Aloha sisters and brothers,
What a wonderful musical number. Thank you, Vice President Schlag for the warm introduction and thank you to the team of teams that week after week set up such an amazing devotional experience by setting up this stage, the flowers, the chairs, keeping the A/C going, the lights on, the water running! Thank you! We appreciate you and hopefully we don't lose power!
It’s an honor for me to be standing here this morning speaking to you. Over my 26 years in the military, I have had several speaking engagements, but I can tell you with confidence that none of those match the level of importance to me as this one.
In 2018, while I was serving in the United States Army, I was assigned to the Security Force Assistance Brigade. During our deployment to Afghanistan, our mission was to advise and accompany the Afghan National Army in the capital of Kabul. The majority of our training included engineer operations that included breaching. A breach is creating an opening where there wasn’t one before, to gain entry into a space. One night, our partners received a mission that required my team to accompany them. I, along with four other members of my team, had the responsibility to create an opening to allow a small tactical Afghan unit to enter a compound. My team and I found ourselves stacked-up—or against each other—shoulder-to-shoulder, on a wall next to a metal door that was locked, leading into a compound. Our objective was to make an opening for follow-on team to get through. I felt the weight of the kit, and the sweat was just pouring down my head under my helmet. Our soul job as engineers was to place small explosives called C4 on the door hinges in order to blow it open. Under the cover of night, my lead engineer carefully moved up to the door, placed the C4, along with blasting caps, and uncoiled the detonation cord and ran it back to his position in the stack, where he connected the detonator, the M57. And when he was ready, he gave the command of Breach, Breach Breach—and on that third Breach, he detonated the C4, creating the opening for the tactical unit to get through. The point isn't the violence of it—it's simply creating an opening for an opportunity. As my team and I prepared to conduct that breach outside that compound, we stood as a close-tight team depending on each other, not knowing how the outcome would play out, but I knew my role. And I knew each team member knew their role.
In 1978, my parents started their treacherous journey leaving Mexico and entering the United States, walking through the Mojave Desert into southern Arizona, not only suffering from the heat of their trek and lack of water, but also suffering from the loss of everything they had known and loved for something better, for themselves and for their future family. My parents created a “breach” so that my siblings and I can stand here today, having been provided with better education, better career options, and better opportunities in life—a better life than what they had.
God never intended us to experience this mortal life alone. Just as I had my team that I could lean on and trust in those moments in Kabul, Heavenly Father has placed and will place people in your life to stand beside you, support you, and strengthen you. Most of you are far away from home. Who are you stacked up with, shoulder-to-shoulder? Who are the people God has placed on your right and on your left? Because just like that night in Afghanistan, we don’t get to choose every person who stands beside us, but we DO get to choose what kind of teammate we will be in the end. There will be times in your life where the person to your right is strong and the person to your left is struggling. There may even be times when you are the one who can’t carry the weight of the task at hand. In Doctrine and Covenants section 81 verse five, the Lord commands us: “Succor the weak, lift up the hands which hang down, and strengthen the feeble knees.” [1]
Ask yourself, what am I willing to sacrifice so someone else can have an opportunity? Whose life can I make better because I stand with them, shoulder-to-shoulder?
Answering those questions takes more than good intentions in the moment. It takes training, repetition, and persistence. From 2005-2007, I served as an Army Drill Instructor at Fort Leonard Wood, Missouri, training more than 7,000 soldiers. Taking civilians who volunteered to serve in our military and making them into United States Army Soldiers. My job was to prepare people for a door they hadn't breached yet. This consisted of long days and nights of training, drills, mock-ups in the pouring rain, and in the brutal heat and humidity of Missouri. As time went on through their training, they were building trust amongst them. This is something that could not be achieved at the point of entry at the door; trust cannot be manufactured at the door. It's built on mock-ups, in the rain, doing repetitions. Focusing on the basics.
In our lives today, daily prayer, reading scriptures, keeping covenants we’ve made, and temple attendance are our rehearsals—and they feel like rehearsals until the night they don't. Until the day that it becomes muscle memory. If I have learned anything about this journey we’re on, it is that sometimes things do not go our way. We make a bad call. We give into temptation. Or maybe, even the hardest of all, life brings a weight we never saw coming, one we could not have prevented. And we find ourselves in the dark. This is the spiritual combat of life we train for all our lives. This is what we rehearse for, for these times of trouble and heartache.
As I stand here today as a Facilities Management director, I hold keys to many of the doors on this campus. Those keys give me authorized access to buildings, classrooms, offices, mechanical spaces. But I have also learned that having keys does not mean I could enter every door alone. There are doors that require another person, another key, or another team member to help me. That reminds me of the role of the breacher. A breacher’s entire responsibility is to create an opening where one did not exist before, allowing others to enter. The breacher may not be the first person through the opening, and he may not receive recognition from everyone who benefits from his work. But without that opening, the rest of the team cannot move forward.
One of the greatest examples of this principle is found in Mark 2. A man who was paralyzed was carried to Jesus by his four friends. When they arrived, the house was so crowded that they could not get through the door. They could have turned around and gone home, but their love for their friend and the relentless power of Jesus Christ motivated them to find another way. They carried him to the roof, opened it, and lowered him down in front of the Savior. In other words, they created a breach. They made an opening so their friend could have an opportunity to reach Jesus Christ. The scripture teaches that when Jesus saw their faith, He forgave and healed the man. Notice that the friends did not try to do what only the Savior could do. They could not heal him themselves. Their role was to carry him, create an opening, and bring him to Christ. The Savior then did what only He had the power to do. [2]
I believe many of us are here today, because someone made an opening, or a breach, for us. Someone prayed for us, encouraged us, taught us, invited us, defended us, or simply stood beside us when we were struggling. Some of you may be here because of a parent sacrifice so you could have a better opportunity. Some of you may be here because of a bishop, ministering brother or sister, a roommate, teacher, coach, or friend saw something in you that you could not yet see in yourself. Their actions may not have solved every problem in your life, but they helped create a path that allowed you to come closer to the Savior.
My wife and I have experienced this principle personally through our son who has special needs. As his parents, we have learned that there are doors he cannot always open on his own and barriers that can make what seems simple for someone else incredibly difficult for him. At times, he needs someone to go ahead of him to create an opening, remove an obstacle, or simply show him that there is a way forward. Our role is not to walk and clear the entire path for him. We cannot make every decision for him, experience every challenge for him, or do the growing that ultimately has to be his. But we can create the conditions that make growth possible. Sometimes that means advocating for an opportunity he may not otherwise have. Sometimes it means breaking a task into smaller steps, holding his hand when he is unsure, encouraging him when something feels too difficult, or simply staying beside him long enough for him to discover that he can take the next step. As we all have learned, this work rarely happens alone. Our son has benefited from siblings, nieces, cousins, teachers, friends, aunties, uncles, and others who have each played a part in helping create openings for him. Raising our son has changed the way I think about the Savior. There are barriers in mortality that none of us have the strength or ability to breach on our own. Sin, sorrow, weakness, injustice, pain, and ultimately death are not obstacles that we can simply work hard enough to overcome. We needed someone who could go before us and create a way where there was no way.
Jesus Christ did that for us. In the April 2024 general conference, Elder Patrick Kearon said, “He will not refuse you or those you love when you bring Him your broken hearts and contrite spirits. That is not His intent or His design, nor His plan, purpose, wish, or hope. No, He does not put up roadblocks and barriers; He removes them, He does not keep you out; He welcomes you in.” [3]
At the center of this entire message is Jesus Christ, the ultimate Breacher. There was a door that no military team, no amount of training, and no earthly key could ever open—the door created by sin, death, and separation from God. We could not breach that door on our own. No matter how hard we worked or how good we tried to be, we needed someone to go and do for us what we could not do for ourselves. In Gethsemane and on the cross, Jesus Christ willingly stood in our place. He took upon Himself our sins, our pains, weaknesses, and sorrows. Then, through His Resurrection, He broke the bands of death and opened the way for every one of us.
The Book of Mormon teaches that Christ suffered “pains and afflictions and temptations of every kind” so He would know how to succor His people. [4] His Atonement reaches into our past, and strengthens us in our present struggles, and gives us hope for the future. Regardless of what we have done, what we are facing, or what weakness we may still have, Christ created an opening for us to return to Heavenly Father. He has breached the door, and He has left it open. However, He does not force us through it. He invites us to choose Him, to exercise faith, repent, make and keep covenants, and continue along the covenant path. As the Son of God stood in the flesh before the people of Jerusalem, Pilate told them to “Behold the man!” and to see Jesus as He truly was. [5] President Dieter F. Uchtdorf said, “Those who find a way to truly behold the Man find the doorway to life’s greatest joys and the balm to life’s most demanding despairs.
So, when you are encompassed by sorrows and grief, behold the Man.
When you feel lost or forgotten, behold the Man.
When you are despairing, deserted, doubting, damaged, or defeated, behold the Man.
He will comfort you.
He will heal you and give you meaning to your journey. He will pour out His Spirit and fill your heart with exceeding joy.
He gives ‘power to the faint; and to them that have no might he increaseth strength.’” [6]
In John 10:9, the Savior declares, “I am the door: by me if any man enter in, he shall be saved.” [7] As the Facilities Management director, I may hold keys to many doors on this campus, but none of those keys can open the door that matters most. That door is opened only through Jesus Christ. He made the way, and now He asks us to help others find it. Ministering is not about fixing people—that is the Savior’s role. It is not about carrying everyone’s burdens forever—Christ is already doing that. Our role is to stand shoulder to shoulder, lift the hands that hang down, strengthen the feeble knees, and create an opening motivated by love.
Some of you are here because someone breached for you. Now ask yourself: Who is standing on my right? Who is standing on my left? Whose life could be better because I am willing to stand beside them? What am I willing to sacrifice so someone else can have an opportunity to come closer to Jesus Christ? When that answer becomes clear, do not wait for someone else to act. Carry your friend. Lift the roof. Create the opening. Then make the breach.
Making the breach is not just a metaphor in our family, but one my son is currently doing now. Elder Lopez, is serving a mission for The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints in Yakima Washington, and is actively making openings to bring others to the Savior. Brothers and sisters, missions are powerful. Serving a mission can bring so much joy onto the people’s lives that you serve, onto your own life, and onto your family’s life back at home. It may not be easy, but it is worth it. Because God is a God of miracles, this is His true gospel on the earth today. I testify to you that I know the power of this gospel. You can hold it in your hands as you read from the word of God. The Book of Mormon and the Bible are tools given to us by loving heavenly parents to help us answer the questions of our soul. I testify that as you kneel in prayer, God will answer you. It may not be in your own way or in your own time, but He is always there, always listening and is actively making opportunities for you. In times of difficulty, let Him carry you and then carry someone else. We were never meant to breach alone.
I say this in the name of Jesus Christ, amen.
Notes:
[1] Doctrine and Covenants 81:5
[2] Mark 2:1-12
[3] Patrick Kearon, “God’s Intent Is to Bring You Home,” Liahona, May 2024, 89
[4] Alma 7:11-12
[5] John 19:5
[6] Dieter F. Uchtdorf, “Behold the Man!,” Ensign or Liahona, May 2018, 109-110
[7] John 10:9