Let’s Get Real with Stephen Jones

What does it actually take for a person to change?Joseph Grenny has spent decades studying human behavior, influence, and transformation. But some of his deepest lessons came when those ideas collided with his own family, including his son’s struggle with heroin addiction and Joseph’s painful realization that knowing how change works did not give him the power to change someone he loved.In this conversation, Joseph explores why repentance is about more than simply wanting to be better or trying harder. He explains the six sources of influence that shape our behavior and connects them to the way God works throughout scripture, through relationships, environments, consequences, truth, accountability, and grace.Drawing from his work with the Other Side Academy, Joseph shares stories of people with long histories of addiction, crime, homelessness, and broken relationships who became dramatically different people. Their experiences reveal why pain is not always the enemy, why agency has to be preserved, and why lasting change often begins with two simple realizations: “I have a problem” and “I need help.”The conversation also explores what this means for families, wards, and the Church. If discipleship is meant to transform us, then Zion cannot just be a place where people hear good advice. It has to be a community where people are known, loved, challenged, supported, and given room to become something new.Joseph’s work ultimately points to a deeply Christian idea: God does not simply command us to change and leave us alone to figure it out. He places us in relationships, covenants, communities, and experiences that can help shape us into the people He knows we can become.

Why did Joseph Smith receive the gold plates on September 22, 1827?Historian Don Bradley began asking that question while reconstructing the timeline surrounding the coming forth of the Book of Mormon. What he found was a striking sequence connecting the events that followed to the Jewish fall festival season.The first aligned with the Feast of Trumpets. The next with the Day of Atonement. Then came the Feast of Tabernacles.Three festivals. Three events. Three for three.As far as Bradley could determine, the pattern had been sitting unnoticed for nearly 200 years.But then the festivals ran out.Bradley kept counting.In this episode of Let’s Get Real, Don Bradley walks Stephen Jones through the historical sources, ancient Israelite traditions, and chronology that led him to one more unexpected connection hiding in the timeline.

Everyone knows the story: Joseph Smith went to a hill and found the gold plates. But historian Don Bradley believes we may have misunderstood what he actually found.In this episode, Don takes a closer look at the objects associated with the coming forth of the Book of Mormon and places them alongside the sacred patterns of ancient Israel.What begins as a familiar story about gold plates starts to look like something much older.From King Josiah to Moses, from the Nephites to Joseph Smith, Don traces a recurring pattern of lost scripture, sacred objects, covenant renewal, and restoration. And the deeper the parallels go, the harder they are to ignore.Was Joseph Smith simply recovering an ancient record?Or was the coming forth of the Book of Mormon part of a much older covenant story happening again?

What if poverty is not only a financial problem, but a spiritual one?

President Brian Ashton explains why intelligence is widely distributed, but opportunity is not. He shares how BYU–Pathway Worldwide combines faith, education, practical skills, and employment to help people build lasting self-reliance instead of depending on temporary handouts.    

From students surviving on one meal a day to returned missionaries coming home with nowhere to live, this conversation reveals how poverty can limit far more than income. It can suppress hope, confidence, leadership, and divine potential.    

President Ashton shares why lasting change requires more than money. It requires opportunity, spiritual identity, education, work, and the belief that every person can become more than their circumstances suggest.

The woman who knew Joseph Smith better than anyone never stopped testifying that he was a prophet. So why has history remembered her almost entirely through controversy?

In this episode of Let’s Get Real, historian Don Bradley takes a fresh look at Emma Smith, separating the historical record from the assumptions that have shaped her legacy for generations.

Together, we explore some of the biggest questions surrounding Emma’s life:

• Why didn’t Emma Smith go west with the Saints?

• What did she really believe about Joseph Smith and the Restoration?

• How did she navigate the challenge of plural marriage?

• Why did she continue to bear a powerful testimony of the Book of Mormon?

• What can Emma’s life teach us about faith when we don’t have perfect answers?

Rather than reducing Emma to a symbol in modern debates, this conversation reveals a faithful, intelligent, courageous disciple whose story is far more compelling than many realize.

Whether you’re wrestling with questions about Church history or simply want to better understand one of the most important women of the Restoration, this conversation offers historical context, empathy, and hope.