R. Garry Rayner, president of the Hamilton Ontario Stake, believes Church members will never be able to learn self-worth until they learn to love the way the Savior loves.
"The only way this can be done is through charity - through reaching out to others to help their brothers and sisters who are struggling and having emotional, spiritual or financial difficulties," Pres. Rayner explained, adding that "Reach Out" is his stake's theme. "We don't have to do great big things to reach out to others. It is the little things."Our natural tendency is to be sad or unhappy because things are not going our way," Pres. Rayner continued. "If we could reach out to others in our moment of trial and tribulations then the Lord will help us more with our own problems."
Jason Hall agrees, saying he is happiest when he is serving others. The former president of the BYU Student Association, who is now a motivational speaker, was paralyzed while vacationing with his family at Lake Powell in southern Utah in 1985.
"The media teaches that if you really want to love yourself then you have to do things for yourself," Brother Hall explained. "But when you are doing everything you can to make other people happy, that is when you are happy yourself."
He said service can be done by kind words and simple deeds.
"Sometimes in the Church we think if we are going to serve our fellowmen then we must bake bread or shingle a roof," he explained. "All we need to do is tell someone they made a nice comment in Sunday school or that they look nice. They start to think, `Maybe I am special.' "
Brother Hall still remembers meeting Danny Ainge, then a professional basketball player for the Boston Celtics, after his accident.
"He didn't give me any shoes. He didn't give me any money. He didn't bake me any bread. We took pictures and none of them turned out," Brother Hall remembered. "But the time that Danny spent with me can't be taken away.
"The world sees Danny Ainge as a champion for a lot of reasons. In my mind he is a champion because he cared about me," he continued. "Each of us has people we can affect like that. People today are screaming inside, saying, `Someone, care about me.' "
