Welcome to Closer To Christ
through General Conference.
We're two friends who love Jesus
and share our own approach to studying
the most recent general conference talks.
This is Abbe and Amy.
Let's jump into it.
Today we're talking about aligning our will with His.
This is by Elder Eulisiz S. Suarez
the Quorum of the Twelve. Abby, this was a fantastic one. Welcome.
Abby Goodman Thank you. Good to be here.
Abby Goodman Happy to have you.
Okay, so Elder Suarez highlights the parable of the pearl of great price as the foundation
for the discussion. So, it's a short and sweet parable with a powerful lesson.
A merchant was on a search for goodly pearls. He finds one of great price, but in order to acquire
the magnificent pearl, he had to sell all of his possessions, which he promptly and joyfully did.
The Savior's message likened the pearl to the kingdom of heaven because it, too, is a priceless
pearl, truly the most precious treasure that should be desired above all else. We learn from
the merchant that what it looks like, essentially, to immediately and without hesitation align our
mind and desires with the will of the Lord and willingly do everything we can during our mortal
journey to attain the eternal blessings of God's kingdom. And Abby, what first comes to my mind is
how this is a stark contrast to the rich man who turned away and he was sad.
He was given such a simple task to do, and that was too much for him.
Abby Goodman And I think we've all been
in this situation and the other and maybe everywhere in between. So, what do you have for us?
Abby Goodman Well, the rest of the talk, he'll go on to center it around how we can align our
will with God's and the transformative power that it will have in our life. There's just so much to
that parable. I think it's worth stopping to talk about what it would mean to sell all to acquire
this pearl and how it parallels aligning our will with God's.
Abby Goodman So, he starts by talking about giving our
best effort to set aside all self-centered pursuits and abandon any entanglement that
holds us back from full commitment to the Lord and His higher and holier ways. You know,
we've heard that again, the higher and holier ways so many times lately that it's starting to sink in.
Nicole Well, how can we know that we are doing that? Or how can we self-assess that we are
fully committed to the Lord? How can we take that and make it a question that we can self-reflect on?
Abby Goodman So, the apostle Paul refers to these sanctifying pursuits as having the mind of Christ.
We can see from the example of Jesus Christ that He was doing always those things that pleased the
Lord. So, in our lives, there are some people who would say doing what works for the Lord,
which Elder Suarez says is all about submitting our will to His. So, how did the Savior teach
His disciples, and therefore us, by extension, as we read His Word in Scripture, Abby?
Abby Goodman I like how he pointed out a few examples of that. He quoted Scripture. He said,
"'For I came down from heaven not to do my own will, but the will of Him that sent me. And this
is the Father's will which hath sent me, that of all which he hath given me. So I should lose nothing,
but should raise it up again at the last day. And this is the will of Him that sent me, that
every one which seeth the Son and believeth on Him may have everlasting life, and will raise
Him up at the last day." So, we can see that the Savior achieved perfect and divine level of
submission to the Father by allowing His will to be swallowed up in the Father's will. What was His
purpose? Whatever the Father's purpose was. He reflected that every moment, every action. And
we know that as early as age 10 that He understood that. And probably sooner. That was just a great
story to recall. Another time He said, "'And he that sent me is with me. The Father hath not left me
alone, for I do always those things that please Him.'" So, that's beautiful. He recognizes that
the choices that He's making because they're aligned with the Father bring the Father joy.
And then another example He shared was the Prophet Joseph Smith's about the anguish and
agonies of the Atonement. The Savior said, "'For behold, I, God, have suffered these things for
all, that they might not suffer if they would repent, which, suffering caused myself, even God,
the greatest of all, to tremble because of pain, and to bleed at every pore, and to suffer both
body and spirit, and would that I might not drink the bitter cup and shrink. Nevertheless, glory be
to the Father, and I partook and finished my preparations unto the children of men.'"
So, we know the complete submission to the will of God looks like,
but in this earth experience, we experience barriers. I would just say from that one,
it's like submitting your will to the Father doesn't always mean things are going to be
cupcakes and rainbows. Yeah. It's painful. Sometimes the process is painful.
It really is.
But totally worth it in the end. But that's just another way to say it. He showed what complete
submission to the will of God looks like.
Yes. And you know what, Abby, I feel like, you said, even when we know we're submitting
to the Lord's will and things still don't go wrong, I feel like it is a-
Don't go wrong.
Sorry, do go wrong. I feel like that feeling that is actually carrying us over is covenant confidence.
Yeah.
Right? Like we know-
He's gonna nod to that.
It's gonna work out.
Because that's what he talked about before.
We love it.
Right. Sometimes it gives you like a stumbling block because you're like,
well, things didn't go perfectly, so did I really listen? Am I really doing what the will of him is?
Like, assuming that doing the right thing will make it life easy.
Totally. And it may have been the pattern in your life before that time. I feel like we all
get that to that speed bump where the Lord's like, no, it's not gonna always go well.
At the beginning it did because I was helping you, you're on training wheels,
but those training wheels are off now. At least that's how it's been in my life.
I hit a point where I was like, oh.
I'm right here by you, but how can I help you grow in faith if it's always perfect?
Yeah.
Right. So I would make that a question. I would say, there are barriers in life.
What are some of the barriers that we face as we're trying to learn about aligning our will with
his? We often wrestle with what we think we know, what we think is best, and what we assume works
for us, as opposed to comprehending what Heavenly Father actually knows, what is eternally best,
and what absolutely works for the children for his plan, within his plan. I love that quote so
much, Abby. We know from scripture that men shall be lovers of their own selves, lovers of pleasures
more than lovers of God. And we see this prophecy fulfilled as we witness a growing trend in the
world adopted by so many, of people being consumed with themselves and constantly proclaiming,
no matter what, I live my own truth and I do what works for me. We can't seek our own pleasure and
also buy in to the idea that we are just being our authentic self in the Kingdom of Heaven or
in eternal life as our ultimate goal. Right.
So what are some of the barriers that we face?
Abby So one of the quotes I loved that he shared is he says, we often wrestle with what we think
we know, what we think is best, and what we assume works for us, as opposed to comprehending what
Heavenly Father actually knows, what is eternally best, and what absolutely works for his children
within his plan. So we know from scripture that men, we've heard men shall be lovers of their own
selves, lovers of pleasure more than lovers of God. We see this prophecy fulfilled as we witness a
growing trend in the world all around us. It's adopted by so many, of people becoming consumed
with themselves and constantly proclaiming, no matter what, I live my own truth, I do what works
for me. We can't seek our own pleasure and also buy in to the idea that we are just being our
authentic self if the Kingdom of Heaven or eternal life is our ultimate goal.
Nicole Yes, that was an awesome quote. It had my
mind spinning. And then he went on to quote Elder Cook from there. He said, being sincerely
Christ-like is an even more important goal than to be authentic.
Bethany Yeah.
Nicole Our journeys are each going to look different,
but our effort to focus on Christ rather than our own pleasure is the recipe for success in this
life. And I love how I felt the message here that's not like we're expected to get that perfect every
time. We just have to demonstrate that we're trying. And we demonstrate through prayer and
listening to the promptings of the Spirit that we want our will to align with his, and then we make
progress in our discipleship. To still from Elder Renlund, how he talked about the goal of getting
iteratively better as we do things. How long did it take us to align ourselves? How long did we
suffer without his aid? How long did we try to do it our way instead of his? Once we turn to him,
what was the result? So our capacity to align our heart with his will increase as we put into action
that principle of trusting in him. But because that is true, so is the inverse.
Meaning, as he taught, when we don't allow God's will to prevail in our life, then we're left to
ourselves. And without the Lord's inspiring guidance, we can justify almost anything we do
or don't do. We can also make excuses for ourselves by doing things on our own and saying,
I'm just doing things my way. When we indicate through our actions that we don't desire to do
things his way, we don't get it iteratively better at setting the things of God aside and becoming
expert in justifying our way to be the right way.
Love that. Those are great thoughts, Abby. I thought it was interesting also to see how the
Pharisees reflected Christ's teaching and used the justification of being the children of Abraham,
implying that their lineage would grant them special privilege in the sight of God. That's
reminding me of one of our talks from last time, like, that your lineage is going to
Be the thing that saves you.
The whole thing, yeah. Not the case. We're all the same in the sight of God.
We can be proud of the name of family that we come from, but it has to be our own characteristic
shining through.
Oh, absolutely. So, our pursuits don't have to be worldly in nature to take us away from Christ.
We can take things of God to the extreme and lean onto our own understanding and disbelieve
what the Savior teaches. Again, that would be like the, what is it, the talk of Elder
Christofferson's, it's-
I have it right here because I thought it totally tied with this talk.
Bearing our weapons of rebellion.
Yes, essentially, just like he said, he said, you know, it doesn't have to be worldly pursuits.
It can be anything that takes us. To them, Jesus wisely and courageously declared that
if they were true covenant children of Abraham, they would do the works of Abraham.
Ouch!
Especially, I know, right? Especially considering that the God of Abraham was standing before them
and teaching them the truth at that very moment. Wow, that must have been very poignant.
So, I think it's worth considering what doctrines might I be leaning on to justify my actions that
aren't bringing me closer to Jesus Christ. I'm going to say that one more time.
What doctrines might I be leaning on to justify my actions that aren't bringing me closer to Jesus
Christ?
What comes to mind? My Facebook or YouTube, when I'm looking on death scrolling, my reels come up.
Sometimes I'll watch pastors engaged with protest crowds, and they'll shout and declare God's Word.
And they'd be like trying to call people to repentance in a very loud, agitating voice.
The biblical kind of way.
And I'm like, I would bet good money that not a single person has ever been converted to Jesus
Christ or wanted to look into more from being yelled at by like a street pastor in that way.
Probably not, Gabi. It's certainly the challenge of our day to constantly be wrestling with the idea
of whether we are on the right track in doing what He wants us to be doing. It's like the age-old
question, right?
It is the challenge of this whole Earth life.
It is.
Well, that's like a good way to present a question. It brought us to my very favorite thing that He
said. He talked about mental gymnastics.
Yes.
I'm wrestling that question, trying to find this balance between what works for me versus doing
what's always pleasing to the Lord. It's the challenge of our day, but it is not unique to
our day. It's as old as time. And it's the trick of the adversary. It's a deceptive path that
carefully leads God's children away from the true and faithful covenant path. While personal
circumstances like genetics, geography, physical, mental challenges do influence our journey,
in things that truly matter, there is an inner space where we are free to choose whether or not
we will decide to follow the pattern the Lord has prepared for our life. Truly, He marked the path
and led the way in every point defined." Cute little song quote, but you see the point of it,
that it's like, it's always this struggle. If you want to do what the world's doing,
but you know what God has encouraged us to do and set the path for us,
and you can't get those things to align, then you're always justifying where God's
wasn't quite right for you and your way is better. And it's nothing better,
no better explanation of that than to call it mental gymnastics.
Totally. So, I think a good litmus test or action item here is to ask ourselves,
do I strive to be true to every covenant I've entered into and live by every word that proceedeth
out of the mouth of God? We emulate the things our Savior did, and in that way, we will be protected
against falling victim to the sins and errors of the world, which, man, there are so many right now,
errors of philosophy and doctrine that would lead us away from those most precious pearls.
Abby, I was just thinking of like, I do wonder though, if we do have a day and age right now
where we have the most distractions that have ever been on the earth.
Abby, yes, but to the point of my testimony today, because-
Also the best good. Isn't it interesting?
Yes, we can accelerate the word, we can share testimonies louder, quicker than ever before.
We don't have to write snail mail to get the message out.
That's a good point.
But yes, am I a victim to death scrolling? Do I skip past the memes on the apostles or prophets
and get to the kiddies and the military men coming home and stuff? Yes, yes, I do.
Except you cry about.
Yeah, like they know how to sucker me in, but I think that was like a big, for me today,
Fast and Testimony meeting in our work, this will air obviously off of that, but
that was a big thing. Yes, there are so many distractions. No, it's not unique to our time,
but does it seem like they're coming at us faster and harder than ever before? Yes.
That's what I was going to say.
But is he making it possible for us to-
It's balanced.
Yeah.
Like whatever we're doing, we can do it faster than ever before.
Laundry.
Whether it's good.
I can be washing the, I can wash the clothes, but also be-
Distracted faster than ever before.
Yeah, both of them.
Or listening to like scriptures while I'm doing those things.
I can be multitasking. I mean, I'm not like hand scrubbing the laundry. It's literally
in a machine. And some people may be still doing that, but maybe they figured out how
to have the kid read to them while they're, you know, doing the laundry.
Well, I'm sure.
But that's still-
That's awesome, Abby. Okay.
So I could see this being like a great place for a class discussion
to take off. You would maybe ask, can you recall a moment in your life when choosing
God's will over your own unexpected blessings? And then I think we would hear lots of stories
about, you know, picking a certain educational pursuit or making a move that you hadn't planned
to. Maybe you're preparing to change jobs when there's really nothing wrong with the
job that you currently have. Just kind of felt like the tides were changing.
You're preparing for that. Kind of letting him know I'm willing and ready to make a change if
you need me to. And then, you know, in that same discussion, I'd probably share something about
my process of bringing children into the world and aligning his will with mine. We were done
at one, then we were done at three, and then we were blessed with two more when
those two things align. You know, our thoughts and impressions and God's will were aligned.
And I don't know, we can't reach out and talk to you in the audience of exact examples of
how you would answer that question, but I'm going to maybe pick on you, Amy, to be thinking
of one yourself if you want to share it. If you do want to be involved in the conversation,
the way to do that would be to find this episode on YouTube and make a comment there. Share with
us how choosing God's will over your own brought unexpected blessings in your life.
Love to have you.
To fill the gap in time while I give you a second to think about it, I'm going to share
from his talk two examples of spiritual submissiveness and faithfulness to God. The
first was a young man who wasn't really sure about serving a mission, and then he felt inspired to go
after he'd heard an apostle's testimony. And we learned that his decision brought him confidence
in God's promises. It transformed his life and it strengthened his testimony through his
restored gospel. And then another one was a young woman who chose to uphold her standards by refusing
to dress immodestly at her fashion industry job. And her decision, rooted in understanding her
body as a sacred gift, preserved her integrity, secured her job, and exemplified covenant
confidence. So, huge blessings that come from something that they previously were worried
about doing or not knowing exactly what decision to make. Then they made their decision and they
got to reap the blessings that come from following what the Spirit impressed them to do.
Love to have you. I would share, there are many examples in my life, because honestly,
my mind doesn't usually think all the way that the Lord does. So, there are lots of different
ideas or examples of this. However, the one that I would like to share is the one where
I did choose to go on a mission. I was painfully shy, painfully shy.
But you knew you had something great to share? Or your example of your siblings?
You know, I just felt like an inner sort of pull to go on a mission, much the same we feel when
we know that great experiences await. And when I say great experiences, I just mean hard things
and good things that bring us closer to Christ. That sounds like a mission.
Yeah. So, that's kind of like, but I was scared to death. I really was. It didn't sound fun to me
to talk to people for 18 months. I would rather not do that. So, the fact that I did do that,
put myself out there, I remember, you know, after I got home, just thinking, you know what,
I can get through this because I went on a mission. Like, that was my bar for a while, you know?
Was it nothing would be harder than the experience that you had serving a mission?
Yeah. Fair. True?
Yeah. I also had, in a foreign country, I had surgery there, like, you know, like my appendix
out and things like that. So, it was just like lots of different things that, you know, the Lord
just throws everything in there that will be something that will benefit the rest of your life.
So, that is one of my things, Abby.
Excellent example. We're constantly confronted by similar decisions in our daily journey.
It takes courage and a willing heart to pause and pursue an honest and meek introspection to
acknowledge the presence of weakness of the flesh in our life that may impede our ability
to submit ourselves to God and ultimately decide to adopt His way rather than our own.
The ultimate test of our discipleship is found in our willingness to give up and lose our old self
and submit our heart and our whole soul to God so that His will becomes our will. Beautiful.
No more mental gymnastics. We're on the same path together. What we want to do and what He would
want us to do are the same thing. That's a beautiful goal that we all have.
It really is.
So, I would say what practical steps could we take to identify and overcome personal barriers
to submitting our will to God?
Okay, Abby. So, this is the height of the talk. As we put this idea to the test and get better
at it every time, we eventually get to the glorious moment when we discover the joy
that comes when doing these things. I love this.
Work for and please the Lord and what works for us become one and the same. I think He said,
what works for me works for thee, and I thought that was the cutest.
That phrase screamed consecration to me.
Totally.
One of the covenants that we make in the temple is to live the law of consecration. We don't have
to make covenants. We don't have to make temple covenants to enjoy the blood, to live a consecrated
life and enjoy the blessings of consecration. What would you say it means to be consecrated to the
Lord?
I would say when we totally yield our wills to Him and our submission brings powerful
transformational change. It also reminds me of the quote that we—
We get something for everything we give.
We really do.
When we want to create a relationship.
Oh, yeah. It also reminds me of the quote by Elder Neal A. Maxwell that says that our will is
really the only thing we have to give. And so, when we give that, we give everything.
Daily, we can self-introspect and we can ask, am I aligning my will with God's?
If it's in the beginning of the day as we set out to do the things that the day requires or
process the events of the day after it's happened and say, did I align my will with God's?
This is the transformative part. When we recognize that we didn't get it perfect,
we have the chance to get it better tomorrow, right? That's the beauty of doing it over and
over and over. When we look at our days and see that our time wasn't spent doing the best things,
and that's something that each of us will individually decide for ourselves,
you get the chance to make better choices of what you do with your hours the very next day.
Cutting out fruitless pursuits like we were just talking about before we let them consume all our
precious time is a true gift. I think that's a gift of the Spirit. The Lord lets us know what is,
I think President Nelson has said this. Yeah, if we invite him into our day like we did,
did I align my will with God's? He will send us the Spirit and absolutely let us know what is worth
our time and what just we don't need to have. What should fizzle out, what we should let go.
That is another way to consider the action item that we might identify one area in our life that
we're struggling to align our will with God's. And then we would just say, what's one step that I
could take to submit to his guidance this week? I like the Abby. Elders' worries would say it in
this way, let's give our best effort to set aside all self-centered pursuits and abandon any
entanglement that holds us back from full commitment to the Lord and His higher and
holier ways. If you're not at a place in your life where you have an interest in giving anything up,
then you certainly don't ask that question. If, however, you're there and you want to know if
you can be more in line with the Lord or want to try to be more in line with Him, you ask that
question. Something simple might come up. Put your phone down during such and such time.
Right. Listen to the scriptures. Ask your kid this question.
You know? Yes. It could be a million different
little things, but they're probably small and simple.
They, yes. That's how he works.
Do you have any more thoughts? Do you want me to kind of close for it?
Yeah, no. Go for it, Abby.
So, his closing testimony, he said, I testify to you that following the Lord's will in our life
will enable us to find the most precious pearl in the world, the kingdom of heaven.
Then he drops this little Easter egg in there. He mentions the word covenant confidence,
which took me back to just last April, general conference, when he spoke of covenant confidence.
Do you remember that talk very well? I love that talk, Abby.
Yes. In it, he emphasized how important it was to live covenants made with God.
They provide spiritual strength, confidence, they provide guidance and advice challenges.
And his message really focused on aligning one's will with the Lord and the blessings
of discipleship and covenant faithfulness. So, really, he built this foundation six months ago.
He did.
And it impressed me to go back and take a listen to it. And I listened back to the podcast,
which is episode five. And man, we've grown a little bit since that time.
But it's still fine.
I need to go back and listen to five, too. That's great.
You might want to listen to it. So, I listened back to that, and I was reminded that this was
the talk above all talks that was the answer to the prayer of my heart in that conference.
I love that.
And the line that came out of it was, home-centered, gospel-supported, temple-bound.
And so, that stuck with me, and the impression that I got was to really make a focus on the temple.
If I want the desires of my heart and for my children to have the best chance at carrying
on the testimony or the faith that my husband and I have been giving them, that was the answer to it.
And then, because I had that moment, then I was like, well, how many times has he helped me see
the different pieces and parts of what it looks like to align our will with his?
And I came up with a list of live up to your privileges by Sister Freeman, trusting in our
Father, God loves all his children, following Christ, bearing our weapons of rebellion,
the Lord Jesus Christ will come again, bonded to Jesus Christ.
And I will say, I miss-said it, it's Tayshara.
I think it's fair that you get another chance to say it, because Granny was listening,
and she rebuked you for not saying it right.
She did.
Not saying it right. She's like, you know this man, you should have said that well.
I highlighted bearing our weapons of rebellion, because that one, like,
I was getting an answer in real time to something that was on my heart.
So I've stumbled through that episode, but it was because I was trying to decide,
how do I balance the things in my life? How do I say yes to the good things?
How do I know when I have too many good things happening? Or how do I know if something is
actually bad for me that I'm juggling with my time with? And just this answer, like as clear as day,
which again, tied back to Elder Suarez's last conference talk, and that paired with this one,
that it was just like, if you don't have time for the temple above all else, then something has to
give. And so it's maybe not going to be specific that he's like, you've got to give this thing up,
but I would just say, okay, if I'm working too many hours, then my kids, you know,
how am I fulfilling their needs? And I can't fulfill their needs. If my needs aren't fulfilled,
my needs can be fulfilled in temple attendance. That's for me. That could be for a lot of people,
but I just love this talk because it gave me a chance to reflect on six months of learning and
growth and what answers that I've received from it. So this was a big one.
Abby, that's beautiful. You know what I also love? I love how, like you said, he started this,
he started teaching this six months ago, right? So it's like, again, the line upon line and how
the Lord just continues to deepen our conviction and deepen our experiences with Him as we study
the words. Right. And I, for one, picked up on the importance of that talk. That resonated with me.
It was what I needed an answer to. So I had the opportunity to buy in back then.
For sure. And then I get to demonstrate through some small actions that I'm taking and some
decisions that I'm making, like, am I doing well at this? And then, because that was still in my
heart, I can look through easily and see in multiple talks thus far in these sessions.
I think, doesn't this wrap up the Saturday evening session?
Yes, I believe so. So we're coming to a wrap on a session,
but just in, I'm being just like, just snippets of things that I got from those talks, but at
least half of the talks answered more and more questions to the question that was on my heart.
Love it. And so I'm just confident that
whatever question that you're presenting, you might have found your answers in the same things. You
might be like, that wasn't even what was on my mind. Right, I didn't even hear that. I got layers of answers.
I don't see that connection. I don't see how those talks tie in with it.
But that's the beautiful thing. They don't have to. So at the expense of spending too much time
on this, what I'm saying is the answers are there in whatever form. And he's kind of laid out this
thing to show me like, you bought in and you asked a question, the question's kind of still open,
and I'm still offering answers to it. And you're hearing what I'm saying to you.
And it's definitely, I'm not getting a pat on the back as I'm listening to these things like,
oh man, I've been doing so great. It's more like, this is where you can
improve. This is where you can improve. And maybe every once in a while it's like,
oh yeah, you're doing that great. Keep doing that. But it is in a gentle way.
And so it's not like hurting my heart that he's like, you can improve this.
You can demonstrate. You can do more to align your will with mine.
And sometimes I would say, maybe we achieve that in a given day, where like that day was for the
Lord. Our purposes were the same. The next day might blow it, but it's okay. I still get the
next day to give that another whirl. So the last line, he says, I pray that each of us in our own
time and turn will be able to declare with covenant confidence to our heavenly father and
savior Jesus Christ that what works for thee works for me. That's a wrap.