"Yet ye would be unprofitable servants" (Mosiah 2:21)

Few discourses are as timeless or doctrinally saturated as the final address of King Benjamin to his people. These chapters of the Book of Mormon constitute a lifetime of learning and spiritual preparation being shared by an aging leader. As part of this sermon King Benjamin declares "I say unto you, my brethren, that if you should render all the thanks and praise which your whole soul has power to possess, to that God who has created you, and has kept and preserved you, and has caused that ye should rejoice, and has granted that ye should live in peace one with another…I say, if ye should serve him with all your whole souls yet ye would be unprofitable servants. And behold, all that he requires of you is to keep his commandments; and he has promised you that if ye would keep his commandments ye should prosper in the land; and he never doth vary from that which he hath said; therefore, if ye do keep his commandments he doth bless you and prosper you."

As we prepare to begin another week I invite all of us to consider King Benjamin's message in these verses. You and I are the recipients of unfathomable blessings. Blessings which we largely did not earn nor merit but were lovingly bestowed upon us by our Father in Heaven in order to accomplish his purposes. Of ourselves we never have nor will we ever do or become enough to deserve all we now have and all which lies in store ahead of us. The beauty and irony of the Gospel of Jesus Christ is that although our constant development through good and righteous works is a crucial aspect of this mortal sphere, regardless of any other factor if we are to one day inherit a throne in our Heavenly Father’s mansion we must accept that inheritance as a gift bestowed in love by a merciful Redeemer. There is no other hope or possibility for us. Each one of us stands in total dependence upon the charity and goodwill of our perfect Judge.

Yet, as King Benjamin taught, all the thanking, praising, and even praying we can summon will still leave us as "unprofitable servants" and unworthy of all which we call our own. Thus, we must do what Benjamin instructed us to do. We must "keep his commandments" in order to prosper, or, perhaps more accurately, because we have already prospered in the land. In other words, we must turn our thanks, praise and gratitude into action. A disciple in word only is not a disciple at all.

In that spirit I would like to extend a special invitation to each of you to make this week an early Thanksgiving of sorts. An opportunity to bow our head in thanks as we look upon all we have been given and the unfathomable possibilities stretching on ahead not because our gratitude is dictated by dates and calendars but rather because we “stand all amazed” that He never “sleeps nor slumbers.” As you ponder those things you do not deserve but nonetheless call your own, I invite you to also prayerfully create a plan to show through action your appreciation for our Savior’s generosity. If you are thankful for your family then how will you make that love more apparent to each family member through word and deed? If you are thankful for the Gospel of Jesus Christ then what will you do to become a better "example of the believers" than you currently are? If you are grateful for the Book of Mormon then how are you going to elevate your study of this book and share it with all around you who "are kept from the truth because they know not where to find it?" As you express gratitude for our Savior Jesus Christ how will you proclaim "yea, Lord, thou knowest that I love thee" through deed and not only through word? My promise is that as you prayerfully seek for your own answers to these and similar questions you will feel a greater appreciation for and witness of our Savior come into your life.

I not only give my witness but also express my gratitude for a Savior who holds in his hands the complete claim upon justice and the absolute capacity to be merciful yet today and forever will favor mercy on our behalf. I testify of his goodness and his unchanging devotion first to our Father in Heaven then to us as that Father’s most cherished creation. I give my promise that our Savior and Father in Heaven are immensely anxious to bestow far greater blessings upon us than we have the capacity to comprehend and they are only limited in doing so by our willingness to “forsake [our] nets and follow [Them].” I give my testimony of authenticity Their work which is spreading across the world at an ever increasing pace as we prepare the world for the second coming of the Savior Jesus Christ. In a coming day every child of God and the very earth itself will bow in reverence before their Creator and King. My plea and invitation is to prepare now for a joyful rather than sorrowful moment in that greatest of all days. That moment will inevitably come. No power of heaven or earth will stop it. The only question, therefore, is whether you and I will experience it basking in the radiance of our triumphal Redeemer, or sorrowing in the anguish only the unrepentant and the impenitent can now. That each of us may more fully come to appreciate our incomprehensible realities and unmatched possibilities is my prayer.

In the name of Jesus Christ, Amen.