Welcome to Closer to Christ through General Conference,
where two friends who love Jesus share our own
approach to studying the most recent General
Conference talks. This is Abby and Amy. Let's
jump into it. Today's talk is called Faith, a
Bond of Trust and Loyalty by Elder Sandino Roman
of the Seventy. He begins his talk by telling
a story about promising to teach a friend how
to swim. This story ends with both of them almost
drowning. In his own words, he said, Now we were
both drowning. Trying my best to reach the surface,
I prayed with all my might for a miracle from
God. Then, slowly but steadily, the power of
God was manifest as I felt a hand propelling
me towards the shallow end of the pool, bringing
us to safety. When he shared the quote from President
Nelson that said, when you reach out for the
Lord's power in your life with the same intensity
that a drowning person has when grasping and
gasping for air, power from Jesus Christ will
be yours. And I felt like he feels that more
than anybody from that personal story. When he
addresses his talk. He's kind of speaking to
children and the youth. I was surprised. I was
like, I looked back to see if he was from a general
presidency or something. Nope, from the 70. And
he said, this is for the children and the youth.
So I thought that was interesting. So let's start
with the question. What does it mean to have
faith in Jesus Christ? And how does believing
in him or having a testimony of him help us to
see him more as a real person? I love that, Abby.
Both of them are true because childlike faith
begins with having a testimony that he's real.
And then I feel like as we have experiences and
act on that faith, we're blessed with deeper
understanding and trust in him and his character
and his goodness. And Elder Roman asked, he kind
of answers his question that he had before by
asking another one. He said, have you ever thought
of faith as trust? When we believe, when we have
faith in Christ, we recognize his blessings and
develop a relationship of trust with him. That
being said, how can we increase trust in Christ?
If you look in the notes, the footnotes, he has
a ton of them. And he goes through and actually
he talks about youth. You've been asked to look
through and ponder your experiences. He, in the
footnotes, there is lights and rays. Or is it
rays and lights? Yeah. With the pillars and rays.
Pillars and rays. There is the 2025 very beginning
devotional that they had. And then there's also...
The youth theme for the year. Look unto me. Yeah.
And then he also has in here, he also has in
here a guiding principle. We'll get to that.
But there are a lot of talks in here. And this
is, I love it because Abby, he like takes all
these small little pieces and puts them together.
And he brings together like... I don't know,
five different talks. And with that, he has these
four suggestions for how to do what they were
asked to do. I'll do the first two. He were asked
to meditate or ponder and meditate on Christ
and the happiness that his atonement and gospel
bring to our lives. And then the second one is
make a record of spiritually defining memories.
That's what it is. The second one was the talk
of spiritually defining memories that he ties
in here. He says it's for you. for your loved
ones, and also for those in the scriptures. And
then he gives a tip. He says, now, these testimonies
will not bring power to your life until the Spirit
etches them in the fleshy tables of your heart,
which brings us to number three. Before I pop
to number three, I'll just say that pairs really
well with what we're studying in Come Follow
Me. Just the power, they reiterate time and time
again. The power that comes when you record testimony,
it's like bearing testimony of it. And, you know,
it may bless you in your own life, you know,
years later when... You're having a time of struggle.
You can look back on your own words, but there's
a great possibility your children or grandchildren
are going to benefit from those words that you've
taken the time to record, which would have otherwise
been lost. Point number three, or suggestion
number three, was to ponder and record all that
God set in motion for these miracles to happen
at just the right time. So the beauty of looking
back. When a miracle happens, you identify that
you saw it as a miracle, but that, well, if I'm...
on the other side of it and i'm looking back
what little things happen that got me to this
point there there's a lot of power in that for
sure and then the last one to use this exercise
an opportunity to get closer to god pray to your
heavenly father as if it were the first time
express your love and gratitude for his blessings
even ask him how he feels about you and about
the direction your life is taking love that faith
flourishes with loyalty We notice that faith
sprouts as we trust in Jesus Christ and blooms
as we are faithful and loyal to him. If you want
a true relationship with Christ, show him by
making covenants and honoring them with faithfulness
and loyalty. Making covenants with Jesus Christ
builds hope. Honoring them builds faith. I feel
like he talks about that over and over again
and really gives good examples of it. Just a
thought that came to my mind is like, you know
you're in the world physical tangible people
if i want a relationship with amy am i going
to have that by saying man if she wants to have
a friendship with me she's going to come and
talk to me or do i put some initiative into it
and i i come up and i reach out to you and i
get to know you and i guess that's the same thing
i'm thinking um with all of the intensity of
a drowning uh person that you know you're reaching
out for these relationships you're gonna it's
talking about the extreme effort the effort to
the best of our abilities the With the most energy
and gusto that we can have, we're trying to say
we want that relationship because he's always
willing and prepared to have that relationship
with us. He's waiting for us to use our agency
to demonstrate we want that relationship. That's
very good. Faith in the face of adversity. He
talks about how should you respond to adverse
situations that require. christ's miracles while
challenges are inevitable and sometimes frightening
and then again he talks about it simply walk
undaunted toward him just as the 2025 fsy conference
theme invites look unto me in every thought doubt
not fear not so you might ask yourself how can
i walk undaunted towards him so the suggestion
is to imagine you're an explorer in an uncharted
territory To overcome the obstacles ahead, you
need a source of light. Your faithfulness to
God and your constant interactions with Him are
the fuel for your lantern. So when you encounter
dark and perilous situations, instead of walking
towards them blindly, you would instead turn
on your lamp filled with the oil of faith in
Christ to shed glimmers of hope on that uncertain
path. How far will your faith go? How far will
you go with your hope and faith in Christ? And
I felt like another way to ask this is, do we
always get to choose the miracle and the timing?
And then Elder Roman answers it this way. Remember
my story at the pool? In that moment of despair,
the miracle came in the way I had expected. And
then he says this, but God does not guarantee
that it will always be according to our will.
Our faith must be centered in Christ and our
hope in His blessings as He chooses to send them.
Expect miracles. but let God prevail in our lives.
So I do love that he, I feel like this teaching
is important because it can take a lifetime to
achieve. Sometimes it feels like Heavenly Father's
not answering prayers or even listening when
the miracles don't come, either how we expect
them or on our own timeline. And that comes with
like a more developed relationship with him.
Absolutely. Sometimes like our first encounters
with him, we were asking for a stuffed animal
and it shows up in the next 30 seconds. And we
were like, man, he's good to us. He just did
the most important thing. Sometimes the miracles
that we're asking for, they're bigger. They're
going to take a little bit more time. We don't
have the resources. We don't have the question
to ask, or it's just not the right timing for
it. So he's asking us to build the faith at these
young ages and continue with that relationship
and trust him enough to know when these harder
things come along, that when we ask for that
miracle, that we know with perfect faith and
trust that he is going to give us what we need.
It could be way better than we even imagined.
But that it will come and that in the wait that
we're just like, you know, I don't feel it yet.
Give me eyes to see what I'm being blessed with.
Or let me know, you know, let me know as the
miracle is right before my eyes. And then the
suggestion from above, when you get to the other
side of it, the resolve has come. It's better
than you could have even imagined. Totally. And
you say, oh, now I see A, B, and C. What happened
along the way to get me there? I love that. You're
experiencing that. Like, you're right in the
middle of the miracles. And it is so, like, it
is so important to, like you said, just remember
that you're maintaining that relationship. On
our end, it's having faith and trust in his character
and in his timing. Because I'll say it again,
my timing is always, right now it'd be great.
That's always my timing. It's not his. He's like,
no, this is going to take some time. I asked
you for it today. That's because I need it today.
I think you've got more new. And I mean, for
sure, we can all agree that Elder Roman needed
to breathe in that moment, right? A little bit
different than something that may take a while
to foster more faith, more character on our part,
and a more well -rounded. Disciple of God. You
know what I mean? Disciple of Christ. And somebody
that's preparing to be a priest or priestess
or a god or goddess. You see like in the world,
they'll do these studies all the time and they'll
present a treat to a kid and they say, if you
wait, then I'll give you two or whatever. And
they track these kids over a lifetime. And you
see like in these studies, you see that people
that are more inclined to needing immediate.
What do you call it? Gratification. Yeah, the
immediate gratification. Tend to suffer with
other things in life way more than the kids that
are willing to wait. There's just more mental
fortitude. Their lives kind of have a better
trajectory, you know, as far as outcomes that
we're looking for. So, of course, that's God's
pattern. Waiting for the waiting for. waiting
past the thing you think that you need in the
moment for something so much better in the end
yes and also you know what's interesting too
when you're talking about that abby it's the
because we're maintaining that relationship because
we continue to trust even when the end goal hasn't
happened yet an end goal meaning like the the
healing that we're praying for or the you know
the relationship or whatever it is that we are
still looking to him and looking for, he says
it in the very beginning of his talk. He said,
then slowly but steadily, the power of God was
manifest as I felt, you know? So that's what
it is. I feel like we're looking for the hand
of God to be manifest, even if it's not in the
ways that we're hoping to see it in the end,
because he's sort of saying, I'm here with you
in the waiting, if we look for that. Yep. If
we have eyes, we're waiting to see the big finish.
we miss the opportunity to see the slow and steady
progress we're making towards the big finish.
I agree. God promises to his faithful people.
He said this in a couple of ways. I'm going to
read them. He says, My young friends, how much
we love and trust you. You belong to the family
of God and are children of the covenant. Believe
and trust in Jesus Christ. He will enable you
to truly become his disciples. i invite you to
begin today to nurture your relationship with
jesus christ make a commitment to never forsake
him and last he says your loyalty love and trust
in christ will shape your character and identity
after his You will gain confidence and strength
to overcome Satan's attacks. And when you make
mistakes, you will yearn for his forgiveness.
Finally, your hope for the future will be bright.
He will trust you with his power to accomplish
anything he expects of you, even the power to
return to his presence. Love that.