I love the gospel of Jesus Christ. It
brings me great comfort and joy and direction. Yesterday I spent a couple of
hours swimming with my young niece and nephews. They enjoy the water, but are
still in the early stages of learning to swim. I was impressed by their trust
and faith in those there to catch them. It was important that they knew us and
trusted our abilities and care for them. This made me think of how we can completely
trust in and depend on our Savior. We must come to know Him and we’ll know that
He will be there to take care of us. Faith in the Lord Jesus Christ is the
first principle of the gospel. As a part of our Heavenly Father’s plan we had
to leave His presence and come here to earth to learn and live and walk by
faith to prove ourselves faithful to Him.
How we can develop or increase our faith
in Jesus Christ, be true to the faith we have and share our faith with others?
We are taught that faith is to hope for
things which are not seen, but which are true. We learn in Alma 32 that faith
includes patience, humility and action. Faith may begin as a little seed (even
just a desire to believe) but that seed will grow as we nourish it through study,
pondering, prayer, seeking to know the Lord and most importantly through our
obedience to the Lord’s commandments.
Faith is complete trust in the Lord and
the opposite of fear. It is waiting on the Lord, but that doesn’t mean sitting
still. J We must actively seek the guidance of the Holy Ghost
and follow directly. Proverbs 3:5-6 teaches, "Trust in the Lord with all thine heart; and lean not unto thine
own understanding. In all thy ways acknowledge him, and he shall direct thy
paths."
1. Faith must
be centered in Jesus Christ in order to produce salvation. To have faith is to
have confidence in something or someone. The Lord has revealed Himself and His
perfect character, including all the attributes of love, knowledge, justice,
mercy, unchangeableness, power…to enable the mind of man to place confidence in
Him without reservation.
·
Elder Robert
D. Hales taught, “The first step to finding faith in
the Lord Jesus Christ is to let His word—spoken by the mouth of His servants,
the prophets—touch your heart. But it is not enough merely to let those words
wash over you, as if they alone could transform you. We must do our part. Or as
the Savior Himself said, “He that hath ears to hear, let him hear.” In other
words, hearing requires an active effort. It means taking seriously what is
taught, considering it carefully, studying it out in our minds.
·
Moroni admonishes us in Ether 12:41,
“seek this Jesus of whom the prophets and apostles have written, that the grace
of God the Father, and also the Lord Jesus Christ, and the Holy Ghost, which
beareth record of them, may be and abide in you forever.”
2. Strong
faith is developed by obedience to the gospel of Jesus Christ, in other words, faith
comes by righteousness.
·
Elder
Joseph B. Wirthlin taught, "Faith is not so much something we believe;
faith is something we live.”
·
President Henry B. Eyring taught, “Our
choosing the right consistently whenever the choice is placed before us creates
the solid ground under our faith.”
·
Nephi
is a great example of obedience. He responded with faith when asked to get the
brass plates and build a boat to take them to the Promised Land. He says, “I
will go and do the things which the Lord hath commanded” and “Lord, whither
shall I go that I may find ore to molten, that I may make tools to construct
the ship?” (1 Ne. 17:9)
3. Faith is a
principle of action and power.
·
It was by faith that the world was
formed. The Savior said, “If ye have faith as
a grain of mustard seed, ye shall say unto this mountain, Remove hence to
yonder place; and it shall remove; and nothing shall be impossible unto you” (Matthew 17:20). Miracles often follow faith.
·
In Matthew 9:20-22 the Savior is on his
way to visit someone who needs his help “and behold, a woman, which was
diseased with an issue of blood twelve years, came behind him, and touched the
hem of his garment: For she said within herself, If I may but touch his garment,
I shall be whole. But Jesus turned him about, and when he saw her, he said, Daughter,
be of good comfort; thy faith hath made thee whole. And the woman was made
whole from that hour.”
4. The effects
of faith include: knowledge that the course of life one is pursuing is
acceptable to the Lord, blessings in this life, assurance of personal salvation
in the world to come
·
Elder Hales
taught, “We cannot receive the greatest
blessings Heavenly Father has in store for us without developing the patience
and faith to wait….'For the people of the Lord are they who wait for him;' (2 Nephi 6:13)….We wait upon the Lord when we walk in faith with a humble
expectation that His promises are sure."
·
I think this may be something we wonder
about at different points in our life…is the path I’m pursuing in accordance
with God’s will? Two years ago I was living in Washington DC. Life was good,
but I felt like I needed to return to Utah. In some ways it didn’t make much
sense to the leave my job and the opportunities there to return to the same job
I had here before graduate school. But it has been a blessing in many ways and
neat to watch special opportunities open up when I followed a prompting in
faith.
The scriptures are full of accounts of
faith. By reading these stories we can come to know our Heavenly Father and
Savior better and increase our faith in them. I love the lists in Ether 12 and
Hebrews 11. We could each make a list of
faithful examples that inspire us to be valiant in our testimonies. Some on my
list would include:
·
Noah
building a boat when there was no sign of rain and while others laughed and
persecuted him.
·
The
Widow of Zarephath feeding Elijah when she had nothing for her son and was
blessed for her faith.
·
Abraham
being willing to sacrifice Issac.
·
The
children of Israel fleeing Egypt and crossing the Red Sea on dry ground.
·
Shadrach,
Meshach, Abed-nego refusing to worship graven images and responding to King
Nebuchadnezzar, “If it be so [if you cast us into the furnace], our God whom we
serve is able to deliver us from the burning fiery furnace, and he will
deliver us out of thine hand. But if not,…we will not serve thy gods, nor
worship the golden image which thou hast set up.” As Elder Dennis E. Simmons taught, “This is a statement of true faith. They
knew that they could trust God—even if things didn’t turn out the way they
hoped. They knew that faith is more than mental assent, more than an
acknowledgment that God lives. Faith is total trust in Him. Faith is believing
that although we do not understand all things, He does. Faith is knowing that
although our power is limited, His is not. Faith in Jesus Christ consists of
complete reliance on Him. Shadrach, Meshach, and Abed-nego knew they could
always rely on Him because they knew His plan, and they knew that He does not
change. They knew, as we know, that mortality is not an accident of nature. It
is a brief segment of the great plan of our loving Father in Heaven to
make it possible for us, His sons and daughters, to achieve the same blessings
He enjoys, if we are willing.
·
The
Brother of Jared knowing that the Lord would help him light the stones he placed
before him, which opened up further opportunities for him to learn more from
the Lord.
·
Abinadi
and Samuel the Lamanite declaring bold testimonies of the Savior without fear
for their lives or what might happen to them.
·
Ammon
and his brothers giving up the kingdom to teach the gospel to the Lamanites.
·
Abish
valiantly living the gospel and watching for the time that she could share her
faith.
·
Helaman’s
2000 stripling warriors trusting the Lord would protect them.
·
The
Nephites of 3 Nephi 1 watching steadfastly
for the sign of the coming of Christ – even when threatened with death.
·
Moroni remaining faithful to the end,
and would not deny Christ even though he was alone and threatened by death.
·
Joseph Smith, as a youth, having faith
to test God’s promise that if he would ask of God he would receive an answer.
·
Brigham Young and the pioneers leaving their
homes to travel to an unknown new land and the Lord directed.
·
The example of faithful family members who have met challenges with faith.
· The example of faithful missionaries eager to learn and prepare to teach the gospel.
In April 1997, Sister Bonnie D. Parkin
shard some faithful pioneer examples and taught, “Do these stories sound so
different from what we write in our journals today? We show faith by the
courageous choices we make each day.
President Harold B. Lee gave some marvelous advice for modern pioneers: ‘We
walk to the edge of the light, and perhaps a few steps into the darkness, and
you will find that the light will appear and move ahead of you.’ We must walk
by faith. That means stepping into the dark unknowns because we believe that
Heavenly Father is awaiting us…with open arms.”
We
each have our own stories of faith!
·
We do family history work and temple
work because we look forward to the resurrection.
·
We
pay tithing and serve and help to build the kingdom of God because we know this
is God’s work.
·
We spend time studying the scriptures
and praying and pondering.
·
We serve missions and have the courage
to open our mouths and share our faith with our friends and neighbors.
Although faith is the first principle
of the gospel, it is something we must work at increasing every day.
In 2011, Elder
D. Todd Christofferson gives an example of the children of Israel, "By
providing a daily sustenance, one day at a time, Jehovah was trying to teach
faith to a nation that over a period of some 400 years had lost much of the
faith of their fathers. He was teaching them to trust Him, to 'look unto [Him]
in every thought; doubt not, fear not' (D&C 6:36). He was providing enough for
one day at a time. Except for the sixth day, they could not store manna for use
in any succeeding day or days. In essence, the children of Israel had to walk
with Him today and trust that He would grant a sufficient amount of food for
the next day on the next day, and so on. In that way He could never be too far
from their minds and hearts."
President
Gordon B. Hinckley said, “In the
on-working of this great cause, increased faith is
what we most need. Without it, the work would stagnate. With it, no one can
stop its progress.”
Faith in
Jesus Christ is an anchor and a sure foundation. President Thomas S. Monson
taught, "My beloved brothers and sisters, fear not. Be of good cheer. The
future is as bright as your faith. I declare that God lives and that He hears
and answers our prayers."
We have been warned that we need strong
faith for the days ahead. Elder Russell M. Nelson said, “Why do we need such
resilient faith? Because difficult days are ahead. Rarely in the future will it
be easy or popular to be a faithful Latter-day Saint. Each of us will be
tested. The Apostle Paul warned that in the latter days, those who diligently
follow the Lord “shall suffer persecution.” That very persecution can either
crush you into silent weakness or motivate you to be more exemplary and
courageous in your daily lives.”
