It reminded me actually about a lot of my personal experiences often. One of the things that they mentioned was that if you told Satan to go away, that he would have to!
"He has to leave you when you say, 'Depart from me Satan'" (President Spencer W. Kimball, The New Era, June 1978, p. 9)
Weird thing: I've done this a lot before.
Have any of you ever tried it? I think I have bad things come into my mind at the end of the day, when I'm sleeping, which is really ridiculous! But I think that's either when he's there the most, or when I notice him the most (probably the latter). But it seems like all of the bad and the good things from the day all just come together in one big mush-up when I'm trying to fall asleep! It's really very annoying. I'd like to only have nice things come to mind.
But, I have told Satan to go away lots of times, and if you've done it before, you'll understand what I'm saying...
It's the nicest feeling ever when you tell the demons and Satan to go away. Maybe it's just me, but when I do, for a couple of seconds I can feel that they're trying to hold on, to stay, but obviously it's impossible for them to stay. It's worse than even before when they're in the process of going away, but then when they are finally gone, I can just feel this incredible burden being lifted off of my shoulders!
Do we every notice those burdens?
We're always told to take the burdens off of others' shoulders, but how can we when we have this immense burden on our own?
This video explains it for me A LOT better!!!
So how do we?
Through Him.
But really... how do we accomplish anything without Him?
Without Him, Satan would be ruling us. Without Him, we would have no choice. Without Him, none of us could ever return to God. Without Him, we would not have a perfect example to follow. Without Him, what would we do?
Telling Satan to leave only works with Him, Heavenly Father, and the Holy Ghost all working together for our good.
Satan doesn't want us to be happy! He wants us to be miserable!
But Heavenly Father and Jesus want us to be with them! They love us more than anyone ever could! If we want perfect love, if we want to help others by lifting their burdens, we need our burden lifted. And through the Atonement, I think it already has been lifted. If we take that extra step to ask for repentance, that terrible burden is gone! If we take that extra step to tell Satan to leave, instead of dwelling on his evil purposes, that terrible burden is gone!
How do you feel when you see pictures of Jesus, or watch videos about Him, or anything! I feel peace. Even if it's just for a moment in this chaotic world. Don't we all want and need peace?
This week, I found out about a sort of contest that they were having. I'm not sure how many of you have seen the movie Meet the Mormons or heard the song "Glorious" performed by David Archuleta, but they were asking people to make videos of themselves singing the song with a backing track.
I did this, and I was just thinking about this song...
Would we be glorious at all without Heavenly Father and Jesus? I think without them, we would just be nothing. Nothing at all! We can only discover ourselves through them!
Like I said last time... everything just connects and connects over and over!!!
Now here's my defense plan: Whenever there is a bad thought that comes into my head, I am going to tell Satan to go away (as I have been doing), and whenever I have done something wrong, I will repent ASAP, and try to remain pure and clean forever!
What are your defense plans?
Love,
Gracious! :)
You have a beautiful, clear way of explaining truths. I was blown away. I loved the connection you made about demons being burdens and Christ's ability to lift them away if we will let Him. It made me think about how often I carry them around needlessly. You are right - without Him we are nothing. But with Him we are all we can be! Thank-you for this uplifting post!
ReplyDeleteI also loved your beautiful voice in your video!
Thank you for writing this. It was inspiring.
ReplyDeleteWhen I'm going through my day part of my battle plan is using checkpoints.
ReplyDeleteThroughout the day, I have times where I'll stop what I'm doing and analyze my spiritual situation. I also have trained myself with automatic responses when I recognize that the devil is at work on me. Those responses are things like; saying a prayer, singing a hymn like How Great thou Art or Hope of Israel (my two favorites). Or if I can't get them to go away I'll go read my scriptures for a little bit. To start off my day, I read scriptures for thirty minutes and then go to seminary. The whole system seems to work rather well!
Anyway, thanks for sharing your battle plan, mine wasn't near as well worded! :P