Mormon Musings

I should like to spend the few minutes I stand before you today to salute a group of people who have developed what I believe to be a Christlike characteristic, and that is the ability to “hang on.” At this very moment, there is a man, a good member of the Church, who hovers between life and death in a nearby hospital. In the last few weeks he has withstood crisis after crisis; and yet to the amazement of all, he still hangs on. I know not whether the Lord will ordain that he should ultimately live or die at this time, but I do know there is something noble about his tenacious fight for life and the desire to hang on. In the lives of each of us come these trials—trials of all kinds which shake us to the very core and cause us to explore to the very depths our ability to hang on. I think of the person who, in the quiet of night, could not be persuaded to compromise virtue and decides instead to hang on, though the temptation is great. I think of those who have withstood the test of man

Romans 4: 1  What shall we say then that Abraham our father, as pertaining to the flesh, hath found?   2 For if Abraham were justified by works, he hath  b whereof  to glory; but not before God.   3 For what saith the scripture? Abraham believed God, and it was counted unto him for righteousness. 18 Who against hope believed in hope , that he might become the father of many nations, according to that which was spoken, So shall thy seed be.   19 And being not weak in faith, he considered not his own body now dead, when he was about an hundred years old, neither yet the deadness of Sara’s womb:   20 He staggered not at the promise of God through unbelief; but was strong in faith, giving glory to God;   21 And being fully persuaded that, what He had promised, He was able also to perform . Hebrews 11: 17 By faith Abraham, when he was tried, offered up Isaac: and he that had received the promises offered up his only begotten  son,   18 Of whom it was said, That in Isaac shall thy s

Much has been said in this conference, and more will be said, I am sure, about the sacrifice of Jesus Christ and the great miracle of the resurrection and his message to the world. It is by him and through him only that we have hope of resurrection and life after death. Through his prophets and by his own teachings, he gave us the plan of life and salvation, which if accepted and lived will give us the greatest joy and success and happiness while we sojourn here upon the earth, and eternal life hereafter. While here he taught us the importance of prayer and how to pray, and it is on this subject that I should like to address you for just a few moments. He said: “… When thou prayest, thou shalt not be as the hypocrites are: for they love to pray standing in the synagogues and in the corners of the streets, that they may be seen of men. … “But thou, when thou prayest, enter into thy closet, and when thou hast shut thy door, pray to thy Father which is in secret; and thy Father which see

The ancient prophets knew that after the darkness there would come light.  We live in that light--but do we fully comprehend it?  With the doctrines of salvation easily within our grasp, I fear that some are still overcome with the "spirit of slumber, eyes that they should not see, and ears that they should not hear." (Romans 11:8)...I ask us all to honestly evaluate our performance in scripture study.  It is a common thing to have a few passages of scripture at our disposal, floating in our minds, as it were, and thus to have the illusion that we know a great deal about the Gospel.  In this sense, having a little knowledge can be a problem indeed.  I am convinced that each of us, at some time in our lives, must discover the scriptures for ourselves--and not just discover them once, but rediscover them again and again. President Spencer W. Kimball " How Rare a Possession--the Scriptures !" Ensign, September 1976, pp 2, 4 I find that when I get casual in my rela

Asking God for our daily bread, rather than our weekly, monthly, or yearly bread, is also a way to focus us on the smaller, more manageable bits of a problem. To deal with something very big, we may need to work at it in small, daily bites. Sometimes all we can handle is one day (or even just part of one day) at a time. Let me give you a nonscriptural example. A book I read recently, titled  Lone Survivor,  recounts the tragic story of a four-man team of U.S. Navy SEALs on a covert mission in a remote sector of Afghanistan five and one-half years ago. When they were inadvertently discovered by shepherds—two men and a boy—these specially trained Navy servicemen had a choice either to kill the two or let them go, knowing that if they let them live they would disclose the team’s location and they would be attacked immediately by al Qaeda and Taliban forces. Nevertheless, they let the innocent shepherds go, and in the firefight that followed, only the author, Marcus Luttrell, survived agai