Author: Chuck Lucas

I am the Editor and Founder of https://principlesneverfail.us/ a blog dedicated to principle centered personal development. The social, intellectual, physical, and spirtual challenges facing individuals and the communities in which we live in 2020 and beyond will require the best that is within us. True principles anchor us to the truths previously discovered. We can move forward into the future with confidence on the correct path if we do not forsake the truths we already know. My over 50 year quest has been to discover true principles and seek to understand and strive to apply them in my life. My hope is that some of what I have found may be of value to my family, friends, and to you.

The Power of Waiting

The Power of Waiting (Nauvoo Moment) May 2014 The power and blessing of waiting came clear to me for the first time in the Nauvoo Temple this week. The Temple is the House of the Lord. The temple is a place for the Lord to visit and rest here on earth. It is a place of revelation & reflection. Peace is felt and love abounds in the temple. Time is put in an eternal perspective. The Nauvoo Temple is located in an area where there is not a large concentration of church members. Sometimes an ordinance workers time is spent just waiting and watching for a temple patron to arrive. It came into my mind clearly this week that this waiting and watching is a sacred holy blessing. It represents in a small way Our Heavenly Father as he waits and watches for us to come to him. He waits patiently. He has high hopes and great expectations for each of us. His waiting is filled with faith, hope and love. In contrast my waiting on occasion is filled with doubt, despair & worry. What if no one comes? Will I get to go home early if no one comes? Why are so few people coming to the temple? What is wrong with everybody? Why are people so weak? These thoughts dampen the spirit and deprive me of the peace and perspective that lead to revelation and reassurance that the Lord desires to give me. Finally after nearly 9 years as an ordinance worker I am beginning to understand the power of waiting. The joy and happiness you feel when that patron or family comes through those temple doors is worth waiting for. Patiently waiting is a heavenly virtue. Revelations come easily in the temple if we know how to wait and watch for them. The temples are a symbol of the Lord’s love for us. Time & eternity intersect within those sacred walls. Waiting & watching in faith builds strength and helps prepare us to be ready when we are needed. Some of God’s blessings will never come to us unless we learn how to wait. The Lord is patiently and lovingly waiting for us – We can learn to do the same for each of his children & for ourselves as we wait patiently and faithfully on the Lord. One Scripture: Blessed [is] the man that heareth me, watching daily at my gates, waiting at the posts of my doors. Proverbs 8:34 One Quote: Many times we say we are waiting on the Lord, when as a matter of fact, the Lord is waiting on us. President Hartman Rector, Jr., Conference Report, April 1970

True freedom is doing what we ought to do.

Personal example is more eloquent than exhortation. There is a real difference between false freedom and true freedom. It is the difference between doing what we wish(want) to do and doing what we ought(should) to do. License to do wrong does not justify wrongdoing.

We must have inner strength to protect personal freedom and preserve us from the yoke of bondage. (surrender to pornography or to chemical compounds)

To develop self-discipline, we must confine our individual actions within the delimiting bounds prescribed by the law of the land, moral law, and divine law. When one’s individual actions are sternly disciplined to conform within those limits, then the full exercise of one’s freedom can be enjoyed.  (“Liberty, License, and Law,” America’s Freedom Festival, Provo, Utah, July 1,1990) Russell M.Nelson