The theme of October 27th conference was Moroni 10:32:
"Yea, come unto Christ, and be perfected in him, and deny yourselves of all ungodliness; and if ye shall deny yourselves of all ungodliness, and love God with all your might, mind and strength, then is his grace sufficient for you, that by his grace ye may be perfect in Christ; and if by the grace of God ye are perfect in Christ, ye can in nowise deny the power of God."
The first two speakers were stake members brother and sister White.
Brother White talked about how a command from the Lord to deny ourselves of ungodliness and be perfected can be intimidating. He sees this as becoming a little better every day.
He also reminded us of the New Testament story of the rich man, who when Christ told him that to gain eternal life he should sell all he had and give it to the poor, left Christ sorrowing. Let's remember that this man claimed to be keeping the basic commandments, but when it came time to give up something he loved, he was not willing to let go of his riches in order to follow Christ's will for him. Brother White asked us what we might be holding on to and/or let get in the way of following the Lord's will for us. If we were in the rich man's position, what would be holding us back?
Brother White then told us about how he had planned to go to medical school and was really set upon this plan. Things worked out such, that he began to question if medical school was really the path he ought to pursue. He was taking a statistics course and an opportunity to do research with a professor came up. After working some time with the professor, he invited brother White to join the masters program, which started in a month, even though he had not taken the general prerequisites. Brother White said that it was very difficult to change his career path as he was afraid to reject his plans for medical school, and he had really set his heart upon this career path, but he felt that statistics might be the Lord's plan for him. In time he did change his path from medical school to the statistics master's program. He says he is not sure how it will turn out, or what his career will be, but that it feels good knowing that he is following the Lord's will for him. He is glad that he did not let his own plans get in the way of following the Saviour.
Sister White brought another perspective to the meeting when it was her turn to address us. She is pregnant and has been working on using the power of words to have a positive outlook on the birthing process. She decided to do the same with our theme verse of scripture, and re-worded it to put a positive spin on denying ourselves of ungodliness. She thinks of denying ourselves of all ungodliness in the words embracing all godliness, which means to embrace who we truly are - children of God. As children of God in the beginning we were pure and innocent. How do we return to this innocence and embrace all godliness? She likened this unto learning to play an instrument, for example, the trumpet. To master a new instrument like this you must practice, learn from one who has mastered the skill, and follow the established music theory of notes and rhythms. It will take effort and time to master the playing of the instrument, just as it does to improve ourselves and embrace godliness after the pattern that our master teacher, Christ displayed during His mortal life.
She pointed out one example Christ showed us - that serving is embracing godliness. What easier way to serve than to visit those we are assigned to at least once a month? Serving shows that we love God and Christ and want to be like them.
I thought that this couple did a great job and were very sincere in all that they said. I enjoyed listening to them. Hopefully after reading this post you have something to think over for the week. What can you do to embrace all godliness and give up that which keeps you from the Lord?
My next post will feature some of the comments and ideas of the next two speakers in conference, who proceeded our stake presidency's talks.
No comments:
Post a Comment