Greater love no man has than to lay down his life for another man.....Those were the words of President Thomas S. Monson today at a Stake Conference broadcast on the gulf coast area. In four different states: Louisiana, Mississippi, Alabama and Florida. Twenty-one LDS stakes were involved and we all got to listen to the words of our prophet.
He mostly spoke of saving others. Those members who were baptized but fell away from church activity. He spoke of a painting he saw in London, England when there at an art museum which was by Joseph Turner or as he is listed on line, Joseph Mallard William Turner. He painted a particular painting in 1831 which caught his attention. He called the painting To The Rescue because it depicted a raft boat rowing against the waves to save the people off of a bigger ship. On the shore was a women and two children calling to them.
It took me a while but I found the painting listed under William Turner called "Lifeboat and Manby Apparatus Going off to a Stranded Vessal Making Signal of Distress. It's a very interesting painting. The more you look at it the more you see.
As President Monson told us... Those on the stranded vessal are those members lost from the Gospel. We should try to rescue them as the people in the lifeboat with those on the shore shouting encouraging words.
Be ye doers of the word and not hearers only........ James 1 :22. Ours is the duty to reach out to others and admonished us all to help those lost to come back to Christ.
You might not be able to tell by this small copy of the picture exactly what is going on but President Monson is using it as a reminder that we should be rescuing others. Great lesson learned today.
2 comments:
It's an intriquing, beautiful picture. Thanks for sharing the prophet's words.
Thank you for the blog and for including the painting. R. Matos, Mount Vernon Stake Virginia
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