A couple of weeks ago, I was on the campus of Brigham Young University in Provo, Utah, to conduct an interview for Church News. While I was there, I saw a sign outside a strength and conditioning room used by some of BYU’s athletes.
The sign was emblazoned with a quote from Church President Russell M. Nelson.
It read, “The Lord loves effort because effort brings rewards that cannot come without it.”
The quote’s use at the door of a room where football players and other athletes exercise in a way that would make them bigger and faster and stronger seemed quite appropriate.
But my mind was also taken back to the roots of that quote because President Nelson wasn’t talking to young adults when he originally said it. He wasn’t talking to any adults. And he wasn’t talking to youth, either. President Nelson was answering the question of a child.
The teaching was shown in a video that featured President Nelson and Joy D. Jones, who was Primary general president at the time, speaking to children in the Smith family home in Palmyra, New York. President Jones included the video as part of her general conference message in April 2020.
The question that prompted President Nelson’s reply came from a young girl named Pearl. She asked President Nelson if it is hard to be a prophet. His answer, “Of course.” But his reasoning wasn’t exclusive to him in his role as Prophet and President of the Church. His reasoning applies to every one of Heavenly Father’s children.
“Everything to do with becoming more like the Savior is difficult,” he said.
Pearl told President Nelson that she took violin lessons. When President Nelson asked what happens when she doesn’t practice, she replied simply, “You forget.”
Without practice, without effort, progress is stopped. What was learned can be forgotten. And there is no end to learning and putting in the effort.
“It takes effort, a lot of hard work, a lot of study, and there’s never an end,” President Nelson continued. “We’re always progressing. Even in the next life, we are making progress.”
That message shared in general conference came at the beginning of the COVID-19 pandemic that had put a pause to many people’s lives in the moment. For many individuals, going to church, school, work, medical appointments or the grocery store became an unexpected burden or, in some cases, impossible. The conference sessions themselves were broadcast in unprecedented conditions from the Church Office Building with no in-person audience of the general membership of the Church.
But while movement was restricted for a season, growth and progress were not.
As I look back at the five years since the unique circumstances of the world at that time, I see different examples of growth and progress.
My family, like many others, participated in the sacred ordinance of the sacrament in our home. And I watched as my children grew in appreciation for that ordinance and its meaning. Scripture study and “Come, Follow Me” lessons took on more meaning as the six of us talked about the messages we studied together.
The challenges of that time were harder than what we had grown accustomed to. But the blessings we received by making a more diligent effort were perhaps sweeter than what we were accustomed to.
The Prophet Joseph Smith received answers to his prayers as a young man “while [he] was laboring under the extreme difficulties” (Joseph Smith–History 1:11). The blessings of his efforts extend to all who benefit from the restored gospel found in The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints.
More than a decade after that experience, the Lord taught Joseph Smith that “the idler shall not have place in the church” (Doctrine and Covenants 75:29).
In the New Testament, the Savior taught His listeners to put in effort in order to multiply their allotted talents.
Paul taught the Thessalonians to “work with [their] own hands” (1 Thessalonians 4:11).
And Nephi also “did cause [his] people to be industrious, and to labor with their hands” (2 Nephi 5:17).
As we prepare for the Second Coming of the Savior Jesus Christ and work through the challenges of today, I hope that we will remember the words of President Nelson and put in the needed effort to receive blessings we can’t receive without it.
— Jon Ryan Jensen is editor of the Church News.
