Tuesday, March 22, 2011

Merge Your Account

I read in a book titled "Believing Christ" about the process of becoming perfect. Well guess what, no one on this earth is perfect! Not your mom (although very close), your spouse, your bishop, or even the prophet. Jesus Christ is the only perfect person to walk the earth. We beat ourselves up trying to become perfect, but what we don't realize is that it's not us that does the perfecting. It's our Savior, Jesus Christ. We have to turn ourselves over to him. What's ours is his, and what's his is mine. My will, my sins, my imperfections, my heart, all of that is his. Perfection and the kingdom of God are mine. But we must merge our accounts for any of this to happen. Think of it as a checking account. I'm awful with money, anyone who knows me can tell you that. So let's say I'm in the negative, not too much of a far stretch. Well Christ is always in the positive. His assets are limitless, while I'm full of liabilities. So without him, I'm in trouble. But once I merge my account with his and take His name upon myself, my "account" is immediately in the positive. I am perfect. So perfection in our sense doesn't mean without sin, but it's what's in our heart. Do we thirst for righteousness? That is all we can do. And what do we do when we are thirsty? We go get a drink! So let's drink up the Gospel and go about bringing forth much righteousness!

Thursday, March 17, 2011

What are your anchor points?

I heard an awesome analogy from someone the other day. He asked us about spiritual experiences that had happened recently that we were willing to share. Then he compared them to anchor points. Rock climbing is where the expression "anchor point" comes from. It refers to a point where the climber inserts a hook into the rock at a certain point, kind of like a checkpoint, and then moves on. This way, if the climber falls, the rope will catch on the most recent anchor point and keep them from falling to the ground. So in a sense, the climber can never fall further than the anchor points. The really powerful spiritual experiences we have are few, but they are SO vital. They serve as our anchor points. When we are backed up against a wall, in a tight spot, or the cards just aren't going the way we want them to and it seems like we're gonna hit "rock bottom", our anchor points are what catches us. They build our testimony whether we know it or not. We can only fall so far when we have our anchor points to catch us. I'm so grateful for the anchor points in my life that keep me from falling all the way to the bottom. The Gospel of Jesus Christ, namely the Atonement, and my family are the biggest anchor points for me. I love them both so much! What are your anchor points?

Saturday, March 5, 2011

Unselfish Service


Service is not about what we get from it, but what we give to others. The Savior was the perfect example of unselfish service. May we duplicate his example and give to those around us. Not just our friends and family and those close to us, but also to the stranger in the grocery store who drops something, and even a a simple act of holding the door open for someone. These are things that should come as instinct in a true disciple of Christ. Let us try to be THAT disciple.