For Every Race, Language, and People

I especially loved the Sunday morning session of general conference which featured nine speakers from nine different countries. President Oaks introduced it this way: “President Nelson expressed a great desire to have speakers from throughout the world preach the gospel of Jesus Christ on Easter morning.” As the Deseret News summarized the session, “In all, talks, prayers and music provided for the session came from a total of 13 countries — Australia, Brazil, Fiji, Hong Kong (China), Mexico, New Zealand, Nicaragua, Philippines, Portugal, South Korea, the United States, Venezuela and Zimbabwe.” This included people from all populated continents. Clearly one of President Nelson’s focuses as the prophet has been to emphasize the universality of the gospel to all of God’s children across the globe, and certainly that is at the heart of the Easter message: Because of the resurrection of Jesus Christ, all of God’s children will rise again. President Nelson remarked, “Truly the blessings of the gospel are for every race, language and people. The Church of Jesus Christ is a global church.” Another unique feature of the session was the addition of recorded music and video from various locations around the world, thus including not just leaders of the Church as participants in the session but also children, women, and men across the globe who offered their testimonies through music. The session was a powerful reminder of Nephi’s declaration: “He inviteth them all to come unto him and partake of his goodness; and he denieth none that come unto him, black and white, bond and free, male and female; and he remembereth the heathen; and all are alike unto God, both Jew and Gentile” (2 Nephi 26:33).

                President Nelson also declared in that session, “The atoning sacrifice and resurrection of Jesus Christ changed each of our lives forever. Each of God’s children deserves the opportunity to hear and accept the healing, redeeming message of Jesus Christ. No other message is more vital to our happiness — now and forever. No other message is more filled with hope. No other message can eliminate contention in our society.” His invitation for each of us was to increase our faith in the Savior which will bless us no matter what corner of the globe we are from or what our challenges are. Faith is a universal requirement of the gospel no matter who we are. The Lord declared, “Behold, verily, verily, I say unto you, this is my gospel; and remember that they shall have faith in me or they can in nowise be saved” (Doctrine and Covenants 33:12). There is no salvation for any of us without faith in Jesus Christ. Jacob similarly declared, “And he commandeth all men that they must repent, and be baptized in his name, having perfect faith in the Holy One of Israel, or they cannot be saved in the kingdom of God” (2 Nephi 9:23). Our faith does not need to be “perfect” but ultimately we must continue to increase it until some day it is. In the New Testament after the Savior had taught the difficult doctrine of forgiveness we read, “And the apostles said unto the Lord, Increase our faith” (Luke 17:5). That is the prayer that President Nelson has invited us to have for the next six months, to ask the Father to increase our faith in His Son. And the promise of the gospel is that no matter who we are or where we are from, more faith in Jesus Christ will help us all to overcome our individual challenges and “turn [them] into unparalleled growth and opportunity.”