Desire - Power to change us; Elder Oaks

I started the lesson by sharing the following two paragraphs and asking what was the difference between the two people.

The first two lessons, which we learned early in our efforts to be good member missionaries, have made sharing the gospel much easier: We simply can’t predict who will or won’t be interested in the gospel, and building a friendship is not a prerequisite to inviting people to learn about the gospel. We discovered these principles when we were newlyweds and the missionaries in our ward asked us to make a list of people with whom we could share the gospel. We were to start with those at the top of our list and begin “preparing” them through a twelve-step process. First, we were to invite them to our home for dinner and follow that by going to a cultural event together. The sixth, seventh, and eighth steps were to invite them to church, give them a copy of the Book of Mormon, and ask them to take the missionary discussions. The program culminated in the twelfth step—baptism.

We dutifully made this list, placing those we thought most likely to be interested in the gospel at the top. They looked like “ideal Mormons”—people whose values, such as clean living and commitment to family, mirrored our own. We then began building deeper friendships with them, adding additional social events to our already busy lives. One by one, those we thought might be interested in learning about the gospel declined our invitations when we got to steps six through eight. Our invitations didn’t offend them, but in their own way they told us they were happy in their present approach to religion. After much work over many months, we didn’t find anyone who was interested in learning more about the gospel.

New missionaries were then transferred to our ward. Knowing nothing of our history, they came to our home, unfolded an identical chart on our table, and asked us to make a list of people with whom we could cultivate friendships in preparation to teaching them the gospel. We protested, “We’ve tried this. It took a long time and didn’t work.” We explained that we felt we had honestly tried with everyone we thought was a candidate for hearing the discussions.

It turns out that missionary work is an assignment in the church at which we cannot succeed if we don’t have the Spirit with us at all times. And I am so grateful that I came to make that decision to be a missionary again because it has blessed our family in profound ways. The next year, 1984, I was listening to General Conference, and Elder M. Russell Ballard gave a talk at that time where he invited us as members of the church to set a date, a point in the future, as a commitment to our Heavenly Father. He invited us-don’t pick a person that we were going to share the gospel with but to set a date. He promised us that if we would do all that we could to engage in conversations about the gospel, with as many people as we could, that God would bless us by that date, that we would intersect with somebody who would accept our invitation to meet with the missionaries. His talk just sunk into my heart. That night I went home and knelt by my bed and committed to my Heavenly Father that by a date I would find somebody for the missionaries to teach. That was in 1984. That year, by the date, Heavenly Father blessed me to find a man who we could bring into our home to teach with the missionaries. I have set a date once, twice and now three times every year as a commitment to my Heavenly Father that I’m going to be a missionary, and every Sunday I fast that God will help me to intersect with somebody who I can invite to learn of the gospel of Jesus Christ. Every time I pray, I pray that God will put somebody in my path, and I’m grateful to be able to say that God has answered my prayer every time. It’s been 20 years.

Interestingly enough, it's the same person writing both stories (Clayton Christensen). He just became a great member missionary. Why? I think it's because he really wanted to. When we want something and will work for it and think about it and pray for it, we'll become something great. God will help us.

Here's a story that illustrates the idea that when we have a strong enough picture of the future, we'll have a strong enough desire to do even extreme things to help that picture of the future happen.

How do we develop desires? Few will have the kind of crisis that motivated Aron Ralston,³ but his experience provides a valuable lesson about developing desires. While Ralston was hiking in a remote canyon in southern Utah, an 800-pound (360 kg) rock shifted suddenly and trapped his right arm. For five lonely days he struggled to free himself. When he was about to give up and accept death, he had a vision of a three-year-old boy running toward him and being scooped up with his left arm. Understanding this as a vision of his future son and an assurance that he could still live, Ralston summoned the courage and took drastic action to save his life before his strength ran out. He broke the two bones in his trapped right arm and then used the knife in his multitool to cut off that arm. He then summoned the strength to hike five miles (8 km) for help.⁴What an example of the power of an overwhelming desire! When we have a vision of what we can become, our desire and our power to act increase enormously.

Most of us will never face such an extreme crisis, but all of us face potential traps that will prevent progress toward our eternal destiny. If our righteous desires are sufficiently intense, they will motivate us to cut and carve ourselves free from addictions and other sinful pressures and priorities that prevent our eternal progress.

I know we will meet Jesus one day and that it will be a wonderful day if we have tried to follow Him and become better people. May we all desire that to be the case.

Have a great day.