Parable on God's Creations

A master artist had a classroom full of students.
"One day," he told them, "I will help you to become just like me."
Meanwhile, he gave them each a beautiful painting --each unique and different, but all his best work.
One student rejected the gift, and a few others did as well, jealous that they could not be the master painters.
The one who rejected the art soon became jealous of the other student's paintings. He went to one student and decided he would make him share his jealousy.
"Wouldn't your painting look cool if you added to it?"
The student was decieved by him, and graffitied the gorgeous painting, covering the beautiful shapes and colors with cheap paint.
The rejector came to another student and said, "Look at your painting, it isn't nearly as beautiful as the student next to you."
She looked at her own painting, and at the girl's next to her. Ashamed, she hid the painting beneath an expensive cloth which she thought was more beautiful than the painting.
The rejector next went to another girl with an especially unique and beautiful painting, one pleasing to all eyes and admired by many.
"Your painting is the most beautiful of all," he said, "you could make money off of that."
The girl felt pride for her painting. Not wanting to sell the whole thing, she sold bits and peices of it to others.

The rejector was glad he was able to deceive so many, but there was one student he could not deceive. He tried all his tricks, but the student continued to love his own painting. Never did he compare his own to others, or defile it, or sell it. He loved and charished his painting and daily thanked the master painter for such a beautiful gift.

The student who had graffited his painting saw the purity and cleanliness of the steadfast student, and realized he had forever destroyed and ruined such a precious gift. He tried to clean the cheap paint from his own canvas, but found the work difficult and laborous.

The student who covered her own painting saw the steadfast student's daily gratitude, and was ashamed she had not shown the same. She threw away the fancy cloth and was grateful for the painting she had, which was truly beautiful.

The student who had sold her bits of her painting, saw the whole canvas of the steadfast student, and realized the mistake she had made that could never be fixed on her own. Her painting was lost. Only through the mercy of the master painter could she be whole again.

Our bodies are creations of our Heavenly Father. Just as we would not destroy a beautiful piece of artwork, priceless, and given to us as a precious gift, we should not defile or be ashamed of the priceless, beautiful creations of our Heavenly Father. We are his pride and joy, his supreme creations. When we repect and love our bodies, we repect and love what was made by Him.

Daily Repentance

Repenting daily has many obvious blessings; it prevents you from forgetting your sins, you learn to recognize sins and feel Godly sorrow quickly, and you strive always to become clean. However, today in our Church Sacrament meeting I realized another blessing I had never noticed before.
Daily repentance directly affects the impact on our Spirits that partaking of the Sacrament has. When we speedily repent of all our sins and transgressions, we have the opportunity to be pure and clean again each week as we take of the bread and water and renew our baptisimal covenants. This in itself is a blessings, however this also brings with it another less-noticable blessing.
When we are pure, clean, and perfect for those few moments between renewing our covenants and the next mistake we make, our Spirits are as open as they can be to the Spirit. I have always felt the Spirit Strongly after taking the bread and water, but today I realized that it was more than that. This is the time of the week when I think of goals I want to make, changes I need to make, how I can help someone I've been praying for, what I need to do about a problem. The Spirit speaks to me and tells me a plethora of information that my heart opens up to while I feel pure and clean. Often this resolve does not stay, as mistakes are once again made. However, speedily repenting can bring that resolve to life again, enough to take it into action.
When we speedily repent, we not only allow ourselves to be perfectly clean for a few precious moments each week, but we also open ourselves up to the Spirit's promptings on a daily basis, as well as an onslought of Revelation that can occur every Sabbath day.