What Thinks Christ of Me?
Elder Neil L. Andersen
- Of the Quorum of the Twelve Apostles
📅 0
📖 general conference
The Saintelus family from Haiti, despite the devastating earthquake that trapped their children, held onto their faith, leading to the miraculous rescue of their three children who were found alive under the rubble.
I recently met a family who is a beautiful example of how we believe Him. Olgan and Soline Saintelus, from Port-au-Prince, Haiti, told me their story. On January 12, 2010, Olgan was at work and Soline was at the church when a devastating earthquake struck Haiti. Their three children"”Gancci, age five, Angie, age three, and Gansly, age one"”were at home in their apartment with a friend. Massive devastation was everywhere. As you will remember, tens of thousands lost their lives that January i ... (continued)
Forgiveness
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What This Work Is All About
President Gordon B. Hinckley
- Counselor in the First Presidency
📅 0
📖 general conference
A man shares his journey from disinterest in the Church to becoming an active and devoted member, serving a mission, and building a family, with the help of his bishops and newfound self-reliance.
Now, I should like to read portions of a letter that came to my desk. I have changed the names to preserve anonymity and have somewhat abbreviated it, paraphrasing a few words in the process. The letter reads:
"Dear President Hinckley,
"When I met you in the elevator at the hospital I had the urge to write you and tell you of some of the things that have happened to me.
"When I was sixteen or seventeen I cared nothing for the Church and would not have anything to do with it. But a bishop who was ... (continued)
Forgiveness
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What We Are Fighting For
Elder Richard R. Lyman
- Of the Council of the Twelve Apostles
📅 0
📖 general conference
Henry Van Dyke's poem is cited to express the preference for death over living under oppression and the importance of fighting for freedom.
Henry Van Dyke says:
Oh, better to be dead
With a face turned toward the sky,
Than live beneath a slavish dread
And serve a giant lie.
Stand up, stand up, my heart, and strive
For the things most dear to thee!
Why should we care to be alive
Unless the world is free?
Baptism
Faith
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What We Are Fighting For
Elder Richard R. Lyman
- Of the Council of the Twelve Apostles
📅 0
📖 general conference
On the day World War I ended, Henry Van Dyke wrote about welcoming home the spirits of the dead and the living sons of America, celebrating the victory for freedom.
On the very day the other war was ended, November 11, 1918, he wrote:
Oh, welcome home in Heaven's peace, dear spirits of the dead!
And welcome home ye living sons America hath bred!
The lords of war are beaten down, your glorious task is done;
You fought to make the whole world free, and the victory is won.
Forgiveness
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What We Are Fighting For
Elder Richard R. Lyman
- Of the Council of the Twelve Apostles
📅 0
📖 general conference
The struggle of the United Nations in the war is compared to the war in heaven, emphasizing the fight for liberty, freedom, and the right of choice.
This struggle is like that great war of long ago which was fought in heaven. And the cause for which we fight is the same, that is, liberty and freedom, the right of choice, for all the sons and all the daughters of God. However great the cost, this struggle must go on until we are victorious.
Charity
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What We Are Fighting For
Elder Richard R. Lyman
- Of the Council of the Twelve Apostles
📅 0
📖 general conference
Abraham Lincoln's speech is referenced to draw a parallel between the Civil War and a current greater war for liberty and equality.
Long years ago Abraham Lincoln said that '. . . our fathers brought forth on this continent, a new nation, conceived in liberty, and dedicated to the proposition that all men are created equal. Now,' said he, 'we are engaged in a great Civil War, testing whether that nation or any nation so conceived and so dedicated can long endure. . . .' Today we are engaged in a greater war, a war that covers the whole earth. We are fighting on battlefields around the world for the sacred purpose of demonstr ... (continued)
Charity
Forgiveness
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What We Are Fighting For
Elder Richard R. Lyman
- Of the Council of the Twelve Apostles
📅 0
📖 general conference
Henry Van Dyke's words are used to describe the fierce nature of the current world war and the commitment to freedom symbolized by the flag.
What he wrote then concerning the other world war and our flag applies to this world war
and to our flag with even greater accuracy and force:
O fiercer than all wars before
That raged on land or sea,
The Giant Robber's world-wide war
For the things that shall not be!
Thy sister banners hold the line;
To thee, dear flag, they call;
And thou hast joined them with the sign—the heavenly sign, the victor sign—
Of the stars that never fall.
All hail to thee, New Glory!
We follow thee un ... (continued)
Jesus Christ
Repentence
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What We Are Fighting For
Elder Richard R. Lyman
- Of the Council of the Twelve Apostles
📅 0
📖 general conference
President Grant's visit to Geneva, Switzerland, is recounted, where he was shown the city's beauty and contemplated the fittingness of building a temple there.
When President Grant was in Europe a few years ago, the mayor of Geneva, Switzerland, took him and as many others of his party as the mayor's car would carry (seven as I remember it) and showed the members of that party the flowers, the parks, the mountain scenery, the loveliness of Lake Geneva, and many other of the attractions in and about that famous city, that great center of peace. President Grant the next day expressed the thought that somewhere among the hills surrounding that city, in th ... (continued)
Jesus Christ
Repentence
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What We Are Fighting For
Elder Richard R. Lyman
- Of the Council of the Twelve Apostles
📅 0
📖 general conference
The mayor of Geneva shows President Grant's party historic Swiss documents, akin to the US Constitution and Declaration of Independence, emphasizing Switzerland's commitment to peace.
The mayor later also took the party through the historic municipal and national buildings of Geneva and showed to us, the members of the party, the many and impressive historic documents and other treasures which the people of Switzerland hold dear as we hold dear the original copies of the Constitution of the United States and our Declaration of Independence. Some twenty-one or twenty-two nations are held together in Switzerland by their love of independence and liberty much as our forty-eight ... (continued)
Faith
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What We Are Fighting For
Elder Richard R. Lyman
- Of the Council of the Twelve Apostles
📅 0
📖 general conference
Henry Van Dyke's poem 'Golden Stars' is referenced to honor the sacrifice of soldiers who have died in war, with their service stars changing from blue to gold.
And when peace finally comes and the war is ended, the following words of Van Dyke found in his poem entitled 'Golden Stars,' will apply as appropriately no doubt as they did when they were read for the first time at the Memorial Service held at Princeton University, December 15, 1918, just four days after the Armistice was signed. He said:
But many a lad we hold
Dear in our heart of hearts
Is missing from the home-returning host.
Ah, say not they are lost,
For they have found and given their li ... (continued)
Baptism
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What We Are Fighting For
Elder Richard R. Lyman
- Of the Council of the Twelve Apostles
📅 0
📖 general conference
The speaker invokes the agony of Christ in Gethsemane and His ultimate submission to God's will as a model for the United Nations' resolve to win the war, despite the cost.
These are trying days, terrible times. The agony on the part of the mothers and of the young wives of those soldiers who may be called upon to give their lives on the field of honor is not unlike the agony of the Master Himself in the garden of Gethsemane. It was under the trying conditions then surrounding Him that He exclaimed, '. . . Father, all things are possible unto thee; take away this cup from me' Mark 14:36 Three times He repeated this the most earnest, prayerful appeal that ever fell ... (continued)
Jesus Christ
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What Will the Church Do for You, a Man?
Elder Gordon B. Hinckley
- Of the Council of the Twelve
📅 0
📖 general conference
A local Church officer, a lawyer, helps a neighbor with marriage and financial troubles by involving a committee of priesthood quorum members.
A local Church officer called me one day. He was a lawyer and said that one of his neighbors had come seeking his help in getting a divorce. He said that his marriage was in serious trouble. He and his wife had been living far beyond their means, they were hopelessly in debt, money problems had led to constant bickering, and the marriage had deteriorated to a point where they could not go on together.
We discussed the case, and the end result was that three of the man’s priesthood quorum ... (continued)
Forgiveness
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What Will the Church Do for You, a Man?
Elder Gordon B. Hinckley
- Of the Council of the Twelve
📅 0
📖 general conference
A Japanese businessman, once a member of the Imperial Army, overcomes his hatred for Americans and alcoholism through the influence of LDS missionaries.
I stood one day some years ago with a Japanese businessman in Hiroshima, beside the monument that marks the events of that tragic August 6, 1945, when in a matter of minutes some 85,000 people were killed. He told me that he had been a member of the Japanese Imperial Army, that out of that experience had come a hatred for all Americans.
One day two of our missionaries knocked on his door. He was too intoxicated to talk with them. All purpose had gone from his life, and his only refuge was drink. ... (continued)
Forgiveness
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What Will the Church Do for You, a Man?
Elder Gordon B. Hinckley
- Of the Council of the Twelve
📅 0
📖 general conference
A young man, once an orphan with a difficult past, finds growth and responsibility through his service and assignments in the Church.
I recall speaking with a young man who first came to this community while in military service. One Sunday he wandered through Temple Square. Conversations begun here eventually led to his baptism.
Four or five years later I was interviewing him to become an elders quorum president. He told me of his childhood as an orphan, pushed from one place to another, of the loneliness and desolation of his life, of all opportunities for education and growth foreclosed against him. Then he came into the Chu ... (continued)
Forgiveness
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What Will the Church Do for You, a Man?
Elder Gordon B. Hinckley
- Of the Council of the Twelve
📅 0
📖 general conference
A convert to the Church changes his perspective on disciplining his children, leading to a more loving and respectful family dynamic.
A convert to the Church once said, "As a father I believed in caning my children. The slightest infraction of a rule was answered with prompt physical punishment. Then the gospel came into our home. I saw my children in a new light. They were my children, yes, but they were also children of our Eternal Father. How could I abuse a child of God? I began to develop an entirely new point of view toward my children, and they reciprocated with a new attitude toward me.
"Do we have discipline in our ho ... (continued)
Forgiveness
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What Will the Church Do for You, a Man?
Elder Gordon B. Hinckley
- Of the Council of the Twelve
📅 0
📖 general conference
The speaker reflects on the funeral of a prominent community member, highlighting the comfort and assurance provided by the Church's teachings on eternal families.
I spoke not long ago at the funeral of a prominent man in this community. It was a time for mourning, yes. But it was also a time for reassurance. And shining through the tears of the wonderful little woman and her children who that day were bereaved was a smile of peace that came of an overriding conviction that their husband and father had merely gone hence to prepare for reunions that will follow.
Following that service I received a letter from a business leader in the community, a man not of ... (continued)
Forgiveness
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What Will the Harvest Be?
Bishop John H. Vandenberg
- Presiding Bishop of the Church
📅 0
📖 general conference
A bishop who took President David O. McKay's counsel seriously about the activity of the youth shaping the spirituality of a ward, led to a rich harvest of spirituality and devotion in his ward.
The spirituality of a ward will be commensurate with the activity of the youth in that ward. The president of the priests quorum is the bishop, by ordination, and it is his duty to have the confidence of those young men and girls of corresponding ages, for they will mold the moral atmosphere of his ward.
Forgiveness
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What Will the Harvest Be?
Bishop John H. Vandenberg
- Presiding Bishop of the Church
📅 0
📖 general conference
The speaker visited welfare farms in Magic Valley, Idaho, and contrasted the well-managed farms with a neglected beet field overgrown with weeds, drawing a parallel to the importance of daily care in our lives to avoid a poor harvest.
Recently, I was in Magic Valley, Idaho. While there I visited three welfare farms that are operated by the wards of the Church in that area. I was impressed by the way in which these farms were being managed. The bounteous crops evidenced the fact that the farms were being cared for properly. It appeared that there would be an excellent harvest.
As we drove away from these farms, however, we noticed a beet field that was overgrown with weeds. It seemed to have had little or no care. Because of t ... (continued)
Forgiveness
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What Will the Harvest Be?
Bishop John H. Vandenberg
- Presiding Bishop of the Church
📅 0
📖 general conference
A bishop involved the young men and women in spiritual quests, leading to them taking initiative and planning activities such as visiting homebound members, presenting programs, repairing toys, and clearing weeds, demonstrating the harvest reaped by involving youth in meaningful responsibilities.
An example of the harvest reaped by a bishop who is taking up the cause and is involving the young men and young women of his ward in the spiritual quest has been reported firsthand to the Presiding Bishopric by a young man and a young woman who are participating in this experience. Under the confidence of the bishop the young people of this ward are saying, "Bishop, this is what we want to do. (1) Under your direction we would like to take a program to the homebound members of our ward. (2) Wit ... (continued)
Forgiveness
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What Will the Harvest Be?
Bishop John H. Vandenberg
- Presiding Bishop of the Church
📅 0
📖 general conference
King Saul is presented as a tragic example of someone who sowed pride and hate, feeling above the law, and ultimately reaped a life of sorrow and tragedy, illustrating the irrevocable law of the harvest.
The law of the harvest is irrevocable in any phase of life. With the simplicity of this law, it is paradoxical that some people have not learned to live their lives accordingly. King Saul offers a tragic example of a man who, in his personal life, failed to learn this simple, yet profound, lesson of life. Unwisely, Saul began to sow pride and hate, feeling be was above the law. Saul could have been a great king; however, he soon began to reap the product of sowing hate and pride. He found from b ... (continued)
Forgiveness
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