Peace Through Your Faith and Good Works

Yesterday was one of those nights that left me a bit exasperated as a parent as all of my kids at one point or another were crying and yelling at me and were filled with frustration because something didn’t quite work out like they wanted.  The peace we hope to have in our home was nowhere to be seen and I went to bed feeling like a failure as a parent to instill resilience and patience and other good qualities in my children.  With that frame of mind, I read Alma 7 this morning and noticed this time that this was a message in particular to the brethren of the Priesthood, to fathers and husbands in a setting perhaps like our Priesthood session of general conference.  Alma began addressing “my beloved brethren” and at the end of the chapter he referred to “your women and children,” and so I believe the counsel is in particular for those of us trying to preside in righteousness over our homes. The phrase that stuck out was in that last verse: “May the peace of God rest upon you, and upon your houses and lands, and upon your flocks and herds, and all that you possess, your women and your children, according to your faith and good works” (Alma 7:1,27).  In other words, to have the “peace of God” in our homes, it is I who needs to have more “faith and good works.”  As opposed to focusing primarily on fixing my children’s behaviors, Alma invites me to first look at my faith and works to instill peace in our home. 

                Alma gave important invitations to us for how to focus on improving our own faith and works in this powerful address to promote peace in our homes.  He invited us first to repent, “Repent ye, and prepare the way of the Lord, and walk in his paths, which are straight…. Now I say unto you that ye must repent…. and lay aside every sin, which easily doth beset you, which doth bind you down to destruction, yea, come and go forth, and show unto your God that ye are willing to repent of your sins” (v9,14-15).  To foster peace in our homes we must first focus ourselves on repentance and laying aside the sins that do easily beset us.  And since that is somewhat vague and we may not know where to begin to simply repent, Alma gave us some pretty good suggestions on where to look for improvement opportunities: “And now I would that ye should be humble, and be submissive and gentle; easy to be entreated; full of patience and long-suffering; being temperate in all things; being diligent in keeping the commandments of God at all times; asking for whatsoever things ye stand in need, both spiritual and temporal; always returning thanks unto God for whatsoever things ye do receive” (v23).  To encourage peace we need humility, gentleness, submissiveness, patience, long-suffering, temperance, diligence in keeping the commandments, and perhaps above all, prayer.  Like Paul and Mormon’s list of attributes of charity, this is a list with a lifetime of work for us to master.    Perhaps Alma’s invitation for all of us who struggle to have peace in our homes and relationships is to focus on faith and repentance through improving these Christlike qualities in our own lives.  As we have contention and stressful situations, we should ask ourselves first how we can show more gentleness and patience, more temperance and long-suffering towards those around us.  This is much easier said than done, so gratefully we have a Savior who is “filled with mercy” and who knows how “according to the flesh how to succor his people according to their infirmities” (v12).  We must turn to He who is the Prince of Peace and who knows how to succor us and help us to “have faith, hope, and charity” that we may “always abound in good works” (v24).