Required, in particular, is meekness of mind which recognizes God’s perfect love of us and His omniscience. By acknowledging these reassuring realities and accepting that God desires our full development and true happiness, we are readied even as the learning experiences come. Such meekness requires genuine intellectual honesty, owning up to the learning experiences of the past and listening to the Holy Ghost as he preaches to us from the pulpit of memory.

As the Lord communicates with the meek and submissive, fewer decibels are required, and more nuances are received. Even the most meek, like Moses (see Num. 12:3), learn overwhelming things they “never had supposed.” (Moses 1:10.) But it is only the meek mind which can be so shown and so stretched—not those, as Isaiah wrote, who “are wise in their own eyes.” (Isa. 5:21; see also 2 Ne. 9:29 and 15:21.)

God’s counsel aligns us and conjoins us with the great realities of the universe; whereas sin empties, isolates, and separates us, confining us to the solitary cell of selfishness. Hence the lonely crowd in hell.

Spiritual submissiveness means, instead, community and communion as the mind and the heart become settled. We then spend much less time deciding, and much more time serving; otherwise, the more hesitation, the less inspiration.

Yielding one’s heart to God signals the last stage in our spiritual development. Only then are we beginning to be fully useful to God! How can we sincerely pray to be an instrument in His hands if the instrument seeks to do the instructing?

Neal A. Maxwell

“Willing to Submit”, General Conference April 1985

let me know Thy will

When you face adversity, you can be led to ask many questions. Some serve a useful purpose; others do not. To ask, Why does this have to happen to me? Why do I have to suffer this now? What have I done to cause this? will lead you into blind alleys. It really does no good to ask questions that reflect opposition to the will of God. Rather ask, What am I to do? What am I to learn from this experience? What am I to change? Whom am I to help? How can I remember my many blessings in times of trial? Willing sacrifice of deeply held personal desires in favor of the will of God is very hard to do. Yet when you pray with real conviction, “Please let me know Thy will” and “May Thy will be done,” you are in the strongest position to receive the maximum help from your loving Father.

Richard G. Scott

"Trust in the Lord" General Conference October 1995

whom we choose to trust

Whom we choose to trust is one of life’s important decisions. King Benjamin instructed his people, “Believe in God; believe that he is … ; believe that he has all wisdom … ; believe that man doth not comprehend all the things which the Lord can comprehend.”

Fortunately, we have the scriptures and guidance from living prophets to help us understand God’s truth. If clarification beyond what we have is needed, God provides it through His prophets. And He will respond to our sincere prayers through the Holy Ghost as we seek to understand truths we do not yet fully appreciate.

Elder Neil L. Andersen once taught that we should not be surprised “if at times [our] personal views are not initially in harmony with the teachings of the Lord’s prophet. These are moments of learning,” he said, “of humility, when we go to our knees in prayer. We walk forward in faith, trusting in God, knowing that with time we will receive more spiritual clarity from our Heavenly Father.”

At all times, it is helpful to remember Alma’s teaching that God gives His word according to the attention and effort we devote to it. If we heed God’s word, we will receive more; if we ignore His counsel, we will receive less and less until we have none. This loss of knowledge does not mean that the truth was wrong; rather, it shows that we have lost the capacity to understand it.

Karl D. Hirst

"God’s Favourite", General Conference October 2024

magnify Christ and not ourselves

If Christ were physically here, He would visit the sick, teach the Sunday School class, sit with the heartbroken young woman, and bless the children. He can do His own work. But He lives this principle of letting us act and learn, so He sends us in His place.

With participation in God’s work comes “the right, privilege, and responsibility to represent the Lord [Jesus Christ].” When we serve to magnify Christ and not ourselves, our service becomes joyful. When others leave our class, meeting, ministering visit, or activity remembering Christ more than they remember us, the work is energizing.

In earnestly seeking to represent the Savior, we become more like Him.

Steven D. Shumway

"Participate to Prepare for Christ’s Return", General Conference April 2025

spiritually whole

What might it mean to be spiritually whole?

We are whole in Jesus Christ when we exercise our agency to follow Him in faith, submit our hearts to Him so He can change them, keep His commandments, and enter a covenant relationship with Him, meekly enduring and learning from the challenges of this earthly estate until we return to His presence and are healed in every way. I can be whole while I wait for healing if I am wholehearted in my relationship with Him.

Faith in Jesus Christ begets hope. I find hope in striving to be whole—a wholeness born of faith in Jesus Christ. Faith in Him increases my hope for healing, and that hope reinforces my faith in Jesus Christ. It is a powerful cycle.

The Lord told Enos his faith had made him “whole.” Wholeness came as Enos pondered on the words of his prophet-father, Jacob, as he hungered to understand the opportunity for eternal life, as he cried unto God in mighty prayer. And in that state of desire and humility, the voice of the Lord came to him, announcing his sins were forgiven. And Enos asked the Lord, “How is it done?” And the Lord responded, “Because of thy faith in Christ, … thy faith hath made thee whole.”

Through our faith in Jesus Christ, we can seek to be spiritually whole while we wait and hope for physical and emotional healing.

Camille N. Johnson

"Spiritually Whole in Him", General Conference April 2025

challenges us to become something

The Apostle Paul taught that the Lord’s teachings and commandments were given that we may all attain “the measure of the stature of the fulness of Christ.” Ephesians 4:13 That process requires far more than acquiring knowledge. It is not even enough to be convinced of the gospel; we must act so that we are converted by it. In contrast to other preaching, which teaches us to know something, the gospel of Jesus Christ challenges us to become something.

From such teachings we conclude that the Final Judgment is not just an evaluation of a sum total of good and evil acts—what we have done. It is based on the final effect of our acts and thoughts—what we have become. We qualify for eternal life through a process of conversion. As used here, this word of many meanings signifies a profound change of nature. It is not enough for anyone just to go through the motions. The commandments, ordinances, and covenants of the gospel are not a list of deposits required to be made in some heavenly account. The gospel of Jesus Christ is a plan that shows us how to become what our Heavenly Father desires us to become. 

Dallin H. Oaks

"Kingdoms of Glory," General Conference October 2023

how we know what we know

One of the pillars of philosophy is the examination of how we know what we know. How can we prove that what we believe is true? In most cases, we can’t.

In reality, even many of the things we think of as hard facts aren’t. They’re half-truths. They’re assumptions. They’re misinterpretations. They’re guesses. They’re based on cognitive biases, faulty information, or conditioning. Use science as an example. What we believed five, ten or twenty years ago has since been disproved. We have made radical leaps in understanding and those leaps are continuing every day. What we know today will one day be looked upon as archaic and outdated. 

Gary John Bishop

Unfu*k Yourself: Get out of your head and into your life by Gary John Bishop. Harper One. 2017. p.106

so much of life's curriculum

So much of life's curriculum, therefore, consists of efforts by the Lord to get and keep our attention. Ironically, the stimuli He uses are often that which is seen by us as something to endure. Sometimes what we are actually being asked to endure is His "help": help to draw us away from the cares of the world: help to draw us away from self-centeredness; attention-getting help when we have ignored the still, small voice; help in the shaping of our souls; and help to keep promises we made so long ago. In some instances the stimuli can be severe and sharp: "And thus we see that except the Lord doth chasten his people with many afflictions, yea, except he doth visit them with death and with terror, and with famine and with all manner of pestilence, they will not remember him" (Helaman 12:3).

Neal A. Maxwell

Not My Will, but Thine by Neal A. Maxwell. 2008. Deseret Book. p. 128

experiential learning is etched deeply into our souls

God seeks to give us tutoring experiences so that, if we are submissive, we will have our own first-hand experiences to refer to in the eternities to come. We ill have authentic, personal knowledge upon which to rely, not merely accurate abstractions. Since experiential learning is etched deeply into our souls, it is not easily forgotten. 

Neal A. Maxwell

Not My Will, but Thine by Neal A. Maxwell. 2008. Deseret Book. p. 105

a mind capable of instruction

We consider that God has created man with a mind capable of instruction, and a faculty which may be enlarged in proportion to the heed and diligence given to the light communicated from heaven to the intellect; and that the nearer man approaches perfection, the clearer are his views, and the greater his enjoyments, till he has overcome the evils of his life and lost every desire for sin; and like the ancients, arrives at that point of faith where he is wrapped in the power and glory of his Maker, and is caught up to dwell with Him. But we consider that this is a station to which no man ever arrived in a moment: he must have been instructed in the government and laws of that kingdom by proper degrees, until his mind is capable in some measure of comprehending the propriety, justice, equality and consistency of the same.

Joseph Smith

Teachings of the Prophet Joseph Smith, P.51, as quoted in Not My Will, but Thine by Neal A. Maxwell. 2008. Deseret Book. p. 88

all will suffer until they obey Christ himself

Faith is strongest when it is without illusions. Realistic faith alone provides allowance for the testing and proving dimensions of this mortal experience (D&C 98:12; Abraham 3:25). We undergo afflictions such as are "common to man" (1 Corinthians 10:13). Additionally, God will deliberately give curriculum common to man and on into uncommon graduate studies or even post-doctoral discipleship. These trials are often the most difficult to bear. Our Father is full of pressing, tutorial love: "The Lord seeth fit to chasten his people; yea, he trieth their patience and their faith" (Mosiah 23:21). Nevertheless we are assured that "all these things shall give [us] experience, and shall be for [our] good," if we endure them well and learn from them (D&C 122:7; 121:8). For we are to learn much by our own experience. 

Thus life itself does not do all of the inflicting. Indeed, some trials come directly from God or with His assent. On the final record will be the incontestable evidence as to whether we are "willing to submit to all things which the Lord seeth fit to inflict upon [us], even as a child doth submit to his father" (Mosiah 3:19). 

Having taken his yoke upon us, then, we will experience - though on our small and lesser scale - certain things which permit us to learn of Jesus: loving when our love is not reciprocated or is even rejected, as with the wicked in His day; serving when our service is not appreciated, as with the nine lepers (Luke 17:12-19); seeing erring loved ones who are free to choose but who are choosing unwisely, as when He lamented, "O, Jerusalem..." (Matthew 23:37): watching in some the root of bitterness spring up to trouble and defile others (Hebrews 12:15); experiencing anguish as a result of what is happening to us and around us, but, as with Nephi, still knowing that God loves us (1 Nephi 11:17); being mocked and despised by the world, perhaps even betrayed, and feeling aloneness - all part of suffering in order to learn obedience (Hebrews 5:8).

The Prophet Joseph Smith taught that "all will suffer until they obey Christ himself." Indeed, some suffering actually comes in striving to become like Christ as well as in obeying Him.

Neal A. Maxwell

Not My Will, but Thine by Neal A. Maxwell. 2008. Deseret Book. p. 5,6

People exist for one another. You can instruct or endure them. 

Marcus Aurelius

Meditations by Marcus Aurelius. Modern Library. 2003. P.114, Book 8, #59. Also see The Internet Classics Archive | The Meditations by Marcus Aurelius (mit.edu)

the most important tradition that man can have

To man was given the power to gather into words his wisdom and to hand it on to his children. This handing on is tradition, and it makes the continuity of human life possible. It binds the generations together. Scripture is the most important tradition that man can have, and yet how few people make use of it. Instead they read the news. The news is what will be old tomorrow and without interest. Yet it becomes a narcotic that must be taken daily and that yields no lasting satisfaction but only another craving. “Whosoever drinketh of this water shall thirst again: but whosoever drinketh of the water that I shall give him shall never thirst; but the water that I shall give him shall be in him a well of water springing up into everlasting life.” (John 4:13-14.) The words of Christ and his prophets are lifegiving. They alone can give all other words real meaning.

The Lord’s Question: Thoughts on the Life of Response by Dennis Rasmussen. Brigham Young University Press. April 1985. Chapter Three, “What Mean the Testimonies?” p.32, 33

in their mouths and in their hearts

How long has it been since I learned something by heart? What does it mean to know something by heart? Modern man reads silently and quickly. He corrects his children from moving their lips when they read. He tends to confront written words with his eye alone. But the ancients read aloud. When the disciple Philip was led by the Spirit to the chariot of the Ethiopian slave, he heard the man reading the prophet Isaiah. (See Acts 8:30.) Writing in the fifth century, St. Augustine records his surprise at the extraordinary practice of St. Ambrose, who read silently. “When he read, his eyes scanned the page and his heart explored the meaning, but his voice was silent and his tongue was still.” How could this habit be explained? Why did St. Ambrose not read aloud like everyone else? St. Augustine hazards the guess that the aged man read silently because “he needed to spare his voice, which quite easily became hoarse.” Those of former times did not hurry when they read the word of God. They did not use only their eyes. They placed the word in their mouths and in their hearts. 

The Lord’s Question: Thoughts on the Life of Response by Dennis Rasmussen. Brigham Young University Press. April 1985. Chapter Three, “What Mean the Testimonies?” p.26, 27

knowledge alone can never satisfy

For all that it has helped man learn, the claim that man is primarily a being who questions is inadequate. It may create minds without hearts. It may lead to the worship of information on the one hand or to skepticism on the other. Even worse, it may lead to despair, for knowledge alone can never satisfy. Will man be happy when he has split the last atom and searched all the sands of the sea? Deeper than the desire to know is the desire to be known. Man’s fundamental need is not to ask a question but to respond to one. Only by responding do I learn to be responsible; only by responding do I learn to care about something beyond myself.

The Lord’s Question: Thoughts on the Life of Response by Dennis Rasmussen. Brigham Young University Press. April 1985. Chapter One, “Where Art Thou?” p.4

what is a question

What is a question? I must use on even to ask. Perhaps it is impossible to define something so basic to thought. A question is unique. Yet my life from childhood to maturity has been filled with questions. Wisdom, I have heard, is as much a matter of knowing the important questions as of having their answers. Questions focus my attention and my efforts. They are a summons to learning. Long ago the great teachers found that people learn best when they are asked instead of simply told. A question is a challenge, the beginning of a quest. 

There is an old tradition that views man as the being who asks the questions. In the words of Aristotle, “All men by nature desire to know.” From this point of view man is distinguished by his power to discover. The mark of man is a question. The history of the ages is the record of man’s questions. When an old question is answered or even just abandoned and a new one replaces it, then a new age begins. All the knowledge that creates civilization emerges in answer to human questions. The history of religion follows this same pattern, as it tells of man’s quest for God. In all things man’s progress is the progress of man’s questions. They lead to knowledge, and knowledge is power.

There is another tradition even older that makes a different claim. It asserts that man is born into the world with a question and that he lives his life with a question, but it is not man’s question. In this view man is not primarily a being who questions, but a being who is questioned. The question addressed to man persists, harder than stone, softer than snow, more insistent than the warmth of the sun. “Where art thou?” (Genesis 3:9.) Man is distinguished not by his power to ask but by his power to hear. The question with which he lives is not his own, but God’s. 

The Lord’s Question: Thoughts on the Life of Response by Dennis Rasmussen. Brigham Young University Press. April 1985. Chapter One, “Where Art Thou?” p.3,4

the laboratory of our lives

All of us remember the home of our childhood. Interestingly, our thoughts do not dwell on whether the house was large or small, the neighborhood fashionable or downtrodden. Rather, we delight in the experiences we shared as a family. The home is the laboratory of our lives, and what we learn there largely determines what we do when we leave there.

President Thomas S. Monson, “Hallmarks of a Happy Home,” Ensign Nov. 1988 as quoted in To the Rescue: The Biography of Thomas S. Monson by Heidi Swinton, Deseret Book. 2010.

two-legged, fumble-fingered slobs

Humans…are generally two-legged, fumble-fingered slobs whose indolent wits enable them by and large to be sitting ducks… The big polluter did not start out with smokestacks. He didn’t start pumping gunk into the waters of our world when he was six years old. He started small. Throwing papers underfoot in the streets, heaving old bottles into vacant lots, leaving the remnants of a picnic in the fields and woodlands. Just like the rest of us.



Walt Kelly, Pogo cartoonist, as quoted in Looking for Calvin and Hobbes: The Unconventional Story of Bill Watterson and His Revolutionary Comic Strip by Nevin Martell. Continuum Intl Pub Group, 2010 p.75

you can train your mind to handle it

The squealing of the pig and the scent of his blood made the hogs beneath me go nearly wild with anger. You never heard such roaring and teeth-popping, as they kept circling the tree and rearing up on its trunk, trying to get to me. The noise they made and the hate and anger that showed in their eyes was enough to chill your blood. Only, I was used to the feeling and didn’t let it bother me. That is, not much. Sometimes I’d let my mind slip for a minute and get to thinking how they’d slash me to pieces if I happened to fall out of the tree, and I’d feel a sort of cold shudder run all through me. But Papa had told me right from the start that fear was a right natural feeling for anybody, and nothing to be ashamed of.

“It’s a thing of your mind,” he said, “and you can train your mind to handle it just like you can train your arm to throw a rock.”

Put that way, it made sense to be afraid so I hadn’t bothered about that. I’d put in all my time trying to train my mind no to let fear stampede me.


Old Yeller by Fred Gipson, 1956.

we are so easily distracted

We are to learn our duty from the Lord, and then we are to act in all diligence, never being lazy or slothful. The pattern is simple but not easy to follow. We are so easily distracted. Studying the daily news can appear more interesting than the priesthood lesson manual. Sitting down to rest can be more attractive than making appointments to visit those who need our priesthood service.

When I find myself drawn away from my priesthood duties by other interests and when my body begs for rest, I give to myself this rallying cry: “Remember Him.” The Lord is our perfect example of diligence in priesthood service. He is our captain. He called us. He goes before us. He chose us to follow Him and to bring others with us.


Henry B. Eyring, "Act in All Diligence", Ensign, May 2010, 60–63