I got asked--six weeks in advance--to talk in Ward Conference. Just the bishop, the stake president, and moi. No pressure. Here's what I came up with. My topic? Invite All to Come unto Christ.
At the beginning of Oscar Wilde’s short novel
The Picture of Dorian Gray, the young man, Dorian, is presented with a freshly finished portrait of himself. As others in the room exclaim over his beauty, he is struck by it himself. Impulsively, he says, “How sad it is! I shall grow old, and horrible, and dreadful. But this picture will remain always young. It will never be older than this particular day of June . . . If it were only the other way! If it were I who was to be always young, and the picture that was to grow old! For that . . . I would give everything! . . . I would give my soul for that!”
Because it is dangerous to wish in a novel, this is precisely what happens. Dorian’s wish is granted. His face remains always youthful and lovely, and only his portrait ages. The picture becomes a stand-in for Dorian’s soul. As he turns to debauchery and sin, his image in the portrait is degraded little by little until the picture is a record of every cruelty and vice Dorian commits. He hides the portrait in an attic, aware that no one seeing the beauty and innocence of his real face would believe the depths to which his soul has sunk.
I realize that this is an odd image with which to begin a talk entitled, “Invite all to come unto Christ.” I begin this way, because I’d like to propose that our ability to effectively invite others hinges on our own first coming unto Christ, and making this fact apparent in our lives and our faces. When our conversion is evident, when we have “received His image in our countenances,” as it says we must in Alma 5:14, we will draw others to us and they will desire to be like us, and have what we have.
Dorian Gray’s countenance was a lie. His beauty drew people to him, despite the ugliness within him. Beauty may draw people, but it does not hold them. Those we hold up as beautiful in our society are readily scorned in tabloids and newspapers for their dissolute lives. Conversely, many of us have known and loved people whom the world looks on as ordinary or even ugly for the profound beauty of their souls.
This idea of goodness marking our bodies is continued in Isaiah, where the Lord says, “Can a woman forget her sucking child, that she should not have compassion on the son of her womb? Yea, they may forget, yet will I not forget thee. Behold, I have graven thee upon the palms of my hands.” His hands bear the marks of His love for us. Certainly these marks are significant. He could have been resurrected without them. He is scarred to remind us of how much He loves us.
So how do we let our love for Him mark us? How do we let our joy in His love show through in our countenances and in the way we live our lives? Surely if we are to invite others to come unto Him, we must have first come unto Him ourselves.
In a wonderful talk from April Conference in 2006, Elder Jeffrey R. Holland suggested that coming unto Christ consists of three things: desiring to believe, removing any obstacles to belief from our lives (i.e., repenting), and taking upon us Christ’s name, and “in as many ways as possible” trying to “take upon us His identity.” I want to address Elder Holland’s third way of coming unto Christ—taking upon us His identity. I believe we take on His identity, let His image physically mark our lives, when we humble ourselves to recognize our need for Him, and then study and try to emulate His attributes. Today I’d like to talk about three of Jesus Christ’s attributes that will, I believe, bring in us Alma’s “mighty change of heart” and etch the features of the Savior on our faces. The three attributes I’d like to address are: His Sacrifice, His Service, and His Mercy.
We often think of Christ’s sacrifice as what happened in the Garden of Gethsemane and on the cross, but it must have began much earlier than that. We know that in the Council in Heaven, Jesus volunteered to be our Savior. He knew what this would mean: that His life on Earth could not be like our lives, full of sins and mistakes and course corrections. From His birth, He would be perfect and sinless, though still subject to the temptations we are subject to. He sacrificed the opportunity to live a life like we lived. We know that as early as twelve years old instead of hanging out with His friends like most kids his age, Jesus was teaching in the temple. He began His ministry at 30, when most young men are marrying and enjoying the comforts of their families. In Matthew 20: 28 we get at the crux of the matter: “. . .the Son of Man came not to be ministered unto, but to minister, and to give his life a ransom for many”—to give His life, not just His death, for us. His sacrifice was total.
After dedicating all His time, all of it, to His “Father’s business,” he did suffer and die for us, to complete His mission here. I can hardly comprehend the love He showed as He took on Himself our sins and sufferings in the Garden, and sealed His ministry on the cross.
There are many things about Christ’s sacrifices that we cannot imitate. Most of us won’t die to save others; most of us are not called to leave our families for a full-time, life-long ministry. But we can do as Christ did in accepting what calls we are given, and doing our best to do as He would do in our callings. Sacrifice is a difficult principle of the gospel. By its nature it’s uncomfortable. It requires us to stretch, sometimes to a breaking point. Yet, no sacrifice we can make can equal Christ’s sacrifice for us. If we accept the burdens we are given and embrace the sacrifices we have to make, we can come to resemble our Savior. As others see us bear our sacrifices willingly, they will be drawn to learn what inspires us to strive on.
A second attribute of Christ that can change us is His service. Jesus seemed completely comfortable with His call of continual service. Even when his circumstances made serving inconvenient, He never hesitated or complained. He healed on the Sabbath—though it was supposed to be a day of rest for Him and others. He welcomed and forgave the woman who washed His feet with her tears, even though she interrupted His dinner with her needs. He calmed the storm for His disciples, even though they woke Him from a much-needed rest. In Matthew 14, we read the most poignant story. Jesus’ friend, John the Baptist, had been beheaded by King Herod. “When Jesus heard of it,” we read, “he departed thence by ship into a desert place apart.” Jesus loved John. He needed time to grieve, to be alone. Yet, “when the people had heard thereof, they followed him on foot out of the cities.” The people loved Him so, that they could not give Him even a few hours alone with His sadness. He did not turn them away. “And Jesus went forth, and saw a great multitude, and was moved with compassion toward them, and he healed their sick.” He went on to preach to them and perform a miracle to feed them all.
When I think about Jesus’ sacrifice and service, I am ashamed of my own weakness. I’m not called to give my whole life—just a few hours a week. I sometimes feel overwhelmed by the service demands life makes on me, and I complain to Bryan. Even under the most challenging of circumstances—circumstances more difficult that I will ever encounter, Jesus never complained. He just served where he saw a need, lovingly and immediately. I believe that if I continually make the effort to change myself, and change my heart to be more like His through my service and sacrifice, this will show in my face--as your sacrifices and service will show on yours. The service we give to others, and the light of Christ engraved on our faces will draw others to Him.
A third attribute of Jesus Christ we can emulate is His mercy. I’ll call it mercy, but love and grace also describe what I mean. Of all beings who have lived on Earth, Jesus, as God incarnate, is the most suited to make judgments. He is sinless. He has perfect knowledge of right and wrong. He lived among mortals who were constantly sinning, which must have frustrated Him sometimes. Yet, we really only have a few examples of His wrath. Merchants desecrating the temple angered Him. And there was a fig tree once that He seemed to have it in for. Other than that, though uniquely qualified to judge, He rarely meted out justice. Time and again, He met sinners like us with mercy, love, and forgiveness. He was more likely to shed tears over the misery He saw than He was to shout or lecture. To the woman taken in adultery, He said nothing condemning. Just, “Go, and sin no more.” To little Zacchaeus, the well-known publican and sinner who climbed a tree to see Jesus, Jesus said, “Zacchaeus, make haste, and come down; for today I must abide at thy house.”
Jesus showed His mercy in whom he associated with. A king on Earth, He might have associated with those of high stature. Instead, he chose fishermen and tax collectors, the blind and the lame, the penitent sinner, and children. The New Testament is full of scriptures that describe Jesus as full of compassion for those around Him. They must have felt, as I do, the wonder expressed in the hymn, “I Stand All Amazed:” “That He should extend His great love unto such as I / Sufficient to own, to redeem, and to justify.” I can’t imagine a greater gift than to be owned, redeemed, and justified by our Savior.
What power for good we might have in the lives of others if we truly come unto Christ and let His love, grace, and mercy shine through our eyes. Jesus told us, “Be ye therefore merciful, as your Father also is merciful.” We can emulate His mercy through letting compassion take the place of judgment in our lives. We can try, as He did, to associate with those who need us most—those with heavy burdens to bear. We can strive to let His pure love color our every interaction with others. When people feel our sincere love for them and for Christ, they will feel His Spirit as we share our testimonies. Conversely, when we lack this love and mercy, people will feel that, as well.
I once had a friend, not a member of our church, who knew many members. She’d been invited to lots church functions, and enjoyed associating with the members she knew. Yet she noticed that the invitations she received didn’t seem to stem from sincere love for her. She observed to me: “Mormons only seem to want to hang out with each other.” I was stung by her words, but as I thought about them, I saw the truth of it. She could tell that the Mormons she knew wanted her to join the church, but they didn’t seem to just want to be with her. She didn’t feel Christ’s love through them.
To invite others—our families and our friends—to come unto Christ, we must first have come unto Him ourselves. He is always inviting us: “Come unto me, all ye that labour and are heavy laden,” he says, “and I will give you rest. Take my yoke upon you, and learn of me: for I am meek and lowly in heart: and ye shall find rest unto your souls.” By taking on His attributes—His sacrifice, His service, and His mercy—we come unto Him and allow Him to mark our countenances and our lives. When our love becomes His love, we draw others to us. Then we can invite them to come unto Him.
