In a new #HearHim video from the Church, Elder Ronald A. Rasband of the Quorum of the Twelve Apostles shares his testimony that the Holy Ghost can direct us in life.
“The Prophet Joseph Smith taught that if you will listen to the first promptings, you will get it right nine times out of ten,” he says. “I learned early in my life that if you follow those first promptings, you are generally going to be directed by the Holy Ghost.”
The Apostle also explained how he personally listens to the Spirit.
“I’ve really felt strongly that the ways that I hear the Spirit of the Lord best in my life is by reading the scriptures and following promptings of the Holy Ghost,” he says.
In the video, Elder Rasband shares a story about being assigned to serve as a young missionary in the Eastern States Mission. He was initially incredibly disappointed—his heart had been set on serving in Germany, where his father, brother, and brother-in-law had all served—but after realizing he needed to find peace and a better attitude about his assignment, he turned to the scriptures. His reading led him to Doctrine and Covenants section 100, where verses 3 and 4 stood out to him:
Behold, and lo, I have much people in this place, in the regions round about; and an effectual door shall be opened in the regions round about in this eastern land. Therefore, I, the Lord, have suffered you to come unto this place; for thus it was expedient in me for the salvation of souls.
His story continues, “I had just been called to the Eastern States Mission, and here the Lord says, ‘I have called you to this eastern land.’ And that fast, my attitude changed about not being called to be a German missionary but going to the eastern states. … I knew, by revelation, through this scripture, that that’s where the Lord wanted me to go.”
Elder Rasband‘s love and appreciation for the scriptures began at an even earlier age. In an accompanying blog post on the Church’s website, Elder Rasband shares a sweet memory of learning to love the scriptures from his mother:
“By the time I came around, she had had a lot of life experiences. Those life experiences led her to focus intensely on me as her last child. I remember she would teach me at her knee, and there was this little warm spot in front of the heater vent in our living room where she would take me. As we would sit there, she would tell me Old Testament stories. That is how I learned to recognize the Spirit. She would take different scripture stories and explain them to me, and then she would apply them to my life.”
He also expounds on how he tries to take an active role in his availability for spiritual promptings:
“In recent years I have experienced the feeling of being prompted in the middle of a conversation,” Elder Rasband writes, “and then I just go with it. I try to be that responsive to the Holy Ghost, and I believe that it impacts me in every area of my life. When I get up in the morning, I go to Heavenly Father in prayer and say, ‘Heavenly Father, help me today to be responsive to the promptings of Thy Spirit.’ That is in every morning prayer for me.”
Watch Elder Rasband‘s full message below:
And you can read Elder Rasband‘s #HearHim blog post at ChurchofJesusChrist.org.
