Gifts of the Spirit: Special ones for these Last Days

I’ve come to believe there are certain gifts of the spirit we must
earnestly seek after, and attain, which are imperative to living in the
fullness of times. Just as there is a fulness of light, the forces and
strength of dark are becoming both stronger and more pervasive.
We will yet experience a fullness of darkness.

Elder Neil L. Andersen gave an especially powerful promise at

Education Week a couple of years ago –and some of the words I
heard have stayed with me in a really powerful way. I wanted to
share them with you:

As evil increases in the world, there is a compensatory spiritual power

for the righteous. As the world slides from its spiritual moorings, the
Lord prepares the way for those who seek Him, offering them greater
assurance, greater confirmation, and greater confidence in the
spiritual direction they are traveling. The gift of the Holy Ghost
becomes a brighter light in the emerging twilight.

To understand better, think of these comparisons: If the world were

growing more physically dark, He could give us enhanced night
vision. If loud noises were constantly in our ears, He could give us a
filtering mechanism to block the unwanted sound. My brothers and
sisters, as evil increases in the world, there is a compensatory power,
an additional spiritual endowment, a revelatory gift for the righteous.
The Lord has long anticipated this most important period of human
history. He knows the end from the beginning. The Savior has assured
us in our day, “Be of good cheer, and do not fear, for I the Lord am
with you, and will stand by you.” (End Quote.)

Those are not just empty promises, but real and meaningful. The
Lord is willing to stand by us, and we will know of His presence in our
lives to the extent that we are able to attune ourselves to feel it and
worthy to receive it.

The first of these spiritual gifts we must have – and which the Lord is
most anxious to bestow – is the gift of discernment. James E.
Talmage doesn’t mince any words on the subject:

Oh, that we all had the power of discernment. That is a gift of the
Spirit, to which we are entitled and we will have it as we live for it.
With that gift we shall be free, to a great extent, from the deception
that otherwise might lead us astray. As the Lord gives revelations, so
does Satan, each in his way. As the Lord has revelators upon the
earth, so has Satan, and he is operating upon those men by his
power, and they are receiving revelations, manifestations, that are
just as truly of the devil as was his manifestation to Moses. We need
the power of discernment. We need the inspiration of the Lord, that
we may know the spirits with whom we have to deal, and recognize
those who are speaking and acting under the influence of heaven,
and those who are the emissaries of hell.

Our Lord’s words on this subject are equally plain, and equally
powerful. In John chapter 4, verse 1, He warns, "Behold, believe not
every spirit, but try the spirits whether they are of God: because
many false prophets are gone out into the world." There’s that
wording: false prophets. We hear it a lot. Prophets speak boldly,
powerfully, directly – and they move my heart. I think false prophets
can be powerful and direct -- and they can move my heart, too.
Even when I don’t mean for it to happen. A recent conference talk
entitled Spiritual Whirlwinds (Also by Elder Andersen, incidentally) puts
it this way: More concerning than the prophesied earthquakes and
wars3 are the spiritual whirlwinds that can uproot you from your
spiritual foundations and land your spirit in places you never
imagined possible, sometimes with your barely noticing that you
have been moved.”

In passing, I’d like to reference Christ’s words about the last days. He
speaks of wolves in sheep’s clothing, of tares growing up amongst
the wheat until it chokes it. The Lord has told us that there are both
wheat and tares in our church, and there will be until the very end.
We can learn to distinguish one from the other inasmuch as we take
the matter to the Lord, for, by their fruits ye shall know them.

Closely connected to the gift to discern is the gift to decide. Another gift
which we must seek is the gift of deciding. The creation, the fall,
the atonement – all parts of our earth life experience have, at
their core, one essential gift: the gift to choose. The way these two
are related is really expertly explained by Elder McConkie: “Where the
Saints are concerned -- since they have received the right to the constant
companionship of the Holy Ghost -- the Lord expects them to discern, not
only between the righteous and the wicked, but between false and true
philosophies, educational theories, sciences, political concepts, and
social schemes. Unfortunately, in many instances, even good men
hearken to "the tradition of their fathers" (D. & C. 93:39) and rely on the
learning of the world rather than the revelations of the Lord, so that they
do not enjoy the full play of the spirit of discernment.”

But the gift of discernment is only as useful as our gift to act,

and to speak. Centuries ago, Dante’s inferno recognized Satan’s
power to keep others from being brave enough to act and speak
in favor of God. I’m not sure political correctness was a thing in
the 14th century, but apparently bravery and cowardice knows
no era. His poem has him asking Virgil, our narrator,

“And I – my head oppressed by horror – said:

“Master; what is it that I hear? Who are those people so defeated
by their pain? And he to me: “This miserable way is taken by the
sorry souls of those who lived without disgrace and without praise.
They now commingle with the coward angels, the company of
those who were not rebels nor faithful to their God, but stood
apart.”

Never in the history of the earth have you and I and common men
everywhere had the capacity to speak as far and wide as we do today.
Scott’s oldest sister and her husband wrote a blog post sharing gospel
principles from a perspective unique to their situation. They published it,
feeling exposed, vulnerable, and worried. To take their minds off things,
they went to see a show. While they were gone, it. Went. Viral. and that
next year they had TV appearances, speaking engagements, and further
writing opportunities. They bore their testimony, and it was heard far and
wide. When they came to visit us, we would go out together and they
were inevitably recognized. You could assume it was a perfect happily
ever after to being brave enough to share their gospel truth. A story fit for
the Ensign. But speaking their truth came at a high cost – at one point
they had someone who appeared to be both threatening and possibly
stalking. Voices online harassed, judged, and condemned them both.
They called them and their lives a lie. His sister wept.
Speaking truth today – in almost any and every capacity – will come with
serious backlash. That may be one of the most obvious things said over
this pulpit. But as Neal A Maxwell said, “Joshua didn’t say choose you
next year whom you will serve; he spoke of “this day,” while there is still
daylight and before the darkness becomes more and more normal.”
Elder Maxwell was right: the world is increasing in darkness. If we do not
practice taking a stand now – if we cannot speak our truth in our spheres
today – how will we have the strength to do so when it is even harder?
And if we cannot take a stand, how can we fight on the Lord’s side?

Using our voice in these days is hard – and one of Satan’s favorite tools is
to paralyze us with fear. Fear of getting it wrong, fear of offending others,
fear of ridicule and repercussions – these things feel so real. We see others
around us who take a stand being taunted, and it’s overwhelming. But
this is a place where compensatory powers promised to us – the ones
Elder Andersen was talking about – this is where God is anxious to bestow
special gifts for those who will speak His truths. As long as your heart is
pure, you cannot disappoint Him. And His blessings will flow unto you
without you exerting the slightest effort. They will come to you simply
because you have been pure and brave, and the laws of Heaven dictate
that they must.
I testify that God has sent us here in these times to bring light unto
those in our spheres. We can bring clarity and understanding. We may
make mistakes from time to time – we may have a little zeal but not
perfect understanding, and that’s okay. We have the capacity to learn
to discern, decide, and to speak. I testify that God has greater truths to
reveal than each of us currently know – and that He will reveal further light
to us as we demonstrate a capacity to act according to what we know. I
testify that Christ loves us, and that He died for us. He will truly take things
at our pace – we only need be moving in the right direction.