“Chapter 17: Hallmarks of a Happy Home,” Teachings of Presidents of the Church: Thomas S. Monson (2020)
“Chapter 17,” Teachings: Thomas S. Monson
Chapter 17
Hallmarks of a Happy Home
“If we really try, our home can be a bit of heaven here on earth.”
From the Life of Thomas S. Monson
Recalling his formative years, President Thomas S. Monson said, “Some of the things you are raised with sink deep when you are young.”1 For him, one of the most important things was learning what it takes to build a happy home—qualities such as service, work, and compassion. He witnessed these qualities daily from his parents and other family members.
Describing his father’s example of service and love, President Monson said: “I remember he yielded his minuscule discretionary time to caring for a crippled uncle, aged aunts, and his family. He served in the ward Sunday School presidency, always preferring to work with the children. He, like the Master, loved children. I never heard from his lips one word of criticism of another.”2
President Monson also told of learning his work ethic from his father: “I … began my first part-time job after school in the printing shop that [my father] managed when I was fourteen. I don’t remember many days in my life after I was fourteen that I didn’t work, other than on Sundays. When you learn to work while you’re young, the habit stays with you. I’m happiest when I’m busy.”3
President Monson’s mother also had a powerful influence. Many times he spoke about the difficulties created by the Great Depression and how his mother cared for those in need:
“Since we lived just a block or two from the railroad tracks, frequently men, unemployed, without funds for food, would leave the train and come to our house for something to eat. Such men were always polite. They offered to do some work for the food. Indelibly imprinted on my mind is the picture of a gaunt and hungry man standing at our kitchen door, hat in hand, pleading for food.
“Mother would welcome such a visitor and would direct him to the kitchen sink to wash up while she prepared food for him to eat. She never skimped on quality or quantity; the visitor ate exactly the same lunch as did my father. As he wolfed down the food, Mother took the opportunity to counsel him to return to his home and his family. When he left the table, he had been nourished physically and spiritually. These men never failed to say thank you. Tears in their eyes revealed ever so silently the gratitude of their hearts.”4
President Monson said his mother “taught me by her life and actions what the [Bible] contains. Care for the poor, the sick, the needy were everyday dramas never to be forgotten.”5
When President Monson spoke about building strong homes, he often quoted the following instructions from the Lord about building the Kirtland Temple: “Establish … a house of prayer, a house of fasting, a house of faith, a house of learning, a house of glory, a house of order, a house of God” (Doctrine and Covenants 88:119). On one occasion he then asked, “Where in all the world could we find a better blueprint to fashion the home, the house, the family—one’s self?” Building a home according to that revealed blueprint, he said, “will meet the building code recorded in Matthew—the house built upon the rock. (See Matt. 7:24–25.) It will withstand the rains of adversity, the floods of opposition, and the winds of doubt everywhere present in our challenging world.”6
Thomas S. and Frances Monson with their children’s families, 2008
Teachings of Thomas S. Monson
1
A happy home is made of love, sacrifice, and respect.
Happiness does not consist of a glut of luxury, the world’s idea of a “good time.” Nor must we search for it in faraway places with strange-sounding names. Happiness is found at home.7
A home is much more than a house. A house is built of lumber, brick, and stone. A home is made of love, sacrifice, and respect. A house can be a home, and a home can be a heaven.8
We can make our houses homes and our homes heavens when the Savior becomes the center of our lives and His example of love and service finds meaningful expression in our own lives.9
May we … demonstrate kindness and love within our own families. Our homes are to be more than sanctuaries; they should also be places where God’s Spirit can dwell, where the storm stops at the door, where love reigns and peace dwells.10
So frequently we mistakenly believe that our children need more things, when in reality their silent pleadings are simply for more of our time.11
Happiness abounds when there is genuine respect one for another. … Where there is respect in the home, children do not find themselves in that dreaded “never never land”—never the object of concern, never the recipient of proper parental guidance.12
All of us remember the home of our childhood. Interestingly, our thoughts do not dwell on whether the house was large or small, the neighborhood fashionable or downtrodden. Rather, we delight in the experiences we shared as a family. The home is the laboratory of our lives, and what we learn there largely determines what we do when we leave there. …
… We are responsible for the home we build. We must build wisely, for eternity is not a short voyage. There will be calm and wind, sunlight and shadows, joy and sorrow. But if we really try, our home can be a bit of heaven here on earth. The thoughts we think, the deeds we do, the lives we live influence not only the success of our earthly journey; they mark the way to our eternal goals.
In 1995 the First Presidency and the Council of the Twelve Apostles issued a proclamation to the world concerning the family. This proclamation states, in part: “Happiness in family life is most likely to be achieved when founded upon the teachings of the Lord Jesus Christ. Successful marriages and families are established and maintained on principles of faith, prayer, repentance, forgiveness, respect, love, compassion, work, and wholesome recreational activities” [“The Family: A Proclamation to the World,” ChurchofJesusChrist.org].
Happy homes come in a variety of appearances. Some feature large families with father, mother, brothers, and sisters living together in a spirit of love. Others consist of a single parent with one or two children, while other homes have but one occupant. There are, however, identifying features which are to be found in a happy home, whatever the number or description of its family members. I refer to these as “Hallmarks of a Happy Home.” They consist of:
1. A pattern of prayer.
2. A library of learning.
3. A legacy of love.
4. A treasury of testimony.13
2
A pattern of prayer should exist in our homes.
To you who are parents, … call upon our Heavenly Father for help as you care for [your children’s] needs each day and as you deal with the challenges which inevitably come with parenthood. You need more than your own wisdom in rearing them.14
“Prayer is the soul’s sincere desire, Uttered or unexpressed” [Hymns, no. 145]. So universal is its application, so beneficial its result, that prayer qualifies as the number-one hallmark of a happy home. As parents listen to the prayer of a child, they too draw close to God. These little ones, who so recently have been with their Heavenly Father, have no inhibitions in expressing to Him their feelings, their wishes, their thanks.
Family prayer is the greatest deterrent to sin, and hence the most beneficent provider of joy and happiness. The old saying is yet true: “The family that prays together stays together.” …
My wife, Frances, and I have been married 53 years. Our marriage took place in the Salt Lake Temple. He who performed the ceremony, Benjamin Bowring, counseled us: “May I offer you newlyweds a formula which will ensure that any disagreement you may have will last no longer than one day? Every night kneel by the side of your bed. One night, Brother Monson, you offer the prayer, aloud, on bended knee. The next night you, Sister Monson, offer the prayer, aloud, on bended knee. I can then assure you that any misunderstanding that develops during the day will vanish as you pray. You simply can’t pray together and retain any but the best of feelings toward one another.”
When I was called to the Council of the Twelve Apostles … , President David O. McKay, ninth President of the Church, asked me concerning my family. I related to him this guiding formula of prayer and bore witness to its validity. He sat back in his large leather chair and, with a smile, responded, “The same formula that has worked for you has blessed the lives of my family during all the years of our marriage.”15
3
Our homes should be libraries of learning.
A second hallmark of a happy home is discovered when home is a library of learning. … An essential part of our learning library will be good books. …
Reading is one of the true pleasures of life. In our age of mass culture, when so much that we encounter is abridged, adapted, adulterated, shredded, and boiled down, it is mind-easing and mind-inspiring to sit down privately with a congenial book.
Young children also enjoy books and love to have their parents read to them.
The Lord counseled, “Seek ye out of the best books words of wisdom; seek learning, even by study and also by faith” [Doctrine and Covenants 88:118].
The standard works offer the library of learning to us and to our children.
Several years ago we took our grandchildren on an escorted tour of the Church printing facilities. There, all of us saw … the Book of Mormon coming off the delivery line—printed, bound, and trimmed, ready for reading. I told the grandchildren, “The operator says that you can remove one copy of the Book of Mormon to be your very own. You select the copy, and it will then be yours.”
Each removed one finished copy of the book and expressed his or her love for the Book of Mormon.
I really don’t remember other events of that day, but I shall never forget the honest expressions of love for the Book of Mormon—expressions which came from the hearts of those children.
As parents, we should remember that our lives may be the book from the family library which the children most treasure. Are our examples worthy of emulation? Do we live in such a way that a son or a daughter may say, “I want to follow my dad,” or “I want to be like my mother”? Unlike the book on the library shelf, the covers of which shield the contents, our lives cannot be closed. Parents, we truly are an open book.16
“The standard works offer the library of learning to us and to our children.”
4
Our homes should have a legacy of love.
A third hallmark of a happy home is a legacy of love. …
Seemingly little lessons of love are observed by children as they silently absorb the examples of their parents. My own father, a printer, worked long and hard practically every day of his life. I’m certain that on the Sabbath he would have enjoyed just being at home. Rather, he visited elderly family members and brought cheer into their lives.
One was his uncle, who was crippled by arthritis so severe that he could not walk or care for himself. On a Sunday afternoon Dad would say to me, “Come along, Tommy; let’s take Uncle Elias for a short drive.” Boarding the old 1928 Oldsmobile, we would proceed to Eighth West [in Salt Lake City], where, at the home of Uncle Elias, I would wait in the car while Dad went inside. Soon he would emerge from the house, carrying in his arms like a china doll his crippled uncle. I then would open the door and watch how tenderly and with such affection my father would place Uncle Elias in the front seat so he would have a fine view while I occupied the rear seat.
The drive was brief and the conversation limited, but oh, what a legacy of love! Father never read to me from the Bible about the good Samaritan. Rather, he took me with him and Uncle Elias in that old 1928 Oldsmobile along the road to Jericho.17
Some of our greatest opportunities to demonstrate our love will be within the walls of our own homes. Love should be the very heart of family life, and yet sometimes it is not. There can be too much impatience, too much arguing, too many fights, too many tears. Lamented President Gordon B. Hinckley: “Why is it that the [ones] we love [most] become so frequently the targets of our harsh words? Why is it that [we] sometimes speak as if with daggers that cut to the quick?” The answers to these questions may be different for each of us, and yet the bottom line is that the reasons do not matter. If we would keep the commandment to love one another, we must treat each other with kindness and respect.
Of course there will be times when discipline needs to be meted out. Let us remember, however, the counsel found in the Doctrine and Covenants—namely, that when it is necessary for us to reprove another, we afterward show forth an increase of love [see Doctrine and Covenants 121:43].18
May your homes be filled with love and courtesy and with the Spirit of the Lord. Love your families. If there are disagreements or contentions among you, I urge you to settle them now.19
Do we exemplify the legacy of love? Do our homes? Bernadine Healy, in a commencement address, gave this counsel: “As a physician, who has been deeply privileged to share the most profound moments of people’s lives including their final moments, let me tell you a secret. People facing death don’t think about what degrees they have earned, what positions they have held, or how much wealth they have accumulated. At the end, what really matters is who you loved and who loved you. That circle of love is everything, and is a great measure of a past life. It is the gift of greatest worth” [“On Light and Worth: Lessons from Medicine” (commencement address, Vassar College, May 29, 1994), 10, Special Collections].20
5
A treasury of testimony should prevail in our homes.
A fourth hallmark of a happy home is a treasury of testimony. “The first and foremost opportunity for teaching in the Church [lies in the home],” observed President David O. McKay [in Priesthood Home Teaching Handbook, rev. ed. (1967), ii]. “A true Mormon home is one in which if Christ should chance to enter, he would be pleased to linger and to rest” [Gospel Ideals (1953), 169].
What are we doing to ensure that our homes meet this description? It isn’t enough for parents alone to have strong testimonies. Children can ride only so long on the coattails of a parent’s conviction.
President Heber J. Grant declared: “It is our duty to teach our children in their youth. … I may know that the gospel is true, and so may my wife; but I want to tell you that our children will not know that the gospel is true, unless they study it and gain a testimony for themselves” [in Conference Report, Apr. 1902, 80].
A love for the Savior, a reverence for His name, and genuine respect one for another will provide a fertile seedbed for a testimony to grow.
Learning the gospel, bearing a testimony, leading a family are rarely if ever simple processes. Life’s journey is characterized by bumps in the road, swells in the sea—even the turbulence of our times.
“Let us determine, whatever our circumstance, to make of our houses happy homes.”
Some years ago, while visiting the members and missionaries in Australia, I witnessed a sublime example depicting how a treasury of testimony can bless and sanctify a home. The mission president, Horace D. Ensign, and I were traveling the long distance from Sydney to Darwin, where I was to break ground for our first chapel in that city. En route we had a scheduled stop at a mining community named Mt. Isa. As we entered the small airport at Mt. Isa, a woman and her two children approached. She said, “I am Judith Louden, a member of the Church, and these are my two children. We thought you might be on this flight, so we have come to visit with you during your brief stopover.” She explained that her husband was not a member of the Church and that she and the children were indeed the only members in the entire area. We shared lessons and bore testimony.
Time passed. As we prepared to reboard, Sister Louden looked so forlorn, so alone. She pleaded, “You can’t go yet; I have so missed the Church.” Suddenly the loudspeaker announced a thirty-minute mechanical delay of our flight. Sister Louden whispered, “My prayer has just been answered.” She then asked how she might influence her husband to show an interest in the gospel. We counseled her to include him in their home Primary lesson each week and be to him a living testimony of the gospel. I mentioned we would send to her a subscription to The Children’s Friend and additional helps for her family teaching. We urged that she never give up on her husband.
We departed Mt. Isa, a city to which I have never returned. I shall, however, always hold dear in memory that sweet mother and those precious children extending a tear-filled expression and a fond wave of gratitude and good-bye.
Several years later, while speaking at a priesthood leadership meeting in Brisbane, Australia, I emphasized the significance of gospel scholarship in the home and the importance of living the gospel and being examples of the truth. I shared with the men assembled the account of Sister Louden and the impact her faith and determination had made on me. As I concluded, I said, “I suppose I’ll never know if Sister Louden’s husband ever joined the Church, but he couldn’t have found a better model to follow.”
One of the leaders raised his hand, then stood and declared, “Brother Monson, I am Richard Louden. The woman of whom you speak is my wife. The children [his voice quavered] are our children. We are a forever family now, thanks in part to the persistence and the patience of my dear wife. She did it all.” Not a word was spoken. The silence was broken only by sniffles and muffled sobs and marked by the sight of tears streaming from every eye.
My brothers and sisters, let us determine, whatever our circumstance, to make of our houses happy homes. Let us open wide the windows of our hearts, that each family member may feel welcome and “at home.” Let us open also the doors of our very souls, that the dear Christ may enter. Remember His promise: “Behold, I stand at the door, and knock: if any man hear my voice, and open the door, I will come in to him” [Revelation 3:20].
How welcome He will feel, how joyful will be our lives, when the “Hallmarks of a Happy Home” greet Him.21
Suggestions for Study and Teaching
Questions
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President Monson emphasized that “happiness is found at home” (section 1). What are some ways we can create greater happiness at home? How can we make the Savior the center of our homes? How can family members nurture genuine respect for each other?
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Why is prayer important in building a happy home? (See section 2.) What blessings have you experienced from having family prayer? How are husbands and wives blessed by praying together?
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In what ways should a home be “a library of learning”? (section 3). How can parents help children develop a love of learning? How can we improve our study of the scriptures?
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How can we create “a legacy of love” in our homes? (section 4). As a child, what did you learn about love from your mother or father or from others? How can we reduce contention in our homes?
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How can parents help children develop strong testimonies of the gospel? (See section 5.) What are some ways we can better fulfill our duty to teach children? What can we learn from the story of Judith and Richard Louden?
Related Scriptures
Deuteronomy 11:19; Colossians 3:19–21; Mosiah 4:14–15; 3 Nephi 18:21; 4 Nephi 1:15; Doctrine and Covenants 68:25–28; 93:40–50; Moses 5:1–5, 10–12
Teaching Help
“Remember that building faith and becoming more Christlike does not happen [all at once]. As you invite those you teach to act on true doctrine, you help them extend the learning experience into their homes and daily lives” (Teaching in the Savior’s Way [2016], 35).