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Our God Is A God Of Love. He Waits With Open Arms, And The Unfolding Of His Merciful Plan Of Salvation Is Not Only Therefore The Mark Of Divine Power But Also The Mark Of God's Relentless, Redeeming Love. It Is A Point Well Worth Pondering Because, Among Other Reasons, It Will Help Us To Understand Better Why God, Through The Prophets, Denounces Sin And Corruption In Such Scalding Terms. He Loves All Of Us, His Spirit Sons And Daughters, But Hates Our Vices. His Denunciation Of Those Vices May, If We Are Not Careful, Seem To Obscure The Enormous And Perfect Love He Has For Us.

-Neal A. Maxwell

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Our God Is A

Neal A. Maxwell

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Our God Is A God Of Love. He Waits With Open Arms, And The Unfolding Of His Merciful Plan Of Salvation Is Not Only Therefore The Mark Of Divine Power But Also The Mark Of God's Relentless, Redeeming Love. It Is A Point Well Worth Pondering Because, Among Other Reasons, It Will Help Us To Understand Better Why God, Through The Prophets, Denounces Sin And Corruption In Such Scalding Terms. He Loves All Of Us, His Spirit Sons And Daughters, But Hates Our Vices. His Denunciation Of Those Vices May, If We Are Not Careful, Seem To Obscure The Enormous And Perfect Love He Has For Us.

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A Society Which Permits Anything Will Eventually Lose Everything.

How Can You And I Really Expect To Glide Naively Through Life, As If To Say, 'lord, Give Me Experience, But Not Grief, Not Sorrow, Not Pain, Not Opposition, Not Betrayal, And Certainly Not To Be Forsaken. Keep From Me, Lord, All Those Experiences Which Made Thee What Thou Art! Then, Let Me Come And Dwell With Thee And Fully Share Thy Joy!'

By Seeing Life's Experiences On Through To The End, On Our Small Scale We Can Finally Say, As Jesus Did On The Cross, "it Is Finished". We Too Can Then Have "finished [our] Preparations," Having Done The Particular Work God Gave Each Of Us To Do.

There Are Certain Mortal Moments And Minutes That Matter. Certain Hingepoints In The History Of Each Human. Some Seconds Are So Decisive They Shrink The Soul, While Others Are Spent, So As To Stretch The Soul.

Coming Unto The Lord Is Not A Negotiation, But A Surrender.

We Tend To Think Of Consecration Only As Yielding Up, When Divinely Directed, Our Material Possessions. But Ultimate Consecration Is The Yielding Up Of Oneself To God. Heart, Soul, And Mind Were The Encompassing Words Of Christ In Describing The First Commandment, Which Is Constantly, Not Periodically, Operative (see Matt. 22:37). If Kept, Then Our Performances Will, In Turn, Be Fully Consecrated For The Lasting Welfare Of Our Souls (see 2 Ne. 32:9).

The Laughter Of The World Is Merely Loneliness Pathetically Trying To Reassure Itself.

A Patient Willingness To Defer Dividends Is A Hallmark Of Individual Maturity.

God's Extraordinary Work Is Most Often Done By Ordinary People In The Seeming Obscurity Of A Home And Family.

It Is Extremely Important For You To Believe In Yourselves, Not Only For What You Are Now, But For What You Have The Power To Become.

Conscience Warns Us Not To Sink Our Cleats Too Deeply In Mortal Turf, Which Is So Dangerously Artificial.

The Flame Of Family Can Warm Us And At The Same Time Be A Perpetual Pilot Light To Rekindle Us.

There Will Be Many Fine And Wonderful Men And Women Of All Races And Creeds-and Of No Religious Creeds At All-who Will Lead Decent And Useful Lives.

A Father Who Finds It Difficult To Express His Love Vocally For His Children May Need, At First, To Be Humbly Obedient In Holding Family Home Evenings In Order To Help Him To Discover, Or To Increase, His Appreciation For His Children. Next Can Come To Him The Courage To Say I Love You To Each One.

Joshua Didn't Say Choose You Next Year Whom You Will Serve; He Spoke Of "this Day," While There Is Still Daylight And Before The Darkness Becomes More And More Normal.

Occasionally Some Individuals Let The Seeming Ordinariness Of Life Dampen Their Spirits. Though Actually Coping And Growning, Others Lack The Quiet, Inner-soul Satisfaction That Can Steady Them, And Are Experiencing Instead, A Lingering Sense That There Is Something More Important They Should Be Doing . . .as If What Is Quietly Achieved In Righteous Individual Living Or In Parenthood Are Not Sufficiently Spectacular.

God’s Grace Will Cover Us Like A Cloak-enough To Provide For Survival But Too Thin To Keep Out All The Cold.

Ironically, Brothers And Sisters, The Natural Man Who Is So Very Selfish In So Many Ordinary Ways Is Strangely Unselfish In That He Reaches For Too Few Of The Things That Bring Real Joy. He Settles For A Mess Of Pottage Instead Of Eternal Joy.

A Few Little Flowers Will Spring Up Briefly In The Dry Gulley Through Which Torrents Of Water Pass Occasionally. But It Is Steady Streams That Bring Thick And Needed Crops. In The Agriculture Of The Soul That Has To Do With Nurturing Attributes, Flash Floods Are No Substitute For Regular Irrigation.

God's Anger Is Kindled Not Because We Have Harmed Him But Because We Have Harmed Ourselves.

Those Who Do Too Much For Their Children Will Soon Find They Can Do Nothing With Their Children. So Many Children Have Been So Much Done For They Are Almost Done In.

No Love Is Ever Wasted. Its Worth Does Not Lie In Reciprocity.

I Testify That He Is Utterly Incomparable In What He Is, What He Knows, What He Has Accomplished And What He Has Experienced. Yet, Movingly, He Calls Us His Friends

If We Knew How Often The Obedience Of Others Is Affected By Our Own, And How Often Our Stepping Forth Soon Brings Forth A Whole Platton Of Helpers, And How Often Our Speaking Forth Soon Creates A Chorus - We Would Be Even More Ashamed Of Our Slackess And Our Silence.

How Could There Be Refining Fires Without Our Enduring Some Heat?

We Must Not Fail, Individually, For If We Fail, We Fail Twice - For Ourselves And For Those Who Could Have Been Helped, If We Had Done Our Duty.

It Is Our Job To Lift Others Up, Not To Size Them Up.

Some Find It Easier To Bend Their Knees Than Their Minds. Exciting Exploration Is Preferred To Plodding Implementation; Speculation Seems More Fun Than Consecration, And So Is Trying To Soften The Hard Doctrines Instead Of Submitting To Them. Worse Still, By Not Obeying, These . . . Lack Real Knowing. Lacking Real Knowing, They Cannot Defend Their Faith And May Become Critics Instead Of Defenders!

Spent Time-like A Spent Bullet-tells Us Much About Its "processor." For We See Not Only The Residual Slug, But Indicators Of How Spent Time Is Grooved By A Man's Soul, A Reliable Indicator Of What A Man Is Like.

Perfect Love Is Perfectly Patient.

Consecration Thus Constitutes The Only Unconditional Surrender Which Is Also A Total Victory!

How Myopic It Is To View His Ministry As All Crucifixion And No Resurrection!

Pure Religion Is Having The Courage To Do What Is Right And Let The Consequence Follow.

When We Rejoice In Beautiful Scenery, Great Art, And Great Music, It Is But The Flexing Of Instincts Acquired In Another Place And Another Time.

A Good Friend, Who Knows Whereof He Speaks, Has Observed Of Trials, ‘if It’s Fair, It Is Not A True Trial!’ That Is, Without The Added Presence Of Some Inexplicableness And Some Irony And Injustice, The Experience May Not Stretch Us Or Lift Us Sufficiently. The Crucifixion Of Christ Was Clearly The Greatest Injustice In Human History, But The Savior Bore Up Under It With Majesty And Indescribable Valor.

Crucifixion Of Christ

Man Can Learn Self-discipline Without Becoming Ascetic; He Can Be Wise Without Waiting To Be Old; He Can Be Influential Without Waiting For Status. Man Can Sharpen His Ability To Distinguish Between Matters Of Principle And Matters Of Preference, But Only If We Have A Wise Interplay Between Time And Truth, Between Minutes And Morality.

I Thank The Savior Personally; For Bearing All Which I Added To His Hemorrhaging At Every Pore For All Humanity In Gethsemane. I Thank Him For Bearing What I Added To The Decibels Of His Piercing Soul Cry Atop Calvary.

Do Not Let The Future Be Held Hostage By The Past

When Great Individuals Move So Marvelously Along The Straight And Narrow Path, It Is Unseemly Of Us To Call Attention To The Fact That One Of Their Shoelaces Is Untied As They Make The Journey.

Mercy Can Purge The Soul Of Sin, Making Room For A Fresh Start. Truth Is Vital In Order That We Have An Unvarying Standard By Which To Determine What We Are To Be And To Do And What We Are To Rid Ourselves Of. All The Cardinal Virtues, Therefore, Carry Their Own Intrinsic As Well As Outward Reward. A Merciful Man Does Do Good To His Own Soul.

Sir Thomas More Was A Victim Of Injustice And Irony. Generously And Meekly, Just As He Was About To Be Martyred, He Said: Paul . . . Was Present, And Consented To The Death Of St. Stephen, And Kept Their Clothes That Stoned Him To Death, And Yet Be They [stephen And Paul] Now Both Twain Holy Saints In Heaven, And Shall Continue There Friends For Ever, So I Verily Trust And . . . Pray, That Though Your Lordships Have Now Here In Earth Been Judges To My Condemnation, We May Yet Hereafter In Heaven Merrily All Meet Together, To Our Everlasting Salvation.

The Gross Size Of Our Talent Inventories Is Less Important Than The Net Use Of Our Talents?

Though We Live In A Failing World, We Have Not Been Sent Here To Fail.

While Most Of Our Suffering Is Self- Inflicted, Some Is Caused By Or Permitted By God. This Sobering Reality Calls For Deep Submissiveness, Especially When God Does Not Remove The Cup From Us. In Such Circumstances, When Reminded About The Premortal Shouting For Joy As This Life's Plan Was Unfolded (job 38:7), We Can Perhaps Be Pardoned If, In Some Moments, We Wonder What All The Shouting Was About.

I Find That Goal Setting, When Done This Way, Leads To Goal Achieving. The Chronic Failure To Achieve Goals Lowers Self-esteem. Show Me A Failure To Achieve A Goal, And Usually I Can Show You The Violation Of One Or More Of The Above Criteria. Imposed Goals, Vague Goals, And Unrealistic Goals Tend To Produce Only Partial Successes And Outright Failures.

If One Is Devoid Of Hope And Thanksgiving, He Cannot For Long Remain Sinless, For He Will, In Despair, Have Slackened His Resolve. Feelings Of Futility Foster Vulnerability. Self-pity Is Such A Busy Stagehand, Rearranging The Scenery To Help Sin Make Its Entrance. No Wonder The Prophets Say That Without Faith In The Lord, There Is No Hope.

So Much Depends, Therefore, Upon Our Maintaining Gospel Perspective In The Midst Of Ordinariness, The Pressures Of Temptation, Tribulation, Deprivation, And The Cares Of The World.

Men's And Nations' Finest Hour Consist Of Those Moments When Extraordinary Challenge Is Met By Extraordinary Response. Hence In Those Darkest Hours, We Must Light Our Individual Candles Rather Than Vying With Others To Call Attention To The Enveloping Darkness. Our Indignation About Injustice Should Lead To Illumination, For If It Does Not, We Are Only Adding To The Despair-and The Moment Of Gravest Danger Is When There Is So Little Light That Darkness Seems Normal!

Crowds Cannot Make Right What God Has Declared To Be Wrong.

A Narcissist Society, In Which Each Person Is Busy Looking Out For Number One, Can Build Neither Brotherhood Nor Community. Aren't We Glad In This Easter Season And In All Seasons That Jesus Did Not Selfishly Look Out For Number One? No Wonder We Have Been Told, 'thou Shalt Have No Other Gods Before Me,' And This Includes Self-worship! (ex. 20:3; Emphasis Added). One Way Or Another, The Grossly Selfish Will Finally Be Shattered, Whimpering, Against The Jagged, Concrete Consequences Of Their Selfishness.

The Unwillingness Of Most Leaders To Set Standards, To Administer Feedback When Standards Are Not Met, To Praise Clearly When Standards Are Met, Stands In The Way Of The Development Of Excellence. The Leader Who Makes No Demands Of His Disciples Cannot Really Lead Them At All. The Sense Of New Excitement And New Challenge Generated By The Gospel Will Be Blunted By Leaders Who Shield Followers From The Full Demands Of Fellowship.

Therefore, As We Strive To Become As The Father Is And As Jesus Is, We Are To Become More Gracious And Merciful, More Kind And Considerate. Even More, We Are To Do This In A World Which Does Little To Encourage Such Qualities Of Character.

Most Of Our Suffering Comes From Sin And Stupidity; It Is, Nevertheless, Very Real, And Growth Can Occur With Real Repentance. But The Highest Source Of Suffering Appears To Be Reserved For The Innocent Who Undergo Divine Tutorial Training.

Oh, How Great The Plan Of Our God!

We Are In Bondage To That Which Overcomes Us. See Also 2 Peter 2:19.

Eventually, There Will Not Be Enough Prisons If There Are Not Enough Good Homes.

You Rock A Sobbing Child Without Wondering If Today's World Is Passing You By, Because You Know You Hold Tomorrow Tightly In Your Arms.

Each Day I See All About Me The Fruits Of Commandment-keeping.

On The Straight And Narrow Path, There Are Simply No Corners To Be Cut.

The Great Challenge Is To Refuse To Let The Bad Things That Happen To Us Do Bad Things To Us. That Is The Crucial Difference Between Adversity And Tragedy.

The Dues Of Discipleship Are High Indeed, And How Much We Can Take So Often Determines How Much We Can Then Give.

We Are Vulnerable If We Can Be Taken By A Wave Of Emotion, Invaded By An Invidious Impulse, Roughed Up By Resentment, Or Engulfed By A Surge Of Selfishness.

It Is So Easy To Be Confrontive Without Being Informative; Indignant Without Being Intelligent; Impulsive Without Being Insightful.

We Can Be Walking Witnesses And Standing Sermons To Which Objective Onlookers Can Say A Quiet Amen.

To Be Cheerful When Others Are In Despair, To Keep The Faith When Others Falter, To Be True Even When We Feel Forsaken—all Of These Are Deeply Desired Outcomes During The Deliberate, Divine Tutorials Which God Gives To Us—because He Loves Us. These Learning Experiences Must Not Be Misread As Divine Indifference. Instead, Such Tutorials Are A Part Of The Divine Unfolding.

Selfishness Is Much More Than An Ordinary Problem Because It Activates All The Cardinal Sins! It Is The Detonator In The Breaking Of The Ten Commandments.

These Transcending Truths Restructure Our Understanding Of Ourselves And Of The Universe And Bring Within Our View Resplendent Reality. To Be Seen Only By Those Who Have Eyes To See, These Flakes Of Fire Are Embedded In The Holy Scriptures. There These Tr.

Promptings For Us To Do Good Come From The Holy Ghost. These Promptings Nudge Us Further Along The Straight And Narrow Path Of Discipleship. The Natural Man Doesn't Automatically Think Of Doing Good. It Isn't Natural. How Many People Worry About The Car Behind Them Or The Person Below Them? The Natural Man Just Doesn't Do It. For Us, However, These Promptings Enlarge Our Awareness Of Other People's Needs And Then Prod Us To Act Accordingly.

If Another Person Only Had In His Storehouse Of Deserved Self-esteem What You Had Put There, What Would He Have To Draw Upon And To Sustain Him?

In The Economy Of Heaven, God Does Not Send Thunder If A Still, Small Voice Is Enough, Or A Prophet If A Priest Can Do The Job.

As We Come Closer To Him, We Not Only "stand All Amazed"-we Even Kneel All Amazed!

During Our Mortal Schooling In Submissiveness, We Will See The Visible Crosses That Some Carry, But Other Crosses Will Go Unseen. A Few Individuals May Appear To Have No Trials At All, Which, If It Were So, Would Be A Trial In Itself. Indeed, If, As Do Trees, Our Souls Had Rings To Measure The Years Of Greatest Personal Growth, The Wide Rings Would Likely Reflect The Years Of Greatest Moisture-but From Tears, Not Rainfall.

We Are So Busy Constantly Checking Our Own Temperatures, We Fail To Notice The Burning Fevers Of Others.

Trials And Tribulations Tend To Squeeze The Artificiality Out Of Us, Leaving The Essence Of What We Really Are And Clarifying What We Really Yearn For.

I Assume, Gladly, That In The Allocation To America Of Remarkable Leaders Like Thomas Jefferson, George Washington, And Abraham Lincoln, The Lord Was Just As Careful. After All, If You've Got Only One Abraham Lincoln, You'd Better Put Him In That Point In History When He's Most Needed-much As Some Of Us Might Like To Have Him Now.

We May Never Become Accustomed To Untrue And Unjust Criticism Of Us But We Ought Not To Be Immobilized By It.

Unjust Criticism

Letting Off Steam Always Produces More Heat Than Light.

The Savior Knows What It's Like To Die Of Cancer.

There Is Also The Very Real Possibility That, In The Justice Of God, One Of The Reasons He Uses The Weak And The Foolish Of The World Is So That No Argument Could Be Made Later That Certain People Were Advantaged In Some Unfair Way By That Which Was Unearned-either In The Premortal Life Or Here. Hence It Seems Prudent For Us To Realize That Just Because One Is Set Apart Or Ordained To A Certain Calling Or Assignment He Or She Must Not Expect To Be Set Apart From The Stresses Of Life. There Appear To Be No Immunities.

Though We Have Rightly Applauded Our Ancestors For Their Spiritual Achievements ... Those Of Us Who Prevail Today Will Have Done No Small Thing.

Naive Optimism And Pervasive Pessimism Are Both To Be Avoided, Therefore. It's Not An Easy Balance To Maintain, To Be Asked To Work Away In The Ninevehs Of Our Lives Without Being So Conscious Of The Coming Cataclysm That We Are Not Serious Citizens Of Our Communities And Nations. By Living And Sharing The Gospel Of Jesus Christ, We Are Doing The Most Relevant Thing We Can Do By Way Of Helping. (there Are Civic And Other Chores To Be Done, Of Course.) Day In And Day Out, The Gospel Is The One Thing That Is Most Relevant, And We Are To Be Of Good Cheer.

We Cannot Repent For Someone Else. But We Can Forgive Someone Else, Refusing To Hold Hostage Those Whom The Lord Seeks To Set Free!

To One Degree Or Another We All Struggle With Selfishness. Since It Is So Common, Why Worry About Selfishness Anyway? Because Selfishness Is Really Self-destruction In Slow Motion. No Wonder The Prophet Joseph Smith Urged, "let Every Selfish Feeling Be Not Only Buried, But Annihilated" (teachings Of The Prophet Joseph Smith, P. 178). Hence Annihilation - Not Moderation - Is The Destination! . . . Meekness Is The Real Cure, For It Does Not Merely Mask Selfishness But Dissolves It!

We Can Hold To The Iron Rod Even If Others Slip Away And A Few End Up Mocking Us From "the Great And Spacious Building."

. . . Just As God Cannot Look Upon Sin With The Least Degree Of Allowance, As We Become More Like Him, Neither Can We. The Best People Have A Heightened Awareness Of What Little Of The Worst Is Still In Them! Indeed, The Divine Discontent, The Justifiable Spiritual Restlessness That We Feel, Is A Natural Follow-on Feeling In The Disciple Who Has Taken The Lord's Counsel To "make You A New Heart And A New Spirit." (ezekiel 18:31.)

The Charity Of Good Women Is Such That Their 'love Makes No Parade'; They Are Not Glad 'when Others Go Wrong'; They Are Too Busy Serving To Sit Statusfully About, Waiting To Be Offended.

Comparatively, We Are So Much Quicker To Return Favors And To Pay Our Debts To Mortals - And We Should Be Responsive And Grateful. But What Of Him Who Gave Us Mortal Life Itself, Who Will Ere Long Give Us All Immortality, And Who Proffers To The Faithful The Greatest Gift Of All, Eternal Life? We Are Poor Bookkeepers, Indeed!

Endurance Involves Much More Than Putting Up With A Situation; Patient Endurance Is More Than Pacing Up And Down Within The Cell Of Circumstance. True Enduring Represents Not Merely The Passage Of Time, . . . But The Passage Of Soul.

The Prompting That Goes Unresponded To May Not Be Repeated. Writing Down What We Have Been Prompted With Is Vital. A Special Thought Can Be Lost Later In The Day Through The Rough And Tumble Of Life. God Should Not, And May Not, Choose To Repeat The Prompting If We Assign What Is Given Such A Low Priority As To Put It Aside.

For Some Church Members The Book Of Mormon Remains Unread. Others Use It Occasionally As If It Were Merely A Handy Book Of Quotations. Still Others Accept And Read It But Do Not Really Explore And Ponder It. The Book Is To Be Feasted Upon, Not Nibbled (see 2 Nephi 31:20).

We Can Tell Much By What We Have Already Willing Discarded Along The Pathway Of Discipleship. It Is The Only Pathway Where Littering Is Permissible, Even Encouraged. In The Early Stages, The Debris Left Behind Includes The Grosser Sins Of Commission. Later Debris Differs; Things Begin To Be Discarded Which Have Caused The Misuse Or Underuse Of Our Time And Talent.

A Vague Goal Is No Goal At All. The Ten Commandments Wouldn't Be Very Impressive, For Instance, If They Weren't Specific, But Simply Were Couched In A Phraseology Such As 'thou Shalt Not Be A Bad Person.

Ten Commandments

For The Faithful, Our Finest Hours Are Sometimes During Or Just Following Our Darkest Hours.

The Submissive Will Make It Through To That Final Scene, For The Word Of God Will Lead The Man And Woman Of Christ "in A Straight And Narrow Course Across That Everlasting Gulf Of Misery . . . And Land Their Souls . . . At The Right Hand Of God In The Kingdom, To Sit Down With Abraham, And Isaac, And With Jacob, And With All Our Holy Fathers" (helaman 3:30) "who Have Been Ever Since The World Began . . . To Go No More Out."

Blessed Is He Who Will Not Be Offended

Any Assessment Of Where We Stand In Relationship To Him Tells Us That We Do Not Stand At All. We Kneel.

If We Are Serious About Our Discipleship, Jesus Will Eventually Request Each Of Us To Do Those Very Things Which Are Most Difficult For Us To Do.

The Overwhelming Joy Of Conversion Or A New Calling Is Often Followed By Feelings Of Being Overwhelmed With Duties And Doctrines. The First Joyous Feelings Are Real And Give One Much-needed Initial Momentum. But The Genuine Exhilaration Is Soon Followed By The Need To Perspire And To Pedal.

It Is One Of The Ironies Of Religious History That Many Mortals Err In Their Understanding Of The Nature Of God And End Up Rejecting Not The Real God But Their Own Erroneous And Stereotypical Image Of God. Frequently This Is Because They Have Thought Of God Solely In Terms Of Thunderings At Sinai Without Pondering Substance. . . .

Our God Is A God Of Love. He Waits With Open Arms, And The Unfolding Of His Merciful Plan Of Salvation Is Not Only Therefore The Mark Of Divine Power But Also The Mark Of God's Relentless, Redeeming Love. It Is A Point Well Worth Pondering Because, Among Other Reasons, It Will Help Us To Understand Better Why God, Through The Prophets, Denounces Sin And Corruption In Such Scalding Terms. He Loves All Of Us, His Spirit Sons And Daughters, But Hates Our Vices. His Denunciation Of Those Vices May, If We Are Not Careful, Seem To Obscure The Enormous And Perfect Love He Has For Us.

Life Is An 'open-book' Exam, But The Problem Is That Most Of The Students Don't Have The 'book', Or Refuse To Open It-a Fact That Ought To Spur Us On As Church Members To Share The Gospel More Widely So That Life Would Be Meaningful For More People.

As You Submit Your Wills To God, You Are Giving Him The Only Thing You Can Actually Give Him That Is Really Yours To Give. Don't Wait Too Long To Find The Altar Or To Begin To Place The Gift Of Your Wills Upon It! No Need To Wait For A Receipt; The Lord Has His Own Special Ways Of Acknowledging.

At The Center Of Our Agency Is Our Freedom To Form A Healthy Attitude Toward Whatever Circumstances We Are Placed In!

Discouragement Is Not The Absence Of Adequacy But The Absence Of Courage.

It Is Not The Years But The Changes That Make Us Grow.

Real Hope Is Much More Than Wishful Musing. It Stiffens, Not Slackens, The Spiritual Spine.

The Cavity Which Suffering Carves Into Our Souls Will One Day Also Be The Receptacle Of Joy.

As Parenting Declines, The Need For Policing Increases. There Will Always Be A Shortage Of Police If There Is A Shortage Of Effective Parents! Likewise, There Will Not Be Enough Prisons If There Are Not Enough Good Homes.

Unproductive Worry - Like Parkinson's Proverbial Law - Tends To Expand To Fill The Time Available.

Although Goal Setting Can Clearly Be Overdone, Only A Few People Are Overly Involved With Goals And Goal Setting; Most People Do Far Too Little Goal Setting, Including The Reflecting That Precedes The Setting Of Such Goals. Too Many Marriages Have Financial Goals But Not Other Explicit Goals. Yet The Gospel Is Certainly Goal-oriented.

Financial Goals

All Of Us Must Walk The Same Strait And Narrow Path, Know The Same Kind Of Experiences As Those We Would Seek To Lead And To Serve. There Is Not One Strait And Narrow Path For The Officers-the Chosen-and Another For The Enlisted Men. We Are All To Experience Life "according To The Flesh"; There Is No Other Way, For It Is The Way To Immortality And Eternal Life. Given The Resplendent Riches Of The Promised Kingdom, Why Would Anyone Wish To Walk Another Path Than The One That Leads Us Back To Our Gracious And Merciful Father In Heaven?

Many Of Those Engaged In A Lemming-like March To The Sea Are Proud Of Their Individualism.

Without Making A Fetish Of Goal Setting, And Without Letting "lists" Of Tasks We Desire To Do Dominate Us, Some Recording Of Goals Is Wise Not Only For The Self-reminder These Constitute, But Also For The Satisfaction Of Crossing Things Off.

I Have On My Office Wall A Wise And Useful Reminder By Anne Morrow Lindbergh Concerning One Of The Realities Of Life. She Wrote, "my Life Cannot Implement In Action The Demands Of All The People To Whom My Heart Responds." That's Good Counsel For Us All, Not As An Excuse To Forgo Duty, But As A Sage Point About Pace And The Need For Quality In Relationships.

Ironically, As Some People Become Harder, They Use Softer Words To Describe Dark Deeds. This, Too, Is Part Of Being Sedated By Secularism. Needless Abortion, For Instance, Is A "reproductive Health Procedure, . . ." "illegitimacy" Gives Way To The Wholly Sanitized Words "non-marital Birth" Or "alternative Parenting."

Regarding Trials, Including Of Our Faith And Patience, There Are No Exemptions-only Variations.

Your Task Is To Conquer Yourselves, Not Ships, Lands And Castles. This Battle Is The One In Which You Especially Are To 'come Off Conqueror.' It Is Fought Every Day. In Fact, It Is A Continuing Process Which Commenced A Long, Long Time Ago.

Personal, Spiritual Symmetry Emerges Only From The Shaping Of Prolonged Obedience. Twigs Are Bent, Not Snapped Into Shape.

It Is Extremely Important For You To Believe In Yourselves Not Only For What You Are Now But For What You Have The Power To Become. Trust In The Lord As He Leads You Along. He Has Things For You To Do That You Won't Know About Now But That Will Unfold Later. If You Stay Close To Him, You Will Have Some Great Adventures. You Will Live In A Time Where Instead Of Sometimes Being Fulfilled, Many Of Them Will Actually Be Fulfilled. The Lord Will Unfold Your Future Bit By Bit.

God Is Very Serious About Joy In The Lives Of His Children.

When Our Minds Really Catch Hold Of The Significance Of Jesus' Atonement, The World's Hold On Us Loosens.

Enthusiasm Needs To Be Effective Enthusiasm. We Must Distinguish Between The Contribution And Enthusiasm Of The Cheerleader And The Enthusiasm Of The Player. While Cheerleaders Serve An Important Purpose, The Real Contest Involves Players On The Field Or On The Court Of Life. We Must Not Go Through Life Acting Only As Enthusiastic Cheerleaders Available For Hire; We Must Be Anxiously And Personally Engaged.

Each Of Us Is An Innkeeper Who Decides If There Is Room For Jesus!

Sometimes We Are So Busy Being The Hammer Or The Anvil, That We Forget Who Really Needs The Shaping.

Ultimate Hope Constitutes The Anchor Of The Soul.

Beware Not To Get Caught Up In The Thick Of Thin Things.

It Is Possible To Know When, At Least Basically, We Please God. In Fact, Joseph Smith Taught That One Of The Conditions Of Genuine Faith Is To Have "an Actual Knowledge That The Course Of Life Which [one] Is Pursuing Is According To [god's] Will."

The Harrowing Of The Soul Can Be Like The Harrowing Of The Soil; To Increase The Yield, Things Are Turned Upside Down.

Brigham Young Observed, "man's Machinery Makes Things Alike" (jd 9:370), While God Gives To Seemingly Like Individuals Pleasing Differences. Secularism Is No Friend Of Righteous Individuality.

The Lord Doesn't Ask About Your Ability, Only Your Availability; And, If You Prove Your Dependability, The Lord Will Increase Your Capability.

Like Jesus, We Can Decide, Daily Or Instantly, To Give No Heed To Temptation (see D&c 20:22). We Can Respond To Irritation With A Smile Instead Of Scowl, Or By Giving Warm Praise Instead Of Icy Indifference. By Our Being Understanding Instead Of Abrupt, Others, In Turn, May Decide To Hold On A Little Longer Rather Than To Give Way. Love, Patience, And Meekness Can Be Just As Contagious As Rudeness And Crudeness.

When, As President Joseph F. Smith Said, We "catch A Spark From The Awakened Memories Of The Immortal Soul, "let Us Be Quietly Grateful. When Of Great Truths We Can Say "i Know," That Powerful Spiritual Witness May Also Carry With It The Sense Of Our Having Known Before. With Rediscovery, We Are Really Saying "i Know - Again!"

When The Real History Of Mankind Is Fully Disclosed, Will It Feature The Echoes Of Gunfire Or The Shaping Sound Of Lullabies? The Great Armistices Made By Military Men Or The Peacemaking Of Women In Homes And In Neighborhoods? Will What Happened In Cradles And Kitchens Prove To Be More Controlling Than What Happened In Congresses? When The Surf Of The Centuries Has Made The Great Pyramids So Much Sand, The Everlasting Family Will Still Be Standing, Because It Is A Celestial Institution, Formed Outside Telestial Time.

God Does Not Begin By Asking Us About Our Ability, But Only About Our Availability, And If We Then Prove Our Dependability, He Will Increase Our Capability.

We Should Not Assume; However, That Just Because Something Is Unexplainable By Us, It Is Unexplainable.

Our Afflictions Brothers And Sisters Often Will Not Be Extinguished, They Will Be Dwarfed And Swallowed Up In The Joy Of Christ. That’s How We Overcome, Most Of The Time. It’s Not Their Elimination, But The Placing Of Them In That Larger Context.

Those Few Members Who Desert The Cause Are Abandoning An Oasis To Search For Water In The Desert.

Patient Endurance Permits Us To Cling To Our Faith In The Lord And Our Faith In His Timing When We Are Being Tossed About By The Surf Of Circumstance. Even When A Seeming Undertow Grasps Us, Somehow, In The Tumbling, We Are Being Carried Forward, Though Battered And Bruised.

C. S. Lewis Pointed Out That Some People Are Angry With God For His Not Existing, And Others For His Existing But For Failing To Do As Mortals Would Have Him Do. Instead Of Such Childishness, We Are Urged To Know God And To Learn Of His Attributes.

The More Seriously We Work On Our Own Imperfections, The Less We Are Judgemental Of The Imperfections Of Others.

The Imperfections Of Others Never Release Us From The Need To Work On Our Own Shortcomings.

The Mortal Experience . . . Is Not Like A College Course Which We Can Passively Audit. Instead, We Are Taking Life's Course For Credit And There Are No Summers Off - Not Even Semester Breaks.

Repentance Is A Rescuing, Not A Dour, Doctrine.

God, As A Loving Father, Will Stretch Our Souls At Times. The Soul Is Like A Violin String: It Makes Music Only When It Is Stretched. . . . God Will Tutor Us By Trying Us Because He Loves Us, Not Because Of Indifference!

Even If Work Were Not An Economic Necessity, It Is A Spiritual Necessity.

God Will Facilitate, But He Will Not Force.

To Think Of Enduring To The End As ‘hanging In There,’ Doing One’s Duty Relentlessly, Is Not Inaccurate. Yet Enduring To The End Is More Than Outlasting And Surviving, Though It Includes Those Qualities. We Are Called Upon, As Was The Prophet Joseph, To ‘endure It Well,’ Gracefully, Not Grudgingly. (d&c 121:8.) We Are Also Told That We Must ‘endure In Faith.’ (d&c 101:35.) These Dimensions Of Enduring Are Important To Note. Likewise, We Are Asked To Endure ‘valiantly.’ (d&c 121:29.)

Enduring To The End

Long Ago When A Child Lay In A Manger, A Special Star Appeared. It Didn't Just Show Up That Evening. It Had To Have Been Placed In Its Orbit Centuries Before In A Trajectory That Would Make It Appear At That Special Moment Of Time To Announce The Birth Of A Special Child. Just As There Is Divine Design In The Universe, So Each Of Us Has Been Placed In Our Own Orbits In This Life To Love, To Serve, To Help Light The World.

A Friend Of Mine Who Passed Through A Most Severe Trial, When I Discussed It With Him, He Said Simply, If It’s Fair, It Isn’t A Trial.

There Are Also Flat Periods In Life Which May Well Be The Periods During Which-before New Lessons Come- The Past Lessons Of Life Are Allowed To Seep, Quietly And Deeply, Into The Marrow Of The Soul. These Outwardly Flat Periods, When Enduring Well May Not Seem Very Purposeful,, Are Probably The Times When Needed Attitudinal Alignments Are Quietly Occurring.

Even The Good Can Become Careless Without The Lord's Being There To Chasten.

If We Are Not Serving Jesus, And If He Is Not In Our Thoughts And Hearts, Then The Things Of The World Will Draw Us Instead To Them! Moreover, The Things Of The World Need Not Be Sinister In Order To Be Diverting And Consuming.

We Cannot Lead Or Draw Others To Christ Unless We Stand Closer To Him Than They Do.

So It Is That Real, Personal Sacrifice Never Was Placing An Animal On The Altar. Instead, It Is A Willingness To Put The Animal In Us Upon The Altar And Letting It Be Consumed! Such Is The 'sacrifice Unto The Lord... Of A Broken Heart And A Contrite Spirit,' (d&c 59:8), A Prerequisite To Taking Up The Cross, While Giving 'away All [our] Sins' In Order To 'know God' (alma 22:18) For The Denial Of Self Precedes The Full Acceptance Of Him.

If, In The End, You Have Not Chosen Jesus Christ It Will Not Matter What You Have Chosen.

How Good You And I Get At Repenting Will Determine How Good Life Is.

The Soul Is Like A Violin String: It Makes Music Only When It Is Stretched.

I Thank The Father That His Only Begotten Son Did Not Say In Defiant Protest At Calvary, "my Body Is My Own!" I Stand In Admiration Of Women Today Who Resist The "fashion Of Abortion, By Refusing To Make The Sacred Womb A Tomb!"

Our Journey Is Demanding Enough That The Need For Reassurance As Well As Reminders Is Constant.

Just As Doubt, Despair, And Desensitization Go Together, So Do Faith, Hope, And Charity. The Latter, However, Must Be Carefully And Constantly Nurtured, Whereas Despair, Like Dandelions, Needs So Little Encouragement To Sprout And Spread. Despair Comes So Naturally To The Natural Man!

It Is Understandable How Some People Could Give Way To This Kind Of Pervasive Pessimism, But We Speak Of A Gospel Which Brings Good Tidings Of Great Joy And This Must Be Reflected In Our Lives, If We Are To Be Believable Especially As We Suggest To Others That There Is, In Fact, Not Only A Better Way, But Also The Way. Scriptures That Speak Of Man As A Being Who "might Have Joy" Have More Impact When Falling From The Lips Or Pens Of Men And Women Whose Lives Give Fresh Evidence Of The Validity Of That Scripture.

Truly We Work And Live On A Streetful Of Splendid People, Whom We Are To Love And Serve Even If They Are Uninterested In Us!

The "new" In Us Is Bound To Notice The "old" That Remains.

Though We Have Rightly Applauded Our Ancestors For Their Spiritual Achievements (and Do Not And Must Not Discount Them Now), Those Of Us Who Prevail Today Will Have Done No Small Thing. The Special Spirits Who Have Been Reserved To Live In This Time Of Challenges And Who Overcome Will One Day Be Praised For Their Stamina By Those Who Pulled Handcarts.

We Cannot Improve The World If We Are Conformed To The World.

We Can Be Of So Much Service To Others In Many Thou-shalt Ways. Of Course, The Problem Is That Rendering Such Service Takes Time, And We Are All So Busy. Some Situations May Call For Service That Somehow Seems To Be Beneath Us. Besides, We Have Other Things To Do. The Thou Shalts Are So Convenient To Put Off. Who Will Notice The Procrastination Anyway? After All, We Are Not Robbing A Bank. Or Are There Forms Of Withholding That Constitute Stealing?

Procrastination

We...live In A World That Is Too Prone To The Tasteless, And We Need To Provide An Opportunity To Cultivate A Taste For The Finest Music. And, Likewise, We’re In A World That’s So Attuned To The Now That We Need To Permit People To Be More Attuned To The Best Music Of All Ages.

It's Service, Not Status, That Counts.

Patience Is Tied Very Closely To Faith In Our Heavenly Father. Actually, When We Are Unduly Impatient, We Are Suggesting That We Know What Is Best—better Than Does God. Or, At Least, We Are Asserting That Our Timetable Is Better Than His. We Can Grow In Faith Only If We Are Willing To Wait Patiently For God's Purposes And Patterns To Unfold In Our Lives, On His Timetable.

If We Entertain Temptations, Soon They Begin Entertaining Us!

Clearly, When We Baptize, Our Eyes Should Gaze Beyond The Baptismal Font To The Holy Temple. The Great Garner Into Which The Sheaves Should Be Gathered Is The Holy Temple.

Meanwhile, Spiritual Submissiveness Brings About The Wiser Use Of Our Time, Talents, And Gifts As Compared With Our Laboring Diligently But Conditionally To Establish Our Own Righteousness Instead Of The Lord's (d&c 1:16). After All, Lucifer Was Willing To Work Very Hard, But Conditionally In His Own Way And For His Own Purposes.

We, More Than Others, Should Carry Jumper And Tow Cables Not Only In Our Cars, But Also In Our Hearts, By Which Means We Can Send The Needed Boost Or Charge Of Encouragement Or The Added Momentum To Mortal Neighbors.

It Is Better To Trust And Sometimes Be Disappointed Than To Be Forever Mistrusting And Be Right Occasionally.

The Winds Of Tribulation, Which Blow Out Some Men's Candles Of Commitment, Only Fan The Fires Of Faith Of Others.

The Book Of Mormon Is To Be Feasted Upon, Not Nibbled.

Our Inspired Constitution Is Wisely Designed To Protect From Excesses Of Political Power, But It Can Do Little To Protect Us From The Excesses Of Appetite Or From Individual Indifference To Great Principles Or Institutions. Any Significant Unraveling Of The Moral Fiber Of The American People, Therefore, Finally Imperils The Constitution.

Our God Does Not Indulge Us, But He Is Merciful Toward Our Weaknesses As He Strives To Tutor Us.

Just As Meekness Is In All Our Virtues, So Is Pride In All Our Sins. Whatever Its Momentary And Alluring Guise, Pride Is The Enemy, "the First Of The Sins." One Reason To Be Particularly On Guard Against Pride Is That "the Devilish Strategy Of Pride Is That It Attacks Us, Not In Our Weakest Points, But In Our Strongest. It Is Preeminently The Sin Of The Noble Mind." Not Only Of The Noble Mind, But Also Of The Semi-righteous.

Education Brightens A Darkened World.

The Issue For Us Is Trusting God Enough To Trust Also His Timing. If We Can Truly Believe He Has Our Welfare At Heart, May We Not Let His Plans Unfold As He Thinks Best?

Real Disciples Absorb The Fiery Darts Of The Adversary By Holding Aloft The Quenching Shield Of Faith With One Hand, While Holding To The Iron Rod With The Other (see Eph. 6:16; 1 Ne. 15:24; D&c 27:17). There Should Be No Mistaking; It Will Take Both Hands!

Listen To These Wounds Of Pain Put In The Form Of Questions To Me By A Young Woman Who Had Had Two Abortions: "i Wonder About The Spirits Of Those I Had Aborted, If They Were There, If They Were Hurt? I Was Under Three Months Each Time, But A Mother Feels Life Before She Feels Movement." "i Wonder If They Are Lost And Alone?" "i Wonder If They Will Ever Have A Body?" "i Wonder If I Will Ever Have A Chance Again To Bring Those Spirits Back As Mine?" Alas, Brothers And Sisters, "wickedness Never Was Happiness" (alma 41:10).

In Contrast To The Path Of Selfishness, There Is No Room For Road Rage On The Straight And Narrow Way.

At Times God's Best Pupils Experience The Most Rigorous And Continuous Courses. Eventually Those Who Prove To Be Men Of Christ Will Thereby Become Distinguished Alumni Of Life's School Of Affliction, Graduating With Honors.

Having Faith In The Plan Of Salvation Includes Steadfastly Refusing To Be Diverted From Our True Identities And Responsibilities. In The Brief Season Of Our Existence On Earth We May Serve As A Plumber, Professor, Farmer, Physician, Mechanic, Bookkeeper, Or Teacher. These Are Useful Activities And Honorable Designations; But A Temporary Vocation Is Not Reflective Of Our True Identities. Matthew Was A Tax Collector, Luke A Physician, And Peter A Fisherman. In A Salvational Sense, 'so What!'

True Discipleship Is For Volunteers Only. Only Volunteers Will Trust The Guide Sufficiently To Follow Him In The Dangerous Ascent Which Only He Can Lead.

The Authority Of Example And Considerations Of Character, Unlike Pudding, Are Not Whipped Up In An Instant.

In One Degree Or Another We All Struggle With Selfishness. Since It Is So Common, Why Worry About Selfishness Anyway? Because Selfishness Is Really Self-destruction In Slow Motion.

All Crosses Are Easier To Carry When We Keep Moving.

Time Is Clearly Not Our Natural Dimension. Thus It Is That We Are Never Really At Home In Time. Alternately, We Find Ourselves Wishing To Hasten The Passage Of Time Or To Hold Back The Dawn. We Can Do Neither, Of Course, But Whereas The Fish Is At Home In Water, We Are Clearly Not At Home In Time--because We Belong To Eternity.

Patience Helps Us To View Imperfections In Others More Generously To The End That We May Learn To Be More Wise Than They Have Been.

Men And Women Of Christ Magnify Their Callings Without Magnifying Themselves.

Faith In God Includes Faith In God's Timing.

If The Nearly One-and-a-half Million Babies Aborted In America Each Year Could, Somehow, Vote, Chameleon Candidates Would Find Fresh Reason To Be Concerned About Abortion, Whereas Now They Are Unconcerned.

What We Insistently Desire, Over Time, Is What We Become.

We Can't Dwell Upon Another's Ingratitude Without Using Up Our Time And Talents Unprofitably.

So Often Our Sisters Comfort Others When Their Own Needs Are Greater Than Those Being Comforted. That Quality Is Like The Generosity Of Jesus On The Cross. Empathy During Agony Is A Portion Of Divinity!

How Can We Truly Understand Who We Are Unless We Know Who We Were And What We Have The Power To Become?

Mother Lode Of Learning.

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