"'Be Still, and Know That I Am God'"

Last updated on June 2nd, 2024 at 07:22 am

General Conference Applied

S3 E6 – Sunday, May 26, 2024 | “‘Be Still, and Know That I Am God’” by Elder David A. Bednar; April 2024 General Conference

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Introduction

Doctrine: Atonement of Jesus Christ: “Jesus Christ was the only one capable of making a perfect Atonement.”

Principle: The Sabbath Day: “President Spencer W. Kimball cautioned, however, that if we merely lounge about doing nothing on the Sabbath, we are not keeping the day holy. The Sabbath calls for constructive thoughts and acts. (See Teachings of Presidents of the Church: Spencer W. Kimball [2006], 170.) …

“We should consider righteous things we can do on the Sabbath. For example, we can keep the Sabbath day holy by attending Church meetings; reading the scriptures and the words of our Church leaders; visiting the sick, the aged, and our loved ones; listening to uplifting music and singing hymns; praying to our Heavenly Father with praise and thanksgiving; performing Church service; preparing family history records and personal histories; telling faith-promoting stories and bearing our testimony to family members and sharing spiritual experiences with them; writing letters to missionaries and loved ones; fasting with a purpose; and sharing time with children and others in the home.

“In deciding what other activities we could properly engage in on the Sabbath, we could ask ourselves: Will it uplift and inspire me? Does it show respect for the Lord? Does it direct my thoughts to Him?”

Christlike Attribute: Virtue: “Virtue originates in your thoughts and desires. ‘Let virtue garnish thy thoughts unceasingly,’ the Lord said (Doctrine and Covenants 121:45). Focus on righteous, uplifting thoughts. Put unworthy thoughts out of your mind rather than dwell on them.”

What is the speaker inviting me to do, and how might I consider taking action?

Invitations

1: “Jesus Christ is our Redeemer, our Mediator, and our Advocate with the Eternal Father and the rock upon which we should build the spiritual foundation of our lives.”

“Helaman explained, ‘Remember, remember that it is upon the rock of our Redeemer, who is Christ, the Son of God, that ye must build your foundation; that when the devil shall send forth his mighty winds, yea, his shafts in the whirlwind, yea, when all his hail and his mighty storm shall beat upon you, it shall have no power over you to drag you down to the gulf of misery and endless wo, because of the rock upon which ye are built, which is a sure foundation, a foundation whereon if men build they cannot fall.’

“The symbolism of Christ as the ‘rock’ upon whom we should build the foundation of our lives is most instructive. Please note in this verse that the Savior is not the foundation. Rather, we are admonished to build our personal spiritual foundation upon Him.

“The foundation is the part of a building that connects it to the ground. A strong foundation provides protection from natural disasters and many other destructive forces. A proper foundation also distributes the weight of a structure over a large area to avoid overloading the underlying soil and provides a level surface for construction.

“A strong and reliable connection between the ground and a foundation is essential if a structure is to remain sturdy and stable over time. And for particular types of construction, anchor pins and steel rods can be used to attach the foundation of a building to ‘bedrock,’ the hard, solid rock beneath surface materials such as soil and gravel.

“In a similar way, the foundation of our lives must be connected to the rock of Christ if we are to remain firm and steadfast. The sacred covenants and ordinances of the Savior’s restored gospel can be compared to the anchor pins and steel rods used to connect a building to bedrock. Every time we faithfully receive, review, remember, and renew sacred covenants, our spiritual anchors are secured ever more firmly and steadfastly to the ‘rock’ of Jesus Christ. …

“As the foundation of our lives is built upon the Savior, we are blessed to ‘be still’—to have a spiritual assurance that God is our Heavenly Father, we are His children, and Jesus Christ is our Savior.” -Elder Bednar
Footnote 10: “Ephesians 2:19–20 indicates that the ‘household of God’ (the Church of Jesus Christ) is ‘built upon the foundation of the apostles and prophets, Jesus Christ himself being the chief corner stone.’ Thus, in the analogy used in Ephesians, Jesus Christ is the central component in the foundation upon which His Church is built.

“In contrast, Helaman 5:12 indicates that ‘it is upon the rock of our Redeemer, who is Christ, the Son of God, that ye must build your foundation’ (emphasis added). Thus, the foundation upon which we should build our lives is the ‘rock of our Redeemer,’ ‘a sure foundation, a foundation whereon if men build they cannot fall.’ Thus, in the analogy used in Helaman, Jesus Christ is the ‘bedrock’ upon which we should build our individual lives.” -Elder Bednar
“More Than a Hero“, October 2023 General Conference, Bishop W. Christopher Waddell (see General Conference Applied season 2 episode 19): “Although we admire and respect many talented and remarkable men and women for their abilities and contributions, the degree to which they are revered, if taken to an excess, can be the equivalent of the children of Israel worshipping a golden calf in the desert of Sinai.

“As adults, what was once innocent childhood fun can become a stumbling block when ‘hero worship’ of politicians, bloggers, influencers, athletes, or musicians causes us to look ‘beyond the mark’ (Jacob 4:14) and lose sight of what is truly essential.

“For the children of Israel, the challenge was not the gold that they brought with them on their journey to the promised land but rather what they allowed the gold to become: an idol, which then became the object of their worship, turning their attention away from Jehovah, who had parted the Red Sea and delivered them from bondage. Their focus on the calf impacted their ability to worship the true God.

“The hero—our hero, now and always—is Jesus Christ, and anything or anyone that distracts us from His teachings, as found in the scriptures and through the words of living prophets, can negatively impact our progress on the covenant path.”

2: “Every Sunday, if we will, we can be still and know that God is our Heavenly Father, we are His children, and Jesus Christ is our Savior.”

How does my Sabbath day observance need to change so that I can better know that God is our Heavenly Father, we are His children, and Jesus Christ is our Savior?
Two definitions of what Elder Bednar means by ‘stillness’:
- 1) “An inner spiritual stillness of the soul that enables us to know and remember that God is our Heavenly Father, we are His children, and Jesus Christ is our Savior.”
  - Why say both “God is our Heavenly Father” and “we are His children”? Doesn’t the fact that God is our Father imply that we are His children? Yes. But I believe that Elder Bednar is emphasizing the importance of loving our neighbor and recognizing that he or she is a child of God as well, even if they look different from me, speak different from me, or think different from me.
  - All In: An LDS Living Podcast, “Thomas Wirthlin McConkie: How Meditation and Being Still Help Us Know God“, August 7, 2019, Episode 41: “As I’ve kind of deepened in the practice over time, I’m really comfortable with the definition of meditation as remembrance. And that feels very much like a gospel principle to me. Like when we remember, what are we remembering?
    
    “Well, let me just riff a little bit. We remember that we are sons and daughters, that we’re children of a living God. And when we remember that, the quality of our whole life in this very moment changes.
    
    “And as Latter-day Saints, we all know how to do that. We remember that a lot. We remember that, oh yeah, we are coheirs of God’s kingdom, and we are the intelligence, the very stuff out of which gods and goddesses are made.
    
    “When we remember these things, it completely transforms our sense of what’s possible. Meditation, we could say, is a tradition of different skillful means or techniques for helping us remember more often, more reliably. That’s it. …
    
    “If our business is restoring the fullness of the gospel, then any truth will need to be eventually gathered up but also embodied and expressed through the saints. So, you know, when we talk about meditation this way, like meditation means living prayerfully and constantly remembering who we are, the power of divinity that flows through us, that is a much more native proposition to our church than like, oh, this guy, he goes to monasteries, I think he’s Buddhist, and I’m not into that. You know, it’s not about another culture. It’s about claiming our birthright.”
  - 2) “I believe the Lord’s admonition to ‘be still’ entails much more than simply not talking or not moving. Perhaps His intent is for us to remember and rely upon Him and His power ‘at all times and in all things, and in all places that [we] may be in.’ Thus, ‘be still’ may be a way of reminding us to focus upon the Savior unfailingly as the ultimate source of the spiritual stillness of the soul that strengthens us to do and overcome hard things.”
    - Doctrine and Covenants 101:16 – “Therefore, let your hearts be comforted concerning Zion; for all flesh is in mine hands; be still and know that I am God.”
    - Y Religion Podcast, “An Interfaith Approach to Keeping the Sabbath Day Holy (Andrew Reed)“, May 1, 2024, S5 E103 (listen on Apple Podcasts): [Jared Halverson] “What is lost when we completely abdicate sacred time and just turn our Sundays, turn our Sabbaths into holidays instead of holy days, just a long weekend kind of a thing. In your study and thought, what are we losing when we lose that sense of the sacred?”
      
      [Andrew Reed] “I think that sense of loss is real. If we were to abandon the emphasis or the allocation of sacred time in our world, in the things we’re doing every week, I think we lose a sense of meaning.
      
      “As religious beings, many of us connect what we’re doing in the secular world at our job, with our families. We connect it to a deeper sense of purpose with a meaning behind our action. And for me, and I think for many people in the world, Sabbath is a chance to recalibrate or refocus.
      
      “There’s a need to reposition ourselves in relationship to the holy. And the Sabbath allows us to do that. It’s very, very easy in the modern world to just sort of perpetuate our activity in ways that doesn’t create a space for pause or create a space to reflect.
      
      “We can be inundated with activity, with technology, and it can absorb our time and in the process it absorbs our energy. And one of the things I like about the way that my friends in Judaism and other Christian traditions are thinking about Sabbath is it really is a moment of pause and reflection. And so you have to carve out time to do that.
      
      “And if we don’t allow that time, then we lose our sense of meaning, at least in the way that I understand what we’re doing in our lives as human beings.”
“24/6: Giving up Screens One Day a Week to Get More Time, Creativity, and Connection” by Tiffany Shlain: “My husband, Ken, and I started a practice of turning off all screens and unplugging from digital life for a full day, every week, for what we call our ‘Technology Shabbat.’ Going offline one day a week for nearly a decade with our daughters has felt like an epiphany on how to fill the day with the best parts of life, and a radical act of protection against the always-on, always-available world.

“Even though I’m Jewish and a mother, I’m not here to make you feel guilty (or become Jewish). I just want to share a practice that has improved my life in every way: a twenty-first-century interpretation of the ancient Jewish ritual of a weekly day of rest. It can work for anyone, from any background or belief, whether single, with a partner, or with kids. As concerns about the effects of excessive tech use on our individual well-being, our relationships, and our democracy come to a head, it’s never felt more urgent to share this idea…

“Living 24/6 actually makes rest the technology – the tool – that balances the encroachment of other technologies. By setting off a day of rest and reflection without screens, we can understand ourselves without the distractions of … everything. If we are online all the time and available to everyone with no time for quality rest, deep thinking, or real-world connecting, we aren’t operating at our most efficient level. Unplugging becomes a tool that returns the power to you. It’s good for your health, for your thoughts, for far-reaching ideas…

“Taking time away from technology is a tool that lets us use technology sanely. Living 24/6 does not require you to go completely off-grid, because the grid can be pretty great. Instead, it offers a way to go off once a week, and use that time to be, reflect, connect, and rethink how you want to dial up the good, dial down the bad, and create an equilibrium that lets you have the best of both worlds: the joy of tech and the joy of unplugging. Each week you get to recalibrate.”
“Teachings of Presidents of the Church: Spencer W. Kimball“: “The Sabbath is a holy day in which to do worthy and holy things. Abstinence from work and recreation is important, but insufficient. The Sabbath calls for constructive thoughts and acts, and if one merely lounges about doing nothing on the Sabbath, he is breaking it. To observe it, one will be on his knees in prayer, preparing lessons, studying the gospel, meditating, visiting the ill and distressed, writing letters to missionaries, taking a nap, reading wholesome material, and attending all the meetings of that day at which he is expected.”

3: “If we will, we can ‘be still’ in our holy places of worship and know ever more surely that God is our Heavenly Father, we are His children, and Jesus Christ is our Savior.”

How does my weekly Church attendance need to change so that I can better know that God is our Heavenly Father, we are His children, and Jesus Christ is our Savior?
“At One Ment: Embodying the Fullness of Human-Divinity” by Thomas Wirthlin McConkie: Idea: Allow for moments of stillness in Sacrament Meeting, Sunday School, Elders Quorum, and Relief Society.
- All In: An LDS Living Podcast, “Ty Mansfield and Jacob Hess: Living a Mindful Latter-day Saint Life“, August 14, 2019, Episode 42: [Ty Mansfield] “There’s one statement from President McKay that I’ve loved and that I come back to often. He said:
  
  “‘We pay too little attention to the value of meditation, a principle of devotion. In our worship there are two elements: One is spiritual communion arising from our own meditation; the other, instruction from others, particularly from those who have authority to guide and instruct us. Of the two, the more profitable introspectively is the meditation. Meditation is the language of the soul.’ [Teachings of Presidents of the Church: David O. McKay; Chapter 4]
  
  “And so when we think about how much, if these are two ways, right, two ways that we learn, how much time do we spend in classes and lessons and listening to talks and these sorts of things and in contrast to how much time we spend in silence.”
How can I ‘be still’ at Church if I have kids?
- All In: An LDS Living Podcast, “Thomas Wirthlin McConkie: How Meditation and Being Still Help Us Know God“, August 7, 2019, Episode 41: “One thing I’ll say about the relationship you’re drawing, that meditation is a part of life and in the church and the life of a Latter-day Saint, whether that’s sacrament meeting or temple worship, etc. What that brings up for me is just a recognition that when we read in the scriptures that we can be still and know that God is God. He doesn’t say, be still once in a while and know that I’m God, he says, be still. I take that to mean be still always.
  
  “And here’s a little bit of a distinction here. We could think of be still like, oh man, be still, now I need to figure out, I’m already super busy. How am I going to find 30 minutes every day to be totally still because I have so much stuff to do? Yes, when we say a prayer or if we sit in stillness, it does help to carve out a little space.
  
  “But to me, the point isn’t to sit as still as we can for as many hours as we can every day. It’s to touch into the stillness, be still and know that I’m God.
  
  “And when we touch deeply into that stillness, the presence of that stillness naturally starts to permeate our entire life. So that in this moment, there’s stillness, and it could be total cacophony and madness. And we feel a deep stillness at the very core of our being. We know God is present and His love is in and through all of us. And He watches over us and cares for us. That’s the next level, I think. Yeah, it starts with formal practices of prayer and sacrament meeting and temple, but to actually generalize that to every moment of our life, to me, that is what Zion looks like.
  
  “I mean, can you imagine 7 billion humans on the planet that are living in full awareness that we are created by and through the power and light of Christ? It would completely transform our economy and our politics and our education and the way someone lets you in to make a left turn when it’s rush hour. Everything would change.”
Lili Anderson: The Sacrament and the presentation of the endowment are meditation exercises. Avoid extremes in dress and appearance (be modest!) and even avoid chewing gum. Go out of our way to not distract others from connecting with Heavenly Father and Jesus Christ.

4: “In His holy house, if we will, we can be still and know that God is our Heavenly Father, we are His children, and Jesus Christ is our Savior.”

How does my temple attendance need to change so that I can better know that God is our Heavenly Father, we are His children, and Jesus Christ is our Savior?
All In: An LDS Living Podcast, “Ty Mansfield and Jacob Hess: Living a Mindful Latter-day Saint Life“, August 14, 2019, Episode 42: [Ty Mansfield] “President Hinckley once made a comment, where he said, ‘I daresay that most of those in this room today have not taken an hour in the last year to just sit down quietly, each man to himself as a son of God, reflecting upon his place in this world. I recall so vividly president McKay in his old age in a meeting with his counselors in the Twelve, saying, ‘Brethren, we need to take more time to meditate.””
“During a recent open house and media day for a new house of the Lord, I led a group of journalists on a tour through the sacred structure. I described the purposes of temples in The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints and responded to their many excellent questions.

“Before entering the celestial room, I explained that this particular room in the house of the Lord symbolically represents the peace and beauty of the heavenly home to which we can return after this life. I indicated to our guests that we would not speak while in the celestial room, but I would be happy to answer any questions after we moved to the next stop on the tour.

“After exiting the celestial room and as we gathered at the next location, I asked our guests if they had any observations they wanted to share. One of the journalists said with great emotion, ‘I have never experienced anything like that in my entire life. I did not know quiet like that existed in the world; I simply did not believe such stillness was possible.’

“I was struck by both the sincerity and the starkness of this person’s statement. And the journalist’s reaction highlighted one important aspect of stillness—overcoming and tuning out the commotion of our external environment.

“As I later pondered the journalist’s comment and reflected on the often hectic pace of our modern lives—the busyness, noise, diversions, distractions, and detours that so often seem to demand our attention—a scripture came to my mind: ‘Be still, and know that I am God.'” -Elder Bednar
All In: An LDS Living Podcast, “Ty Mansfield and Jacob Hess: Living a Mindful Latter-day Saint Life“, August 14, 2019, Episode 42: [Jacob Hess] “What does the gospel look like with a little more space, stillness, silence? And for me, I can tell you, I have found a greater depth and richness and joy in all of it. The temple becoming a place of retreat and sanctuary, where I go not to just do a session or do a name, but to not do all the stuff that I’m busy with in my life, to really practice what the Buddhists sometimes call non-doing. That’s our place. This is our Latter-day Saint Meditation Center, right?”

5: “Today I repeat a principle I previously have emphasized. Our homes should be the ultimate combination of both sacred time and holy place wherein individuals and families can ‘be still’ and know that God is our Heavenly Father, we are His children, and Jesus Christ is our Savior. Leaving our homes to worship on the Sabbath and in the house of the Lord certainly is essential. But only as we return to our homes with the spiritual perspective and strength obtained in those holy places and activities can we then sustain our focus upon the primary purposes of mortal life and overcome the temptations so prevalent in our fallen world.”

How does what’s happening in my home need to change so that I can better know that God is our Heavenly Father, we are His children, and Jesus Christ is our Savior?
“Teachings of Presidents of the Church: Spencer W. Kimball“: “We hope . . . that either before or after your series of Sunday meetings, depending upon your particular . . . meeting schedule, you will do what the Savior asked the Nephite disciples to do: After he taught them, he asked them to go to their homes and to ponder and to pray over what was said (see 3 Nephi 17:3). Let us keep that pattern in mind.”
“Deep and Lasting Conversion to Heavenly Father and the Lord Jesus Christ“, October 2018 General Conference, Elder Quentin L. Cook: “The Church’s traditional curriculum has emphasized the Sunday Church experience. We know that when we have better teaching and more spiritually prepared class members, we have a better Sunday Church experience. We are blessed that often the Spirit increases and strengthens conversion in the Church setting.

“The new home-centered and Church-supported curriculum needs to influence more powerfully family religious observance and behavior and personal religious observance and behavior. We know the spiritual impact and the deep and lasting conversion that can be achieved in the home setting. Years ago, a study established that for young men and women the influence of the Holy Ghost most often accompanies individual scripture study and prayer in the home. Our purpose is to balance the Church and the home experiences in a way that will greatly increase faith and spirituality and deepen conversion to Heavenly Father and the Lord Jesus Christ. …

“What do these adjustments mean for members of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints? We are confident that members will be blessed in extraordinary ways. Sunday can be a day of gospel learning and teaching at church and in the home. As individuals and families engage in family councils, family history, ministering, service, personal worship, and joyful family time, the Sabbath day will truly be a delight.”
“Atomic Habits: An Easy & Proven Way to Build Good Habits & Break Bad Ones” by James Clear: “Imagine you are holding a garden hose that is bent in the middle. Some water can flow through, but not very much. If you want to increase the rate at which water passes through the hose, you have two options. The first option is to crank up the valve and force more water out. The second option is to simply remove the bend in the hose and let water flow through naturally.

“Trying to pump up your motivation to stick with a hard habit is like trying to force water through a bent hose. You can do it, but it requires a lot of effort and increases the tension in your life. Meanwhile, making your habits simple and easy is like removing the bend in the hose. Rather than trying to overcome the friction in your life, you reduce it.

“One of the most effective ways to reduce the friction associated with your habits is to practice environment design. …

“The central idea is to create an environment where doing the right thing is as easy as possible. Much of the battle of building better habits comes down to finding ways to reduce the friction associated with our good habits and increase the friction associated with our bad ones.

“Imagine the cumulative impact of making dozens of these changes and living in an environment designed to make the good behaviors easier and the bad behaviors harder.

“Whether we are approaching behavior change as an individual, a parent, a coach, or a leader, we should ask ourselves the same question: ‘How can we design a world where it’s easy to do what’s right?’ Redesign your life so the actions that matter most are also the actions that are easiest to do.”
All In: An LDS Living Podcast, “Ty Mansfield and Jacob Hess: Living a Mindful Latter-day Saint Life“, August 14, 2019, Episode 42: [Jacob Hess] “I even start prayer with a few minutes of just breathing and feeling the body and noticing what’s on my heart so that I’m not just blurting off. And I noticed that what I end up saying is very different if I give a little bit of space on the front end. I say something different because I’m noticing something different to start. I’m noticing what’s really on my heart rather than just going into what I think I’m supposed to say. I’m saying what feels right to say.

“So prayer is a fascinating practice. I actually think it’s the greatest mindfulness practice there is because rather than just sitting in silence with yourself, you are communing with God. And my prayers have become more quiet. I have more pauses.

“I pause. I like to have silence at the beginning, at the end, and even times are just sitting and searching and trying to, it’s not always easy for me to know what I’m feeling. And so if I give a little time to that, it really changes the experience.

“And I find a lot of my prayer becomes trying to find what I’m feeling. And then trying to discern what God really wants. And then noticing the discrepancy between where my heart is and where it seems like God wants me to be. And then the conversation really gets interesting.”

Take Action

How will you take action on the invitations extended in this General Conference address?

Additional Content

Previous Podcast Episode (“A Higher Joy” by Elder Dieter F. Uchtdorf)

Next Podcast Episode (“Be One With Christ” by Elder Quentin L. Cook)

All Podcast Episodes

“‘Be Still, and Know That I Am God'”