This post is part of the General Conference Odyssey. This week covers the Saturday Afternoon Session of the April 1995 Conference.
I realized something as I was reading the Conference talks this week. Elder Henry B. Eyring, who had just gotten his call to the apostleship ("yesterday," he said!!) was talking about how some sister missionaries had asked him how they could become more humble. He tried to give them ideas, but at the end of the conversation, he said he felt like he had failed. Then he gave some insights about humilty he'd thought of since that time:
First, I would have realized that they already had the first lesson in their hearts. The fact that they even asked meant that they had gone beyond being overwhelmed by their doubts about themselves to hope that if they would just submit, if they could just learn what to do, they could be better. If I had the chance again, I would have told them that. And then I would have given them just this one bit of counsel, counsel about what to do. I would have said just this: “Always remember him.”
Here's what I realized: "Always remember him" is the counsel for when we want to be better at ANYTHING. Humility. Patience. Trust. If we were thinking about the Savior, how could we think we were better than anyone else? How could we be impatient with others? How could we forget His goodness in the past and doubt it in the future? It just clicked into place for me that the reasons we are told to always remember Jesus are many, but they all go back to the fact that remembering him will help us with whatever we are struggling with! If I'm discouraged with myself, I can remember His mercy. If I'm overwhelmed with the impossibility of tasks ahead, I can remember His power. If I'm annoyed with others I can remember His kindness. And it makes sense why Jacob tells us to believe in Christ and "view His death," because when you keep His death—the reasons for it, the implications of it—in your mind, it clarifies so many other things!
No comments