Seek truth, guidance
Look to Father- Listen and obey
A submissive heart and a humble spirit are fundamental to a person's faith, regardless of that person's station in life or great achievements, Bishop Richard C. Edgley said Saturday morning.
"We must guard against letting our worldly successes or earthly learning become a substitution for spiritual wisdom and divine direction given through the prophets," remarked Bishop Edgley, who was sustained as second counselor in the Presiding Bishopric last October.
"We all face the normal and the expected challenges of mortality," he explained. "We experience illness, we encounter transgression, we work through the difficulties of repentance, we sometimes wrestle with rebellion, and we deal with the stresses of providing for our families. These we prepare for and these we cope with.
"While we don't necessarily look forward to these obstacles and challenges, we accept them and build our lives and faith from them. To the faithful, the very obstacles that we overcome draw us closer to our Heavenly Father by helping us develop a humble, submissive spirit and causing us to be grateful and appreciative of those blessings that flow from a loving Father. In short, these experiences can and often do increase our faith.
"The faithful," Bishop Edgley continued, "do not pray to be spared the trials of life, but pray that they may have the strength to rise above them."
Often the greater testing of faith for Latter-day Saints comes from the successes of mortality, he commented.
"When our successes are received without proper acknowledgment to Him who is the grantor of all blessings, these same successes often lead to false pride and a deterioration of the virtues that bring us to faith. . . . Anything that erodes humility and submissiveness is indeed a threat to faith."
Bishop Edgley warned of the so-called "learned" that have let their intellect undermine their spiritual moorings.
"There are those who feel that our leaders are out of touch with the realities of the day. They would attempt to lead members by substituting their own knowledge for the revelations from God to His prophets. And, unfortunately, there are those who would so follow.
"Let us not be led astray by the sophistry of man, untempered by the principles of the gospel and the spirit of the Lord," Bishop Edgley concluded. "Let us not lose sight of those enduring God-given principles of humility and the submissive heart that have sustained us since the restoration of the gospel. Let us seek truth and guidance from a loving Father. Let us look to our Father in Heaven and His living prophets and personal revelation for guidance. When the prophets speak, let us listen and obey."
