“Whether you are diligently moving along the covenant path, have slipped or stepped from the covenant path or can’t even see the path from where you are now, I plead with you to repent. Experience the strengthening power of daily repentance — of doing and being a little better each day.”
President Nelson talks of the strengthening power of repentance. Why do we need to repent on a daily basis? How will that strengthen us?
“Brethren, prayerfully seek to understand what stands in the way of your repentance. Identify what stops you from repenting. And then change! Repent! All of us can do better and be better than ever before.”
What sort of things stop us from repenting or changing?
How can we overcome these barriers?
“I bless you with the courage to repent daily and learn how to exercise full priesthood power. I bless you to communicate the love of the Savior to your wife and children and to all who know you. I bless you to do better and to be better. And I bless you that as you make these efforts, you will experience miracles in your life.”
How might we see miracles in our lives if we qualify for the blessings promised by President Nelson?
What specific ways does President Nelson suggest we could improve?
Suggested answers:
- One is in the way we treat our bodies.
In what ways might we not be treating our bodies well? (Remember that President Nelson was a surgeon and physician!)
- Another way we can also do better and be better is how we honor the women in our lives, beginning with our wives and daughters, our mothers and sisters.
Read Jacob 2:35 and consider: How can our bad examples affect those we love?
- We need to get up off the couch, put down the remote, and wake up from our spiritual slumber.
In what ways do you think we might need to wake from our spiritual slumber?
You might want to link to some of the points from Sister Craven’s talk ‘Careful vs Casual’ or Elder Holland’s talk ‘Behold the Lamb of God.’
- Your family needs your leadership and love.
- Your quorum and those in your ward or branch need your strength.
- And all who meet you need to know what a true disciple of the Lord looks like and acts like.
How does it make you feel to hear the Lord’s Prophet address the Priesthood in these terms?
What sort of men do we need to become?
President Nelson sets out what the Lord needs from us:
The Lord needs selfless men who put the welfare of others ahead of their own. He needs men who intentionally work to hear the voice of the Spirit with clarity. He needs men of the covenant who keep their covenants with integrity. He needs men who are determined to keep themselves sexually pure—worthy men who can be called upon at a moment’s notice to give blessings with pure hearts, clean minds, and willing hands. The Lord needs men eager to repent—men with a zeal to serve and be part of the Lord’s battalion of worthy priesthood bearers.
In case we risk getting too downcast we should remember:
The Lord does not expect perfection from us at this point in our eternal progression. But He does expect us to become increasingly pure.
Which brings us back to daily repentance.
Latter-day Bloke 