“I’ve Tried Everything”

By Elder Marion D. Hanks

of the Presidency of the First Quorum of the Seventy

(Adapted from an April 1972 general conference address. See Ensign, July 1972, pages 104–105.)

A youngster was assigned by his father to move a large rock. The boy tugged and pushed, and he lifted and struggled unsuccessfully. Some friends were enlisted, but even together they could not move it. Reluctantly he reported to his father that he could not budge the rock.

“Have you done all that you could?” asked the father.

“Yes,” said the boy. “I’ve tried everything.”

“No, Son, you haven’t,” said his dad. “You haven’t asked me.”

Why do so many of us, “heirs of God, and joint heirs with Christ” (Rom. 8:17), fail to go to Him, to keep in touch with our Father? He is anxious to help, but He wants us to learn our need for Him, to open the door to Him.

The prophet Isaiah said, “And therefore will the Lord wait, that he may be gracious unto you, and therefore will he be exalted, that he may have mercy upon you” (Isa. 30:18).

Illustrated by Diane Pierce