The only life worth living is a life lived for others.
You will discover that you have two hands. One is for helping yourself and the other is for helping others.
Elder Jeffrey R. Holland’s words from a past general conference: “When we speak of those who are instruments in the hand of God, we are reminded that not all angels are from the other side of the veil. Some of them we walk with and talk with—here, now, every day. Some of them reside in our own neighborhoods. … Indeed heaven never seems closer than when we see the love of God manifested in the kindness and devotion of people so good and so pure that angelic is the only word that comes to mind” (“The Ministry of Angels,” Ensign or Liahona, Nov. 2008, 30). It is about angels on this side of the veil that I want to talk. The angels that walk among us in our everyday lives are powerful reminders of God’s love for us.
Our part is to love and serve God and to love and serve God’s children. As you do so, God will encircle you with His love, joy, and certain guidance through this life, even under the most serious circumstances, and even beyond.
By and large, I have come to see that if we complain about life, it is because we are thinking only of ourselves.
We receive the Holy Spirit best when we are focused on serving others. That is why we have the priesthood responsibility to serve for the Savior.
Let your labors be confin'd mostly to those around you in your own circle.
It is a duty which every Saint ought to render to his brethren freely—to always love them, and ever succor them. To be justified before God we must love one another: we must overcome evil; we must visit the fatherless and the widow in their affliction, and we must keep ourselves unspotted from the world; for such virtues flow from the great fountain of pure religion [see James 1:27].
[A member of the Church] is to feed the hungry, to clothe the naked, to provide for the widow, to dry up the tear of the orphan, to comfort the afflicted, whether in this church, or in any other, or in no church at all, wherever he finds them.
Life's most urgent question is: what are you doing for others?
Opportunities to serve others in meaningful ways, as we have covenanted to do, rarely come at convenient times. But there is no spiritual power in living by convenience. The power comes as we keep our covenants.
We sometimes find ourselves praying for others when we should be doing things for them. Prayers are not to be a substitute for service, but a spur thereto.
As to the questions asked—even by faithful Saints—such as, "If what is going to happen is 'all set,' why pray?," the answer is that God foresees, but He does not compromise our agency. All the outcomes are not, for our purposes, "all set." True, God's foreseeing includes our prayers, our fasting, our faith, and the results that will thereby be achieved. But until our mortal actions occur and our decisions are made, things are not "all set." The Father foresaw the Atonement, but the Atonement was not wrought until the very moment of Christ's death when He gave up His spirit, which He had the power to retain.
In those moments our desires of the day may have to be sacrificed to our needs in our endless tomorrows. A mortal life may need to be "shortened" by twenty years as we might view it—but if so, it may be done in order for special services to be rendered by that individual in the spirit world, services that will benefit thousands of new neighbors with whom that individual will live in all of eternity. Perhaps this reality is yet another reason and reminder why we are urged to pray only for "our daily bread," for disciples must be portable. Our omniloving and omniscient Father will release us when it is best for us to be released. But each such release of a righteous person is also a call to new labors!
Isn't it interesting that of the many ways in which the Lord might have phrased the object of the "thou shalt" in the second great commandment, He chose the word neighbor—not mankind, not organizations, not people, and not society, but neighbor. In keeping the second great commandment, the most significant and basic service we can regularly render unto others will emerge from our most basic roles—as brothers and sisters, as parents, as neighbors, as disciples. What we do vocationally and professionally matters, of course—and sometimes very much. But those of us who try to escape from, or neglect, our basic roles will find that we have only made the effective keeping of the second great commandment even more difficult. Keeping the commandments and sharing the gospel of Jesus Christ are the two most relevant things we can do to assist our fellowman in our time. In addition to keeping the second commandment by direct service to others, what a service we render others when we do not commit adultery or steal, even though these become more and more fashionable!
Let us think of service not only as giving, but also as receiving righteously. Parenthetically, one of the many reasons some of today's children have not learned to give is that some parents do not know how to receive.
Let us in our professional and vocational chores serve with excellence even if others care more and more about pay and less and less about quality in their workmanship.
Evil people exist. The in-betweeners merely survive. But those who have really lived will be those who have lived righteously, because they will have lived righteously and served selflessly in a time of stunning contrasts. They will have managed to keep clean in a dirty world. And being free, they will be happy in otherwise sad times, and all their experiences will be for their good.
The true meaning of life is to plant trees, under whose shade you do not expect to sit.
What do we live for if not to make life less difficult for others.
Have something to bring to the table because that will make you more valuable.
My life is like my shoes--to be worn out in service.
Our service is to save souls. May I suggest five helpful guidelines: 1. Take time to think 2. Make room for faith. The prophet Isaiah declared that man's ways are not God's ways. (Isaiah 55:8.) 3. Stand firm for truth. Our leaders of youth become the stable force, the port of safety in the storm-tossed seas, the watchman on the tower, even the guide at the crossroads. Youth looks to us. How do we stand? May we answer: 4. Reach out to help 5. Provide place for prayer. Our task is larger than ourselves. We need God's divine help.
I have learned when the Lord has an errand to run, He can call on Tommy Monson and I will go.