This is a favorite scripture. I may or may not have posted about it before, but I have thought about it a lot over the years.
Mosiah 18: 21
And he commanded them that there should be no contention one with another, but that they should look forward with one eye, having one faith and one baptism, having their hearts knit together in unity and in love one towards another.
As we grow to embody the principles of unity in this scripture, we must start where we are. It is not possible for us to sincerely love and serve every person on the earth in a meaningful way. There are too many. But we may begin to love and serve specific individuals. The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints has a program in place to facilitate the development of this type of uniting love. It is called home and visiting teaching. Home teachers are responsible for a number of families or individuals (typically one to four). It is in this program that they we have the opportunity to knit our hearts together in love and unity, with each relationship a home or visiting teacher developes with each other member of the congregation being another stitch. Eventually as members fulfill these assignments faithfully the individual stitches begin to form a web of interconnected relationships that bind each congregation together as well as binding the congregations to other congregations. The goal is that each member of the church feel that they are valued, and that they have a meaningful place in the greater whole. Additionally because every home and visiting teacher is called to represent the Savior Jesus Christ, the relationships they form with the members they visit not only bind them to one another, but bind both the teacher and the taught to the Savior. As home and visiting teachers faithfully shoulder the responsibility to do and say as the savior would do and say, as directed by the spirit, the interconnected web of relationships is connected directly with Jesus Christ and with the powers of heaven. In this way we begin to knit our hearts together in unity and in love.
Because we represent the savior we bear the burdens of pain, sickness, and sin that those we visit suffer. The blessings of faithfully fulfilling these callings include that we will heal one another's bodies, minds, hearts, and souls. This is perhaps the most effective way that we have to combat problems of pornography, homosexuality, and other problems that have recently tended to divide us against one another. We must take those that struggle with these and other difficult issues and put them on our shoulders, we must carry them in an attitude of love and acceptance, not of the behaviors, but of the individuals, despite their behaviors.
Through faithful home and visiting teaching we will build Zion. Not only in the sense that we will strengthen the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints, but also in the sense that we will cultivate within that community a culture that will purify our hearts and lay the foundations for lasting world peace and equality.
Mosiah 18: 21
And he commanded them that there should be no contention one with another, but that they should look forward with one eye, having one faith and one baptism, having their hearts knit together in unity and in love one towards another.
As we grow to embody the principles of unity in this scripture, we must start where we are. It is not possible for us to sincerely love and serve every person on the earth in a meaningful way. There are too many. But we may begin to love and serve specific individuals. The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints has a program in place to facilitate the development of this type of uniting love. It is called home and visiting teaching. Home teachers are responsible for a number of families or individuals (typically one to four). It is in this program that they we have the opportunity to knit our hearts together in love and unity, with each relationship a home or visiting teacher developes with each other member of the congregation being another stitch. Eventually as members fulfill these assignments faithfully the individual stitches begin to form a web of interconnected relationships that bind each congregation together as well as binding the congregations to other congregations. The goal is that each member of the church feel that they are valued, and that they have a meaningful place in the greater whole. Additionally because every home and visiting teacher is called to represent the Savior Jesus Christ, the relationships they form with the members they visit not only bind them to one another, but bind both the teacher and the taught to the Savior. As home and visiting teachers faithfully shoulder the responsibility to do and say as the savior would do and say, as directed by the spirit, the interconnected web of relationships is connected directly with Jesus Christ and with the powers of heaven. In this way we begin to knit our hearts together in unity and in love.
Because we represent the savior we bear the burdens of pain, sickness, and sin that those we visit suffer. The blessings of faithfully fulfilling these callings include that we will heal one another's bodies, minds, hearts, and souls. This is perhaps the most effective way that we have to combat problems of pornography, homosexuality, and other problems that have recently tended to divide us against one another. We must take those that struggle with these and other difficult issues and put them on our shoulders, we must carry them in an attitude of love and acceptance, not of the behaviors, but of the individuals, despite their behaviors.
Through faithful home and visiting teaching we will build Zion. Not only in the sense that we will strengthen the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints, but also in the sense that we will cultivate within that community a culture that will purify our hearts and lay the foundations for lasting world peace and equality.
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