Invite the members of your quorum or Relief Society members to share experiences in which they needed to develop faith that their calling or another’s calling came from God. How did they exercise their faith? How did they come to learn that the calling was from God? Invite members to search President Eyring’s message and identify truths he learned from personal experience that can help us trust and be patient with ourselves and others whom the Lord has called.

Let’s start with what faith means for a teachers or a deacons quorum president. It is important for him to have faith that the Lord called him personally, knowing that teacher’s weaknesses and strengths. He has to have faith that the man who issued the call received revelation by the Spirit of God. His counselors and members of his quorum need the same faith to follow him with fearless confidence.

It is important for any of us, in whatever calling we may serve, to have faith that the Lord has called us personally. How can we develop that faith?

“Faith and service cannot be separated; on the contrary, they are intimately linked, interwoven with each other.” – Pope Francis

“Where shall I serve today?” I said,
And my love flowed warm and free.
Then he pointed me out a little spot
And said, “There, tend that for me.”

I said, “Oh no, not that,
Not that little place.
Why, no one would ever see—
No matter how well my work was done—

Not that little spot for me.”
The words he spoke—they were not stern.
He answered me tenderly,
“Little one, search that heart of thine,
Art thou serving them or me?
Nazareth was just a little spot
And so was Galilee.”

Let’s talk about what such faith means for a bishop. A bishop is sometimes called to serve people who know him well. Ward members know something of his human weaknesses and his spiritual strengths, and they know that others in the ward could have been called—others who seem better educated, more seasoned, more pleasant, or even better looking.

These members have to know the call to serve as a bishop came from the Lord, by revelation. Without their faith, the bishop, who was called of God, will find it harder to get the revelation he needs to help them. He will not succeed without the faith of the members to sustain him.

Why is it important to overlook the weaknesses we know about in Church leaders we are personally acquainted with? How can we do this?

‘Everyone who participates in this conference is accountable to a bishop or a branch president. Tremendous are the burdens which they carry, and I invite every member of the Church to do all that he or she can to lift the burden under which our bishops and branch presidents labor.

We must pray for them. They need help as they carry their heavy loads. We can be more supportive and less dependent upon them. We can assist them in every way possible. We can thank them for all that they do for us. We are wearing them out in a short time by the burdens which we impose upon them.’ (Gordon B Hinckley, General Conference, October 2003)

In what ways can we sustain the Bishop and help him carry his heavy load? Some of the ways include:

• By our faith and prayers in their behalf.

• By following their counsel.

• By helping when they ask us.

• By accepting callings they extend to us.

Your leader in the Lord’s Church may seem to you weak and human or may appear to you strong and inspired. The fact is that every leader is a mixture of those traits and more. What helps servants of the Lord who are called to lead us is when we can see them as the Lord did when He called them.

The Lord sees His servants perfectly. He sees their potential and their future. And He knows how their very nature can be changed. He also knows how they can be changed by their experiences with the people they will lead.

How can we see our leaders as the Lord saw them when he called them?

Have you had the experience of being changed by a calling?

There is a thread that binds us to the Lord in our service. It runs from wherever we are called to serve in the kingdom, up through those called to preside over us in the priesthood, and to the prophet, who is bound to the Lord. It takes faith and humility to serve in the place to which we are called, to trust that the Lord called us and those who preside over us, and to sustain them with full faith.

What does President Eyring mean when he refers to a thread that binds us to the Lord?

In what ways do we risk cutting that thread?

What would be the consequence if we did cut it?