What the members of the Church need, more than anything else, are strong testimonies of Jesus Christ and the gospel He restored. They need to know. And they need to know that they know. This is the best protection against the tsunami of temptations and the waves of immorality that crash against us. Perhaps this is just another reason why the first principle of the gospel is faith in the Lord Jesus Christ!
John Bytheway, "How Do I Know If I Know?", Deseret Book, 2021
There is a reason that time after time we are taught, even strongly encouraged, to develop and strengthen our testimonies and our faith in Jesus Christ. There is a reason for it. Maybe we haven't been tested sufficiently enough yet to know why that testimony is crucial. Maybe we have been tested already and are being tested right now but don't even realize it.
We know that by small and simple things are great things brought to pass. But I will venture to say that this concept works in the opposite direction too. It may not seem critical enough that one day of scripture study or one prayer is missed. But....those missed moments add up (small means) and, greater that number gets, before we even realize it, our testimony is gone (great things.... great in the sense of immensity).
In this life, there are only two directions to travel. One is easy and is filled with fun and temporary pleasure. The other is hard, rocky, bumpy, but it is filled with eternal joy and peace. We need to pay attention and realize which direction we're going. It's so easy to travel the wrong way. It takes constant reassessment and intentional movements to travel the straight and narrow and rocky.
But that difficult path leads to our ultimate goal, the reason why we agreed to come to this earth in the first place.
Tsunamis will try to drown us. Violent storms will try to get us to quit. Terrible and ferocious winds will try to knock us over. Earthquakes will try to dissappear our path in front of us. But these powerful deterrents are nothing compared to the power of Christ.
Keep moving forward on the straight and narrow and rocky, no matter how slow and difficult.