“It is the Privilege of the Children of God to…get Revelation”
I received permission from Michael R. Conder to share the following experience. He gave this as a sacrament meeting talk last September. Michael, his wife, and four children live in Colorado. He is a system engineer.
Joseph Smith has said, “It is the privilege of the children of God to come to God and get revelation.”
Feasting on Intellectual Mammon Vs Feasting on the Words of Christ
Regarding revealed Knowledge the Lord said:
As well might man stretch forth his puny arm to stop the Missouri river in its decreed course, or to turn it up stream, as to hinder the Almighty from pouring down knowledge from heaven upon the heads of the Latter-day Saints( D&C 121:33).
That’s powerful. However, not all revealed knowledge is of equal value. Some knowledge is more valuable because it is knowledge that "saves". The Book of Mormon contains knowledge that when properly applied opens up the heavens and allows us to be recipients of the things of the Spirit.
For What Doth It Profit A Man If A Gift Is Bestowed Upon Him, And He Receive Not The Gift?
Our Heavenly Father has revealed that it is His work and glory to bring to pass the immortality and eternal life of man (Moses 1:39). In other words, to make it possible for each of us to become as He is-a God. The promise continues-He will give us all that He hath (D&C 84:38).
Heavenly Father's plan is to give us power, the unimaginable power to create worlds without end (Moses 1:4, 33) and to possess knowledge, all knowledge such that there is not anything save we'll know it (2 Nephi 9:20).
“I Don’t Think I Believe in the Church Anymore”
"A little over six months into my [calling as a Bishop], I visited one evening with one of the brethren in my ward who suffered from what turned out, unfortunately, to be a fairly common problem. He was a good man, very active and serving in a leadership position. A returned missionary, he had been married in the temple to an outstanding woman. They had some great kids, and to every appearance they had it ‘all together' spiritually speaking. Yet he was obviously troubled as he sat down across from me, and it didn't take long to discover why.
‘I don't think I believe in the Church anymore', he said abruptly, ‘and I guess maybe I ought to be released.'" I Need Thee Every Hour, Blaine M. Yorgason, p. 83-85.