You can’t teach the
gospel unless you know it. . . .
So I would suggest
that you do study the gospel and study it every day. You should never let a day
go by that you don’t read it.
Now, I don’t know
much about the gospel other than what I’ve learned from the standard works.
When I drink from a spring I like to get the water where it comes out of the
ground, not down the stream after the cattle have waded in it. . . . I
appreciate other people’s interpretation, but when it comes to the gospel we
ought to be acquainted with what the Lord says and we ought to read it. You
ought to read the gospel; you ought to read the Book of Mormon and the Doctrine
and Covenants; and you ought to read all of the scriptures with the idea of
finding out what’s in them and what the meaning is and not to prove some idea
of your own. Just read them and plead with the Lord to let you understand what
he had in mind when he wrote them. . . . Become converted to it. Become
acquainted with the language of the scriptures and the teachings of the
scriptures.
After you have done
that, you have to live it. You can’t learn the gospel without living it. Jesus
didn’t learn it all at one time. He went from grace to grace. . . . You can’t
understand [the gospel] just by reading it and knowing the words; you have to
live it. (Marion G. Romney, Address at coordinators’ convention, Seminaries and
Institutes of Religion, April 13, 1973, p. 4 as quoted by Richard G. Scott,
"Four Fundamentals for Those who Teach and Inspire Youth," in Scott
C. Esplin and Richard Neitzel Holzapfel, eds., The Voice of My Servants:
Apostolic Messages on Teaching, Learning, and Scripture [Provo, Utah:
Religious Studies Center, Brigham Young University; Salt Lake City: Deseret
Book, 2010], 50-51)
