Excerpts from Recent Addresses of President Gordon B. Hinckley

“Let the Church be your dear friend. Let it be your great companion. Serve wherever you are called to serve. Do what you are asked to do. Every position you hold will add to your capacity. I have served in many responsibilities in this great organization. Every bit of service brought its own reward.

“This, too, will require your unselfish devotion, your unyielding loyalty and faith. You will serve in many capacities before your lives are complete. Some of them may seem small, but there is no small or unimportant calling in this Church. Every calling is important. Every calling is necessary to the advancement of the work. Never demean a responsibility in the Church. …

“Make room for the Church in your life. Let your knowledge of its doctrine grow. Let your understanding of its organization increase. Let your love for its eternal truths become ever and ever stronger.

“The Church may call upon you to make sacrifice. It may call upon you to give of the very best that you have to offer. There will be no cost in this, because you will discover that it will become an investment that will pay you dividends for as long as you live. The Church is the great reservoir of eternal truth. Embrace it and hold fast to it” (devotional, Logan Institute of Religion, 21 Oct. 1997).

“The Savior said, ‘Blessed are the merciful: for they shall obtain mercy’ (Matt. 5:7). There is so much of hatred in the world. There is so much of bitterness in the world. There is so much of selfishness in the world. There is so much of arrogance in the world. What a marvelous thing to have in our lives the quality of mercy, of reaching out to others and lifting those with feeble knees who cannot, as it were, stand upon their own feet—to reach out in the spirit of mercy, love, and kindness. This is the very essence of the gospel of the Lord. ‘Whatsoever ye would that men should do to you, do ye even so to them’ (Matt. 7:12). Oh, how we need the practice of the quality of mercy in our lives” (Montevideo, Uruguay, regional conference, 10 Aug. 1997).

“Are we Christians? Of course we are! No one can honestly deny that. We may be somewhat different from the traditional pattern of Christianity. But no one believes more literally in the redemption wrought by the Lord Jesus Christ. No one believes more fundamentally that He was the Son of God, that He died for the sins of mankind, that He rose from the grave, and that He is the living resurrected Son of the living Father.

“All of our doctrine, all of our religious practice stems from that one basic doctrinal position: ‘We believe in God, the Eternal Father, and in His Son, Jesus Christ, and in the Holy Ghost.’ This is the first article of our faith, and all else flows therefrom” (meeting with Religion Newswriters Association, Albuquerque, New Mexico, 14 Sept. 1997).

“Our lives become extremely busy. We run from one thing to another. We wear ourselves out in thoughtless pursuit of goals which are highly ephemeral. We are entitled to spend some time with ourselves in introspection, in development. I remember my dear father when he was about the age that I am now. He lived in a home where there was a rock wall on the property. It was a low wall, and when the weather was warm he would go and sit on his wall. It seemed to me he sat there for hours thinking, meditating, pondering things that he would say and write, for he was a very gifted speaker and writer. He read much, even into his very old age. He never ceased growing. Life was for him a great adventure in just thinking” (devotional, Logan Institute of Religion, 21 Oct. 1997).