Lesson Recap: July 9, 2017

Losing Ourselves in the Service of Others

May the real meaning of the gospel distill into our hearts that we may realize that our lives, given us by God our Father, are to be used in the service of others.

When President Gordon B. Hinckley was struggling through he first few months of his mission in England, he wrote to his father feeling discouraged and confused, he expressed that he felt he was wasting his time and his money on his mission because he did not feel he was successful in sharing the gospel. President Hinckley's father wrote back, "...Forget yourself and go to work." Shortly after reading the letter President Hinckley engaged in scripture study with his companion and he read in Mark 8:35, "Whosoever will safe his life shall lose it, but whosoever shall lose his life for my sake and the gospel, the same shall save it." After that day President Hinckley wrote "I covenanted that I would try to forget myself and lose myself in His service." He recounted that a new light came into my life and new joy into his heart. 

Our Lives are gifts from God and are to be used in the service of others:

"There is much poverty and stark want across the world, so much of rebellion and meanness, so much of sleaze and filth, so many broken homes and destroyed families, so many lonely people living colorless lives without hope, so much distress everywhere." President Hinckley asked all members of the church to give of ourselves to make the world a little better. If the world is to be improved, the process of love must make a change in the hearts of men. It can do so when we look beyond ourselves to give our love to God and others, and do so with all our hearts, with all our soul and all our minds. The Lord has declared in modern revelation, "If your eye be single to my glory, your whole bodies shall be filled with light, and there shall be no darkness in you." (D&C 88:67)

The best antidote for worry is work. The best medicine for despair is service. The best cure for weariness is the challenge of helming someone who is even more tired. 

Give expression to the noble desires that lie within your hearts to reach out comfort, sustained build others. As you do so the cankering poison of selfishness will leave you, and it will be replaced by a sweet and wonderful feeling that seems to come in no other way. 

When we reach out to help others, we find our true selves.

We will never be happy if you go through life thinking only of yourself. Get lost in the best cause in the world, the work of the Lord. You will bless your own life as you bless the lives of others.