An Easiness and Willingness to Believe


Often in the scriptures, prophets use the metaphor of soft and hard hearts to describe the easiness and willingness of the people to believe and act upon the word of God. If our hearts are soft, we believe more readily, our testimonies grow, and we strive to do that which the Lord asks of us because we love Him and understand that obedience and repentance brings lasting happiness to our lives. If our hearts are hard, we reject the words of the prophets, think that we know better than they, live "how we want to live and do what we want to do," thus our wills are not in line with God, and we end up with very unhappy and unfulfilled lives.

The article of the week this week is entitled, "An Easiness and Willingness to Believe," a talk given by Elder Michael T. Ringwood of the Quorum of the Seventy in the most recent General Conference. This article builds off last week's article about preserving the heart's mighty change and keeping the heart from becoming hardened. Elder Ringwood addresses those things that we can and should do in order to retain soft hearts and willing attitudes to do those things that bring eternal and lasting happiness.

Although many of the principles discussed in this article are simple and easy to understand, sometimes we choose not to apply them in our lives. I have noticed in my own life that when I consistently study my scriptures and pray, when I go to Church with a desire to learn and grow, when I look for opportunities to serve others, and when I otherwise apply the teachings of the Savior in my life, I find that the Spirit is more prevalent in my life and that I am more willing and able to believe the words of the prophets, both ancient and living.

Jeremy

Comments

  1. That's kinda cool that you posted about this talk back in January. I got baptized on Jan 30 and my first Sacrament meeting talk is centered on Elder Ringwood's talk and I am giving it this sunday.

    I really love your perspective on the talk too!

    ReplyDelete
  2. How'd the talk go?

    Congrats on getting baptized, that's an exciting step!

    I have a question for you as an investigator/new member. Sometimes I wonder if I don't cater to the nonmember reader enough although they are my intended audience. Is my blog easy to read or is the language I use hard to understand from a nonmember/new member perspective?

    ReplyDelete

Post a Comment