The Joys of Living a Christ Centered Life – After Mission
Welcome Home Talk
December 26, 2015
Emma Bower
Good Morning Brothers and Sisters!
As most of you probably know (as was just said), I just
returned from serving a full time mission in the Massachusetts Boston Mission.
During those short 18 months I experienced and witnessed many miracles, and I
can tell you that the Lord really does care about His children. He loves you
and wants all of us to return to Him some day. He sent His son, Jesus Christ to
earth, to live, atone, and die for us so that this might be possible. I can
think of no greater love than this.
I wanted to start out by sharing a story with you from this
past general conference. The talk was given by Elder Richard J. Maynes of the
Presidency of the Seventy, titled “The Joys of Living a Christ Centered Life.”
He says:
Elder Taiichi Aoba of
the Seventy, who resides in a small mountain village in Shikoku, Japan, was
asked to teach a class at a youth conference. “Stand Ye in Holy Places” was
selected as the theme of the conference. After considering the theme and what
to teach, Elder Aoba decided to use his vocation as a teaching tool. His work
is making pottery.
Elder Aoba relates
that his classroom of youth really sprang to life when they saw how he was able
to almost magically transform the shape of the clay in his hands to plates,
bowls, and cups. After his demonstration, he asked them if any of them would
like to give it a try. They all raised their hands.
Elder Aoba had several
of the youth come forward to try out their new interest. They assumed, after
watching him, that this would be quite simple. However, none of them were
successful in their attempts to make even a simple bowl. They proclaimed: “I
can’t do this!” “Why is this so hard?” “This is so difficult.” These comments
took place as the clay flew all around the room.
He asked the youth why
they were having such difficulty making pottery. They responded with various
answers: “I don’t have any experience,” “I have never been trained,” or “I have
no talent.” Based on the result, what they said was all true; however, the most
important reason for their failure was due to the clay not being centered on
the wheel. The youth thought that they had placed the clay in the center, but
from a professional’s perspective, it wasn’t in the exact center. He then told
them, “Let’s try this one more time.”
This time, Elder Aoba
placed the clay in the exact center of the wheel and then started to turn the
wheel, making a hole in the middle of the clay. Several of the youth tried
again. This time everyone started clapping when they said: “Wow, it’s not
shaking,” “I can do this,” or “I did it!” Of course, the shapes weren’t
perfect, but the outcome was totally different from the first attempt. The
reason for their success was because the clay was perfectly centered on the
wheel.
The world in which we
live is similar to the potter’s spinning wheel, and the speed of that wheel is
increasing. Like the clay on the potter’s wheel, we must be centered as well.
Our core, the center of our lives, must be Jesus Christ and His gospel. Living
a Christ-centered life means we learn about Jesus Christ and His gospel and
then we follow His example and keep His commandments with exactness.
The ancient prophet Isaiah
stated, “But now, O Lord, thou art our father; we are the clay, and thou our
potter; and we all are the work of thy hand.”1
If our lives are
centered in Jesus Christ, He can successfully mold us into who we need to be in
order to return to His and Heavenly Father’s presence in the celestial kingdom.
The joy we experience in this life will be in direct proportion to how well our
lives are centered on the teachings, example, and atoning sacrifice of Jesus
Christ.
As I served my mission, I saw many people who received the
blessings from living a Christ centered life, and many who didn’t. Those who
strived to live a Christ centered life were blessed with peace, joy, stability,
and happiness in their lives. I can promise you that as you do your best to
live the example given you, by Jesus Christ, that you will experience those
same blessings.
I can think of one man in particular on my mission who
changed everything in order to center his life on Christ. His name is John. To
give you a little background about him – Prior to meeting him, John was
recently remarried to his wife Lotta, and they have a mixed family with 5 children.
His wife is a member of the church but had fallen inactive due to this new part
of her family not being members. One Sunday, she made it to church, and invited
the missionaries into their home. John was not interested in the church, or
what the Elders had to say to him. His eldest son Jack, however, was very
interested and even got baptized. John went to the baptism, and while waiting
in the car for his family so that they could go home, he picked up a Book of
Mormon in their car and opened to a random passage. This verse read: “Repent
and be baptized.” I don’t think anything could be more clear than that.
After a little while
of his son being a new member of the church, John had a dream one night. I
won’t tell you all the details of the dream, but the message was this: He knew
that he could not end up where his son was, because Jack had something that he
did not. The gospel. This troubled John exceedingly, because he wanted to be
with his family. Soon, the Elders began to teach John, and he was baptized.
A few months later, I arrived in my first area in the
mission field. About my third Sunday we met a woman we had not seen before in
Relief Society. Her name is Lotta. We welcomed her and introduced ourselves.
She was very kind, and even signed up to feed us for dinner.
When we arrived at her home a few days later, we were
welcomed in happily and were asked to sit on the couch while she finished
preparing for dinner. As we waited on the couch, a tall, loud man walked down
the stairs and plopped down on the couch next to my companion. He had a fluffy
Go-T on his face, tattooed sleeves, a shaved head, and wild eyes. He introduced
himself as John. John, we found out had been recently baptized but was now
inactive. He was inactive because he felt overwhelmed at all the things that He
was asked to do in the church, and he felt like everyone that went to church
with him was perfect – and he was very far from it. As we ate dinner with their
family, we fell in love with them. Never have I felt such a strong love for
someone in my life – and it was because I could not only feel my own love for
this family, but God’s love mingled with my own. I would do anything in the
world for this family to keep them happy.
A month or two past, and all we wanted to do was go visit
this family. But Lotta had not come to church, and we felt a strong impression
not to visit their home. This troubled us a lot, my companion and I had no idea
why Heavenly Father didn’t want us to go to their home. But we listened,
fasted, and prayed for them. At the end of that month or two we were invited
back to their home for dinner. As we sat down to eat with one another, John’s
countenance had slightly changed. He still had his wild eyes, and could never
sit still, just like last time. But something was different. During our dinner
message we all shared about a hard time we had gone through, and how Christ had
helped us through it. My companion was the last to share. Now you need to
understand something – in John’s mind, us missionaries had never gone through a
hard thing our lives, everything was perfect, and we had our lives mapped out
in front of us. Because he thought this, he believed that we wouldn’t be able
to relate or understand what he had gone through. Which was true, it was
impossible for us to understand the hardships he had experienced – but we had
each experienced trials. My companion felt impressed to share a little bit
about her life and the hard things she had gone through – and as she shared, I
watched John. His eyes were glued to her, and he physically began to change. He
stopped fidgeting, his eyes became soft, and tears poured down his cheeks. The
wall that he had built up was quickly broken, and this allowed the spirit to
move within him.
After leaving their home that night, all we could do was
pray for them. All we wanted was for John and his family to come to church. We
thought it to be impossible.
That Sunday, we went to church. We had finished greeting
everyone like we normally did and took our seats in the back. As we sat down I
felt two hands on my shoulders, and I turned around and saw one of John’s sons.
Confused but happy, I stood up and turned around and saw John walk into the
chapel with the biggest grin on his face. Tears came to our eyes as we shook
John’s hand and sat with their whole family in church that Sunday.
To shorten the story a little, eventually, John baptized his
youngest son and their family became an active part of the ward. They began to
study scriptures together, participate in ward activities, and have family home
evening. This caused not only a spiritual change, but a physical one as well.
John’s crazy eyes became tame, he was a lot calmer, and he was happy. Over the
course of my mission, John’s son was able to receive the priesthood and passed
the sacrament, and his father blessed it. I was able to attend the sealing of
their family in the Boston temple which was probably one of the best days in my
mission. I never thought I would see that man go to church, to see him in the
temple was the greatest miracle. John is now actively participating in his
calling in the Bishopric.
Brothers and Sisters, this is one of my favorite stories to
tell. I feel so blessed and honored to be able to have witnessed such a mighty
change of heart. I know that Heavenly Father was, and still is mindful of John.
He molded and formed John until he was ready to have us in his home, to remind
him of the atoning sacrifice of Jesus Christ. I want to testify to you that I know that when
we choose to actively do our best to have Christ in the center of our lives –
to do everything we can to be like Him, that we are blessed more than we can
imagine. I have seen it time and time again, and I have experienced it within
my own life as well.
In the parable of the potter’s clay that I shared earlier –
it talked about being centered on Christ vs. being exactly centered on Christ.
There is a difference between obedience and exact obedience. We can choose to
be obedient to the Lord and His commandments, but are we striving to do so at “all
times, and in all things, and in all places?” In my mission, the missionaries
always say: “Obedience brings blessings, and exact obedience brings miracles.”
I can’t remember a specific example, but I can tell you that
there have been different times on my mission when my companions and I have
decided that we needed to improve and be exactly obedient. We knew that by
being exactly obedient, the Lord would see that we were doing our best to give
everything we had to Him. We knew miracles would come – and they did. New
investigators were found, baptismal dates were set, addictions our
investigators had, became less of an issue, my companion’s and I taught with
more unity, we became more aware of the tender mercies the Lord was sending us.
And the list goes on. I have such a strong testimony of being exactly obedient
to the Lord. He knows what is best for us, and that is why He asks us to do all
that He does. Living the way Christ did is not always easy – it can actually be
really hard sometimes. But something that my mission president has taught me is
that it wasn’t easy for Jesus, so why would it be easy for us? Through Jesus
Christ we can receive help and guidance.
Remember in the book
of Alma chapter 20, Ammon and Lamoni were traveling to the city of Middoni for the
purpose of finding and delivering Ammon’s brother Aaron out of prison. During
their journey they encountered Lamoni’s father, who was the Lamanite king over
all the land.
The king was very
upset that his son Lamoni was traveling with Ammon, a Nephite missionary, whom
he considered an enemy. He felt that his son should have attended a great feast
he had sponsored for his sons and his people. The Lamanite king was so upset
that he commanded his son Lamoni to slay Ammon with his sword. When Lamoni
refused, the king drew his own sword to slay his son for disobedience; however,
Ammon interceded to save Lamoni’s life. He ultimately overpowered the king and
could have killed him.
This is what the king
said to Ammon after finding himself in this life-and-death situation: “If thou
wilt spare me I will grant unto thee whatsoever thou wilt ask, even to half of
the kingdom.”3
So the king was
willing to pay the price of one-half his kingdom in order to spare his own
life. The king must have been astonished when Ammon requested only that he
release his brother Aaron and his associates from prison and that the king’s
son Lamoni retain his kingdom.
Later on, due to this
encounter, Ammon’s brother Aaron was released from the Middoni prison. After
his release he was inspired to travel to where the Lamanite king ruled over the
land. Aaron was introduced to the king and had the privilege of teaching him
the principles of the gospel of Jesus Christ, including the great plan of
redemption. The teachings of Aaron inspired the king deeply.
The king’s response to
Aaron’s teachings is found inverse 15 of Alma chapter 22: “And it came to pass that after Aaron
had expounded these things unto him, the king said: What shall I do that I may
have this eternal life of which thou hast spoken? Yea, what shall I do that I
may be born of God, having this wicked spirit rooted out of my breast, and
receive his Spirit, that I may be filled with joy, that I may not be cast off
at the last day? Behold, said he, I will give up all that I possess, yea, I
will forsake my kingdom, that I may receive this great joy.”
Amazingly enough, in
contrast to giving up one-half his kingdom to spare his life, the Lamanite king
was now willing to give up his entire kingdom that he might receive the joy
that comes from understanding, accepting, and living the gospel of Jesus
Christ.
Unlike Ammon and Lamoni, I have not had any near death
experiences, but I have like Aaron, been prompted to visit certain homes or
places. There was one day in particular that my companion and I received a
media referral on our phone for someone who requested a Book of Mormon.
Excited, and thinking we were going to get a new investigator, we went to this
woman’s house. When we got to her home, there were men working on trucks and
cars in front of her house – and we weren’t sure if we should really be there. But
we asked one of the men if Silvia lived there, and he went in the house to get
her. To our surprise, a frail, old woman came onto the porch and sat in a
chair. Her hair was falling out and she looked ill, she was too weak to stand.
When she saw my companion and I, tears came to her eyes as she expressed how
grateful she was to see us. She told us that she had been praying for someone
from the church to find her so that she could take the Sacrament, because of
cancer she was unable to be around people. She had sent in a referral for a
Book of Mormon in hopes that someone would come to her home – and we did.
Silvia had been on our ward list for a long time, but no one had noticed her
name, so she hadn’t been visited in years. Though we didn’t find a new
investigator, the Lord knew that Silvia needed us – He knew that we needed to
visit her.
I can recall another time when the Lord needed us in a
certain place at a certain time. I was in my third area and we felt prompted to
visit an inactive family. I had never seen the Dunn family at church, and we
were told that they hadn’t come to church since they were baptized. They were
set in their ways and said they would come to church, but never did. But oh how
they loved the missionaries, we would visit them weekly. Sometimes twice a
week. After praying about it, we decided to give them a break from the
missionaries for a few weeks so that they could feel the difference without the
gospel in their lives. But when the prompting came to visit their family, we
went. While we were there, we met Brother Dunn’s nephew, Jose.
Jose is 20 years old, and I have never seen someone so lost.
His eyes were dark and he just looked like a gloomy person. But he was nice. A
few weeks later, Jose agreed to take the missionary discussions. When we taught
him the restoration, He agreed with everything we taught him. He knew what we
said was true, and He knew the Book of Mormon was true. He told us that he had
been praying for direction and guidance in his life – and that we had answered
his prayers. He was like that with all of the lessons that we taught him. Jose
fell in love with the Book of Mormon. He read every day, and had questions for
us each time we visited about what he had read.
Eventually, Jose agreed to be baptized. In order to be able
to make this covenant, he needed to stop smoking and conquer other addictions.
So we started working with him on it, and giving him different assignments to
help him. In the end, the things that he said got him to overcome his
addictions the most was the Book of Mormon. When he felt a craving, he would
read and pray until the cravings went away, and it worked for him.
Like John, Jose’s countenance changed both temporally and spiritually.
He became more outgoing, his eyes had the brightest light in them that I have
ever seen in a person, his prayers were the most beautiful I have ever heard.
He began to teach the Dunn family about the restored gospel, and helped them
come back to church. He introduced the Plan of Salvation to his immediate
family, and the missionaries began to teach them. He has recently received the
Priesthood, and is now working on going to the temple to do baptisms for the
dead with his own family names.
If it wasn’t for the spirit telling us to go to the Dunn’s
home at that time, I don’t know if we would have found Jose. The Lord knew that
we needed to be there, and because we were trying our best to be faithful and
listen to the promptings of the Holy Ghost – great blessings came from it.
I want to touch on something that has been a common problem
throughout my mission for members and non-members alike. Too many people think
they need to be perfect before they can come to church. Let me tell you
brothers and sisters, that Jesus Christ is the only person who has walked this
earth that is perfect. A lot of people on my mission have become either less
active or inactive because they think they need to have everything in their
life in order to be able to come to church. For both John and Brother Dunn,
whom I have mentioned in my talk – this has been a struggle. Both have since
learned however that church is a place where we can go to become more like our
Savior and strengthen our relationship with Heavenly Father.
There was one woman in my third area who expressed to me
that she was struggling with this problem. She listed some families to us that
she thought were perfect and had it all. I have been to the homes of those
families, and they each have their struggles too.
Something that my companions and I would often tell people
is that “The church is a hospital for sinners. Every saint has a past, and
every sinner has a future.”
We are all sinners – but the amazing thing is that Christ
atoned for us – and we can be forgiven of all our wrongs as long as we pray to
the Father with a broken heart and a contrite spirit. I know that the Atonement
of Jesus Christ is real. I have seen it work in the lives of many people and I
have seen it work in my own life as well.
Naturally, we are all striving to be better. Relief society
Presidents, Young men, missionaries, non-members – all of us.
When I was set apart as a full time missionary, part of my
blessing told me that I would have a great influence on those that came from
broken families. And that I would teach them the importance of family and of
how we can be together for eternity. On my journey as a full time missionary, I
struggled to see the changes that I had made in people’s lives. I often
wondered if I had made a difference at all. I prayed the whole 18 months that I
was in New England that I would be able to see the impact that I had on
people’s lives. Maybe that was a selfish thing to pray for – but I am grateful
that I did. I don’t think I will ever come close to understanding the influence
I had on others on my mission, but Heavenly Father has been able to show me
some small ones as I neared the end of my mission and have now been reflecting
on it.
As I was writing this talk, I was flipping through a binder
that my mom made that contains all of my emails and letters that I sent home
each week. One letter in the binder is a letter from my first companion to my
parents. This letter shows that she was personally striving to be better. I
didn’t know that she wrote this, but here is what she said:
“I have grown with love for each of you (meaning your
family) as Sister Bower continues to tell me about you. She always speaks with
so much love about each of you. I love listening to her tell me stories. Some
being funny and others being just loving memories. She misses you but she
always says that being a missionary makes up for it. Being a missionary makes
up for practically everything in life the Lord blesses us always. I don’t know
how much she has told you about my family but I come from a very… different
family situation. I have been very blessed though to serve with a companion who
has become my family. And allowed me into her family to know that functional
families exist. You have impacted me a lot through Sister Bower. She has no
idea the effect she has on people.”
We worked a lot together on what it meant to forgive others,
and to love everyone as the Savior would. She struggled a lot with her family,
but because of the example that my family was to her, and because of Jesus
Christ – she was able to see that things would work out. My family is not
perfect, but because they strive to center their lives on Christ they have a
great influence on others.
When we try our best to be like the Savior, and be exactly
centered on Him, the Lord not only blesses us – but uses our example to bless
the lives of others.
Another experience
from the Book of Mormon clearly illustrates how living a Christ-centered life
can fill us with great happiness even when we are surrounded with incredible
hardships.
After the prophet Lehi
and his family left Jerusalem in 600 b.c., they wandered approximately
eight years in the wilderness until they finally arrived in a land they called
Bountiful, which was near the seashore. Nephi describes their life of
tribulation in the wilderness this way: “We had suffered many afflictions and
much difficulty, … even so much that we cannot write them all.”4
While living in
Bountiful, Nephi was charged by the Lord with the responsibility to build the
ship which would take them across the sea to the promised land. After they
arrived in the promised land, great conflicts continued to arise between the
people who centered their lives in Christ and the nonbelievers, who followed
the examples of Laman and Lemuel. Ultimately, the risk of violence between the
two groups was so great that Nephi and those who followed the teachings of the
Lord separated themselves and fled into the wilderness for safety. At this
point in time, some 30 years after Lehi and his family left Jerusalem, Nephi
makes a well-documented and somewhat surprising statement, especially after
recording in the scriptures the many afflictions and tribulations they had
faced for so long. These are his words: “And it came to pass that we [did live]
after the manner of happiness.”5 Despite
their hardships, they were able to live after the manner of happiness because
they were centered in Christ and His gospel.
Nephi is not the only person in the Book of Mormon to live a
Christ centered life – but he certainly is a wonderful example of pushing
through hard things and living the way He knew was right.
One of my companion’s and I had a unique teaching
opportunity. In the Massachusetts Boston Mission we have the opportunity to
teach people online from all over the world using Skype. My companion asked
President for permission to start teaching her sister in laws little brother
over Skype. Permission was granted, and we were able to start teaching. His
name is Chad.
To give you some background on Chad, he became inactive for
about 5 years. He was very opposed to the church; he wouldn’t even step foot
inside a church building. After those 5 years, Chad began to wonder if the
church was really true or not. He wanted to know for himself. That is where my
companion and I came in. Keeping it a secret from his active family, we began
to teach Chad the discussions, and gave him reading assignments in the Book of
Mormon. He read several chapters a day. He didn’t know if it was true – but he
thought that they were nice stories. It was hard to teach him at first because
he had so many oppositions and he didn’t know how to feel the spirit. We kept
persisting that he needed to pray. It took a while, but when he finally did,
things began to change. His prayers were simple, he accounted for the things he
did that day and talked to God like they were friends. He became more open to
the assignments we gave him, and he started to take things more seriously. He
began to try different singles wards in his area, and talked with a Bishop when
he decided which singles ward he wanted to go to. He read SO many chapters each
night! His heart began to soften little by little – I can remember one
particular lesson where my companion and I pointed out all of the amazing
things that the Spirit was leading him to do. And we testified of the love of
the Savior, and how Heavenly Father feels about him. Chad just cried – and the
spirit was so incredibly strong.
A few weeks later he emailed us and told us that he was
going to tell us some news. Wondering what it could be, we anxiously waited for
our next skype appointment with him. When the time came, we followed up on his
assignments and then we asked him what was going on. He then proceeded to tell
us about how he left a note on his sisters bed saying that he was fasting and
was going to find an answer if the Book of Mormon was true or not, and that he
was leaving into the wilderness to do it. He said that if he wasn’t back in
three days that she needed to call the police. He was planning on fasting for 3
days in the wilderness with just his Book of Mormon! Well, five hours later, he
finished the Book of Mormon, and knew that it was true.
Chad kept progressing after that. He bore his testimony in
Sacrament meeting. He began to talk to his Bishop about getting a Patriarchal
blessing. He told his family that he was back in the church. He read and
watched the past 2 general conferences and prayed to know if the Prophet was
really a mouthpiece for God, and he knew it was true. He began to work towards
receiving the Melchizedek priesthood. Chad is now serving in the Michigan
Lansing Mission. Of this experience Chad said: “I would like to express how glad I am for the restored gospel on the
earth today. I know that it has blessed my life, and made me a better person.”
One of the greatest things I have been able to be a part of
during my mission, is the opportunity I have had to watch people change. There
is nothing better than seeing people repent and come closer to Jesus Christ.
I would like to end with one last story. I am sure many of
you have heard this story – so just bear with me. But I wanted to share with
you the reason that I went on a mission. I am going to be speaking specifically
to the youth, so all you youth out there – be listening.
To tell you the truth, I never wanted to serve a mission. I
didn’t really even know what a missionary was or what they did. When I was a
senior in High School, things began to change.
I was in a marching band competition one day, warming up and
getting ready to go onto the field. We were all in an arch formation,
practicing different parts of the show. While we were practicing, some of the
volunteers were putting the plums in our shakos – or for you non marchers out
there, the big feather in our hats. When a feather was placed in my hat, I
quickly recognized the volunteer as a Latter-day Saint. He leaned over to me
and quickly whispered, “Did you hear what happened in conference today?”
Confused, I replied no.
“The prophet lowered the missionary age. Boys can now go at
18 and girls at 19.”
When he said this my first thought was, yeah right – that didn’t happen. But right before we marched onto
the field and I switched into competition mode, the last thought I remember
having was, oh darn, I am going to have
to serve a mission. I quickly pushed the thought to the back of my mind and
tried to never think of it again.
With the excitement of this news going around, not thinking
about it became harder. I signed up for school, and was accepted to BYU-Idaho.
So whenever people asked me if I was going to serve a mission, my answer was
always the same: “No, I am going to school this winter.” In my mind, I knew
what I wanted to do. I wanted to go to school, major in English, get published,
and if I was lucky – someone would come sweep me off my feet. I did not,
however, consider what the Lord wanted for me.
Later in my Senior year, I started to work towards getting
my Patriarchal blessing. One Saturday night, I can remember reading my
scriptures but being a little distracted while reading them. Finally, I closed
my Book of Mormon and got on my knees to pray. As I prayed I said something
along the lines of:
Heavenly Father, I guess I should ask. If you want me to
serve a mission, then you need to tell me tomorrow in my Patriarchal blessing
tomorrow or I am not serving a mission.
And that was about my whole prayer.
So, the next day we went to church and had a wonderful time. Afterwards we grabbed a quick lunch and went over to the Patriarch’s house. When my blessing began, I thought I was in the clear the whole time. It wasn’t until near the end, the second to last paragraph in my blessing that Heavenly Father said:
“There will come a time very soon in your life when your
Heavenly Father will call you on a mission. There are many people who are
waiting to hear the gospel as only you can present it to them. You will affect
many lives.”
Tears poured from my eyes as I immediately accepted the call
to serve a mission. Although I didn’t want to, I knew it was what the Lord
wanted me to do. It was very hard to change my attitude about it, but as soon
as I put my name tag on and began to learn the gospel for myself and to share it
with others – I couldn’t have been happier.
I want you to know that serving a mission was not a
sacrifice for me. Yes, it was the hardest thing I have ever done – but it was
also the most rewarding. I have learned so much about myself, and about my
Savior, Jesus Christ. There is a quote that says:
“Yes, as a missionary we choose to leave home for 18 months
to 2 years. We pay our way to devote our time to the Lord and be instruments in
his hands. We are asked to wear a suit and tie, or skirts and dresses for every
single day we ae gone. We are limited to speaking to our family and friends to
once a week. We are asked to leave our music, phones, TV, and movies of our
choice so that we can have a whole new genre fit specifically for our
missionary work.”
To some, this seems like a hefty sacrifice – but for me, it
was the greatest blessing. Gordon B. Hinkley said:
“You will come to know that what appears today to be a
sacrifice will prove instead to be the greatest investment that you will ever
make.”
I know that the blessings that come from sharing the gospel
are great. What better way to live a Christ centered life? Many of my
companions did not come from homes that centered their lives on Jesus Christ –
their missions helped them to do that for themselves. My mission helped me to
better understand how I could do that, and how I could help others center
themselves as well.
Brothers and Sisters I want to testify to you that I know
Jesus Christ lives. I know that he lived a perfect life, suffered for us, died
for us, and rose again. He did this because He loves us. I know that when we
strive our best to live Christ centered lives that our situations improve. I
can again promise you that you will be blessed with peace, joy, stability, and
happiness. I know that the Atonement is real. I have seen it and experienced it.
I know that the Plan of Salvation is truly God’s plan for us and that we can
live with our loved ones again. I know that the Book of Mormon is the word of
God, and that it really can bring us closer to Heavenly Father than any other
book. Before my mission, I thought I loved the Book of Mormon – but boy did I
learn to love it more than I could imagine. It provides peace and guidance, can
give us strength, and bring us comfort. It is one of the best tools Heavenly
Father has given us. I know that life isn’t always easy, but that as we center
our lives exactly on Christ, it becomes better. I love the gospel, and I love
Jesus Christ. I say these things in the name of Jesus Christ, Amen.
