Transcript

Chapter 6 is entitled "Far from Our Heavenly Home." I have to tell you an incident that happened to us when we were serving in Bordeaux as mission president. Our family went to the airport to pick up the missionaries. There we met a Frenchman who was waiting for his black labrador dog. We soon learned something about this dog. I sensed he was treated better than my children. I envisioned that he had free reign of the house, probably slept in the bed with the master, maybe even had a shelf in the refrigerator where he got his food. But, then, think what happened. This man was transferred to Bordeaux. The dog, in the kennel. Suddenly, two men take him, put him in a crate, put him in the belly of a big airplane, wondering what's going on. What has he done? What caused this? Now he's coming into baggage, and we saw the crate was undone. The dog came out nervous, tense, ready to defend himself. And then, suddenly, he caught the eyes of his master, and his total demeanor changed. He started wagging his tail, and his bark stopped, and he lunged into the arms of his master. I thought about what we learned from this experience. Like that black labrador dog, we are far from our heavenly home. He gives us this mortal experience, but it is not our natural experience, just like the dog did not have his natural experience. But in one way, we are very different. We are sons and daughters of Heavenly Parents who love us, and we have a great purpose to be far from our heavenly home. And as we learn that purpose, as we learn to repent, to follow the Savior, to believe in Him, to have confidence that we can be forgiven of our sins and that we can look forward to our Resurrection, I promise you that we will have joy and happiness, and we will be prepared to enter back into His presence and fall into His arms. I know this is the way we should look on our life. This is a special time, a time of testing but a time of joy and happiness and showing that we can have the faith in our Savior Jesus Christ that we are meant to have.

We Have a Purpose Here

Description
(The Divine Gift of Forgiveness, Chapter 6) Elder Neil L. Andersen uses the analogy of a dog disoriented from traveling on an airplane to help us understand our mortal lives, far from our heavenly home.
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