Virtue: The Confidence of Self-Mastery

President Russell M. Nelson taught in General Conference last month: "Charity and virtue open the way to having confidence before God! Brothers and sisters, we can do this! Our confidence can truly wax strong in the presence of God, right now!" (https://www.churchofjesuschrist.org/study/ftsoy/2025/05/03-nelson?lang=eng)

President Nelson wasn't talking about the confidence of the world - the participation trophy mentality of Stuart Smalley that's mostly hopeful bravado. (https://youtu.be/_S9TC_O89J0?si=_dxrOEiDtwJ7qzDK)

Nor was he talking about living largely without that confidence, hoping we were maybe good enough to have the confidence to stand before God at the end of our lives. He didn't mean that we should live out life without knowing - knowing - that we can "come boldly unto the throne of grace, that we may obtain mercy, and find grace to help in time of need" (Hebrews 4:16). Right. This. Minute.

President Nelson is trying to teach that we can have that confidence every single day - in all the splendid messes of our lives - as impure and unrefined as you can get in a fallen world...

IF...

IF... we've taken on the project of pairing our unrefined imperfection with the refined perfection of the Lamb without blemish - entering a covenant relationship with the Son who earned the inheritance for all of us by his infinite atoning sacrifice.

IF... we've taken on the project of developing virtue and charity and made them our daily walk.

President Nelson got his text from D&C 121:45-46: “

Let thy bowels also be full of charity towards all men, and to the household of faith, and let virtue garnish thy thoughts unceasingly; then shall thy confidence wax strong in the presence of God; and the doctrine of the priesthood shall distil upon thy soul as the dews from heaven. The Holy Ghost shall be thy constant companion, and thy scepter an unchanging scepter of righteousness and truth; and thy dominion shall be an everlasting dominion, and without compulsory means it shall flow unto thee forever and ever.”

I've come to see virtue and charity as shorthand - two pinnacle qualities which describe honoring the First and Second Great Commandments – to love God first, and our neighbor as ourselves.

Every discussion about what virtue is inevitably includes using synonyms such as strength and power. I've come to wonder if virtue isn't speaking of self-mastery.

Wouldn't power or strength over yourself be the ultimate mortal power or strength there is? All it takes to answer that would be considering those completely lacking in self-mastery. Devoid of virtue, these are easily the weakest humans there are.

I can't think of a better way to live the First Commandment - to honor and worship God - and to practice becoming like God - than to practice self-mastery. Because He is exalted perfection, Father practices perfect, exalted self-mastery, as does His perfect, exalted Son, Jesus Christ.

If Father and His Son wish to give us the kind of life They have, it seems that would entail practicing self-mastery. Even imperfectly. Entering a covenant relationship means we lean into Their perfection, borrowing Their perfection as we practice imperfectly, enabling Them to give us power in the practice.

Power to change.

For me, on any given day, imperfection looks like staying up too late, being cross with stupid drivers - which I never am - eating a second cookie... or seventh... jumping to conclusions about another person's motives or behavior, scrolling longer than is needful, feeling discouraged that I pray for the same help with the same problems So. Many. Times...

You get the idea. While the destroyer tries to convince me I'm the only one so remedial, I strongly suspect I'm not alone.

In Abraham, the Lord describes preparing His children for earth life:

"And God saw these souls that they were good, and he stood in the midst of them, and he said: These I will make my rulers; for he stood among those that were spirits, and he saw that they were good; and he said unto me: Abraham, thou art one of them; thou wast chosen before thou wast born." (Abraham 3:23)

I always read that scripture and assumed it was talking about the great ones of the earth. As in - Not Me. Until I had a gifted, inspired gospel teacher - Brother David Christensen - testify to the youth of our stake that Christ was describing us.

Jesus Christ chooses those who take on the mortal project of entering a covenant relationship with Him to refine themselves - aligning their wills to the will of God - making a lifestyle of practicing higher and holier ways - relying on the perfection of their covenant partners.

This lifestyle is the antithesis of those who follow the philosophies of the world; Babylon seeks the path of least resistance and makes it the chief mission of life to avoid anything unpleasant, uncomfortable, or difficult.

Those who choose the lifestyle of climbing will become the rulers Christ speaks of in Abraham. Virtue – or the strength and power of self-mastery – is the strength and power to rule and reign over yourself - without any outward compulsory force causing you to do it.

Over a lifetime of practice, those who practice self-mastery make choices based on unchanging eternal law, and not on fickle, temporal - temporary - emotion. How they feel at any particular moment is irrelevant to the choice. Because of the great love they have for Father and Jesus Christ, and because of the inner strength and power they’re developing, those who practice self-mastery are honoring the First Commandment as the ultimate way to worship God. Because that’s who HE is – that’s the way HE lives - and that's the way THEY strive to live.

That's virtue. And it all sounds like an impossibly high way to live for a girl who sat down to write still in her exercise clothes.

But hey! I exercised! I committed today to more practice. More glorious, soul-stretching, messy, chaotic practice.

Considering doctrine which promises the power of rocket thrusters beneath our own pathetic power of tiddly winks can exhaust an ordinary mortal. Can Jesus Christ really make more of this "unholy mess of a girl" - to quote Katherine Hepburn in Philadelphia Story?

He really, really can.

He really, really doesn't care what you're capable of - or incapable of - right this minute. He really, really doesn't care how much you're starting with, or how much you end up with. He really, really doesn't care where you've been, or what you've done. NONE of that qualifies or disqualifies you.

He only cares what you do next.

He will never stop inviting - not even at the end of the day (see Matthew 20 - or https://www.laureensimper.com/post/prison-of-choices-and-on-coming-late).

"Come. Come partner with me. Let me help you. Let me walk with you. Let me teach you.

"Let me make you holy."

Ultimately - wouldn't you say that's it's holiness we're talking about? Covenant relationships, taken seriously, produce virtuous people - which eventually produce holy people.

God is holy. The Pearl of Great Price refers to the name of God as "Man of Holiness" (Moses 6:57). To honor the First Commandment is to spend your life trying to grow up to be like Dad. Which is impossible without the rocket thruster help of the only One who has been virtuous every single minute of His existence, and who suffered unspeakably to give you the chance to grow into it with His help.

When Jesus Christ comes to rule and reign over the earth, He will not rule and reign over serfs with no will of their own. He will not rule and reign over grumbling, reluctant servants.

Jesus Christ will rule and reign over imperfect, virtuous apprentices, who have learned - through their own experiences - to love their God most by practicing higher and holier living. He will rule and reign over future kings and queens, priests and priestesses - who have learned the joy of ruling and reigning over themselves.