"If any of us are imperfect, it is our duty to pray for the gift that will make us perfect. Have I imperfections? I am full of them. What is my duty? To pray to God to give me the gifts that will correct these imperfections. If I am an angry man, it is my duty to pray for charity which suffereth long and is kind. Am I an envious man? It is my duty to seek for charity which envieth not. So with all the gifts of the Gospel. They are intended for this purpose. No man ought to say, 'Oh, I cannot help this; it is my nature'. He is not justified in it, for the reason that God has promised to give strength to correct these things and to give gifts that will eradicate them. If a man lacks wisdom, it is his duty to ask God for wisdom. The same with everything else. That is the design of God concerning His Church. He wants His Saints to be perfected in the truth. For this purpose He gives these gifts, and bestows them upon those who seek after them, in order that they may be a perfect people upon the face of the earth." (President George Q. Cannon, Millenial Star, Apr. 1894, p. 260)
I have taught several lessons over the years on the gifts of the spirit as outlined in D&C 46. The last time I taught it was this year in Gospel Doctrine class and I finally decided to take my own advice and seek some of these gifts as we are encouraged to do. Joseph Smith said that this Church would be dead without the gifts of the spirit. They are one of the greatest tools we have for developing traits we lack and need to have, not only for our benefit but most importantly for the benefit of the Church for it is for this purpose they are given. They are also an incredible tool for overcoming weaknesses we need to be rid of. I got so convinced by my latest lesson that the gifts of the spirit should be sought for this purpose that I started to wonder if one of them could help me with a long standing weakness I had. As I pondered about it I realised I didn't know which gift was needed for me to have for this particular weakness so I decided to pray about this and ask which gift I should seek. I knew the answer that came to me was straight from above because I would never have come up with it in those words on my own.
I tend to have a somewhat dogmatic manner at times and this has troubled me over the years and has created clashes with people which necessitated later apologies. This weakness also makes me detest unfairness and others' imperfections and causes me to stand up for myself even in less important situations such as customer service. The gift I was told to pray for was the gift of 'forbearance and self-restraint'. As I contemplated this definition of the gift I needed I realised I had other weaknesses that could be overcome with this gift. It was rather humbling to discover I had so many weaknesses that they could be grouped into a whole category.
I thought obtaining this gift was going to be a simple matter of praying for it and one day I would wake up with this gift under my belt ready to take on the world. Unfortunately it didn't prove to be that simple. I prayed many weeks for this gift and one day I had another 'customer service' incident that left me feeling less than good about myself. I was wrongly done by and I gave as good as I got. I walked away thinking I really could have used the gift of forbearance and self-restraint that day and wondered when I was going to get it. As I thought about it, I realised what I had been doing wrong. When I remembered, I prayed for this gift during my prayers and then I would forget about it. I realised this is not calling upon God for help at all. I remembered the scripture in Ether 12:27 in the Book of Mormon which says:
"And if men come unto me I will show unto them their weakness. I give unto men weakness that they may be humble; and my grace is sufficient for all men that humble themselves before me; for if they humble themselves before me, and have faith in me, then will I make weak things become strong unto them".
Firstly, this scripture tells us that weaknesses are designed to bring us to God. Secondly, I lacked humility in 'receiving' this gift. I realised it was not enough to just pray for the gift in my daily prayers. What I needed to do was humbly call upon God for my gift in the moment that I needed it and then act in faith as if I had it. Two things were needed of me to make this promise of God active, humility and faith. In other words, some effort on my part was needed as well.
I realise it can be very hard to make yourself call on God in the moment when you are facing your weakness instead of giving into it because a lot of our weaknesses come with payoffs, payoffs that we enjoy and more than often want. The key is desire. When the desire becomes greater than the payoff, you are half way there. When you no longer want to be the person you see in the mirror, you are ready to change.
No comments:
Post a Comment