Going Back To The Opening By President...

Going back to the opening by President Brown this morning on doing and living the law and keeping the commandments and proving it by our actions, I should like to talk briefly on a subject, suggested by the phrase, that "knowing is not enough." ¶

May I share with you a sentence or two from Winston Churchill, who said, "It is no use saying 'We are doing our best.' You have got to succeed in doing what is necessary." I'm not sure we know really when we are doing our best. ¶

I'm not sure that in most cases we couldn't extend ourselves further in any performance in life. Since eternal life is the great prize, it isn't enough just to try. We have to succeed. There is only one journey — an everlasting one — one time and one eternity — so far as I am aware, and if I may use the vernacular, we can't afford to "sit this one out." Knowing is not enough! ¶

Emerson said, "The world looks like ... a mathematical equation, which, turn it how you will, balances itself." ¶

And then he added a sentence which I have often cited, "Do the thing, and you shall have the power. They who do not the thing have not the power." ¶

One eminent thinker and writer, Richter, said, "Don't wait for extraordinary circumstances to do good actions; try to use ordinary situations." ¶

The encouraging thing in life for all of us is this or one of the encouraging things, one of the realistic facts to face, that our Father in heaven knows us better than we know ourselves; that he knows our capacity; that he doesn't expect of us the unattainable, the unreachable, or the impossible; that he hasn't given us commandments that we can't keep or requirements that we can't meet. Just to take one specific thing, for example, as to our physical wellbeing: the law of health that God has given us. He describes it as being counsel to "the weak and the weakest." ¶

(D&C 89:3.) Nobody can be weaker than "the weakest" and he has assured us that this counsel is for even these, and simply knowing is not enough. It is the doing of the thing, the living of the law, the keeping of the commandment that brings the blessings. There is ample, conclusive, objective, medical evidence that this great law of health can be factually demonstrated to be what it is said to be. But mere knowing is not enough. We have to accept first the first of the first principles, which include not only faith but also repentance. ¶

Now we hear much, and we are grateful for the wonderful wide-reaching of the Church, for its accomplishments world-wide, for conversions, for the marvelous forward moving in every field that pertains to the Church. But this is made possible by people who perform, by missionaries who go out, by people who pay tithes and offerings and building funds. And again, just knowing is not enough. Someone has to do everything; and wonderful as has been and is the growth of the Church it can be yet much more so by the performance of those who increase in faithfulness. Such things are never quite convenient. We have to stretch ourselves and exceed ourselves and set aside our convenience ofttimes. ¶

How many times this people have heard from this pulpit the words of Ralph Waldo Emerson so often uttered in the ringing voice of President Grant: ¶

"That which we persist in doing becomes easier for us to do; not that the nature of the thing itself has changed, but that our power to do is increased," although President Grant, as I remember quoted them just a bit differently from the above. ¶

I am thinking of our statistics pertaining to the active and the inactive, all of which are needed as a measure of performance. But I am not sure that our Father in heaven is going to be too much impressed with statistics pertaining to the missing. I think perhaps he will look at us and ask, "Where are the others?" as any father would if any of his family were missing. Where are the others? ¶

Testimony is a great thing, but men who have had great testimonies have fallen by the wayside. Men who have had wonderful manifestations have fallen by the wayside, and the living of the law, the meeting of the obligation, the rendering of the service, the doing of the duty, the rising to the actual performance is the essential thing, and the mere knowing of our duty is not enough. ¶

There is one thing concerning which none of us knows enough. We don't know enough, any of us, to be safe in setting any of the commandments aside. ¶

We have to take someone's advice; we have to believe someone; and I for myself would hope to accept the counsel of my Father in heaven and not presume to know enough to set any of his commandments aside. ¶

"No life," said one of our eminent contemporary thinkers, "ever grows great until it is focused, dedicated, and disciplined." ¶

"And, if you keep my commandments and endure to the end you shall have eternal life, which is the greatest of all the gifts of God." (D&C 14:7.) If I may again cite Emerson, he said, "Nothing can bring you peace but yourself. Nothing can bring you peace but the triumph of principles." ¶

With you, I would wish this day to say to President McKay that I believe we have the courage, the devotion, the dedication, and the conviction to follow him wherever the Lord God leads him to lead us. With you I know that he is a prophet. With you I bear witness of the divinity of our Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ, and with you I acknowledge that merely knowing this is not enough, and with you I would pray for strength to do increasingly well that which we know so well, which God has given us to know, and I do it in Jesus' name. Amen. ¶