Hello! Welcome to my blog! I love all the visiting teaching messages - this month's message I have a passion for. The theme is: The Enabling Power of Jesus Christ and His Atonement. For the full visiting teaching message on
I love the word ACTION - so that is what I feel to focus on in this message. I am continually striving to learn how to activate the enabling power of Jesus Christ and His Atonement in my life because I know I don't even scratch the surface of what is offered in this incredible gift.
I especially love the quote from David A. Bednar included in this month's message:
“Nephi’s brothers bound him with cords and planned his destruction. Please note Nephi’s prayer: ‘O Lord, according to my faith which is in thee, wilt thou deliver me from the hands of my brethren; yea, even give me strength that I may burst these bands with which I am bound’ (1 Nephi 7:17; emphasis added). “… Nephi did not pray to have his circumstances changed. Rather, he prayed for the strength to change his circumstances. And I believe he prayed in this manner precisely because he KNEW, UNDERSTOOD, and had EXPERIENCED the enabling power of the Atonement. “I do not think the bands with which Nephi was bound just magically fell from his hands and wrists. Rather, I suspect he was blessed with both persistence and personal strength beyond his natural capacity, that he then ‘in the strength of the Lord’ (Mosiah 9:17) worked and twisted and tugged on the cords, and ultimately and literally was enabled to break the bands."
The message stops there but I looked up the talk that came from the talk"Strength Beyond My Own" and loved the words that followed...
"The implication of this episode for each of us is straightforward. As you and I come to UNDERSTAND and EMPLOY the enabling power of the Atonement in our personal lives, we will pray and seek for strength to change our circumstances rather than praying for our circumstances to be changed. We will become AGENTS WHO ACT rather than objects that are acted upon (2 Nephi 2:14).” David A. Bednar “Strength Beyond our Own”
We only learn and grow when we ACT. My employment is a Life Skills Specialist at a therapy centre for Autism. I help children with many skills they need for life. One of those skills is dressing. One child had a goal of putting on socks. When a task is not able to be achieved, I ask, WHY CAN'T THIS BE DONE? Possible answers to this situation were fine motor difficulties, eye hand coordination, etc., etc. We worked on strengthening those skills, but the goal to put socks on was still not being achieved. The only thing I could think of was that the child always relied on someone else to do it for him. In other words - he was acted upon. We had to work on changing the behavior for HIM TO ACT (the student put his own sock on) instead of being acted upon (having someone else do it for him). It took a little bit of time and a lot of patience - but the child is now putting on his own socks. YAY!
I believe it is the same in many aspects in our lives. Do we have a challenge? Are we hoping for the situation to take care of itself or maybe hoping someone else will fix it for us - or, are we ACTION HEROS personally doing something about our situation? When we add the enabling power of Jesus Christ and His Atonement, then we have a super power to help us in any situation.
This reminds me of something President Monson once said :"Work will win, when
wishy, washy, wishing won't!"
To go with this message I printed out the pictures above with the quote, and wrapped it around a package of ACT II popcorn.
Here is the PDF if you would like to make it:
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