President Ezra Taft Benson taught us that “when we put God first, all other things fall into their proper place or drop out of our lives. We should put God ahead of everyone else in our lives. ‘ (May 1988 Ensign article, The Great Commandment – Love the Lord) This includes ourselves, we must love God more than we love ourselves. As we focus on our Savior and His commandments and do all we can to try to be like Him, our lives will be bless and we will find joy. We will be able to ‘count our many blessings” as we follow the counsel of our Savior and do as He would do. In our marriages, we should follow this same counsel. Our marriages will be blessed as “we put God first.” Jesus Christ put aside His own will to do the will of the Father. This reminds me of one of my favorite primary songs, "I'm Trying to Be Like Jesus." One line of that song says, "In all that I do and say." We must strive to do as our Savior did and treat others as He would treat them, including our spouses.

H. Wallace Goddard, PhD states, “It takes faith in the Lord Jesus Christ to remove evil from our marriages and bring them to vibrant life.” Just as Jesus healed the son who had been inflicted by the unclean spirit, He can remove the evil from our lives as we rely on Him and invite Him into our lives. The Prophet Brigham Young counseled two sisters, each wanting a divorce, to see their husbands as they will be in the glorious resurrection. If we look at our marriages with eternal perspective, we’ll be able to see more clearly the potential our marriages have. Goddard states that “If we replace judgment and condemnation at each other with compassion and love, we not only find more peace, serenity, and tranquility but also become one smidgen more like God.” Our purpose in coming to this earth is to receive a body and to prove ourselves worthy. As we become more like our Father in Heaven, we will find that our lives are filled with happiness and not sorrow. We may not be able to enjoy all the promised blessings in this life, but they are promised and we will have them in the next life.

I’m grateful for my marriage and my husband and for all he does for me. Tonight, as my husband was leaving to go to mutual (he’s the deacon’s quorum advisor) he kissed me goodbye and said, “Thank you.” I asked him for what and he replied, “For being you.” My heart skipped a beat and even after 14 years of marriage, that man made my heart pitter patter. I’m grateful for the teachings of our Savior and even today through latter-day prophets.

President Joseph Fielding Smith wrote that “if all mankind would live in strict obedience to the gospel, and in that love which is begotten by the Spirit of the Lord, all marriages would be eternal; divorce would be unknown. Divorce is not part of the gospel plan and has been introduced because of the hardness of heart and unbelief of the people... There never could be a divorce in this Church if the husband and wife were keeping the commandments of God.” Marriage is not easy, which is why H. Wallace Goddard, PhD refers to marriage as “God’s finishing school,” in his book titled, “Drawing Heaven Into Your Marriage.” Marriage requires sacrifice. Sacrifices that can sometimes feel uneven or unfair. However, I love the way Goddard states that, “We ‘sacrifice’ our puny preferences and God rewards us with eternal joy.”

This reminds me of Sister Reeves’ talk titled “Worthy of our Promised Blessings,” in October 2015 General Conference. She stated that “many have expressed that our Father’s promised blessings are just “way too far away,” particularly when our lives are overflowing with challenges. But Amulek taught that “this life is the time … to prepare to meet God. (Alma 34:32.)” It is not the time to receive all of our blessings.” She goes on to say, “I do not know why we have the many trials that we have, but it is my personal feeling that the reward is so great, so eternal and everlasting, so joyful and beyond our understanding that in that day of reward, we may feel to say to our merciful, loving Father, “Was that all that was required?” We can’t fully comprehend the blessings that our Heavenly Father has in store for us in the next life. However, we can get a small taste of those joyful blessings as we live the commandments and count our blessings that surround us. We can feel the love of our Heavenly Father and feel the power of the Holy Ghost bless and comfort us in times of trials and heartache. What a blessing that is for us! "Forget yourself and go to work,” as President Hinckley's father has reminded us, our lives and our marriages will be blessed.

Love the Lord, yourself, and your spouse

I am loving the book titled, “Drawing Heaven Into Your Marriage,” by H. Wallace Goddard, PhD. I love how simply he reminds us that to have success in our marriages, we need to become more like our Savior. I truly appreciated the counsel he gave to the woman who was no longer attracted to her husband. The Spirit prompted him to tell her that, “The Atonement of Jesus Christ was the answer. Because of His goodness, we are reconciled to God. When we are reconciled to God, we are reconciled to each other. His goodness makes us one.” This reminds me of my brother’s wedding. During the ceremony, their Bishop talked about a triangle that is involved in a marriage with three points. On those three points are the husband, the wife, and the Savior. All three should be equally involved in the marriage. As the husband and the wife grow closer to the Savior, they also grow closer to each other and their marriage is unified. I have always appreciated this counsel and have made couples prayer a priority. Goddard states that, “the key to a healthy relationship is being a healthy, saintly, God-seeking person.” As long as we are staying true to our covenants and doing all we can to keep His commandments, we will be blessed. “The Gospel of Jesus Christ – that great plan of happiness – provides the solutions for our humanness.” Our Heavenly Father wants to be involved in our lives and wants to bless us. He wants to help us in all aspects of our lives, including the small, silly problems that we think He may not want to be involved with. He loves us and is our Father, of course He wants to be included in every aspect of our lives. Jesus proclaimed, “Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart, and with all thy soul, and with all thy strength, and with all thy mind; and thy neighbor as thyself (Luke 10:27).” It’s as simple as that. If we love our God, we will want to follow His commandments, and our lives will be blessed. For a Relief Society meeting, we had a family counselor come to share some marital advice with us. She taught about this scripture and I’ll never forget the lesson. She shared the order in which we are to love. First, we love the Lord. Later in that scripture it reads, “thy neighbor as thyself.” She explained that we must love ourselves second, and our neighbor (or our spouses) third. We have to love ourselves in order to love and show love to others. That doesn’t mean be selfish, it means to love ourselves. We are children of our Heavenly Father, He loves us, we should also love us. To think negative thoughts about ourselves is to think negative thoughts about one of God’s creations. I had never thought of it that way and it really touched my heart. I also loved this statement by Goddard, “The Gospel of Jesus Christ – that great plan of happiness – provides the solutions for our humanness.” Also, “I believe the key to a healthy relationship is being a healthy, saintly, God-seeking person.” Whenever I am irritated with my husband, when I take a step back and think about what is really bothering me, I realize that I am usually being selfish. Maybe I expected something from him that he didn’t do exactly the way I wanted, or oftentimes, I expected him to read my mind, which is impossible. I believe Goddard’s wards, that if we strive to live the plan of happiness and be “healthy, saintly, God-seeking person,” our lives and our relationships will be blessed.

“When our Heavenly Father placed Adam and Eve on this earth, He did so with the purpose in mind of teaching them how to return to His presence. Our Father promised a Savior to redeem them from their fallen condition. He gave to them the plan of salvation and told them to teach their children faith in Jesus Christ and repentance. Further, Adam and his posterity were commanded by God to be baptized, to receive the Holy Ghost, and to enter into the order of the Son of God.” (President Ezra Taft Benson, April 1986 Liahona) What a wonderful blessing, to have been put on this Earth in families to help us learn and grow together in the gospel. After Adam and Eve partook of the fruit, then learned that our Father in Heaven would provide a Savior for mankind, they must have rejoiced; rejoiced in the knowledge that they can repent and be forgiven of their sins. I am grateful for this promise and blessing as well. I am not perfect, in fact I sin daily, but the Atonement provides a way for me to repent and be made clean again. This blessing enables me to return to live with my Heavenly Father, and my family which has been sealed to me on this Earth, again. I am grateful for President Joseph Fielding Smith’s appreciation and love for women. I know that our Heavenly Father holds a special place in his hearts for his daughters and that we are not left out of the church in these latter days. I am grateful for his reminder, “I think we all know that the blessings of the priesthood are not confined to men alone. These blessings are also poured out upon our wives and daughters and upon all the faithful women of the Church. These good sisters can prepare themselves, by keeping the commandments and by serving in the Church, for the blessings of the house of the Lord. The Lord offers to his daughters every spiritual gift and blessing that can be obtained by his sons, for neither is the man without the woman, nor the woman without the man in the Lord.” (President Joseph Fielding Smith, Improvement Era, June 1970, pp. 65-66) I love being a woman and I love being a mother. I have a sacred responsibility, along with my husband, to raise my children in righteousness. It is my duty to raise my boys to love the Lord and to show them, by my example, that joy comes from obedience to His commandments. I love the Lord and I love the Gospel of Jesus Christ. My life is blessed daily as I strive to grow closer to Him through prayer and scripture study.

Tolerance

Elder Dallin H. Oaks, of the Quorum of the Twelve Apostles, is someone I have really come to look forward to hearing from at General Conference. In “The Divine Institution of Marriage,” a Mormon Newsroom article, I appreciated this definition he gave of tolerance, "Tolerance does not require abandoning one's standards or one's opinions on political or public policy choices. Tolerance is a way of reacting to diversity, not a command to insulate it from examination." This topic is something I’ve pondered on quite a bit recently, and I really loved his words. I can be tolerant of others and still stand up for what I know to be right. I always think of the Savior and love the words of the primary song that states, “Jesus said love everyone, treat them kindly too.” I want to be like my Savior and love everyone, treat them kindly, but I always want to stand up for what I know is right, just as our Savior did. He loved the sinner but did not condone the sin. While the, “Church unequivocally affirms that marriage should remain the lawful union of a man and a woman,” (The Divine Institution of Marriage, page 6) that doesn’t mean that I should shun those who engage in same-gender relationships. I can treat them kindly and show love to them. As the National Review article, “Marriage: Where Do We Go From Here?” article states, “We must continue to witness to the truth about marriage;” Page 2, of that article, states, and “... those who defend marriage as the union of a man and a woman will prove to be prophetic.” However, we can “defend marriage as the union of a man and a woman” without being rude or mean. The Divine Institution of Marriage article states, “The Church’s affirmation of marriage as being between a man and a woman “neither constitutes nor condones any kind of hostility toward gays and lesbians.” We must remember the commandment to “Love One another,” and treat our brothers and sisters with kindness, love, and compassion. (http://www.mormonnewsroom.org/article/church-responds-to-same-sex-marriage-votes) In a National Review article titled, “Marriage: Where Do We Go From Here?” Ryan T. Anderson states, “Whatever happens, it is essential to take the long view, and to be ready to bear witness to the truth even if law and culture grow increasingly hostile.” As the world gets more and more wicked and angry, we must be cautious to not allow ourselves to become angry. We must hold firm to the iron rod and be Christ-like in all things. We mustn’t be hostile to those around us who feel differently than we do.