The Atonement & The Journey of Mortality – Elder Bednar

1. Mosiah 3:19 – The natural man is an enemy to God, how do we put it off when it’s human nature to be selfish and inwardly focused?

I must remember that I find joy when I help, inspire, and learn from others. Communicating about things that inspire me or help me learn and grow bring me joy and spiritual edification. I do have my "natural man/woman" moments from being tired, upset, etc, where I want to be left alone. I'm human. It comes naturally. Yet, I should remember that the Lord doesn’t want me to shy away or neglect others because I'm upset. We are here to bless and uplift His sons and daughters. In this, we find we uplift ourselves too.
 

The purpose of the gospel is to make bad men good, good men better, and change human nature. – President McKay

2. According to Elder Bednar, we don’t discuss the second part of President McKay’s quote as much as we should. How do good men and women become better and how does it apply to the atonement?

By constantly learning about the gospel, keeping our hearts open, evaluating ourselves and how we should improve, praying for guidance to know how to improve, etc.

“I am not so sure, however, that we know and understand that the Atonement is also for saints—for good men and women who are obedient, worthy, and conscientious and who are striving to become better and serve more faithfully. We may mistakenly believe we must make the journey from good to better and become a saint all by ourselves, through sheer grit, willpower, and discipline, and with our obviously limited capacities.”

The atonement not only redeems and cleanses us, but has a strengthening and enabling power to help us live better. We are not expected to become a saint on our own.

“The gospel of the Savior is not simply about avoiding bad in our lives; it also is essentially about doing and becoming good. And the Atonement provides help for us to overcome and avoid bad and to do and become good. Help from the Savior is available for the entire journey of mortality—from bad to good to better and to change our very nature.”

“The enabling power of the Atonement strengthens us to do and be good and to serve beyond our own individual desire and natural capacity.”

Wow! The atonement gives us strength to do better even when our desire and capacity is lacking. Interesting. So, if we have only a small desire to do good, the enabling power of the atonement gives us strength to enlarge our desire, if we allow it to happen. I think Church callings or circumstances out of our comfort zone can push us to want to be better.

3. Pray for strength to change our circumstances, rather than to pray that circumstances will be changed.

"I do not think the bands with which Nephi was bound just magically fell from his hands and wrists. Rather, I suspect he was blessed with both persistence and personal strength beyond his natural capacity, that he then “in the strength of the Lord” (Mosiah 9:17) worked and twisted and tugged on the cords, and ultimately and literally was enabled to break the bands."

"The implication of this episode for each of us is straightforward. As you and I come to understand and employ the enabling power of the Atonement in our personal lives, we will pray and seek for strength to change our circumstances rather than praying for our circumstances to be changed. We will become agents who act rather than objects that are acted upon (see 2 Nephi 2:14)."

Our burdens are made light through the Lord and we do submit cheerfully.

“And putteth off the natural man and becometh a saint through the atonement of Christ the Lord, and becometh as a child, submissive, meek, humble, patient, full of love, willing to submit to all things which the Lord seeth fit to inflict upon him, even as a child doth submit to his father”

As we put off the natural man, we become more cheerful and patient to do the will of the Lord. Ah ha! I like Elder Bednar’s connection.

Handcart Company - Daniel W. Jones prayed that food would be adapted to their stomachs, rather than prayed for something else to eat.

“In those circumstances I probably would have prayed for something else to eat: “Heavenly Father, please send me a quail or a buffalo.” It likely would not have occurred to me to pray that my stomach would be strengthened and adapted to the food we had. What did Daniel W. Jones know? He knew about the enabling power of the Atonement of Jesus Christ. He did not pray that his circumstances would be changed. He prayed that he would be strengthened to deal with his circumstances. Just as Alma and his people, Amulek, and Nephi were strengthened, Daniel W. Jones had the spiritual insight to know what to ask for in that prayer.”

Wow! We really need the Spirit to guide our prayers. I would have prayed for some other food too.

“The enabling power of the Atonement of Christ strengthens us to do things we could never do on our own. Sometimes I wonder if in our latter-day world of ease—in our world of microwave ovens and cell phones and air-conditioned cars and comfortable homes—we ever learn to acknowledge our daily dependence upon the enabling power of the Atonement.”
 

Very valid insight. We can be so dependent on modern-living and often lack the dependence on the enabling power of the atonement. What a weird world we live in. I love being on this earth at this time, but we do have millions of distractions that drive away the Spirit and our focus on the Lord.

More to the Atonement:

The Savior has suffered not just for our iniquities but also for the inequality, the unfairness, the pain, the anguish, and the emotional distresses that so frequently beset us. There is no physical pain, no anguish of soul, no suffering of spirit, no infirmity or weakness that you or I ever experience during our mortal journey that the Savior did not experience first. You and I in a moment of weakness may cry out, “No one understands. No one knows.” No human being, perhaps, knows. But the Son of God perfectly knows and understands, for He felt and bore our burdens before we ever did. And because He paid the ultimate price and bore that burden, He has perfect empathy and can extend to us His arm of mercy in so many phases of our life. He can reach out, touch, succor—literally run to us—and strengthen us to be more than we could ever be and help us to do that which we could never do through relying upon only our own power.

What an immense blessing and power.

“I declare my witness of and appreciation for the infinite and eternal sacrifice of the Lord Jesus Christ. I know the Savior lives. I have experienced both His redeeming power and His enabling power, and I testify that these powers are real and available to each of us. Indeed, “in the strength of the Lord” we can do and overcome all things as we press forward on our journey of mortality.”

 
Amen. I love it!

http://www.lds.org/ensign/2012/04/the-atonement-and-the-journey-of-mortality?lang=eng