The Power of the Written Word

Title

The Power of the Written Word

Publication Type

Journal Article

Year of Publication

2014

Authors

Holland, Jeffrey R. (Primary)

Pagination

14-23

Volume

15 Issue

2 URL

https://rsc.byu.edu/archived/re-15-no-2-2014/power-written-word

Terms of use

Items in the BMC Archive are made publicly available for non-commercial, private use. Inclusion within the BMC Archive does not imply endorsement. Items do not represent the official views of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints or of Book of Mormon Central.

Bibliographic Citation

Abstract

In this war in which we are engaged, this fight over good and evil that began in heaven and continues on earth, we do not have a lot of weapons, certainly not the weapons traditionally granted to armies or navies or cor-porations or governments. To accomplish our purposes we don’t, at least in the ecclesiastical realm, hire people or fire people. We don’t yell at them or harangue them (at least we’re not supposed to), and we don’t force them to do anything. In a purely gospel sense, we not only can’t force anyone to do anything, we shouldn’t. Irony of ironies is that this issue is what part of that premortal fight was about. So how do we motivate, inspire, stimulate, and move others? We are left with one principal asset— words. Energized by the Spirit and expressed with love, words are the only real sword we have in this divine battle.

Writing

Scripture Study