Increasing our Faith & Personal Righteousness...

In the February Visiting Teaching message, Sister Barbara Thompson says, “The greatest help we will have in strengthening families is to know and follow the doctrines of Christ and rely on Him to help us.” Lately I have really been thinking about this and have come to know even more just how true it is. I believe that when true doctrine is understood and becomes a part of a person…like way down deep in the heart and in the mind, it can change us and we become more like our Savior. We ourselves become strengthened which enables us to strengthen our families even more.

I came across a quote from Elder Jeffrey R. Holland, where he talks about the doctrine of repentance and reminds us of the importance of really understanding how a person truly can be purified and made new again. 

He says, “We learn that when repentance is complete we are born again and leave behind forever the self we once were. To me, none of the many approaches to teaching repentance falls more short than the well-intentioned suggestion that ‘although a nail may be removed from a wooden post, there will forever be a hole in that post.’ We know that repentance (the removal of that nail, if you will) can be a very long and painful and difficult task….But where repentance is possible and its requirements are faithfully pursued and completed, there is no ‘hole left in the post’ for the bold reason that it is no longer the same post. It is a new post. We can start again, utterly clean, with a new will and a new way of life. Through repentance we are changed to what Alma calls ‘new creatures’ (Mosiah 27:26)… Repentance and baptism allow Christ to purify our lives in the blood of the Lamb and we are clean again. What we were, we never have to be again…Christ is the power behind all repentance.
("Alma, Son of Alma,” Ensign, March 1977, pg. 82-83). *This is a great talk by Elder Jeffrey R. Holland.

Truly understanding the doctrine of repentance gives a person hope

through our loving Savior, Jesus Christ.