Skip to main content

Posts

Petitioning in Prayer (Maxwell)

“Petitioning in prayer has taught me, again and again, that the vault of heaven with all its blessings is to be opened only by a combination lock.  One tumbler falls when there is faith, a second when there is personal righteousness; the third and final tumbler falls only when what is sought is, in God’s judgment—not ours—right for us.  Sometimes we pound on the fault door for something we want very much and wonder why the door does not open.  We would be very spoiled children if that fault door opened any more easily than it does.  I can tell, looking back, that God truly loves me by inventorying the petitions He has refused to grant me.  Our rejected petitions tell us much about ourselves but also much about our flawless Father.”  Elder Neal A. Maxwell, “Insights”, New Era, April 1978

Answers to Prayer (Packer)

“Answers to prayer come in a quiet way.  The scriptures describe that voice of inspiration as a still, small voice...I have come to I know that inspiration comes more as a feeling than a sound...Put difficult questions in the back of your minds and go about your lives.  Ponder and pray quietly and persistently about them.  The answer may not come as a lightning bolt.  It may come as a little inspiration here and a little there, ‘line upon line, precept upon precept’ (D&C 98:12).  Some answers will come from reading the scriptures, some from hearing speakers.  And, occasionally, when it is important, some will come by very direct and powerful inspiration.  The promptings will be clear and unmistakable.”  President Boyd K. Packer, G.C. October 1979)

The crucial test of life (Packer)

"We want our children and their children to know that the choice in life is not between fame and obscurity, nor is the choice of life between wealth and poverty.  The choice is between good and evil, and that is a very different matter indeed.   When we finally understand this lesson, thereafter our happiness will not be determined by material things.  We may be happy without them or successful in spite of them.  Wealth and prominence do not always come from having earned them.  Our worth is not measured by renown or by what we own...Our lives are made up of thousands of everyday choices.  Over the years these little choices will bundle together and show clearly what we value.  The crucial test of life, I repeat, does not center in the choice between fame and obscurity, nor between wealth and poverty.  The greatest decision of life is between good and evil."  President Boyd K. Packer, October 1980 GC

Perfect Judgment (Maxwell)

"Jacob, in 2 Nephi 9:41, in speaking of the straight and narrow, reminds us that 'the keeper of the gate is the Holy One of Israel' and that Jesus 'employeth no servant there.' The emphasis rightly is on the fact that Jesus 'cannot be deceived.' There is another dimension of reassurance, too: not only will the ultimate judgment not be delegated in order to serve the purposes of divine justice, but also divine mercy can best be applied by Him who knows these things, what only He can know--the quiet moments of courage in the lives of His flock, the un-noticed acts of Christian service, the unspoken thoughts which can be 'credited' in no other way, except through perfect judgment." (Elder Neal A. Maxwell, "For the Power Is in Them." [1970], 37)

Other Books Will Come Forth (Welch)

Let me share a personal story to illustrate this point. During my time in law school at Duke University, I attended a class in the Duke Divinity School from James Charlesworth. He was a very prominent Dead Sea Scrolls scholar working at that time on a translation of Jewish and Christian texts from around the time of Christ that had never been translated and published in English. In this class, we were charged with reading a certain text. Charlesworth presented it as one of the most puzzling texts he had ever run across. His question was: Is it Christian or Jewish? He had no idea where it might have originated, because it was quite unlike anything else that he had ever seen. He explained to this seminar that it tells a story about a man named Zosimus who leaves Jerusalem. He goes out into the desert, wanders and gets lost in a big mist of darkness. He then arrives at the banks of a big ocean or river. He cannot move. He is afraid because he wants to know the way to a life of righte

Prayer (Talmage)

"It is well to know that prayer is not compounded of words, words that may fail to express what one desires to say, words that so often cloak inconsistencies, words that may have no deeper source than the physical organs of speech, words that may be spoken to impress mortal ears. The dumb may pray, and that too with the eloquence that prevails in heaven. Prayer is made up of heart throbs and the righteous yearnings of the soul, of supplication based on the realization of need, of contrition and pure desire. If there lives a man who has never really prayed, that man is a being apart from the order of the divine in human nature, a stranger in the family of God’s children. Prayer is for the uplifting of the suppliant. God without our prayers would be God; but we without prayer cannot be admitted to the kingdom of God. So did Christ instruct: “your Father knoweth what things ye have need of, before ye ask him.” James E. Talmage, Jesus The Christ

The Price of a Perfect Life (Porter)

“We are accustomed to saying that the Atonement took place in Gethsemane and on Calvary. In a literal sense, this is true, since it was in the last hours of his life that Christ took upon himself the full burden and weight of the sins of the world. But the trial of Jesus in Gethsemane and on the cross would not have been possible and could not have occurred had it not been preceded by a lifetime of sinless virtue, accomplished in the face of the most vehement spiritual opposition. From his temptation in the wilderness to his rejection in Nazareth to the illegal trial before the Sanhedrin, Christ paid the price of a perfect life, walking in holy sinlessness despite adversity, physical suffering, deep sorrows, and the snares of ruthless and determined adversaries, both seen and unseen. “He suffered temptations but gave no heed unto them” (D& C 20: 22). All this he did with the knowledge that one misstep would mean creation’s doom! For had he sinned even in the smallest poin