Top 577 Quotes & Sayings by Gordon B. Hinckley - Page 6

If we are worried about the future, then we must look today at the upbringing of children.

All of us have far too much to do to waste our time and energies in criticism, faultfinding, or the abuse of others.

In matters of honesty, there are no shortcuts; no little white lies, or big black lies, only the simple, honest truth spoken in total candor... Being true is different than being honest.

Enjoy music. Not the kind that rocks and rolls, but the music of the masters, the music that has lived through the centuries, the music that has lifted people. If you do not have a taste for it, listen to it thoughtfully. If you do not like it the first time, listen to it again and keep listening.

What I fear from these reports is that the prevalent use of foul language has become an acceptable pattern in the schools, probably due in large part to the influence of TV and the general permissiveness in our society.

Under the plan of heaven, the husband and the wife walk side by side as companions, neither one ahead of the other, but a daughter of God and a son of God walking side by side. Let your families be families of love and peace and happiness. Gather your children around you and have your family home evenings, teach your children the ways of the Lord, read to them from the scriptures, and let them come to know the great truths of the eternal gospel as set forth in these words of the Almighty.

Do you want to be happy? Forget yourself and get lost in this great cause.

Spare yourselves from the indulgence of self-pity. It is always self-defeating. Subdue the negative and emphasize the positive.

It is both relaxing and invigorating to occasionally set aside the worries of life, seek the company of a friendly book...from the reading of 'good books' there comes a richness of life that can be obtained in no other way.

God is weaving His tapestry according to his own grand design. All flesh is in His hands. We have no need to fear. We have no need to worry. Our imperative need is to be found doing our duty.

I wish for each of you a time, perhaps only an hour, spent in silent meditation and quiet reflection on the wonder and the majesty of this, the Son of God. Our joy at this season is because He came into the world.

I am saying that out of a spirit of appreciation and gratitude, and a sense of duty, you ought to make whatever adjustment is necessary to give a little of your time-as little as two years-consecrating your strength, your means, your talents to the work of sharing with others the gospel, which is the source of so much of the good that you have. I promise that if you will do so, you will come to know that what appears today to be a sacrifice will prove instead to be the greatest investment that you will ever make.

At this time of Christmas, this season when gifts are given, let us not forget that God gave His Son, and His Son gave His life, that each of us might have the gift of eternal life.

You are good. But it is not enough just to be good. You must be good for something.

The greatness of the world in which we live is the accumulated goodness of many small and seemingly inconsequential acts.

It is important to know when you feel down that many others do also and that their circumstances are generally much worse than yours. And it’s important to know that when one of us is down it becomes the obligation of his friends to give him a lift. I hope that each of us will cultivate a sensitivity toward the feelings of others and when encouragement is needed make an effort to extend it. Be a friend and you will have a friend. God be thanked for wonderful friends.

Gratitude is of the very essence of worship. ... When you walk with gratitude, you do not walk with arrogance and conceit and egotism, you walk with a spirit of thanksgiving that is becoming to you and will bless your lives. Sincerely giving thanks not only helps us recognize our blessings, it also unlocks the doors of heaven and helps us feel God's love.

How much more beautiful would be the world and the society in which we live if...every mother regarded her children as the jewels of her life, as gifts from the God of heaven, who is their Eternal Father, and brought them up in true affection in the wisdom and admonition of the Lord.

Work at our responsibility as parents as if everything in life counted on it.

I love the youth of the Church. I have said again and again that I think we have never had a better generation than this. How grateful I am for your integrity, for your ambition to train your minds and your hands to do good work, for your love of the word of the Lord, and for your desire to walk in paths of virtue and truth and goodness.

The best place to have some food set aside is within our homes, together with a little money in savings. The best welfare program is our own welfare program. Five or six cans of wheat in the home are better than a bushel in the welfare granary. ... We can begin with a one week's food supply and gradually build it to a month, and then to three months. I am speaking now of food to cover basic needs.

He whose birth we commemorate this season is more than the symbol of a holiday. He is the Son of God, the Creator of the earth, the Jehovah of the Old Testament, the fulfillment of the Law of Moses, the Redeemer of mankind, the King of Kings, the Prince of Peace.

There is no end to the good we can do, to the influence we can have with others. Let us not dwell on the critical or the negative. Let us pray for strength; let us pray for capacity and desire to assist others. Let us radiate the light of the gospel at all times and all places, that the Spirit of the Redeemer may radiate from us.

Bind to you friends of your own kind, friends who will encourage you, stand with you, live as you desire to live, who will enjoy the same kind of entertainment, and who will resist the evil that you determine to resist.

God is the designer of the family.

I am grateful for emphasis on reading the scriptures. I hope that for you this will become something far more enjoyable than a duty; that, rather, it will become a love affair with the word of God. I promise you that as you read, your minds will be enlightened and your spirits will be lifted. At first it may seem tedious, but that will change into a wondrous experience with thoughts and words of things divine. Gordon B. Hinckley

All of us have to deal with death at one time or another, but to have in one's heart a solid conviction concerning the reality of eternal life is to bring a sense of peace in an hour of tragedy that can come from no other source under the heavens

God has brought us together as families to bring to pass His eternal purposes. We are part of this plan in this marriage relationship. let us love and respect and honor one another. We can do it, and we will be the better for it.

It is possible to be honest every day. It is possible to live so that others can trust us-can trust our words, our motives, and our actions. Our examples are vital to those who sit at our feet as well as those who watch from a distance. Our own constant self-improvement will become as a polar star to those within our individual spheres of influence. They will remember longer what they saw in us than what they heard from us. Our attitude, our point of view, can make a tremendous difference.

Christmas means giving. The Father gave his Son, and the Son gave his life. Without giving there is no true Christmas, and without sacrifice there is no true worship.

The temple is concerned with things of immortality. It is a bridge between this life and the next. All of the ordinances that take place in the house of the Lord are expressions of our belief in the immortality of the human soul.

Knowledge without labor is profitless. Knowledge with labor is genius.

Gambling undermines the moral fiber of society.

Let everything that you do bring credit and honor to the Church, of which you are a member, and the Lord will bless you and magnify you. Let there be no animosity among you but only love, regardless of race, regardless of circumstances. Let us love one another as the Lord would have us do

Just as our Redeemer gave His life as a vicarious sacrifice for all men, and in so doing became our Savior, even so we, in a small measure, when we engage in proxy work in the temple, become as saviors to those on the other side.

The best cure for weariness is the challenge of helping someone who is even more tired.

Children don’t need beating. They need love and encouragement. They need fathers to whom they can look with respect rather than fear. Above all, they need example.

Do your best, and be a little better than you are.

We are sometimes told that we are not a biblical church. We are a biblical church. This wonderful testament of the Old World, this great and good Holy Bible is one of our standard works. We teach from it. We bear testimony of it. We read from it. It strengthens our testimony. And we add to that this great second witness, the Book of Mormon, the testament of the New World, for as the Bible says, "In the mouth of two or three witnesses shall [all things] be established" (2 Cor. 13:1).

The way of the gospel is a simple way. Some of the requirements may appear to you as elementary and unnecessary. Do not spurn them. Humble yourselves and walk in obedience. I promise that the results that follow will be marvelous to behold and satisfying to experience.

This Church is true. It will weather every storm that beats against it. It will outlast every critic who rises to mock it. It was established by God our Eternal Father for the blessing of His sons and daughters of all generations. It carries the name of Him who stands as its head, even the Lord Jesus Christ, the Savior of the world. It is governed and moves by the power of the priesthood. It sends forth to the world another witness of the divinity of the Lord. Be faithful, my friends. Be true. Be loyal to the great things of God which have been revealed in this dispensation.

Let us all try to stand a little taller, rise a little higher, be a little better. Make the extra effort. You will be happier.

Let there be music in the home. If you have teenagers who have their own recordings, you will be prone to describe the sound as something other than music. Let them occasionally hear something better. Expose them to it. It will speak for itself. More of appreciation will come than you may think. It may not be spoken, but it will be felt, and its influence will become increasingly manifest as the years pass.

Christmas means 'giving,' and the gift without the giver is bare. Give of yourselves; give of your substance; give of your heart and mind.

You have nothing in this world more precious than your children. When you grow old, when your hair turns white and your body grows weary, when you are prone to sit in a rocker and meditate on the things of your life, nothing will be so important as the question of how your children have turned out... Do not trade your birthright as a mother for some bauble of passing value... The baby you hold in your arms will grow as quickly as the sunrise and the sunset of the rushing days.

Forget yourself and go to work.

How wonderful it is that we believe in modern revelation. I cannot get over the feeling that if revelation were needed anciently, when life was simple, that revelation is also needed today, when life is complex. There never was a time in the history of the earth when men needed revelation more than they need it now.

When I say do your best, I mean your very best. You are capable of so much more.

Our kindness may be the most persuasive argument for that which we believe.

Let us stand a little taller, if you don't, you will never strengthen yourself

It is not so much the major events as the small day-to-day decisions that map the course of our living. . . Our lives are, in reality, the sum total of our seemingly unimportant decisions and of our capacity to live by those decisions.

Gratitude is the beginning of civility, of decency and goodness, of a recognition that we cannot afford to be arrogant. We should walk with the knowledge that we will need help every step of the way.

Believe in Jesus Christ, our Savior and our Redeemer, the Son of God, who came to earth and walked the dusty roads of Palestine - the Son of God - to teach us the way of truth and light and salvation, and who, in one great and glorious act offered an atonement for each of us. He opened the way of salvation and exaltation for each of us, under which we may go forward in the Church and kingdom of God. Be not faithless, but believe in the great and wonderful and marvelous blessings of the Atonement.

It should be recognized that this Church is not a social club. This is the kingdom of God on the earth. It is the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints. Its purpose is to bring salvation and exaltation to both the living and the dead.

There is no more compelling motivation to worthwhile endeavor than the knowledge that we are children of God, that God expects us to do something with our lives, and that He will give us help when help is sought.

The time has come for us to stand a little taller, to lift our eyes and stretch our minds to a greater comprehension and understanding of the grand millennial mission of this, The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints.

There is a portent of stormy weather ahead to which we had better give heed...No one knows when emergencies will strike...Set your houses in order. If you have paid your debts, if you have a reserve, even though it be small, then should storms howl about your head, you will have shelter for your wife and children and peace in your hearts. That's all I have to say about it, but I wish to say it with all the emphasis of which I am capable.

Those who move forward "with a" happy spirit will find that things alwas work out.

Believe in the power of prayer - it is real, it is wonderful, it is tremendous.

Let us never forget to pray. God lives. He is near. He is real.