Grow Their Faith Through Scriptures

In the most recent general conference, President Eyring spoke about creating a home where the Spirit of the Lord is and where love abides.  He referred to the Book of Mormon period when the people began to be wicked again in 4 Nephi and how pride, hatred, wickedness, and a weakening of faith crept in among the people.  He then related this to our day, saying, “Wise parents will be alert enough to notice those symptoms when they appear among their family members. They will, of course, be concerned. But they will know that the underlying cause is the influence of Satan trying to lead good people down a path to sin and thus to lose the influence of the Holy Ghost.”  He suggested a few things we might try when we see these signs in our own families: “You could have limited success by calling a child to repent, for instance, of pride. You might try persuading children to share what they have more generously. You could ask them to stop feeling they are better than someone else in the family.”  Trying to simply persuade our children to be less prideful or to share more or to stop being so selfish will indeed only have limited results.  Then President Eyring gave the real key: “But then you come to the symptom I described earlier as ‘They began to diminish in their faith in Jesus Christ.’ There is the key to leading your family to rise to that spiritual place you want for them—and for you to be there with them. As you help them grow in faith that Jesus Christ is their loving Redeemer, they will feel a desire to repent.”  Whatever sins we are trying to correct in our families, the key to helping them to repent and improve is help them grow their faith in Jesus Christ.  He summarized, “So building faith in Jesus Christ is the beginning of reversing spiritual decline in your family and in your home. That faith is more likely to bring repentance than your preaching against each symptom of spiritual decline.”

                So how do we help build faith in Jesus Christ in our children?  That is more difficult than simply trying to attack the specific problems of selfishness or pride or disobedience.  The Lord has confirmed the importance of this duty in our dispensation to teach faith to our children: “Inasmuch as parents have children in Zion, or in any of her stakes which are organized, that teach them not to understand the doctrine of repentance, faith in Christ the Son of the living God… the sin be upon the heads of the parents” (Doctrine and Covenants 68:25).  President Eyring suggested that the best way to teach this is to first grow faith in ourselves: “You will best lead by example. Family members and others must see you growing in your own faith in Jesus Christ and in His gospel.”  He also suggested that our study of the scriptures is key: “Parents in the Church have been blessed with an inspired curriculum for families and individuals. As you use it, you will build your faith and the faith of your children in the Lord Jesus Christ.”  We must seek to grow our own faith through the study of the words of God and to let our children both see that and participate in it.  We have to trust that this effort will in the long run yield more lasting fruit than attacking and individually trying to root out every sign of sin we see in our families.      

We see this pattern of teaching children the importance of the scriptures as it relates to building faith in the Book of Mormon itself.  King Benjamin focused on the scriptures with his three sons in some of his final teachings: “And now, my sons, I would that ye should remember to search them diligently, that ye may profit thereby.”  He suggested that without the scriptures, they would “have dwindled in unbelief” (Mosiah 1:5, 7).  In other words, there would be no faith without the scriptures.  Alma focused on the scriptures as he taught his son Helaman, telling him to take care of the plates and to not overlook them because they seemed simple: “By very small means the Lord doth confound the wise and bringeth about the salvation of many souls.… Behold, they have enlarged the memory of this people, yea, and convinced many of the error of their ways, and brought them to the knowledge of their God unto the salvation of their souls” (Alma 37:7-8).  The scriptures are what bring us to a knowledge and faith in God.  Helaman similarly taught his sons about faith in Jesus Christ through the scriptures, telling them to remember the people and teachings of earlier Nephite prophets which he had certainly taught them about many times.  He encouraged them to remember works of the original Nephi and Lehi after whom they were named.  He also reminded them, “O remember, remember, my sons, the words which king Benjamin spake unto his people.”  He likewise encouraged them, “And remember also the words which Amulek spake unto Zeezrom, in the city of Ammonihah.”  Helaman reminded Nephi and Lehi of these Nephite scriptures so that they could “remember, remember that it is upon the rock of our Redeemer, who is Christ, the Son of God, that ye must build your foundation” (Helaman 5:6-12).  Our most important teaching to our children will be to help them grow their faith in Jesus Christ, and focusing ourselves and them on the words of the scriptures is a key part of that endeavor.