“An Unshakable Foundation,” Friend, May 2013, 2–3
From the First Presidency
An Unshakable Foundation
From an April 2012 general conference address.
My purpose today is to describe how we can lay an unshakable foundation of faith.
As a young man I worked with a contractor building foundations for new houses. In the summer heat it was hard work to prepare the ground for the form into which we poured the cement. There were no machines. We used a pick and a shovel. Building lasting foundations for buildings was hard work in those days.
In a similar way, the ground must be carefully prepared for our foundation of faith to withstand the storms that will come into every life. That solid basis for a foundation of faith is personal integrity.
Choosing the right consistently whenever the choice is placed before us creates the solid ground under our faith. It can begin in childhood since every soul is born with the free gift of the Spirit of Christ. With that Spirit we can know when we have done what is right before God and when we have done wrong in His sight.
Those choices, hundreds in most days, prepare the solid ground on which our edifice of faith is built. The metal framework is the gospel of Jesus Christ, with all its covenants, ordinances, and principles.
If we have faith in Jesus Christ, the hardest as well as the easiest times in life can be a blessing. In all conditions, we can choose the right with the guidance of the Spirit.
Illustration by Jennifer Tolman