Wednesday, December 21, 2016

"Without...the Holy Ghost, a person … would have ...little power to change"

“Water Baptism is only a preparatory cleansing of the believing penitent; it is only a condition of a cleansing from sin; whereas, the Baptism of fire and the Holy Ghost cleanses more thoroughly, by renewing the inner man, and by purifying the affections, desires, and thoughts which have long been habituated in the impure ways of sin. Without the aid of the Holy Ghost, a person … would have but very little power to change his mind … and to walk in newness of life. Though his sins may have been cleansed away, yet so great is the force of habit, that he would, without being renewed by the Holy Ghost, be easily overcome, and contaminated again by sin. Hence, it is infinitely important that the affections and desires should be, in a measure, changed and renewed, so as to cause him to hate that which he before loved, and to love that which he before hated: to thus renew the mind of man is the work of the Holy Ghost.”

- Elder Orson Pratt (1811-1881), from Orson Pratt: Writings of an Apostle, Mormon Collector Series (1976), 2:57, as quoted by Elder Kevin R. Duncan, Of the Seventy, "The Sacred Roles of the Holy Ghost," Ensign, October 2014, p. 65
https://www.lds.org/ensign/2014/10/the-sacred-roles-of-the-holy-ghost?lang=eng 

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