Selflessness Versus Selfishness | William R. Bradford | 2003

The War in Heaven was the original case of selflessness versus selfishness. We fight the same battle today, making decisions that determine our priorities.

This speech was given on June 3, 2003.

Read the speech here:
https://speeches.byu.edu/talks/william-r-bradford/selflessness-versus-selfishness/

Learn more about William R. Bradford here:
https://speeches.byu.edu/speakers/william-r-bradford/

Subscribe to BYU Speeches for the latest videos: http://www.youtube.com/c/byuspeeches

Read and listen to more BYU Speeches here:
https://speeches.byu.edu/

Follow BYU Speeches:
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/byuspeeches
Twitter: https://twitter.com/byuspeeches
Instagram: https://instagram.com/byuspeeches
Pinterest: https://www.pinterest.com/byuspeeches

© Brigham Young University. All rights reserved.

"It is nice to be here with you again. As I contemplated what I ought to say to you here and now, the thoughts that came into my mind were basically the same thoughts I talked about 22 years ago on October 27, 1981. None of you would have been here to hear that talk, so I feel justified in repeating some of the same material.

When I was a student here, I used to attend the devotionals and listen to great men and women give powerful messages. I couldn’t imagine then how they could possibly do it. I still can’t imagine it.

I received a call to serve as a missionary, and then after my mission I had a military obligation. I married and began to raise a family and never did get back to complete my formal education.

I believe it is possible for a person to become educated without necessarily being schooled, but I have grieved over the fact that I was not able to get more formal education. I have struggled with a compensatory effort to overcome that problem. I have not always succeeded, and so in many ways I am still unschooled. If it were not for the powers of heaven helping to educate me, it would be most difficult to carry on with my assignments. I recommend education to you with all my heart. I congratulate you for being here.

Asking your attention and patience, I will attempt to convey some thoughts that have come to me.

If the veil that covers our remembrance of our premortal past were somehow lifted, we could see ourselves in that glorious assembly where our Eternal Father presented to us the plan for our salvation and exaltation.

How long it took I do not know—the time does not matter. What matters is that it really happened. It must have been a most interesting time. I suppose there were some anxious moments as one thing built upon another. There must have been intense emotion and anticipation while waiting for the next part to unfold. Think of the pondering and discussion. Father was about His work, teaching us how to exercise our agency by unfolding truth to our understanding.

As these truths did unfold, there must have been many questions and concerns on our part about the creation of the earth, leaving our Father’s presence, our need for physical bodies, the veil, living by faith, symbolic ordinances, death, the Resurrection, and the conditions upon which our return to our Father was based.

We must have understood some very basic principles then. We must have been able to see that all living things are designed to reproduce after their own kind, that as children of an eternal Father—the seed of a god, if you will—it is our nature to grow and develop into eternal beings with the potential to become like He is. There must have been anxiety on our part when we learned of the need to leave our Father, come to this earth, and have a veil of forgetfulness cover our minds. How would we know what to do or how to do it? And then there would be opposition, choices to make, and the possibility of mistakes and failure.

It must have been a great comfort as our Heavenly Father made covenants with us to send one of His counselors to be a guide and companion—one of His counselors with delegated power to communicate the truths of the plan to us, that by the power of spiritual communication we could know how to make correct decisions so as to mature after the nature of the species of our Father, who is a god. We know this great counselor as the Holy Ghost.

As our Father taught us, a pattern began to unfold. It must have become obvious that there would be many things we could not do for ourselves. Someone would have to serve us.

After its creation, it would not be possible for us to control this world upon which we were to be placed. The earth’s delicate environment would have to have a unique relationship to the sun, would need rain and fertile soil to sustain life, would have governing laws of gravity and electricity, and would be subject to the requirements of the elements and their reactions to each other. Someone would have to control these things for us.

A sense of calmness and peace with the Father’s plan must have come to us as He made covenants to give us His other counselor...."

Видео Selflessness Versus Selfishness | William R. Bradford | 2003 канала BYU Speeches