Courage: Continuing to Walk the Path

"It is the plain and very sobering truth that before great moments, certainly before great spiritual moments, there can come adversity, opposition, and darkness. Life has some of those moments for us, and occasionally they come just as we are approaching an important decision or a significant step in our life."

Jeffrey R. Holland, "Cast Not Away Therefore Your Confidence", BYU Devotional March 1999

Access full address here, or watch below. 

Finances: Tithing

“Pay your tithing as a declaration that possession of material goods and the accumulation of worldly wealth are not the uppermost goals of your existence. … Pay your tithes and offerings out of honesty and integrity because they are God’s rightful due. … Paying tithing is not a token gift we are somehow charitably bestowing upon God. Paying tithing is discharging a debt. … We should pay them as a personal expression of love to a generous and merciful Father in Heaven.”

Elder Jeffrey R. Holland, “Like A Watered Garden”, October 2001 General Conference

Read full talk here, or watch below.

Faith: Helping The World Make Sense

"Without our religious faith, without recognizing the reality and necessity of spiritual life, the world makes no sense, and a nonsense world is a place of horror. Only if the world has meaning at a spiritual level is it possible for human beings to keep going, to keep trying."

Elder Jeffrey R Holland, “Look to God and Live”, October 1993 General Conference

Personal Revelation: Seeking With Intent

"Usually we think of revelation as information. Just open the books to us, Lord, like: What was the political significance of the Louisiana Purchase or the essence of the second law of thermodynamics? It is obvious that when you see those kinds of questions on a test paper, you need revelation. Someone said prayer will never be eliminated from the schools so long as there are final examinations. But aside from the fact that you probably aren’t going to get that kind of revelation—because in this Church we do not believe in ex nihilo creation, especially in exams—this is too narrow a concept of revelation. ... First of all, revelation almost always comes in response to a question, usually an urgent question—not always, but usually. In that sense it does provide information, but it is urgently needed information, special information. ... You will need information, too, but in matters of great consequence it is not likely to come unless you want it urgently, faithfully, humbly. Moroni calls it seeking “with real intent” (Moroni 10:4)."

Elder Jeffrey R. Holland, "Cast Not Away Therefore Your Confidence", March 02, 1999 BYU Devotional 

Access full address here or watch below. 

Family: Speak Kindly

“We must be so careful in speaking to a child. What we say or don’t say, how we say it and when is so very, very important in shaping a child’s view of himself or herself. But it is even more important in shaping that child’s faith in us and their faith in God. Be constructive in your comments to a child—always. Never tell them, even in whimsy, that they are fat or dumb or lazy or homely. You would never do that maliciously, but they remember and may struggle for years trying to forget—and to forgive. And try not to compare your children, even if you think you are skillful at it. You may say most positively that ‘Susan is pretty and Sandra is bright,’ but all Susan will remember is that she isn’t bright and Sandra that she isn’t pretty. Praise each child individually for what that child is, and help him or her escape our culture’s obsession with comparing, competing, and never feeling we are ‘enough.’”

Elder Jeffrey R. Holland, “The Tongue of Angels”, April 2007 General Conference.

Access entire address here.