“I know people, in and out of the Church, who are following Christ just that faithfully. … I know those who live with debilitating poverty but, defying despair, ask only for the chance to make better lives for their loved ones and others in need around them.”
“In the Lord’s calculus, He will do everything He can to help us turn our slopes toward heaven. This principle should give comfort to those who struggle, and pause to those who seem to have every advantage. Let me start by addressing individuals with difficult starting circumstances, including poverty, limited access to education, and challenging family situations. Others face physical challenges, mental health constraints, or strong genetic predispositions. For any struggling with difficult starting points, please recognize that the Savior knows our struggles. He took “upon him [our] infirmities, that his bowels [might] be filled with mercy, … that he [might] know … how to succor [us] according to [our] infirmities.” ...let me share two areas of counsel for those with elevated starting points. First, can we show some humility…
“Given the monumental challenge of addressing inequity in the world, what can one man or woman do? The Master Himself offered an answer. When, prior to His betrayal and Crucifixion, Mary anointed Jesus’s head with an expensive burial ointment, Judas Iscariot protested this extravagance and “murmured against her.” Jesus said: “Why trouble ye her? she hath wrought a good work. …“She hath done what she could.” (Mark 14:6, 8) “She hath done what she could”! What a succinct formula! “Brothers and sisters, such a sermon demands that I openly acknowledge the unearned, undeserved, unending blessings in my life, both temporal and spiritual. Like you, I have had to worry about finances on occasion, but I have never been poor, nor do I even know how the poor feel. Furthermore, I…
“In what would be the most startling moment of His early ministry, Jesus stood up in His home synagogue in Nazareth and read these words prophesied by Isaiah and recorded in the Gospel of Luke: “The Spirit of the Lord is upon me, because he hath anointed me to preach the gospel to the poor; he hath sent me to heal the brokenhearted, to preach deliverance to the captives, and … set at liberty them that are bruised.” (Luke 4:18) Thus the Savior made the first public announcement of His messianic ministry. But this verse also made clear that on the way to His ultimate atoning sacrifice and Resurrection, Jesus’s first and foremost messianic duty would be to bless the poor, ...” ...the Creator of heaven and earth “and all…
“During recent months, both in Salt Lake City and across the nation, considerable interest has been expressed in the position of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints on the matter of civil rights. We would like it to be known that there is in this Church no doctrine, belief, or practice that is intended to deny the enjoyment of full civil rights by any person regardless of race, color, or creed. We say again, as we have said many times before, that we believe that we are the children of the same God, and that it is a moral evil for any person or group of persons to deny any human being the right to gainful employment, to full educational opportunity, and to every privilege of citizenship, just…
“Although pride is highly effective at drawing individuals to racism and justifying its application, greed often motivates it. The adversary offers the destructive force of racism as a dangerous tool to justify greed—greed that manifests in the oppression of others for material gain, power, and control. Greed, as it relates to racism toward African Americans, can be seen with stark clarity in the history of slavery that I outlined earlier but also in the modern day. Researchers studying the Great Recession found that predatory lending agencies—all for the sake of profit—targeted predominantly Black communities and channeled them into high-cost, high-risk mortgage loans. This left Black families vulnerable to defaulting on their loans, having their homes repossessed, and losing much of their wealth. In the end, these two unholy traits—pride and…
“The pure love of Christ [is] kind, meek, and lowly….it has no place for bigotry, hatred, or violence….It encourages diverse people to live together in Christian love regardless of religious belief, race, nationality, financial standing, education, or culture.”
Three Fold Mission of the Church: “My brothers and sisters, as the Brethren of the First Presidency and the Twelve... we are impressed that the mission of the Church is threefold: -To proclaim the gospel of the Lord Jesus Christ to every nation, kindred, tongue, and people; -To perfect the Saints by preparing them to receive the ordinances of the gospel and by instruction and discipline to gain exaltation; -To redeem the dead by performing vicarious ordinances of the gospel for those who have lived on the earth. All three are part of one work—to assist our Father in Heaven and His Son, Jesus Christ, in Their grand and glorious mission “to bring to pass the immortality and eternal life of man.” (Moses 1:39.) President Spencer W. Kimball. April 1981…
"The Savior Himself, at the beginning of His ministry, “was left to be tempted of the devil.” But Jesus emerged successful from that great trial. How did having an attitude of anti-Satan or anti-temptation serve Him? What made Jesus emerge triumphant from these most difficult moments was His spiritual preparation, which permitted Him to be in a condition to resist the temptations of the adversary. …in the account of the temptations to which the Savior was submitted, we see that He always answered Satan having scriptures in His mind, quoting them, and applying them at the right moment.”
"I am learning that Heavenly Father is more interested in my growth as a disciple of Jesus Christ than He is with my comfort. I may not always want it to be that way—but it is! Living in convenience does not bring power. The power we need to withstand the heat of our day is the Lord’s power, and His power flows through our covenants with Him. To lean in with our faith when facing strong headwinds—to sincerely strive each day to do what we covenanted with the Savior we would do, even and especially when we are tired, worried, and wrestling with troubling questions and issues—is to gradually receive His light, His strength, His love, His Spirit, His peace. The point of walking the covenant path is to approach…
