Thought of the Sunday 12

I was reading a talk earlier this week by M Russell Ballard of the Quorum of the Twelve Apostles entitled Women of Righteousness from the April 2002 Ensign.  There were a ton of interesting thoughts in his talk and I wanted to share this one with you:

"The stunning reality...is that you control how close you are to the Lord. You determine just how clear and readily available promptings from the Holy Ghost will be. You determine this by your actions, by your attitude, by the choices you make, by the things you watch and wear and listen to and read, and by how consistently and sincerely you invite the Spirit into your life."

"One of the sweetest messages the Spirit will relay is how the Lord feels about you."

This reminded me that it is up to me to change myself if I need to.  Jesus Christ will not force me to repent or come closer to Him.  I have to decide for myself and do the work myself.  No one else is going to do it for me and no one else really knows what I need to do to change for the better.  Only Heavenly Father and Jesus Christ truly know me well enough to know whether I'm doing the right things or not.  Luckily they are so loving that they will always give me second and third, etc. chances.  If I don't feel close to my Savior then it is up to me to figure out (through prayer, obedience, scripture study, the Holy Ghost, etc.) what I need to do to change.  And through the Atonement of Jesus Christ I can make those necessary changes.