1 Nephi 21-22 & 2 Nephi 1

Lesson Quotes:
Jeffery R. Holland

“No love in mortality comes closer to approximating the pure love of Jesus Christ than the selfless love a devoted mother has for her child. When Isaiah, speaking messianically, wanted to convey Jehovah’s love, he invoked the image of a mother’s devotion. ‘Can a woman forget her sucking child?’ he asks. How absurd, he implies, though not as absurd as thinking Christ will ever forget us”

CONTINUED:
“To those who stagger or stumble, he is there to steady and strengthen us. In the end he is there to save us, and for all this he gave his life. However dim our days may seem they have been darker for the Savior of the world.

In fact, in a resurrected, otherwise perfected body, our Lord of this sacrament table has chosen to retain for the benefit of his disciples the wounds in his hands and his feet and his side—signs, if you will, that painful things happen even to the pure and perfect. Signs, if you will, that pain in this world is not evidence that God doesn’t love you. It is the wounded Christ who is the captain of our soul—he who yet bears the scars of sacrifice, the lesions of love and humility and forgiveness."

(“Behold Thy Mother,” Ensign, Nov. 2015, 48).

Thomas S. Monson about Jay Hess:

“In the 1960s, during the Vietnam War, Church member Jay Hess, an airman, was shot down over North Vietnam. For two years his family had no idea whether he was dead or alive. His captors in Hanoi eventually allowed him to write home but limited his message to less than 25 words. What would you and I say to our families if we were in the same situation—not having seen them for over two years and not knowing if we would ever see them again? Wanting to provide something his family could recognize as having come from him and also wanting to give them valuable counsel, Brother Hess wrote—and I quote: “These things are important: temple marriage, mission, college. Press on, set goals, write history, take pictures twice a year.” (CR Oct. 2008)

Lesson Story:

I grew up in a small town in southern Italy. My family were not members of the Church. One day, when I was nine, two missionaries knocked on our door.

My parents weren’t interested in what the missionaries had to say, but I was. So was my brother, Alberto. Our parents let us keep meeting with the missionaries. Later we got baptized and confirmed. I was 10, and Alberto was 11.

When I was 18, I asked my father to help me pay for my mission. At first he said, “No way. It’s too much money.” But a couple of days later, he asked me, “Do you really want to go on a mission?” And I said, “Yes. With all my heart.” My father said he would help me.

I didn’t understand why my father would pay such a great price for me. Then I realized it was because he loved me. It made me think of Jesus Christ’s sacrifice for us. He paid the highest price because He loves us.

When I got back from my mission, my mother was very sick with cancer. One day she asked me to teach her to pray. She wanted to pray for me. Even in her pain, she was thinking of others. She reminded me of Jesus too. When He atoned for us, He was in great pain. But He was praying for us.

Even though my parents never joined the Church in this life, they were good examples for me. (Massimo De Feo Of the Seventy, “A Lesson from My Parents,” Friend, March, 2019).