Welcome to our collection of quotes by Russell M. Nelson. We hope you enjoy pondering them and please share widely.
Wikipedia Summary for Russell M. Nelson
Russell Marion Nelson Sr. (born September 9, 1924) is an American religious leader and retired surgeon who is the 17th and current president of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints (LDS Church). Nelson was a member of the LDS Church's Quorum of the Twelve Apostles for nearly 34 years, and was the quorum president from 2015 to 2018. As church president, Nelson is accepted by the church as a prophet, seer, and revelator.
A native of Salt Lake City, Utah, Nelson attended the University of Utah for his undergraduate and medical school education. He then did his medical residency and earned a Ph.D. at the University of Minnesota, where he was a member of the research team developing the heart-lung machine that in 1951 supported the first ever human open-heart surgery using cardiopulmonary bypass. After further surgical training and a two-year stint in the U.S. Army Medical Corps during the Korean War, Nelson returned to Salt Lake City and accepted a professorship at the University of Utah School of Medicine. He spent the next 29 years working in the field of cardiothoracic surgery. Nelson became a noted heart surgeon and served as president of the Society for Vascular Surgery and the Utah Medical Association.
Nelson served in a variety of lay LDS leadership positions during his surgical career, beginning locally in Salt Lake City and then as the LDS Church's Sunday School General President from 1971 to 1979. In 1984, Nelson and the American jurist Dallin H. Oaks were selected to fill two vacancies in the LDS Church's Quorum of the Twelve Apostles. LDS apostles serve full-time for life, and so Nelson retired from all of his prior professional positions.
The Savior's way of life is good.
Religious liberty is essential if we are to raise up righteous children. Morally responsible families will not marginalize religious liberty, they will nurture and protect it.
Make the Sabbath a delight by rendering service to others.
We were born to die and we die to live. As seedlings of God, we barely blossom on earth we fully flower in heaven.
We teach that God's love for His children is infinite.
Heavenly Father loves every one of His children. After all, He is their Father.
When I think of the love I feel for each member of our family, I sense, to a slight degree, the love that our Heavenly Father bears for His children.
Through the ages, many of His children have had access to the blessings of the gospel, but many more have not.
Faith is the antidote for fear.
When we ponder His voluntary atonement, any sense of sacrifice on our part becomes completely overshadowed by a profound sense of gratitude for the privilege of serving Him.
Our busy lives force us to focus on things we do from day to day. But the development of character comes only as we focus on who we really are.
You can change. You can 'come unto Christ, and be perfected in him.'
Obedience allows God's blessings to flow without constraint. He will bless His obedient children with freedom from bondage and misery. And He will bless them with more light.
Longer Version:
Obedience allows God's blessings to flow without constraint. He will bless His obedient children with freedom from bondage and misery. And He will bless them with more light. For example, one keeps the Word of Wisdom knowing that obedience will not only bring freedom from addiction, but it will also add blessings of wisdom and treasures of knowledge.
Counting blessings is better than recounting problems.
Fasting gives you confidence to know that your spirit can master appetite ... and helps to protect against later uncontrolled cravings and gnawing habits.
When we love somebody, we show it by doing something nice. So learn to serve: find a need and fulfill a need. Surprise people with a good deed they hadn't planned on. We have that opportunity at home, at school, and at church.
Each marriage starts with two built-in handicaps. It involves two imperfect people.
We need more missionaries -- more worthy missionaries.
Rationalization is one of the real obstacles to obedience.
Could an explosion in a printing shop produce a dictionary?
Jesus suffered deeply because He loves us deeply! He wants us to repent and be converted so that He can fully heal us.
I thank God and His Son, Jesus Christ, for the Restoration and its power to propel a magnificent wave of truth and righteousness across the earth.
Make the Sabbath a delight by rendering service to others.
Longer Version:
Make the Sabbath a delight by rendering service to others, especially those who are not feeling well or those who are lonely or in need. Lifting their spirits will lift yours as well.
An unprecedented wave of enthusiasm for missionary work is sweeping the entire earth. It is not man-made! It comes from the Lord, who said, I will hasten my work in its time (DandC 88:73).
With celestial sight, trials impossible to change become possible to endure.
While we are free to choose, once we have made those choices, we are tied to the consequences of those choices.
Wickedness never was happiness. Many have tried to challenge that truth and have failed every time!
When we realize that we are children of the covenant, we know who we are and what God expects of us.
You can experience true delight on the Sabbath from family history work...Finding family members...can bring immense joy.
Your choices will not all be between good and evil. Many will be choices between two good options. Not all truths are created equal, so you will need to establish priorities.
Don't be afraid to pursue your goals--even your dreams! But know that there is no shortcut to excellence and competence. Education is the difference between wishing you could help other people and being able to help them.
There is mounting concern worldwide over the consumption of alcohol. The U.S. government estimates that 10.6 million adults are alcoholics and that one family in four is troubled by alcohol. It is a factor in half of all the nation's traffic deaths.
The highest and noblest work in this life is that of a mother.
Who are we? We are children of God. Our potential is unlimited. Our inheritance is sacred. May we always honor that heritage -- in every thought and deed.
To those who feel defeated and downtrodden, look to the early hours of the day for your rescue...Shadows of yesterday's grief melt in the rays of early morn's opportunity.
When our hearts turn to our ancestors, something changes inside us. We feel part of something greater than ourselves. Our inborn yearnings for family connections are fulfilled when we are linked to our ancestors.
Faith in God engenders a love for the Sabbath; faith in the Sabbath engenders a love for God. A sacred Sabbath truly is a delight.
Focusing on the Lord and everlasting life can help us not only at Christmas, but through all the challenges of mortality.
No other work transcends that of righteous, intentional parenting.
You young men need to know that you can hardly achieve your highest potential without the influence of a good women, particularly you mother, and in a few years, a good wife.
Recently I was tenderly hugging one of our precious little five-year-old granddaughters and said to her, I love you, sweetheart. She responded rather blandly: I know. I asked, How do you know that I love you? Because! You're my grandfather!
There is no conflict between science and religion. Conflict only arises from an incomplete knowledge of either science or religion, or both.
The Lord can only teach an inquiring mind.
Living life in separate compartments can lead to internal conflict and exhausting tension.
Each holy temple stands as a symbol of our membership in the Church, as a sign of our faith in life after death, and as a sacred step toward eternal glory for us and our families.
As loud voices argue on, let us remember that those who advocate abortion have already been born!
The Savior's way of life is good.
Truth, covenants, and ordinances enable us to overcome fear and face the future with faith.
Feelings of worth come when a woman follows the example of the Master. Her sense of infinite worth comes from her own Christlike yearning to reach out with love, as He does.
Physical conditioning from regular exercise is important. And we can do so much more to keep our bodies strong.
A strong human spirit with control over appetites of the flesh is master over emotions and passions and not a slave to them. That kind of freedom is as vital to the spirit as oxygen is to the body! Freedom from self-slavery is true liberation!
The temple endowment was given by revelation. Thus, it is best understood by revelation, prayerfully sought with a sincere heart.
Throughout the world, the family is increasingly under attack. If families fail, many of our political, economic, and social systems will also fail.
As you teach more, you will learn more. This is the Lord's way of helping you to comprehend His gospel.
When priorities are in place, one can more patiently tolerate unfinished business.
Keep studying the scriptures, keep doing the things that build your faith in Jesus Christ and then notice the wise choices you are naturally drawn to make.
From the holy scriptures, heaven-sent lift will be found for heaven-sent duties.
I urge you to choose companions well and cherish those friends who lift you and make you better in their presence. And be such friends to one another.
The second of our Lord's two great commandments carries a double charge: 'Thou shalt love thy neighbour as thyself' (Matt. 22:39). Therefore, love of companion is governed, in part, by esteem of self.
When priorities are proper, the power to endure is increased. And when internalized, those priorities will help keep you from going overboard.
The temple is the house of the Lord. The basis for every temple ordinance and covenant…is the Atonement of Jesus Christ. Every activity, every lesson, all we do in the Church, point to the Lord and His holy house.
We as servants of the Lord are advocates of joy. We know that men are that they might have joy. In contrast, the way of the adversary always leads to misery, despair, and destruction.
A pivotal spiritual attribute is that of self-mastery-th e strength to place reason over appetite. Self-mastery builds a strong conscience. And your conscience determines your moral responses in difficult, tempting, and trying situations.
Longer Version:
The temptation to be popular may prioritize public opinion above the word of God. Political campaigns and marketing strategies widely employ public opinion polls to shape their plans. Results of those polls are informative. But they could hardly be used as grounds to justify disobedience to God's commandments! Even if "everyone is doing it," wrong is never right. Evil, error, and darkness will never be truth, even if popular. A scriptural warning so declares: "Woe unto them that call evil good, and good evil; that put darkness for light, and light for darkness." After World War I, a rather risqué song became popular. In promoting immorality, it vowed that 50 million people cannot be wrong. But in fact, 50 million people can be wrong--totally wrong. Immorality is still immorality in the eyes of God, who one day will judge all of our deeds and desires.
Men are that they might have joy ... not guilt trips.
It matters not that giants of tribulation torment you. Your prayerful access to help is just as real as when David battled his Goliath. see 1 Samuel 17.
The full flower of divine love and our greatest blessings from that love are conditional-predicated upon our obedience to eternal law. I pray that we may qualify for those blessings and rejoice forever.
How you deal with life's trials is part of the development of your faith. Strength comes when you remember that you have a divine nature, an inheritance of infinite worth.
The only duration of family life that satisfies the loftiest longings of the human soul is forever.
While the family is under attack throughout the world, The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints proclaims, promotes, and protects the truth that the family is central to the Creator's plan for the eternal destiny of His children.
Marriage is sanctified when it is cherished and honored in holiness. That union is not merely between husband and wife; it embraces a partnership with God.
Differences of opinion may occur between husband and wife. But one's objective in marriage is never to win an argument, but to build an eternal relationship of love.
Each day is a day of decision, and our decisions determine our destiny.
Be patient with yourself. Perfection comes not in this life, but in the next life. Don't demand things that are unreasonable, but demand of yourself improvement. As you let the Lord help you through that, He will make the difference.
Inner peace comes only as we maintain the integrity of truth in all aspects of our lives.
Sweet serenity is found in fervent prayer. Then, we forget ourselves and remember the reaching hands of the Savior, who said, Come unto me, all ye that are heavy laden, and I will give you rest. As our burdens are shared with Him, they do become lighter.
It really matters what you listen to... Select music that will strengthen your spirit.
Missionaries serve to make life better for God's children.
Whether full-time missionaries or members, we should all be good examples of the believers in Jesus Christ.