Children and Timing

“Marie and I had rationalized that to get me through medical school it would be necessary for her to remain in the workplace. Although this was not what we [wanted] to do, children would have to come later. [While looking at a Church magazine at my parents’ home,] I saw an article by Elder Spencer W. Kimball, then of the Quorum of the Twelve, [highlighting] responsibilities associated with marriage. According to Elder Kimball, one sacred responsibility was to multiply and replenish the earth. My parents’ home was [close to] the Church Administration Building. I immediately walked to the offices, and 30 minutes after reading his article, I found myself sitting across the desk from Elder Spencer W. Kimball.” (This wouldn’t be so easy today.)

“I explained that I wanted to become a doctor. There was no alternative but to postpone having our family. Elder Kimball listened patiently and then responded in a soft voice, ‘Brother Mason, would the Lord want you to break one of his important commandments in order for you to become a doctor? With the help of the Lord, you can have your family and still become a doctor. Where is your faith?’”

Elder Mason continued: “Our first child was born less than a year later. Marie and I worked hard, and the Lord opened the windows of heaven.” The Masons were blessed with two more children before he graduated from medical school four years later.⁹

Elder Neil L. Andersen "Children"

Motherhood

“[Growing] up in this culture, it is very hard to get a biblical perspective on motherhood. … Children rank way below college. Below world travel for sure. Below the ability to go out at night at your leisure. Below honing your body at the gym. Below any job you may have or hope to get.” She then adds: “Motherhood is not a hobby, it is a calling. You do not collect children because you find them cuter than stamps. It is not something to do if you can squeeze the time in. It is what God gave you time for."

www.desiringchildren.org

The Healing Power of the Priesthood

Dr. Russell M. Nelson was in Manzanillo, Mexico, in February 1978, attending medical meetings with the group of doctors he had graduated with 30 years earlier. Suddenly, one of the doctors became seriously ill, suffering from massive internal bleeding in his stomach. Under normal circumstances, any of the physicians in the room could have treated him. But in a remote fishing village with no hospitals nearby, no planes that could fly at night, and no medical equipment, they realized they were helpless as they watched their colleague suffer.

“All the combined knowledge and concern there could not be converted to action to help our friend as we saw his life ebbing before our eyes. We were powerless to stop his bleeding,” Elder Nelson said.

The victim asked for a blessing. Several of the doctors who held the Melchizedek Priesthood immediately responded, and Dr. Nelson acted as voice. “The Spirit dictated that the bleeding would stop and that the man would continue to live and return to his home and profession.” The man recovered and returned home.

“Men can do very little of themselves to heal sick or broken bodies,” Elder Nelson said. “With an education they can do a little more; with advanced medical degrees and training, a little more yet can be done. The real power to heal, however, is a gift from God. He has deigned that some of that power may be harnessed via the authority of His priesthood to benefit and bless mankind when all man can do for himself may not be sufficient.”

Lds.org What Are Prophets and Apostles

Submission of Will

"The submission of one’s will is really the only uniquely personal thing we have to place on God’s altar. The many other things we “give,” brothers and sisters, are actually the things He has already given or loaned to us. However, when you and I finally submit ourselves, by letting our individual wills be swallowed up in God’s will, then we are really giving something to Him! It is the only possession which is truly ours to give!"

Elder Neal A. Maxwell

I Really Lived

"I don't want to drive up to the pearly gates in a shiny sports car, wearing beautifully, tailored clothes, my hair expertly coiffed, and with long, perfectly manicured fingernails.

I want to drive up in a station wagon that has mud on the wheels from taking kids to scout camp. I want to be there with a smudge of peanut butter on my shirt from making sandwiches for a sick neighbors children. I want to be there with a little dirt under my fingernails from helping to weed someone's garden. I want to be there with children's sticky kisses on my cheeks and the tears of a friend on my shoulder. I want the Lord to know I was really here and that I really lived."

Marjorie Pay Hinckley

And now, my friends--what can we possibly give to the Lord this Christmastime? In consideration of all that he has done and is doing for us, there is something that we might give him in return.

Christ's great gift to us was his life and sacrifice--should that not then be our small gift to him--our lives and sacrifices, not only now, but in the future? A few years ago, my colleague, Elder Boyd Packer, said this:

I'm not ashamed to say that . . . I want to be good. And I've found in my life that it has been critically important that this was established between me and the Lord so that I knew that He knew which way I committed my agency. I went before Him and said, "I'm not neutral, and you can do with me what you want. If you need my vote, it's there. I don't care what you do with me, and you don't have to take anything from me, because I give it to you--everything, all I own, all I am." And that makes the difference. [Seminary and Institute conference, summer 1970]

Yes, men and women who turn their lives over to God will find out that he can make a lot more out of their lives than they can. He will deepen their joys, expand their vision, quicken their minds, strengthen their muscles, lift their spirits, multiply their blessings, increase their opportunities, comfort their souls, raise up friends, and pour out peace. Whoever will lose his life to God will find he has eternal life.

And now as to our sacrifice to him. Yes, sacrifice is the crowning test of the gospel. Men are tried and tested in this mortal probation to see if they will put first into their lives the things of the kingdom of God (see Matthew 6:33). To gain eternal life, they must be willing, if called upon, to sacrifice all things for the gospel. "If thou wilt be perfect," Jesus said to the rich young man, "go and sell that thou hast, and give to the poor, and thou shalt have treasure in heaven: and come and follow me."

Hearing this injunction, Peter said, "Behold, we have forsaken all, and followed thee; what shall we have therefore?"

To this query, our Lord replied, "Every one that hath forsaken houses, or brethren, or sisters, or father, or mother, or wife, or children, or lands, for my name's sake, shall receive an hundredfold, and shall inherit everlasting life" (Matthew 19:16–29; see also D&C 132:55).

Joseph Smith said this about sacrifice:

For a man to lay down his all, his character and reputation, his honor and applause, his good name among men, his houses, his lands, his brothers and sisters, his wife and children, and even his life--counting all things but filth and dross for the excellency of the knowledge of Jesus Christ--requires more than mere belief or supposition that he is doing the will of God; but actual knowledge, realizing that, when these sufferings are ended he will enter into eternal rest; and be a partaker of the glory of God. . . . A religion that does not require the sacrifice of all things never has power sufficient to produce the faith necessary unto life and salvation; for, from the first existence of man, the faith necessary unto the enjoyment of life and salvation never could be obtained without the sacrifice of all earthly things. It was through this sacrifice, and this only that God has ordained that men should enjoy eternal life. [Lectures on Faith, pp. 58–60]

Elder Bruce McConkie said, "Sacrifice pertains to mortality; in the eternal sense there is none. Sacrifice involves giving up the things of this world because of the promises of blessings to be gained in a better world. In the eternal perspective there is no sacrifice in giving up all things--even including the laying down of one's life--if eternal life is gained through such a course" (Mormon Doctrine [Salt Lake City: Bookcraft, 1966], p. 664; see also D&C 98:13–15).

But just as when one loses his life to God he really finds the abundant life; so also, when one sacrifices all to God, then God in return shares all that he has with him. Try as you may, you cannot put the Lord in your debt--for every time you try to do his will he simply pours out more blessings upon you. Sometimes the blessings may seem to you to be a little slow in coming; perhaps this tests your faith, but come they will and abundantly. And it has been said, "Cast your bread upon the waters and after a while it comes back toasted and buttered."

Said President Brigham Young:

I have heard a great many tell about what they have suffered for Christ's sake. I am happy to say I never had occasion to. I have enjoyed a great deal, but so far as suffering goes I have compared it a great many times, in my feelings and before congregations, to a man wearing an old, worn-out, tattered and dirty coat, and somebody comes along and gives him one that is new, whole and beautiful. This is the comparison I draw when I think of what I've suffered for the Gospel's sake--I have thrown away an old coat and have put on a new one. [Discourses of Brigham Young, comp. John A. Widtsoe (Salt Lake City: Deseret Book Co., 1973), p. 348]

Do you know one reason why righteous mothers love their children so much? It's because they sacrifice so much for them. We love what we sacrifice for, and we sacrifice for what we love.

[A young girl] had sacrificed her worldly plans to spend long, tedious hours in work in order to provide for and raise her younger orphan brother. But now she lay on her bed, dying of a sickness. She called for her bishop, and as she talked to him in her last moments, he held her rough, hard, work-calloused hand in his. Then she asked the question "How will God know that I am his?"

Gently he raised her wrist and answered, "Show him your hands."

Someday we may see that pair of hands that sacrificed so much for us. Are our hands clean, and do they show the signs of being in his service? Are our hearts pure and filled with his thoughts?

Each week we make a solemn covenant to be like him and take him for our leader, to always remember him in everything and keep all of his commandments.

President Benson

Unseen eyes are watching

A few years ago, we knew our Elder Brother and his and our Father in heaven well. We rejoiced at the upcoming opportunity for earthly life that could make it possible for us to have a fullness of joy as they had. We could hardly wait to demonstrate to our Father and our Brother, the Lord, how much we loved them and how we would be obedient to them in spite of the earthly opposition of the evil one. And now we're here--our memories are veiled--and we're showing God and ourselves what we can do. Nothing is going to startle us more when we pass through the veil to the other side than to realize how well we know our Father and how familiar his face is to us. And then, President Young said, we're going to wonder why we were so stupid in the flesh.

God loves us, he's watching us, he wants us to succeed, and we'll know someday that he has not left one thing undone for the eternal welfare of each of us. If we only knew that there are heavenly hosts pulling for us--friends in heaven, whom we can't remember now, who yearn for our victory. This is our day to show what we can do--what life and sacrifice we can daily, hourly, instantly bring to God. If we give our all, we will get his all from the greatest of all.

I close with this last true story, as it was given by Bob Richards in his book Life's Higher Goals. It always touches my heart and it may touch yours. Lou Little tells this story about his greatest football team. They were on their way to the conference championship--one last game. He had a boy on his squad who had not quite been able to make the team for four straight years. Just before the game--three days before--Lou was given a telegram to give to this boy that informed him his only living relative had just died. The boy looked at the telegram and said, "Coach, I'll be back for Saturday's game." The morning of the game he came up to his coach and said, "Lou, I want you to put me in this game. I know I haven't made the first team yet, but let me in for this kickoff. I'll prove to you that I'm worthy of it." Well, Lou could see that the boy was emotionally upset, and he made all kinds of excuses, but finally he thought, "Well, he can't do much harm on the kickoff, so I'll put the boy in."

The roar of the crowd followed the kickoff. The opposing quarterback took the ball on the goal line, moved up, and on the seven-yard line there was a tremendous tackle. The boy had dropped him in his tracks. On the next play Lou left him in. He made the next tackle; he was in on the next tackle; you couldn't move him out of there. He made practically every tackle that day--terrific downfield blocking. He was the reason why Columbia won the championship. Afterwards, all the guys were pounding him on the back. When they were all done, Lou Little went up to the boy and said, "Son, I don't understand it. Today you were an all-American. I've never seen you play like this in four straight years. What happened?"

And the boy looked up at his coach and said, "Coach, you knew my dad died, didn't you?"

"Yes, I handed you the telegram."

He said, "You knew he was blind, didn't you?"

"Yes, I've seen you walk him around the campus many times."

He said, "Coach, today is the first football game my dad ever saw me play." It makes a difference, friends, when those unseen eyes are watching.

Ezra Taft Benson