Teaching our children to live a quiet, sane, and balanced life is one of the most important parental tasks of our day.

Whatever worldly thing we may covet-zealously striving to obtain and then retain-never seems to bring an end to our desires. Covetousness, envy, jealousy, and greed always escalate into a vicious spiral, as we seek greater and greater gratification but find less and less contentment. . . . Striving to acquire the things of the world not only does not bring lasting happiness and peace, but it drives us to seek more. When "all we've ever wanted" is grounded in the temporal trappings of this world, it is never enough!

Teaching our children to live a quiet, sane, and balanced life is one of the most important parental tasks of our day.

Keeping the daily demands of life in balance is one of the great tasks of mortality. There is no peace for those whose lives are out of balance temporally or spiritually.

Mercy is compassion, kindness, empathy, forgiveness. While grace might be described as blessings and favor from God that we do not necessarily deserve, mercy represents not receiving what we do deserve because of the patience, love, and atonement of the Master.

Any divine communication from God to man is called revelation. Revelation comes in many different forms. All true revelation comes by the power of the Spirit of God. By this power, the Almighty speaks to our minds and hearts (D&C 8:2).

We must remember that much spiritual growth does not occur suddenly but rather through time and experience. The encouraging message of the gospel is that God does not often require us to perform sensational or extraordinary deeds but rather to try to do better today than we did yesterday. He is mindful of our desires, our determination, and our direction as well as of our deeds.