Stronger in Their Humility

Elder Joni L. Koch spoke about humility in the most recent general conference. He told a story about how he had a very difficult assignment he was traveling to where there was a challenging problem to solve. As he rode in a taxi to the airport, the taxi driver said to him, “I can see you’re not well today!” Elder Koch related, “I explained to him that I had quite a hard situation to deal with, and he then asked me, ‘Have you done everything in your power to solve this?’ I responded I had done everything I could. He then said something I have never forgotten: ‘So leave this in God’s hands, and everything will work out fine.’ I confess that I was tempted to ask him, ‘Do you know who you’re talking to?’ But I didn’t! What I did was humble myself before the Lord throughout that one-hour flight, asking for divine help. As I left the airplane, I learned that the difficult situation to be solved was already in order and that my presence wouldn’t even be necessary anymore.” He highlighted the fact that we cannot solve all our problems on our own and that we depend on the Lord. He said, “Above all, in developing humility, we must also understand and accept that we are not able to overcome our challenges or to achieve our full potential through our own efforts only…. But through the restored gospel, we’ve learned that we greatly depend on Heavenly Father’s benevolence and the Atonement of our Savior, Jesus Christ.” As we regularly renew our covenants with our Father in Heaven and His Son Jesus Christ, we “invite Their power into our lives to help us through all our problems and ultimately fulfill the measure of our creation.” As we live the gospel of Jesus Christ, we realize that we constantly need the sustaining hand of the Lord in our lives.

                And so, true humility brings us power because it leads us to put our trust in God. One group of righteous Nephites who chose to humble themselves when others were lifted up in pride were described this way: “Nevertheless they did fast and pray oft, and did wax stronger and stronger in their humility, and firmer and firmer in the faith of Christ, unto the filling their souls with joy and consolation” (Helaman 3:35). It seems at first like an oxymoron, but their humility brought them power through their faith in Jesus Christ. Similarly, the Lord told Moroni, “I give unto men weakness that they may be humble; and my grace is sufficient for all men that humble themselves before me; for if they humble themselves before me, and have faith in me, then will I make weak things become strong unto them” (Ether 12:27). True humility leads us to come unto the Lord who will make us strong in overcoming our challenges and our weakness. After the Nephites, through the help of the Lord, defeated the terrible Gadianton robbers they recognized where their power had come from: “And their hearts were swollen with joy, unto the gushing out of many tears, because of the great goodness of God in delivering them out of the hands of their enemies; and they knew it was because of their repentance and their humility that they had been delivered from an everlasting destruction” (3 Nephi 4:33). Their humility and trust in the Lord had given them the power they needed to defeat this formidable foe. Later Nephites would learn that their power was lost when were filled with pride and it was indeed pride that led to their downfall. Instead of relying on our own strength, when we face challenges we must first humbly recognize our dependance upon the Lord and seek His power to help us. Elder Koch summarized his message with this invitation: “May we be humble to follow the counsel of our prophets and accept that only God and Jesus Christ can transform us—through ordinances and covenants received in His Church—into the best version of ourselves in this life and, one day, make us perfect in Christ.” Humility is not weakness; rather it is a principle of power that says with Paul, “I can do all things through Christ which srengtheneth me” (Philippians 4:13).