Paisley: Hey everybody, welcome back Paisley imperfect here
again today, and I'm going to talk about something I pretty
much talk about in every episode. But now I have proof.
Let me explain so President Holland's talk back in April,
motions of a hidden fire. It really hit me, as I'm sure it
did most people. But the part that really hit me kind of in
the chest, really was this part. He said, virtually all my
experience in the hospital during that first period is lost
to my memory. What is not lost is my memory of a journey
outside the hospital, out to what seemed the Edge of
Eternity. I cannot speak fully of that experience here, but I
can say that part of what I received was an admonition to
return to my ministry with more urgency, more consecration, more
focus on the Savior, more faith in His Word. It wasn't the
experience part they hit me. We've been we've talked about
miracles and sacred experiences, and I am absolutely fine leaving
that part alone. Obviously I'm curious. Who isn't, but that is
a personal sacred experience between him and his heavenly
Father, and not something that he needs to share with me or the
rest of us. Frankly, over the pulpit, what hit me in the chest
was the admonition part, because my thought was, if Elder Holland
needed to be admonished, what hope is there for me. Where do I
stand? And honestly, that's kind of been weighing on me a little
bit for the last six months. But the other day, I was scrolling
through Pinterest, I didn't really know how to address it
here, and so I've just kind of been letting it stew for a
little bit. But the other day, I was scrolling through Pinterest
and came across this, this quote from President Hinckley. And I
need to get more into President Hinckley stuff, because he was
so funny and he was so fun and he was so cheerful all the time.
But he said, it isn't as bad as you sometimes think it is. It
all works out. Don't worry, if you do your best, it will all
work out, put your trust in God and move forward with faith. And
so I thought that while prepping for this episode, I would go and
try and find where that quote originally came from. But as I
was doing that search, I came across another talk that I just
loved and that is relevant. So I'm going to come back to
President Hinckley in a little while, and instead, I'm going to
talk about this talk from 2016 it's by Elder J Devon Cornish of
the 70 and it's called, am I good enough? Will I make it?
Obviously, it'll be linked in the description, because
everybody needs to go and read or listen to it themselves. He
starts with a personal experience. He was coming out of
medical school, was doing a pediatric residency at a
hospital, and he was trying to write the admission order for a
10 year old boy with pneumonia. And he said he was alternately
sobbing and falling asleep. And have you been that tired? I've
been that tired before, as the brand new mom of twins, there
are days I just don't even remember, because I was so tired
that I cried and just just alternating between sobbing and
crying. So here's this kid, essentially, this young man who
who just came out of medical school, he's trying to write
this admission. He's trying to do the admission paperwork for a
10 year old boy. And he's just, he's struggling, and one of the
senior residents notices that he's struggling, and so he comes
over and asks him how he's doing, and he pours his heart
out. And the senior resident says to him, you know, we all
think that you're doing an excellent job, and someday
you're going to make a fantastic doctor. And he said that that
even though he didn't feel like it at the time, that that
changed, that changed him. It made a world of difference to
him. And then he said this, as with my own experience, our
members often ask, Am I good enough as a person, or will I
really make it to the celestial kingdom? Of course, there is no
such thing as being good enough. None of us could ever earn or
deserve our salvation. But it is normal to wonder if we are
acceptable before the Lord, which is how I understand these
questions. Sometimes, when we attend church, we become
discouraged even by. Sincere invitations to improve
ourselves. We think silently, I can't do all these things, or I
will never be as good as all these people. And for those of
you who have been hanging out with me long enough, we know we
have a giant list from President Kimball and President Nelson on
all of the things that we need to work on to become better
versions of ourselves, right? The list gets longer every time
we have a general conference, every time the Liahona comes
out, our lists just get longer and longer. But that's okay. We
also know that those that those thoughts, am I ever going to be
good enough? I'm never going to be able to get all of those
things done. Those thoughts come from Satan. He's constantly
trying to make us feel like we are not good enough. But also
notice, especially in this example, that elder Cornish
gives that Satan uses other people. So so Satan uses other
people to make us feel bad, where Heavenly Father uses other
people to make us feel good. Satan uses them by planting
little thoughts in our ears, whispering things in our ears,
like you're never going to be as pretty as she is, or you're
never going to have it as well together as she does. And so he
uses, he uses other people to try and build a sense of
contention or resentment within us, and Heavenly Father uses
them to help build us up. Elder Cornish said, Please, we must
stop comparing ourselves to others, we torture ourselves
needlessly by competing and comparing. We falsely judge our
self worth by the things we do or don't have and by the
opinions of others. So let me ask you this question, have you
ever felt fulfilled by comparing yourself to someone else. Have
you ever when you compare somebody to when you compare
yourself to someone else? One of two things, at least in my
experience, one of two things happens. You either feel like
you're not as good as them, or you feel like you're better than
them. Both of those thoughts are dangerous, and both come from
Satan. Neither one ever works out very well. Elder Cornish
gives us something else that we can pick can compare ourselves
with. Instead, he said, If we must compare, so if you have to,
if we must compare, let us compare how we were in the past,
to how we are today, and even to how we want to be in the future.
The only opinion of us that matters is what our Heavenly
Father thinks of us. And then he says this, please sincerely ask
him what he thinks of you. He will love and correct but never
discourage us. That is Satan's trick. So if you want to know
ask, it seems too simple, right? Also, elder Cornish kind of just
kind of as a side note here, he gives us a clear indicator on
whether our thoughts are coming from the Holy Ghost or coming
from the adversary. If they are giving us courage and hope, then
they're coming from God through the Holy Ghost. If they are
discouraging or depressing us, those are not thoughts that our
Heavenly Father wants us to have. Those are not thoughts
that he would give us. Those are thoughts that come from Satan.
Okay, so if we ask our heavenly father what he thinks of us, I
have a feeling that we will feel loved and cared about so so much
so our Heavenly Father loves us so much that he will tell us the
things that we need to work on, and he will give us the tools,
the resources, the people that we need to be able to work on
those things. He will help us see our progress and help us
learn those things that we need to become better in a hopeful
and encouraging way, but we still have to put in the effort
we don't get to just ask and then be like, Okay,
now I know. Now, show me what I gotta do. Do it for me. That's
not how that works either. Alder Cornish quotes President
Hinckley, and he says, All the Lord expects of us is to try,
but you have to really try. And really is italicized, you have
to really try. He defines really trying like this. This is elder
Cornish defining really trying. He says really trying means
doing the best we can, recognizing where we need to
improve, and then trying again. By repeatedly doing this, we
come closer and closer. To the Lord, we feel his spirit more
and more, and we receive more of His grace or help. That sounds
like the definition of daily repentance, didn't we? We just
talked about that when we've talked about daily repentance a
couple episodes back, right? So I don't know about you, but it's
all coming together. All these things are all coming together.
We've talked about daily repentance. Now we're talking
about President Hinckley calls it really trying. And then elder
Cornish says all we have to do to receive this heavenly help is
to ask for it and then act on the righteous promptings we
receive. So we ask our Heavenly Father What we need to do to
improve, and then we act on it, daily repentance, really trying.
He does caution us, though. I mean, what would a general
conference talk be without a little bit of caution or
warning? Right? He says this talking about the opportunity
that we have for daily repentance and heavenly help. He
says this does not mean in any way that sin is okay. Sin, it
always has consequences. Sin always harms and hurts both the
sinner and those affected by his or her sins. And true repentance
is never easy. And the worst kind of sin is premeditated sin,
where one says, I can sin now and repent later. I believe that
this is a solemn mockery of the sacrifice and sufferings of
Jesus Christ. Then he quotes from Alma, from the Book of
Mormon. In Alma, Chapter 4110, Behold, I say unto you,
wickedness never was happiness. But he explains why, and I love
his explanation. He said one of the reasons that Alma statement
is particularly true is that with repeated sinning, we
distance ourselves from the spirit, become discouraged and
then stop repenting. So all of the things that we were just
talking about, all of these things that provide courage and
hope and forward progression, they all stop. They all stop
when we decide that I'm just going to do this I can repent
later, when we stop repenting and stop listening, also, that's
when pride sets in. We start to rationalize and justify our own
behavior, our thoughts, our actions, our excuses, all of the
things we start to rationalize and justify them. It becomes an
I didn't do anything wrong, situation or mindset which
continues to push us further from who we can become. Elder
Cornish says what we cannot do is rationalize rather than
repent. It will not work to justify ourselves and our sins
by saying, God knows it's just too hard for me, he accepts me
like I am. That sounds familiar. That sounds an awful lot like we
are trying to tell God that His rules are dumb, they're too
hard, and we're not going to follow them, and we still expect
for him to give us all of the rewards, as though we did follow
the rules. We talked about that a couple episodes back in the
love and laws episode, so I'm not going to get into all of
that right now. President oaks did a great job of putting that
to rest. You can go check that one out. Elder Cornish continues
talking about really trying, so we're putting the
rationalization. We're putting the rationalization the
justification. We're putting that away because we are trying
to focus on becoming better, and we're trying to focus on forward
progression. And forward progression does not come from
rationalization and justification. Really trying,
elder Cornish says means we keep it. We keep at it. Sorry, really
trying means we keep at it as we fully come up to the Lord's
standard, which is clearly defined in the questions we are
asked in order to get a temple recommend. So if you need to
know what the standard is, go check out the temple recommend
questions. That's the standard that our Heavenly Father expects
us to live to. And if you have a temple recommend, a temple
recommend, congratulations, you're there, that does not mean
that you're perfect. I have a temple recommend. I am not
perfect, far from perfect. Instead of expecting the Lord to
come to us, it's too hard. He'll forgive me later. We need to
come to him a little bit at a time, every day, daily
repentance, really trying, moving forward, forward
progression. That is, that's what started this whole thing,
right? The quote from President Hinckley. Where did it go? The
quote from President Hinckley, where he said,
Oh my goodness, it isn't as bad as you sometimes think it is. It
All. Works out. Don't worry if you do your best. It will all
work out. Put your trust in God and move forward with faith a
little bit at a time every single day. Okay, two more
quotes from elder Cornish to finish off this episode. Let he
says, Let me be direct and clear the answers to the questions, am
I good enough and Will I make it? Are? Are the answers? Yes,
you are going to be good enough and yes, you are going to make
it, as long as you keep repenting and do not rationalize
or rebel. The God of Heaven is not a heartless referee looking
for any excuse to throw us out of the game. He is our perfectly
loving Father who yearns more than anything else, to have all
of his children come back, come back home and live with him as
families forever. Our heavenly Father intends for us to make
it. That is His work and His glory. It is God's purpose to
help us make it. We still get to choose. We talked about agency
before too. We still get to choose. He's not going to take
our agency away and say, you have to make it do all of these
things. And lastly, he says, I witness to you that if you will
really try and will not rationalize or rebel, you
positively are going to be good enough that is acceptable before
the Lord. You will be acceptable before the Lord. You are going
to make it to the celestial kingdom being perfect in Christ,
and you are going to receive the blessings and glory and joy that
God desires for each of his precious children, including
specifically you and me. And just to be sure, I actually went
and looked up the word admonished that President
Holland used earlier. Yes, it can be used to denote a
reprimand, a criticism or a scolding, but it can also be
replaced with advised, taught, warned or counseled. I don't
want to put words into President Holland's mouth, but I sure feel
a lot better knowing that admonish, admonished was more
likely used as strongly counseled from our Heavenly
Father, letting President Holland know where he can
improve. And then elder Cornish tells us that we can get the
same we just have to ask, before you go and ask, please make sure
that you're ready to really try, because once you know better,
the expectation is that you will do better. You won't have to do
it alone, though your heavenly Father loves you and will
provide all of the tools and necessary things that you need
to be able to progress along that covenant path and to become
more like Him, your Savior will be right there with you the
whole way as he will me, I have a long way to go. It's going to
be a long path, but a little bit at a time, we just have to keep
trying. And that is, according to President Hinckley, who is a
prophet of God, we just have to keep trying. Our heavenly Father
loves you. He loves me. He wants to see us succeed. Thank you so
much for being here today. Keep learning, keep growing, keep
trying just a little bit more every day, and be of good cheer.
Thanks everybody until next time you.