ELDER RICHARDSON'S TALK (ADDED CONTENT) FROM THIS PAST SUNDAY WHEN HE HAD TO SPEAK AGAIN...IN ANOTHER WARD.
Good Morning Brothers and Sisters! It is great to be able to be here and speak to you. For those of you whom I have not met yet, I am Elder Richardson. I have been on my mission for 14 months and have been serving in this area for about 5 weeks! I would like to thank all of you for helping make this branch feel like home! It is great as missionaries to be serving in an area where you are comfortable and loved so much, thank you!
We have been asked to speak to you today on pretty much what ever. It was left up to us so I decided to talk about New Year’s resolutions and Charity. I have never really been one for making resolutions and I have definitely not been one for keeping them so this was a great topic for me! I have learned a lot as I have prepared to speak to you today and I hope the spirit may uplift and edify you as it has me.
When I started thinking about making new year’s resolutions for myself I was looking at all the things I was struggling at the last year or that I simply wasn’t doing which isn’t a bad thing but we need to remember some advice Elder Holland gave us last April during general conference in his talk “Lord I believe”. Elder Holland talks about the story in which a father in distress over his sons violent illness comes to the Lord to have him heal his son. Jesus asks the man if he believes that he can heal his son. The man’s response is “Lord I believe, Help thou my unbelief”. Elder Holland responds to the story with this. “Observation number one regarding this account is that when facing the challenge of faith, the father asserts his strength first and only then acknowledges his limitation. His initial declaration is affirmative and without hesitation: “Lord, I believe.” I would say to all who wish for more faith, remember this man! In moments of fear or doubt or troubling times, hold the ground you have already won, even if that ground is limited. In the growth we all have to experience in mortality, the spiritual equivalent of this boy’s affliction or this parent’s desperation is going to come to all of us. When those moments come and issues surface, the resolution of which is not immediately forthcoming, hold fast to what you already know and stand strong until additional knowledge comes.” I know this talk doesn’t have anything to do with resolutions but I believe we can apply specifically one portion of this talk to setting resolutions which is “Hold the ground you have already won.” When setting resolutions we need to not only set goals to improve at what we are struggling with but also set goals for those things that we are doing good at. We need to push ourselves in those categories, those things at which we are exceeding, i.e. the ground we have already won and keep going forward.
I will be basing the majority of my talk off of an article titled “Keeping New year’s Resolutions” from the December 1990 Liahona.
The Article starts out:
“Do you start out each new year with lots of plans to improve your life but, after a few weeks, lose your enthusiasm? If so, here are a few ideas to help you keep the best of your New Year’s resolutions:”
The first idea the article talks about is setting realistic resolutions. It says “Make realistic resolutions. Don’t try too much too quickly. For example, if you are presently not reading your scriptures at all but your resolution is to read half an hour every day, you may be setting yourself up for failure. It may be more realistic to resolve just to read something, even if it is just a few verses, every day. After that becomes habit, then you can work on increasing your goal.” This step is crucial. As missionaries we get to make tons of goals whether it be for baptisms, how many lessons we want to teach, how many investigators we want to try and have at sacrament meeting or it might be goals we set for ourselves to improve as missionaries. Whatever the case is we set a ton of goals and one thing preach my gospel says is. Be specific and realistic, but set goals that will make you stretch. I think this is perfect advice when it comes to setting goals for the new year.
The next thing the article says is: “Set a series of smaller goals. Divide your big goal into smaller sections. Say, for instance, you want to save money. Instead of leaving your goal so vague, plan a reasonable amount to work toward in the first month, then a larger amount to have saved at the first quarter of the year. These smaller goals will keep you encouraged as you make progress.” This step is very important if you are one for setting large goals and you want any chance of meeting them. I like to look at this step in a sports perspective. Say a team sets a goal to go undefeated. That is a great goal but might be pretty difficult to reach. So the coach has to break it down into smaller things at practice like, Conditioning, drills, teamwork, and so on. But once the team practices these things diligently and reaches these smaller goals that they have set to work together, be the most conditioned, and hardest working team, that goal to be undefeated this season may become a reality but only through these small things. There is a story in a talk given by M Russell Ballard titled “Finding joy through loving service”.
Oftentimes we are like the young merchant from Boston, who in 1849, as the story goes, was caught up in the fervor of the California gold rush. He sold all of his possessions to seek his fortune in the California rivers, which he was told were filled with gold nuggets so big that one could hardly carry them.
Day after endless day, the young man dipped his pan into the river and came up empty. His only reward was a growing pile of rocks. Discouraged and broke, he was ready to quit until one day an old, experienced prospector said to him, “That’s quite a pile of rocks you are getting there, my boy.”
The young man replied, “There’s no gold here. I’m going back home.”
Walking over to the pile of rocks, the old prospector said, “Oh, there is gold all right. You just have to know where to find it.” He picked two rocks up in his hands and crashed them together. One of the rocks split open, revealing several flecks of gold sparkling in the sunlight.
Noticing a bulging leather pouch fastened to the prospector’s waist, the young man said, “I’m looking for nuggets like the ones in your pouch, not just tiny flecks.”
The old prospector extended his pouch toward the young man, who looked inside, expecting to see several large nuggets. He was stunned to see that the pouch was filled with thousands of flecks of gold.
The old prospector said, “Son, it seems to me you are so busy looking for large nuggets that you’re missing filling your pouch with these precious flecks of gold. The patient accumulation of these little flecks has brought me great wealth.”
We need to remember what Alma taught his son Helaman in Alma 37: 6-7 about small and simple things and relate it to our resolutions. It says: “6 Now ye may suppose that this is afoolishness in me; but behold I say unto you, that by bsmall and simple things are great things brought to pass; and small means in many instances doth confound the wise.
7 And the Lord God doth work by ameans to bring about his great and eternal purposes; and by very bsmall means the Lord doth cconfound the wise and bringeth about the salvation of many souls.
The Next step the article has to offer is: “Make reminders. After you decide the things you would like to work on, make several reminders for yourself. The old method of taping a sign on your mirror or somewhere where you will see it regularly might work. But if you usually ignore your signs, try something different. Sometimes simple things can work. Take the resolution to read your scriptures every day, for example. When you get out of bed in the morning, place your scriptures on your pillow. It will be difficult to say you forgot when you have to move them before going to bed.” We cannot possible fulfill our goals if we can’t remember to do them in the first place. We need to constantly be reminding ourselves of our goals whether it is putting a note somewhere around the house or setting an alarm on your phone you simply can’t reach your goals if you don’t remember. Also when planning out your day remember to make time for your goals. Set aside time to run if you are trying to lose weight or make sure to have a least a few minutes every night to read your scriptures if that is what you are working on. Either way if you do not make time for your goals it is going to be easy to forget about them and your are simply not going to accomplish them.
The last little bit of advice the article gives us is: “Be kind to yourself. If you find you’ve made resolutions that are making you miserable, be willing to change them. After all, they are your resolutions. Sometimes you can resolve to do things that are really too big to handle. Instead of giving up as a failure, modify your goals so that they will be a true help and result in improvement.”
Like the article says, these are our resolutions we are the ones that set them and we can change them! The point of making resolutions and setting goals is to better ourselves or improve in something we are lacking. We cannot do this if we are not reaching our goals. When we set to high of goals and do not reach them it makes us lose motivation and from there we will simply stop trying because that is better than failing. Always remember that these are your goals and you can tweak them to where you can reach them but they are still making you stretch!
I would like to share some scriptures with you from Alma chapter 32 regarding to helping us reach our goals. This is the chapter where the word unto a seed. In Verse 28 it says “Now, we will compare the word unto a seed. Now, if ye give place, that a seed may be planted in your heart, behold, if it be a true seed, or a good seed, if ye do not cast it out by your unbelief, that ye will resist the Spirit of the Lord, behold, it will begin to swell within your breasts; and when you feel these swelling motions, ye will begin to say within yourselves—It must needs be that this is a good seed, or that the word is good, for it beginneth to enlarge my soul; yea, it beginneth toenlighten my understanding, yea, it beginneth to be delicious to me.” Just like Alma said the word would become delicious to us as we nourish it and let it grow within us so will our resolutions. As we do the things we need to, as we nourish our resolutions so to speak, we will reach our goals. Later on in Chapter 32 verse 41 it says “But if ye will nourish the word, yea, nourish the tree as it beginneth to grow, by your faith with great diligence, and withpatience, looking forward to the fruit thereof, it shall take root; and behold it shall be a tree springing up unto everlasting life.” As this scripture says it will take great diligence and patience to nourish our resolutions, but as we have that diligence and patience with ourselves while trying to reach these goals we will succeed!
The last step I would like to add, is remember to rely on Christ. If we are having trouble reaching our goals we can always ask for help. I have experienced this first hand in my life. We need to remember to be humble and realize we may need help accomplishing our goals. Christ is all knowing and can help us accomplish anything if it will benefit us. We also need to remember to thank him and acknowledge his hand in what we have accomplished. It is like Ammon says in Verse 12 of Alma chapter 26: “Yea, I know that I am nothing; as to my strength I am weak; therefore I will notboast of myself, but I will boast of my God, for in his strength I can do allthings; yea, behold, many mighty miracles we have wrought in this land, for which we will praise his name forever.”
Now I would like to talk a little bit about a goal I have set for the New Year which is to strive to always have charity. In Preach my gospel there is a whole chapter designated to Christ like attributes. One of which is Charity. If you don’t know what charity is you can find the answer in multiple scriptures. My favorite is in Moroni chapter 7 verse 47. It says: “But charityis the pure love of Christ, and it endureth forever; and whoso is found possessed of it at the last day, it shall be well with him.” I can remember a certain lesson I had in the MTC. It was about these Christ like attributes and how we need to strive to posses them. It is one thing to BE charitable or in other words show charity for an instance or a short period of time and then there is HAVING charity. This means to possess it. It means that it is with you always and you don’t have to think about it you just act with Charity. This is what I am going to try and accomplish this year. I have always loved charity and the effect it has on other people. A couple months ago I was studying charity and really learned how important it is. I was studying 1st Corinthians chapter 13, this chapter is basically Paul talking about the High status of charity. In verses 1-3 it says: “1 though I speak with the tongues of men and of angels, and have not charity, I am become as sounding brass, or a tinkling cymbal.2 And though I have the gift of prophecy, and understand allmysteries, and all knowledge; and though I have all faith, so that I could remove mountains, and have not charity, I am nothing.3 And though I bestow all my goods to feed the poor, and though I give my body to be burned, and have not charity, it profiteth me nothing.” In these verses Paul talks about all the great and amazing things he can perform such as talk with the gift of tongues, move mountains, and give all he has to the poor. He then says that if he does not HAVE charity (notice the scriptures say have and not be) he is nothing. Charity is much more than being nice to someone or doing them a favor, it is literally loving everyone as Christ would. This is not easy and I am not sure if it is even possible, but if we are doing our best the Lord will know and we will be blessed. Ther is a quote that comes to mind when I think about charity or love. “That which is done with love ceases to burden but becomes a blessing” I would encourage all of you to find your own Christ Like attribute you would like to work on this year and strive to posses it. I can promise you that as you try your best to strive to have what ever Christ like attribute you decide to work on you will be blessed immensely. I have seen so many blessings come as I have worked on being more like Christ. After all when we are baptized we promise to do our best to be like Christ and in return receive blessings.
I pray that what I have shared with you today regarding Resolutions, Goals and Charity has helped you in some way want to be more like Christ this coming year. In closing I would like to share a quote with you out of preach my gospel from Elder M Russell Ballard. He said “I am so thoroughly convinced that if we don’t set goals in our life and learn how to master the techniques of living to reach our goals, we can reach a ripe old age and look back on our life only to see that we reached but a small part of our full potential. When one learns to master the principles of setting a goal, he will then be able to make a great difference in the results he attains in this life.”
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