A Parent's Promise...

 

Enlisted to Serve God at Baptism...

Photo: Douglas Stewart

The Prophet Joseph pointed out that before your baptism, you could be on neutral ground between good and evil. But “when you joined this Church you enlisted to serve God. When you did that you left the neutral ground, and you never can [go] back.” His counsel was that we must never forsake the Master.
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At baptism we promise to take upon us “the name of [Jesus] Christ, having [the] determination to serve him to the end.” Such a covenant requires courageous effort, commitment, and integrity if we are to continue to sing the song of redeeming love and stay truly converted.

-Elder Quintin L. Cook

Be Patient...

Photo By Douglas Stewart  (Huntington Beach, California)

Be patient with yourself.  Perfection comes not in this life, but the next.  Don’t demand things that are unreasonable, but demand of yourself improvement.

-Elder Russell M. Nielsen

Dost thou love life?

Dost thou love life? Then do not squander time, for that is the stuff life is made of.
-Ben Franklin

Progress...

Photo: Ben Romney, Europe

Progress means not just changing, but changing for the better. If no set of moral ideas were truer or better than any other, there would be no sense in preferring civilized morality to savage morality, or Christian morality to Nazi morality.

"We all want progress. But progress means getting nearer to the place where you want to be. And if you have taken a wrong turning, then to go forward does not get you any nearer. If you are on the wrong road, progress means an about-turn and walking back to the right road; and in that case the man who turns back soonest is the most progressive man. "
— C.S. Lewis (Mere Christianity)