through and show how Satan, the father of lies, tries to have rationalize these truths away. If we know he does this, how can we protect ourselves against his deceptions? How can we teach our children and neighbors to see the truth and not be deceived? Focus on this later part, not all the lies.
Study the story of Satan trying to deceive Moses together (see Moses 1). What other new insights can you gain from these scripture verses?
There is a sticky note that I share in my Back to School Sticky Notes for Teens. It has a picture of a parrot on it that says, “Moo, I’m a goat. School, it’s important.” You can pass the note around for people to laugh at as you start your lesson or draw a similar thing on your board. How do we gain the knowledge we need so we won’t be deceived? Look for answers that are deeper than “read your scriptures.” How do we really internalize the reality of our divine nature or that keeping the commandments is a good thing?
Bring some pictures of animals or easy to recognize people. Cover up these images with paper so that only their eyes show. Ask your class to correctly identify these individuals with that little bit of information. How do we unmask things as they really are so we can see that a skunk is always a skunk and will never be a cat? What helps you know that the animal one was at least an animal and not a human? How can you compare that to what you are met with daily?
You can combine this talk with some of the others that talked about the deceptive nature of the adversary such as Elder David A. Bednar’s or Elder Peter M. Johnson’s.