Stay on God’s Winning Team, Says Seventy Elder K. Brett Nattress

Contributed By Valerie Johnson, Church News staff writer

  • 23 March 2018

Exaltation and eternal life hang in the balance in the game of life, Elder K. Brett Nattress said. We can decide to be on the Lord’s winning team.  Photo by Ericka Sanders, BYU–Idaho.

Article Highlights

  • In the game of life, stay on God’s winning team and strive for eternal victory.
  • Even when you stumble, you can always get back up with the Savior’s help.
  • Achieve spiritual success by reading the scriptures, praying every day, and finding someone to serve.

“[God] is in the very details of your lives. He will never give up on you. You must never give up on Him. And you must not give up on yourself. You are a member of His winning team, and an eternal victory is in your future.” —Elder K. Brett Nattress, General Authority Seventy

“God knows you personally,” Elder K. Brett Nattress, General Authority Seventy, told BYU–Idaho students on March 20. “He is in the very details of your lives. He will never give up on you. You must never give up on Him. And you must not give up on yourself. You are a member of His winning team, and an eternal victory is in your future.”

“Let us become devoted disciples. Let us be covenant keepers who humbly yet powerfully live our lives in the strength of the Lord. Let us remember who we are.”

Speaking in the BYU–Idaho Center during the university’s weekly devotional and drawing from the example of the sons of Mosiah in the Book of Mormon, Elder Nattress shared three things everyone should do each day to attain spiritual success and remain on the covenant path. “Read the scriptures. I would recommend, specifically, read the Book of Mormon,” he said. “Pray. Every day. And find someone to serve. Make a positive difference in someone else’s life.”

Even if someone makes a mistake or suffers a severe spiritual injury, repentance and recovery is possible through the Atonement of Christ, he said.

Elder Nattress shared a story about a woman he met while speaking during sacrament meeting in a young single adult ward in Boise, Idaho. Entering the back of the chapel, she lowered her head and did not partake of the sacrament.

The topic of the meeting was the Atonement of Jesus Christ and the incredible blessings of repentance and forgiveness. The Sunday School lesson that day focused on the blessings of repentance, forgiveness, and coming unto Christ. In Relief society, the lesson centered one question: “What is the greatest challenge facing you today?”

A few responses were given before this particular sister, with tears streaming down her face, said, “The greatest challenge facing me today is that I know I need to repent.” She shared how she had been inactive in the Church for two years and had decided that morning to try one last time to come to church. “After falling so far, how does one ever come back?” she asked.

The other Relief Society sisters gathered around her to comfort her and help her feel the love of the Savior, Elder Nattress said. Following the Relief Society lesson, this sister’s stake president, with Elder Nattress and her bishop, gave her a priesthood blessing. “It was a sacred moment,” he said.

The sister felt the love of the Savior. She returned to full activity in the Church and became the Relief Society president of her ward. Later, she married a worthy young man in the temple.

“She had returned to the covenant path,” Elder Nattress concluded.

Elder K. Brett Nattress, General Authority Seventy, meets with students after a BYU–Idaho devotional. Photo by Garrett Blanchard, BYU–Idaho.

Using BYU–Idaho President Henry J. Eyring in a photo illustration as a positive example for students, Elder K. Brett Nattress, General Authority Seventy, speaks during a devotional in the BYU–Idaho Center. Photo by Garrett Blanchard, BYU–Idaho.

Elder Nattress told students, “[God] will never give up on you. You must never give up on Him.”

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