A Quote by William J. Critchlow, Jr.
Every member of our Church is a missionary. Without the formality of a setting-apart we should be so set-apart from the ways of the world that we can teach the gospel, which is our Father's way of life, by the very lives we live.
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If we all gave all our goods to the poor, the church would fall apart. If we all hated our father and mother, as Jesus told us to, there'd be an end of the church's emphasis on the family as being the one important thing holding the whole society together. There are all sorts of ways in which the church's teachings contradict directly what Jesus says in the Gospel.
We must share the gospel with others. That is our responsibility-every member a missionary. That is the call of prophets of God. ...Member-missionary work is one of the great keys to the individual growth of our members. It is my conviction that member-missionary work will raise the spirituality in any ward where applied
There are two keys to productive missionary work -- (1) family-to-family friendshipping (when a member family shares the gospel with a nonmember family) and (2) cooperation between members and the missionaries to reach people...Every member knows of nonmembers he or she can refer to the missionaries. Every father, mother, and youth in this church should share the gospel by giving a Book of Mormon, telling the account of the Prophet Joseph Smith, or inviting our acquaintances to a special meeting.
We have heard that we are all missionaries. Every member ... is or ought to be a missionary; ... as members of the Church, having pledged ourselves to the advancement of the gospel of Jesus Christ we become missionaries. That is part of the responsibility of every member of the Church
Jesus is the prime exemplar of life in God's presence. He lived out of an awareness of the identity God had given him, not the identity the world wanted to give him; he led an active, ongoing prayer life; he took time apart from the world to be with his Father; he made his Father's agenda his agenda; he made his Father's love for people evident in tangible ways; and so on. These are all characteristics that we should emulate in our lives.
There is also the very real possibility that, in the justice of God, one of the reasons He uses the weak and the foolish of the world is so that no argument could be made later that certain people were advantaged in some unfair way by that which was unearned-either in the premortal life or here. Hence it seems prudent for us to realize that just because one is set apart or ordained to a certain calling or assignment he or she must not expect to be set apart from the stresses of life. There appear to be no immunities.
Perhaps the greatest reason for missionary work is to give the world it's chance to hear and accept the gospel. The scriptures are replete with commands and promises and calls and rewards for teach the gospel. I use the word command deliberately for it seems to be an insistent directive from which we, singly and collectively, cannot escape...I wonder if we are doing all we can. Are we complacent in our approach to teaching all the world? We have been proselyting now 144 years. Are we prepared to lengthen our stride? To enlarge our vision?
It's so easy in life for us to receive blessings, many of them almost uncounted, and have things happen in our lives that can help change our lives, improve our lives, and bring the Spirit into our lives. But we sometimes take them for granted. How grateful we should be for the blessings that the gospel of Jesus Christ brings into our hearts and souls. I would remind all of you that if we're ever going to show gratitude properly to our Heavenly Father, we should do it with all of our heart, might, mind, and strength-because it was He who gave us life and breath
The world will teach our children if we do not, and children are capable of learning all the world will teach them at a very young age. What we want them to know five years from now needs to be part of our conversation with them today. Teach them in every circumstance; let every dilemma, every consequence, every trial that they may face provide an opportunity to teach them how to hold on to gospel truths.
Do you think I could bear to live on after you died? Oh, Lyra, I'd follow you down to the world of the dead without thinking twice about it, just like you followed Roger; and that would be two lives gone for nothing, my life wasted like yours. No, we should spend our whole lifetimes together, good long busy lives, and if we can't spend them together, we... we'll have to spend them apart.
But I know this. We're ready to move forward again in our way. Together or apart, no matter how far apart, we live in one another. We go on together.
It's easy for us to feel separate from other people and from other forms of life, especially if we don't have a reliable connection to our own inner world. Without insight into our internal cycles of pleasure and pain, desires and fears, there is a strong sense of being removed, apart or disconnected. When we do have an understanding of our inner lives, it provides an intuitive opening, even without words, to the ties that exist between ourselves and others.
As in Rome there is, apart from the Romans, a population of statues, so apart from this real world there is a world of illusion, almost more potent, in which most men live.
There is only one Church, and the responsibility for missionary work is universal. 'Every member a missionary.'
We should be patient in developing and strengthening our testimonies. Rather than expecting immediate or spectacular manifestations, though they will come when needed, we should pray for a testimony, study the scriptures, follow the counsel of our prophet and other Church leaders, and live the principles of the gospel. Our testimonies then will grow and mature naturally, perhaps imperceptibly at times, until they become driving forces in our lives.
without you, dearest dearest I couldn't see or hear or feel or think - or live - I love you so and I'm never in all our lives going to let us be apart another night.
