Gaining a Testimony

My thoughts on Elder Hales "Gaining a Testimony of God the Father; His Son, Jesus Chris; and the Holy Ghost."

A testimony of God the Father; His Son, Jesus Christ; and the Holy Ghost. Why do you think it needs to be a testimony of these three beings? Is this different than having a testimony of the Gospel? Or Baptism? Or Tithing? I believe it is.

I have a friend whose husband pays on honest tithe because he has a testimony of it, but is not a baptized member of our church. He sees the blessing that come to his family through his obedience. But he doesn’t have a testimony of the Father, The Son or the Holy Ghost—at least not yet.

I truly didn’t mark but one line from the whole talk because I just agreed with everything Elder Hale said. So what I’m going to say has NOTHING to do with the talk but about my testimony of the God Head.

When I was a young girl and trying desperately to find direction for my life, I was praying like nothing else to feel the Savior’s love and to become a changed person. (not sure I changed all that much ~smile~) I was on an overnight water skiing activity with my Laurel class. We spent the night under the stars at some state park. For some reason when I choose my spot I didn’t realize that when the sun came up it would hit me straight in the face. Everyone else must have placed their heads better than I for at 4:30 AM (we are up way north) the sun woke me up. Of course there wasn’t much for me to do. We air was a bit chilly so I just snuggled into my bag and watched the sun rise. Eventually the sunrays hit a spider web. This as a unique spider web as it was like a ladder between two trees which must have been about 10 feet apart. The dew and the sunlight made this invisible ladder some to life. As my eyes traced up the ladder I noticed that it led to heaven. It was then that my heart burned and I knew Heavenly Father truly loved me as much as anyone else. Not that the spider web was special, but that my heart and mind were open at that moment to feel the love.

Of course I crawled as best as I could onto my knees and spent some time in prayer and then opened my scriptures (the only books we were allowed to bring) and the testimony that had begun to burn that morning was etched into my mind and heart.

When the scriptures say that they can not write the words they heard, I know what it is like. I didn’t hear words, but the feelings I had don’t have an English (or any spoken language) word for them. There is NOTHING to describe the way I felt. I knew then as I do today that the Father, The Son and the Holy Ghost are three different beings each with a similar but different task.

Another time, about 10 years ago, I was asked to speak on Father’s Day, but my topic was our Heavenly Father. You can search all you want, but the scriptures talk very, very little about our Heavenly Father. Our latter-day prophets have spoken more about him than any ancient prophet has. But the one thing I did learn is that if you want to know the Father, know the Son. As you study the Son, his mission, his life and his teachings you will come to know the Father. After all he is about his father’s business.”