Gems of the Week

I want to share a few gems I found over the past week.

These were just what I needed to get through some rough days and give me food for thought.

I'll start with the most recent, which I came across here.  I ran into Emily's Lioness at the Gate blog as I was searching for an appropriate quote for the Mother's Day "gift" for the sisters in our ward. I remembered a talk Sister Beck gave at Women's Conference a few years back (2010) that had impacted me greatly: Choose Ye This Day to Serve the Lord. In my quest to find the talk, I also found Emily's blog. I decided to follow it, since I liked her simple and honest style of writing, and her focus on her values and beliefs. Anyway, she posted this yesterday and I loved it.

I love "The Captial-T-Truth is about Life Before Death..." 
It ties perfectly to this scripture in Alma 34:32:
"For behold, this life is the time for men to prepare (TG Self-Mastery) to meet God; yea, behold the day of this life is the day for men to perform their labors (TG Good Works)."

I found it interesting that earlier this week, Bill shared with me how he felt that people needed to slow down. Look around. Appreciate all that God has done for us. Have a respect for the people and things around us. I appreciated this reminder that it takes a conscious effort to look outside of ourselves. I believe it will help us show greater love to others when we do. I put it into practice today while I was at the temple, and was filled with an overwhelming feeling of love for others attending the session.  The thought that they were all good people, striving to do their best, seeking for strength and help, offering service to others, filled me with gratitude to be there and a sense of unity with these people I didn't know. My next goal is to use this technique while driving (probably a lot more challenging).

Earlier this week, as I was reading this blog, I came across a reference to a talk by Elder Donald L. Hallstrom given at a BYU Devotional earlier this year called Living a Reverent Life.

Here are a couple of my favorite quotes:

"Public worship is when we assemble as children of God, as brothers and sisters, as a community of Saints... In each of these meetings we pray, we teach, we testify, and we edify - all with the purpose of increasing our understanding of our Father in Heaven, Jesus the Christ, and the Holy Spirit. We then have the responsibility to translate that ever-increasing knowledge into wisdom - to continually lessen the gap between what we know and how we live."

Elder Hallstrom also shared a quote given by Elder D. Todd Christofferson:

"The importance of having a sense of the sacred is simply this - if one does not appreciate holy things, he will lose them. Absent a feeling of reverence, he will grow increasingly casual in attitude and lax in conduct. He will drift from the moorings that his covenants with God could provide. His feeling of accountability to God will diminish and then be forgotten. Thereafter, he will care only about his own comfort and satisfying his uncontrolled appetites. Finally, he will come to despise sacred things, even God, and then he will despise himself."

Elder Hallstrom's definition of a reverent life:  a life reflective of our love for God the Eternal Father and Jesus Christ, His Son and our Savior.  He concludes with "Whatever your circumstances, living a reverent life will lessen your load... Today can be a pivotal, even historic day in our lives. It can be the day we make the decision and take the disciplined efforts to become more reverent."

Is it just me, or does this not tie into the "This is Water" clip AND into Bill's comments about slowing down and giving gratitude for our blessings.  Thinking of others before self. Consciously living and making the choice to show charity.

And finally, I came across a talk given by Elder David A. Bednar (I was attempting to listen to the CES Broadcast talk by Elder William R. Walker this past Sunday) called That We Might "Not Shrink".  

Here are a few gems:

"Elder Neal A. Maxwell was a beloved disciple of the Lord Jesus Christ. He served as a member of the Quorum of the Twelve Apostles for 23 years. The spiritual power of his teachings and his example of faithful discipleship blessed and continue to bless in marvelous ways the members of the Savior's restored Church and the people of the world.

In October of 1997, Sister Bednar and I hosted Elder and Sister Maxwell at BYU-I. Elder Maxwell was to speak to the students, staff, and faculty in a devotional assembly... Earlier that same year, Elder Maxwell underwent 46 days and nights of debilitating chemotherapy for leukemia... His rehabilitation and continued therapy progressed positively through the spring and summers months, but Elder Maxwell's physical strength and stamina were nonetheless limited when he traveled to Rexburg... During the course of our conversation that day, I asked Elder Maxwell what lessons he had learned through his illness. I will remember always the precise and penetrating answer he gave. 'Dave,' he said, 'I have learned that not shrinking is more important than surviving.'"

Elder Bednar then shared a quote I love from President Spencer W. Kimball:

"No pain that we suffer, no trial that we experience is wasted. It ministers to our education, to the development of such qualities as patience, faith, fortitude and humility. All that we suffer and all that we endure, especially when we endure patiently, builds up our characters, purifies our hearts, expands our souls, and makes us more tender and charitable, more worthy to be called the children of God... and it is through sorrow and suffering, toil and tribulation, that we gain the education that we come here to acquire."

This whole talk is great food-for-thought; but here is a closing quote:

"The potent spiritual combination of faith in and on the holy name of Jesus Christ, of meekly submitting to His will and timing, of pressing forward 'with unwearied diligence', and of acknowledging His hand in all things yields the peaceable things of the kingdom of God that bring joy and eternal life."

I consider it a tender mercy this week to have stumbled upon these talks. They have given me a lot to contemplate and improve upon.

Have a great weekend!