Gratitude

Has the promise of prospering in the land led us to believe that if we keep the commandments, life will be easy?

Taking a moment to be grateful for these often-overlooked blessings may be just what you need to feel more peace this Thanksgiving.

Gratitude shows up in different places for everyone. Here are three times it was brought up in the most recent general conference.

Gratitude can help us feel more peaceful, grow closer as a family, and hold onto a celestial perspective.

I am grateful for the gifts and talents my Heavenly Father has given me and I am grateful for the ones He hasn’t. Working hard to adopt the gifts I don’t have allows me to experience the bitter taste of failure, but more importantly, the rewarding feeling of success.

Marcia heard her grandmother constantly pray for her children, grandchildren, neighbors, and friends—and that example changed her life.

As the seasons of Thanksgiving and Christmas approach, we all remind ourselves to focus a little more on the things that we are blessed with in our lives.

These videos will help remind you that Thanksgiving is the perfect time count our blessings and live in an attitude of gratitude.

“Perhaps the longest-lived celebration of gratitude and thanksgiving is Passover. What’s the origin of Passover and what’s its connection to modern day Thanksgiving and our covenants with God?”

“O brethren, let us be thankful that it is as well with us as it is, and we are yet alive and peradventure, God hath laid up in store great good for us in this generation, and may grant that we may yet glorify his name,”

Over the years, President Thomas S. Monson shared several Thanksgiving tales that help us remember gratitude, charity, and the hand of God on our lives.

if you’re feeling a bit down about the weekend slipping away, here are some ideas to help you beat those Sabbath blues and make the day more of a delight.

“When we focus on our many amazing blessings, we become more and more aware of them, and thus more and more content and humble and grateful. And I might add, happier and more peaceful.”

“No matter our situation, showing gratitude for our privileges is a fast-acting and long-lasting spiritual prescription.”

Throughout his service in the Church, President Nelson has helped us to find joy and gratitude in every circumstance.

“Never in my wildest dreams did I think that I would have my long-awaited newborn in the middle of the largest global crisis our generation has ever known.”

Before President Russell M. Nelson’s challenge to turn social media into our own gratitude journals, there were dozens of lists online of things to be grateful for in the year 2020. Since his invitation, millions of ideas have been added by those using #GiveThanks. But there are a few spiritual things that I think we have become more grateful for this year, as we have either relied on them more or had to do without them. Everyone’s list will look a little different depending on personal circumstances, but here are a few things that I think many of us have come to appreciate more than ever this year (in no particular order).

Editor’s note: “This week from the pulpit” highlights recent messages from General Authorities, General Officers, and leaders of the Church.

Heaven never seems closer than when we see the love of God manifested in the kindness and devotion of others.

On Friday, November 20, President Russell M. Nelson delivered a special video message of hope and healing that resonated with viewers around the world. In the prophet’s message—which he received inspiration for in the middle of the night—President Nelson spoke about the pandemic, societal issues, and where healing from these challenges can come:

It’s not often that the prophet announces a special video message, but one week ago, President Russell M. Nelson announced that he had received an impression to share a message with the world.

As a world-renowned heart surgeon, President Russell M. Nelson is no stranger to offering prescriptions for wellness, but on Friday morning, he offered perhaps his most important prescription ever. Speaking to a world that—though it may feel divided—is united by a need for healing, President Nelson offered two prescribed ways to find it: 1. "Turn social media into your own personal gratitude journal” 2. “Let us unite in thanking God through daily prayer.”

After my mother recently passed away, my childhood home sold quickly to a local contractor. And just like that, the setting for decades of my memories, had suddenly disappeared.

Retired Air Force Col. Gail S. Halvorsen, internationally known as the “Berlin Candy Bomber,” celebrates his 100th birthday tomorrow, October 10, 2020. After a century of life experience and service, he shared his gratitude and love for life in a recent article for Church News.

Sheri Dew recently shared her thoughts on grief following the loss of her mother earlier this summer. Dew is a former member of the Relief Society General Presidency who now serves as the executive vice president of Deseret Management Corporation and the CEO of Deseret Book Company.

This story was originally published by LDS Living in November 2016.

A few years ago, I was inspired to start keeping a gratitude journal. I had been regularly keeping a journal anyway, but I decided to make gratitude a deliberate part of that daily journal entry. Every day, I would take a moment and list a few things I was thankful for. I would ask myself the question:

The following is an excerpt from Ed J. Pinegar's book, The Little Book of Gratitude.

While giving an address to LDS Business College students on November 19 in the Assembly Hall at Temple Square in Salt Lake City, Utah, Elder Neil L. Andersen of the Quorum of the Twelve Apostles shared three things that we can always be grateful for—regardless of our circumstance.

“Whenever I think of giving thanks, I think of what in this life makes me whole, and I think of all the people I’m unable to properly thank.”

“No matter how much I do for my children, no matter how much I give, they always want more. They’re demanding and rude if they don’t get their way. There’s no gratitude.”

This week's FHE lesson topic comes from the Come, Follow Me reading in Luke 12-17 andJohn 11. Check out this week's Come, Follow Me study ideas on LDS Living for additional resources and suggestions.

Life is messy, and it was orchestrated to be so.

Every day we are surrounded by miracles, but sometimes we don't see them. The more we look for God’s hand in our lives, the more likely we are to recognize it!

One year ago, Maddy Wilford arrived at Broward Health North Hospital fighting for her life after a gunman opened fire on her and her classmates in Parkland, Florida. Today, the high school senior at Marjory Stoneman Douglas is turning tragedy into a chance to bless the lives of others.

Just as my parents taught me what to do if I got lost at Disneyland, we’ve all been taught what to do when we feel lost, scared, or abandoned on earth. 

My Young Women leader asked a hard-hitting question that began to change how I pray.

As Thanksgiving day approaches, frenzied preparations for a magnificent feast, rampant thoughts of Christmas preparations, and busy family schedules can take over.

Embrace everything you love about fall and get your home Thanksgiving-ready with these delightful decorations centered around family and gratitude.

When the prophets said the gospel would go to the ends of the earth, they meant it. Guiuan, Samar, a small town in the Philippines, was the farthest away from anywhere that I had ever been. I was approaching the last five months of my mission when I was told that I was transferring to Guiuan, a nine-hour trip by bus and jeep from the mission home. This area was generally known throughout the mission as “outer darkness” because it was so far away from anything. I came to learn that the name held true for a lot of things about Guiuan. I also learned some of the greatest lessons of my life while I was there.

Speaking to reporters and live web viewers across the globe, Maddy Wilford shared her gratitude for the outpouring of love she received after she was critically injured in the Parkland shooting.

What a powerful story that demonstrates how it is possible to have gratitude in trials.

From President Thomas S. Monson we have learned we should "cultivate an attitude of gratitude." Here are a few scientifically proven reasons why it would be a good idea to follow his counsel.

It was early on a Sunday morning in January and the fifth-floor cancer wing of the East Texas Medical Center was uncharacteristically quiet.

"The Church is really not so much about an organization. The Church is much more about you, about every individual member—that makes all the difference. Your work, your service, your love, your kindness to God and fellow men is a reflection of what the Church is all about," President Dieter F. Uchtdorf says in a new Church videothanking members and people around the world for their humanitarian efforts following so many natural disasters.