Thoughts, Tips for Health, Benefits of Mindful Living
10/27/2016 0 Comments remembering....Earlier this year I gave a talk in church about remembering. It was from the Conference talk by Elder Gerrit W. Gong. I won't share the whole thing but a few points that really hit me.
"We can remember the Savior by having confidence in His Covenants, promises and assurances." This means we trust Him. Trust that He is fulfilling all of His end of the promises. He has told us that He is Mindful of us. That means we trust that He really does know what we are going through and not just hope that He does. HE DOES!!! He will really give us what He has told us He will give us meaning we can expect it not just hope for it. This also leads us into another one. "We can remember Him by trusting when the Lord assures us, "he who has repented of his sins, the same is forgiven, and I, the Lord, remember them no more"." (Isaiah 43:25 and Doctrine and Covenants 58:42). Done. Finished. NO more. There is no more residue of the sin on our souls. I look at it like laundry. White shirt becomes scarlet through sin or a kool aid stain. We put stain remover on it which is the repentance, and scrub it with restitution, we let it soak in with remorse and then we hand it over to the washing machine, the Savior and the Atonement cleanses it. When we take it off the line and put it on again, do we still see the memory of the stain and how bright red it was and so we still see color or do we trust it really is white. Do we Trust that the Lord can really remove all of it even the color of the memory so that all emotion connected to it is truly gone? So many times we let go of the behavior, or the attitude of the sin but hold on to the memory of it or the emotion of it because we doubt that the Atonement covers all. We walk around still hiding the spot the stain was because somehow we still see it. DON'T!!! Its gone!! Trust that it is and wear it proudly knowing that not only can no one see it but you can't either because it is whole and complete. Elder Gong went on to say. "He knows all the things we don't want anyone else to know about us-- and loves us still." Do we love us still? Do we allow that repentance to really change us and allow ourselves to trust in that cleansing power? THAT alone can be a life long test. While studying for this talk I found a Talk by Jeffery R Holland, called For Times of Trouble. I LOVED IT!!! Here is an awesome quote from it about change. You can change anything you want to change, and you can do it very fast. That’s another satanic suckerpunch—that it takes years and years and eons of eternity to repent. It takes exactly as long to repent as it takes you to say, “I’ll change”—and mean it. Of course there will be problems to work out and restitutions to make. You may well spend—indeed you had better spend—the rest of your life proving your repentance by its permanence. But change, growth, renewal, and repentance can come for you as instantaneously as for Alma and the sons of Mosiah. Even if you have serious amends to make, it is not likely that you would qualify for the term, “the vilest of sinners,” which is the phrase Mormon uses in describing these young men. Yet as Alma recounts his own experience in the thirty-sixth chapter of the book that bears his name, his repentance appears to have been as instantaneous as it was stunning. Do not misunderstand. Repentance is not easy or painless or convenient. It is a bitter cup from Hell. But only Satan, who dwells there, would have you think that a necessary and required acknowledgment is more distasteful than permanent residence. Only he would say, “You can’t change. You won’t change. It’s too long and too hard to change. Give up. Give in. Don’t repent. You are just the way you are.” That, my friends, is a lie born of desperation. Don’t fall for it. Make life about making a change and do it NOW!
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Calista BurbankI am a single mom, student, teacher, massage therapist, lecturer, blogger, and friend. Archives
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