Today the most visible strength of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints is the unselfish service and sacrifice of its members. Prior to the rededication of one of our temples, a Christian minister asked President Gordon B. Hinckley why it did not contain any representation of the cross, the most common symbol of the Christian faith. President Hinckley replied that the symbols of our Christian faith are “the lives of our people.”5 Truly, our lives of service and sacrifice are the most appropriate expressions of our commitment to serve the Master and our fellowmen.
Perhaps the most familiar and most important examples of unselfish service and sacrifice are performed in our families. Mothers devote themselves to the bearing and nurturing of their children. Husbands give themselves to supporting their wives and children. The sacrifices involved in the eternally important service to our families are too numerous to mention and too familiar to need mention.
I believe that Latter-day Saints who give unselfish service and sacrifice in worshipful imitation of our Savior adhere to eternal values to a greater extent than any other group of people. Latter-day Saints look on their sacrifices of time and means as a part of their schooling and qualifying for eternity. This is a truth revealed in the Lectures on Faith, which teach that “a religion that does not require the sacrifice of all things never has power sufficient to produce the faith necessary unto life and salvation. … It [is] through this sacrifice, and this only, that God has ordained that men should enjoy eternal life.”
The other day at the archives Elder Low talked about Brother Oaks talk on sacrifice. This is a beautiful talk with I would encourage all to read.
It is not easy to be away from family and friends. My Daughter Leslie is very sick today with an infection. I am grateful for her righteous husband and the blessing he gave her. I would be at her house helping her if I was home but I am not. I have to leave her in Gods hands. Those are the best hands a daughter could be in. I know Heavenly Father can take better care of her than I can. I consider this to be a great blessing. I have also had to put my dad in the hands of Heavenly Father. I love my dad and miss him greatly.
I always go and read Neal a Maxwell when I need comfort. Here are a few of his comforting words:
"No pain that we suffer, no trial that we experience is waste; it ministers to our education the development of such qualities as patience, faith, fortitude and humility. All we suffer and all we endure patiently, builds up our character, purifies our hearts and expands our soul, and make us tender and charitable and more worthy to be a child of God.
God, as a loving Father will stretch our souls at times. He is never surprised by developments within our lives. This estate is to be a learning and test experience. If it is fair, it is not a true trial. With irony and injustice, the experience may not stretch us or lift us sufficiently. The absence of major tribulation can ironically product the trial of tranquility with its very grave risk of careless ease.
One day we will praise God for taking us near to our limits - as He did His Only Begotten in Gethsemane and Calvary. In retrospect, we will even see that out most trying years here will often have been our best years, producing large tree rings on our should of gethsemane's grow."
I LOVE THESE REMARKS AND READ THEM OFTEN. THE REMARKS HELP TO GROUND ME IN THE GOSPEL. I READ THEM WHEN I FEEL DOWN AND THEY HELP ME HAVE A BETTER UNDERSTANDING OF THE GOSPEL.
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