Good Morning, Good Afternoon, Good Evening,
this post should take four to seven minutes to read from start to finish.
For this week's topics focuses on Opportunities, and Pregnancy. What is your definition and understanding of the word, "opportunity"? What does "opportunity" means to a friend? What does "opportunity" means to a immediate relative?
This post focuses on a October 1998 General Conference talk, and it is called "A Season of Opportunity" by H. David Burton. I would like to share with you some highlights while I was reading the talk. I hope that you would be able to learn something new.
Elder Burton has mentioned the following;
"... As our recent sesquicentennial celebration concluded, our beloved prophet refocused our attention when he said: “The time has now come to turn about and face the future. This is a season of a thousand opportunities. It is ours to grasp and move forward. What a wonderful time it is for each of us to do his or her small part in moving the work of the Lord on to its magnificent destiny” (Gordon B. Hinckley, in Conference Report, Oct. 1997, 90–91; or Ensign, Nov. 1997, 67).
All of us face challenges in our daily lives. Yet in challenges lie some of our greatest opportunities. As we recognize and act on our opportunities, progress, happiness, and spiritual growth follow. We need to be involved in moving the Lord’s work forward. ... Over and over again we have been reminded ... to fully observe the Sabbath day. If we are not keeping the Sabbath day holy, today is a wonderful time to commit to seize that opportunity, to receive the promised blessings that come from Sabbath day observance. ... The need to reverence the Sabbath day is not new counsel.
We are only being told today what prior generations have been told by the prophets of their day and reconfirmed countless times by the prophets of our day. ... But I also know that remembering to keep the Sabbath day holy is one of the most important commandments we can observe in preparing us to be the recipients of the whisperings of the Spirit. This is the season of opportunity for families to stand tall and be counted among the faithful who obey the fourth great commandment: “Remember the sabbath day, to keep it holy. “Six days shalt thou labour, and do all thy work: “But the seventh day is the sabbath of the Lord thy God” (Ex. 20:8–10).
... Early in this dispensation, our forefathers were blessed with the opportunity of sacrificing mightily to build temples. They offered generously of their meager financial means as well as the fruits of their physical labor. As temples were completed in Kirtland and later in Nauvoo, the sacrifice of the Saints was great. They were blessed as they responded. After the migration of the Saints to the tops of the mountains, temples began to appear in a number of locations in the West. Each temple project represented great sacrifice. Divinely promised blessings awaited those who availed themselves of the opportunity to participate in building temples.
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| "Today is an opportunity to get better. Don't waste it." |
The season of opportunity that awaits us today, in temple service, is different from that of the past. ... We are, however, extended a marvelous opportunity to faithfully pay our tithes so temple construction and the work of the Lord may go forward. We are also challenged to be worthy to offer ourselves in the service of providing sacred saving ordinances for those who have preceded us. ... A few years ago a major communications company used in their advertising the phrase “Reach out and touch someone.”
President Hinckley has reminded us repeatedly of the many opportunities to reach out and touch someone. In speaking of those who have recently joined with us, he described a need to reach out and touch them with love and fellowship; to those who are estranged, a touch of encouragement, unconditional love, and a full measure of forgiveness if required; to our neighbors, associates, and friends who are not of our faith, the blessing of being touched by the Holy Spirit because of our words and deeds.
In a recent training meeting for stake and ward councils held as a part of a stake conference I attended, well-prepared presentations centered on the opportunities to be “inclusive” rather than “exclusive” in reaching out and touching new and less-active individuals, as well as those not members of our church. Sister Laura Chipman, a stake Young Women president, suggested five I’s to help us to be inclusive in our outreach.
They are: (1) Introspection - Are we inadvertently communicating an exclusionary attitude? (2) Identify - Do we know the recently baptized, the less-active, or nonmembers who reside in our neighborhoods and communities? (3) Individualize - Do we seek to know the interests, talents, and skills of those we wish to fellowship? (4) Invite - Do we include neighbors and friends in appropriate activities? (5) Involve - Are there ways we can utilize the skills, talents, and abilities of those we wish to include?
... All of our memories were refreshed during the course of the service. ... When the stories and recollections were complete, we all realized that our physically challenged, loving angel of a friend had given us and the wonderful compassionate families who reached out so often in love, far more of real value than he had ever received.
Yes, today is, indeed, a season of many opportunities. It is a season to reach out to touch the life of someone, a season to commit to keeping the Sabbath day holy, and a season to help keep the lights of our temples burning brightly, to name just a very few. ..."
If you would like to read the whole talk either now or in your own time, here's the link below.
Stay Tuned until next time.
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