CHARITY

Along your pathway of life you will observe that you are not the only traveler. There are others who need your help. There are feet to steady, hands to grasp, minds to encourage, hearts to inspire, and souls to save (Thomas S. Monson, “How Firm a Foundation,” Ensign, Nov. 2006, 68).

I hope that we welcome and love all of God’s children, including those who might dress, look, speak, or just do things differently. It is not good to make others feel as though they are deficient. Let us lift those around us. Let us extend a welcoming hand. Let us bestow upon our brothers and sisters in the Church a special measure of humanity, compassion, and charity so that they feel, at long last, they have finally found home  (Dieter F. Uchtdorf, ”You Are My Hands,” Ensign, May 2010, 68-69).

The Lord works from the inside out. The world works from the outside in. The world would take people out of the slums. Christ takes the slums out of people, and then they take themselves out of the slums. The world would mold men by changing their environment. Christ changes men, who then change their environment. The world would shape human behavior, but Christ can change human nature (Ezra Taft Benson, “Born of God,” General Conference Oct. 1985).

We need to be kinder with one another, more gentle and forgiving. We need to be slower to anger and more prompt to help. We need to extend the hand of friendship and resist the hand of retribution. In short, we need to love one another with the pure love of Christ, with genuine charity and compassion and, if necessary, shared suffering, for that is the way God loves us....

We need to walk more resolutely and more charitably the path that Jesus has shown. We need to "pause to help and lift another" and surely we will find "strength beyond [our] own." If we would do more to learn "the healer's art," there would be untold chances to use it, to touch the "wounded and the weary" and show to all "a gentle[r] heart" (Howard W. Hunter, "A More Excellent Way", General Conference Apr. 1992).

True charity, the absolutely pure, perfect love of Christ, has really been known only once in this world—in the form of Christ Himself, the living Son of the living God. It is Christ's love that Mormon goes to some length to describe for us and that Paul the Apostle did as well some years before, writing to the Corinthians in New Testament times. As in everything, Christ is the only one who got it all right, did it all perfectly, loved the way we are all to try to love. But even though we fall short, that divine standard is there for us. It is a goal toward which we are to keep reaching, keep striving—and, certainly, a goal to keep appreciating.

And as we speak of this, may I remind you, as Mormon explicitly taught, that this love, this ability, capacity, and reciprocation we all so want, is a gift. It is "bestowed"—that is Mormon's word. It doesn't come without effort and it doesn't come without patience, but, like salvation itself, in the end it is a gift, given by God to the "true followers of his Son, Jesus Christ." The solutions to life's problems are always gospel solutions. Not only are answers found in Christ, but so is the power, the gift, the bestowal, the miracle of giving and receiving those answers. In this matter of love, no doctrine could be more encouraging to us than that (Jeffrey R. Holland, “How Do I Love Thee?”, BYU Speeches 15 Feb. 2000).

Our words, like our deeds, should be filled with faith and hope and charity, the three great Christian imperatives so desperately needed in the world today. With such words, spoken under the influence of the Spirit, tears can be dried, hearts can be healed, lives can be elevated, hope can return, confidence can prevail. … May we all rejoice in the thought that when we say edifying, encouraging things unto the least of these, our brethren and sisters and little ones, we say it unto God. (Jeffrey R. Holland, “The Tongue of Angels,” Ensign, May 2007, 18)

Love is one of the chief characteristics of Deity, and ought to be manifested by those who aspire to be the sons of God. A man filled with the love of God, is not content with blessing his family alone, but ranges through the whole world, anxious to bless the whole human race (Joseph Smith, in History of the Church, 4:227).

"There is one gift I would like to focus on—the gift of charity. Use charity, 'the pure love of Christ' (Moro. 7:47), and give service for the right reasons. Charity is the ability to make life more meaningful for others....

"There are times when we need to be lifted. There are times when we need to be strengthened. Be that kind of friend and that kind of person who lifts and strengthens others. Never make someone have to choose between your ways and the Lord's ways. And always make sure that you're making it easier to live God's commandments for those who are by your side and who are your friends. Then you will understand whether you have charity" (“Robert D. Hales: Gifts of the Spirit,” Ensign, Feb 2002, 12).

We are challenged to move through a process of conversion toward that status and condition called eternal life. This is achieved not just by doing what is right, but by doing it for the right reason—for the pure love of Christ. The Apostle Paul illustrated this in his famous teaching about the importance of charity (see 1 Cor. 13). The reason charity never fails and the reason charity is greater than even the most significant acts of goodness he cited is that charity, 'the pure love of Christ' (Moro. 7:47), is not an act but a condition or state of being. Charity is attained through a succession of acts that result in a conversion. Charity is something one becomes  (Dallin H. Oaks: The Challenge to Become Ensign, Nov 2000, 32–34).

Faith in Christ means we trust Him; we trust His teachings. That leads to hope, and hope brings charity, the pure love of Christ—that peaceful feeling that comes when we sense His concern, His love, and His capacity to cure us or to ease our burdens with His healing power (Richard G. Scott, “To Be Healed”, General Conference 1994)

We are challenged to move through a process of conversion toward that status and condition called eternal life. This is achieved not just by doing what is right, but by doing it for the right reason—for the pure love of Christ. The Apostle Paul illustrated this in his famous teaching about the importance of charity (see 1 Cor. 13). The reason charity never fails and the reason charity is greater than even the most significant acts of goodness he cited is that charity, 'the pure love of Christ' (Moro. 7:47), is not an act but a condition or state of being. Charity is attained through a succession of acts that result in a conversion. Charity is something one becomes (Dallin H. Oaks, "The Challenge to Become", General Conference Oct. 2000).