October 2026 General Conference Recap—Saturday Afternoon Session

The Saturday afternoon session of the 196th Semiannual General Conference of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints continued at the Conference Center in Salt Lake City, Utah, with Elder Neil L. Andersen of the Quorum of the Twelve Apostles conducting and President Dallin H. Oaks presiding. Church members around the world joined the broadcast for another session of worship and instruction.

Music for the session was provided by a choir of men and women from northern Utah, directed by Jane Fjeldsted, with Joseph Peoples and Linda Margetts at the organ.

Elder Dale G. Renlund

Remembering what God has already done helps us trust that His promises apply personally to us, even when present difficulties demand our attention.

Key Quotes

• “When our faith is centered on Jesus Christ, He promises spiritual peace no matter our circumstances. We can experience joy in our here and now because of Him and through our covenant relationship with Him.”
• “Faith in Jesus Christ frees us from uncertainty, because our hope rests on His faithfulness and righteousness, not our own.”
• “Ample provision means that all human circumstances are within the Savior’s redemptive reach.”

Key Teachings

Elder Dale G. Renlund recalled a patient who survived two heart transplants and multiple organ failures, then complained about his breakfast shortly before leaving the hospital. His frustration illustrated how immediate difficulties can eclipse extraordinary blessings: “We focus on the here and now, the cold oatmeal, and lose sight of the bigger picture, both where we’ve been and God’s promises to us.”

The children of Israel similarly lost trust in God and Moses despite the miracles that sustained them, eventually doubting their prospects in the promised land. Elder Renlund pointed to the Savior’s victory as the foundation for peace amid tribulation, declaring, “Jesus overcame the world.”

Drawing on Lehi’s teaching to Jacob, Elder Renlund explained that redemption comes through Jesus Christ’s righteousness. Remembering God’s mercy helps us recognize the larger picture and rely on His promises, because “Faith in Jesus Christ frees us from uncertainty, because our hope rests on His faithfulness and righteousness, not our own.”

His sister Linda once imagined an asterisk excluding her from scriptural blessings, but eventually recognized that those promises included her. Elder Renlund urged listeners to erase any imagined exclusion and explained the reach of Christ’s redemption: “There is more than enough to cover any breach, need, or deficit for all of us, for each of us.”

He concluded by encouraging listeners to remember the times the Savior had heard them, particularly when present frustrations obscured their perspective. His testimony affirmed that God’s promises will be fulfilled and are personally available to every listener.

President Timothy L. Farnes

Taking upon ourselves the name of Jesus Christ means seeing the people God places in our path and ministering to them with compassion.

Key Quotes

• “As covenant followers of Jesus Christ, we minister with compassion to whomever God places in our path, we do it because that’s what the Savior did, and we’ve made a covenant to follow Him.”
• “It means that when someone encounters us, they should experience something of Jesus Christ, His kindness, His patience, His hope, His love, His compassion.”
• “Brothers and sisters, let us pray every day for eyes to see the divine appointments God places before us.”

Key Teachings

Elder Timothy L. Farnes recalled feeling discouraged while balancing family, business, and Church responsibilities, until Elder Dallin H. Oaks listened compassionately during an unexpected encounter in the temple. That kindness restored his desire to serve and illustrated his teaching about following Jesus Christ: “His life should be reflected in ours.”

Partaking of the sacrament includes witnessing our willingness to take upon ourselves the name of Jesus Christ, a commitment that shapes our daily interactions. Elder Farnes explained, “We make the covenant during sacred time with God every Sunday; a way we keep the covenant is by ministering to God’s children every day.”

The Savior’s account of the good Samaritan illustrated how recognizing another person’s need can awaken compassion and lead to action. Describing the Savior’s own ministry, Elder Farnes emphasized, “To Jesus, these people were not interrupting His mission; they were His mission.”

Elder Farnes and his wife helped a frightened young missionary navigate an unfamiliar flight, discovering how simple acts of assistance could turn an ordinary encounter into a divine appointment. He invited listeners to pray for eyes to recognize such opportunities and urged, “Let us put compassion into action and minister to the person in front of us.”

Elder Christian C. Chigbundu

Spiritual immunity grows through small and simple acts of devotion that help us withstand life’s challenges.

Key Quotes

• “When we study the scriptures, we get knowledge. But more importantly, we come to know the Lord as we apply what we learn.”
• “As we remember Jesus Christ throughout the week and strive to keep His commandments, our lives are gradually refined and reshaped.”
• “Making covenants and staying on the covenant path are inseparable companions. Covenants create a bond between us and God.”

Key Teachings

Elder Christian C. Chigbundu reflected on lessons about physical immunity during the COVID-19 pandemic to introduce spiritual immunity as strength to withstand life’s troubles. “As we build our spiritual immunity, we develop the strength and courage to withstand the challenges of life.”

Scripture study helps us know the Lord and allows His words to change our thinking and responses to difficulty. After describing a missionary whose daily study helped him find purpose and happiness, Elder Chigbundu invited, “My friends, I invite you to study the scriptures diligently, that you may know the word of God.”

Prayer draws us closer to Heavenly Father and helps us recognize the Savior’s love, as illustrated by a woman battling cancer who felt His reassuring presence through daily prayer. Elder Chigbundu taught, “As we pray in faith, our spiritual immunity will be strengthened.”

The sacrament strengthens our relationship with Jesus Christ as we promise to take His name upon us, remember Him, and keep His commandments. “As we remember Jesus Christ throughout the week and strive to keep His commandments, our lives are gradually refined and reshaped.”

Covenants bind us to God, and temple worship helps us remain on the covenant path and receive personal direction through trials. Elder Chigbundu concluded by inviting listeners to remember scripture study, prayer, the sacrament, and covenants as small and simple practices that provide spiritual protection.

Elder Patricio M. Giuffra

Paying tithing expresses faith in the Lord and trust that He fulfills His promises in His own time and way.

Key Quotes

• “Commandments are given to draw us closer to the Savior, to protect us and to help us remain free from sin and many of the challenges the world presents.”
• “Even when we don’t understand the purpose of our trials, we can have the assurance that the Lord knows our circumstances, honors our obedience and fulfills His promises in His own time and way.”
• “I testify that the law of tithing is a law of faith.”

Key Teachings

Elder Patricio M. Giuffra recalled teaching an older woman in Chile whose earnings barely covered rent, firewood, and food, leaving her afraid she could not afford to pay tithing. After he sought counsel from his mission president and the missionaries prayed and fasted, she prayed for Heavenly Father’s help, chose baptism, and faithfully paid tithing and fast offerings.

Drawing on his family’s experiences, Elder Giuffra described both temporal and spiritual blessings from paying tithing and offerings, emphasizing that love for God should motivate obedience. He explained, “Commandments are given to draw us closer to the Savior, to protect us and to help us remain free from sin and many of the challenges the world presents.”

He acknowledged that obedience does not spare us from financial hardship, illness, loss, or uncertainty. “Yet, even when we don’t understand the purpose of our trials, we can have the assurance that the Lord knows our circumstances, honors our obedience and fulfills His promises in His own time and way,” he taught.

During his service in Central America, Elder Giuffra witnessed greater financial stability, opportunities for employment and education, stronger marriages, and increased peace and hope among faithful people. After sharing President Dallin H. Oaks’s teaching that tithing prepares us for consecration and temple covenants, he concluded, “I testify that the law of tithing is a law of faith.”

Elder Jeremiah J. Morgan

Covenants with God extend across generations, reaching descendants through His enduring power and love.

Key Quotes

• “No time or effort is ever wasted in reading the Book of Mormon. Not for you, not for your children, not for your family, not for anyone.”
• “Though the covenant faithfulness of parents and grandparents does not alter the agency of children or grandchildren, there is a discernible impact of those covenants on all our posterity.”
• “If you are wondering whether you or a loved one has wandered so far away that the love of God and His covenantal power cannot reach you, I say to you, you have not.”

Key Teachings

Elder Jeremiah J. Morgan grew up in another church that believed in the Book of Mormon and Joseph Smith, with a single mother who read the book aloud to him every day. Although he remembered little of the reading, her example established its importance and truth, teaching him that “No time or effort is ever wasted in reading the Book of Mormon.”

At age 14, he attended both his family’s congregation and, secretly, a congregation of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, gaining a testimony before he could join. Years later, his wife connected his spiritual journey to his ancestors’ temple covenants in Nauvoo, and he explained, “It was covenants that had impacted me, not my covenants, but those that came before me.”

Covenants influence descendants while preserving their agency, and the Lord’s covenant with Enos illustrated how fulfillment can extend across thousands of years. Elder Morgan taught, “Like the great binding power of gravity that stretches across the universe, covenants with God stretch over all time and all space.”

The Savior’s Atonement fulfills God’s greatest promise, assuring those worried about wandering loved ones that His love and covenant power can still reach them. Elder Morgan urged listeners to keep their covenants, act faithfully, and trust God’s timing, declaring, “I testify that the infinite power of God is in our covenants.”

Elder Hutch U. Fale

Understanding our identity as children of a loving Heavenly Father helps us follow Jesus Christ and recognize the divine worth of others.

Key Quotes

• “Understanding our Father’s love and our true identity as His children is essential for our daily and eternal happiness. It prevents deception and gives purpose to this mortal life.”
• “Receiving Christ through priesthood ordinances and covenants, and then being faithful to those covenants is the only way for us to fully understand His love and the only way to exaltation.”
• “Understanding our Father’s love protects us from the pernicious lie that it is too late for someone to change, too late for someone to turn to Christ, and too late to receive His redeeming grace.”

Key Teachings

Elder Hutch U. Fale taught that every person is a beloved child of God with a divine nature and destiny. He explained, “It is often through families, despite all their imperfections, that our Father teaches us about His love.”

After showing his children their baby pictures, Elder Fale explained that they had done nothing to earn their parents’ love and could never lose it. He extended that assurance to those without loving earthly families: “Even when a loving family is not part of our earthly experience, knowing that our Heavenly Father loves us can provide power, peace, and comfort, especially as we remember the eternal blessings that await all who make and keep sacred covenants, including all the blessings of an eternal family.”

God’s enduring love does not mean people can reject His Son and disregard repentance and covenants while expecting salvation. Understanding the Father’s love helps us understand Christ’s efforts to save His children and encourages us to join His work.

That understanding also changes how we regard others, protecting us from divisive labels and encouraging repentance, compassion, and inclusion. Elder Fale taught, “We become quick to repent, slow to judge, and ever hopeful that the best is yet before us.”

Through His victory over sin and death, His ministry, and priesthood keys held by living prophets and apostles, Jesus Christ demonstrates the Father’s continuing love. Recalling his childhood witness of John 3:16—“For God so loved the world, that he gave his only begotten Son”—Elder Fale affirmed that Christ, His restored Church, and the divine pattern of families testify of that love.

Elder Patrick Kearon

Jesus Christ lifts us spiritually as we turn toward Him, respond to the Holy Spirit, and help others rise with us.

Key Quotes

• “Through the amazing grace of Jesus Christ, we can avoid spiritual sink and find spiritual lift.”
• “How easy it is to slowly slip from spiritual heights we’ve worked so hard to climb when we neglect the practices and behaviors that brought us there.”
• “We can learn to live in spiritual lift, and when we sink, our gentle Savior is there to lift us up as we turn to Him.”

Key Teachings

Elder Patrick Kearon described learning to fly a glider as a teenager, finding invisible rising air that carried him upward and turning away from sinking air that threatened his flight. Years later, those experiences helped him recognize spiritual principles: “At the heart of our faith is the glorious truth that we have an adoring Father in heaven, whose Son, our Savior, loves to lift.”

The Savior lifted Peter from the waves, raised Jairus’s daughter from death, and took a healed boy by the hand to lift him up. Elder Kearon explained, “Spiritual lift cannot be seen, but as we learn to discern and act upon the sensitive impressions of the Holy Spirit, we can feel it as surely as I felt the rising air lift a wing beneath me.”

A glider gradually descends when it is not climbing, and spiritual decline can likewise go unnoticed when we neglect the habits that brought us closer to God. Ammon’s account of people moving from darkness into “everlasting light, encircled about with the matchless bounty of God’s love” illustrated the profound joy of redemption.

Recognizing the peaceful feelings that draw us toward Christ also helps us guide others toward Him. Elder Kearon taught, “Helping others turn from sink and into the lift of Jesus Christ is our glorious opportunity and brings joy beyond compare.”

His concluding counsel included learning from a faithful guide, following the Holy Spirit, joining those who are rising, and helping others find lift. He urged, “We simply need to keep turning toward the Savior into the source of lift and keep choosing to rise into the light rather than drift imperceptibly into the shadow.”

Elder Michael A. Dunn

Jesus Christ helps us endure life’s burdens by carrying what we cannot and strengthening us to continue.

Key Quotes

• “In other words, the Redeemer rescues not by shortening our course, but by helping us lengthen our stride.”
• “Any time we turn to Christ, we turn a corner.”
• “Well, to those who are nearing their mile 90, bearing the unimaginable, or if you feel like I did, both depleted and defeated, I promise that as you expend even your last drop of energy to ask, His helping hand will ultimately give you that much-needed leg up, and even when the outcome or the timing is not what you pled for, take solace, knowing that feeling broken does not mean you’ve been abandoned by God.”

Key Teachings

Elder Michael A. Dunn described entering a 100-mile ultramarathon with encouragement from his experienced running partner, Ted, who promised to accompany him through the difficult second half. When Elder Dunn collapsed at mile 90 and wanted to quit, Ted helped him continue, illustrating how the Savior supports people who feel unable to take another step.

A photograph later revealed that Ted had quietly carried Elder Dunn’s water bottles and pack during the final 10 miles, lifting a burden Elder Dunn had not realized his friend was bearing. Connecting that discovery to the Savior’s often unseen help, Elder Dunn taught, “In other words, the Redeemer rescues not by shortening our course, but by helping us lengthen our stride.”

Turning to the Savior opens us to His grace and to assistance that can come through other people, even when we do not recognize His presence. “Any time we turn to Christ, we turn a corner,” Elder Dunn said, explaining that Jesus Christ knows both the path we travel and our divine potential.

Elder Dunn encouraged those who feel depleted to ask for the Savior’s help, while acknowledging that answers may come with different timing or outcomes than they sought. He urged listeners to “take solace, knowing that feeling broken does not mean you’ve been abandoned by God,” concluding that the Savior can increase our courage and capacity to keep moving forward.

Elder Matthew J. Eyring

Jesus Christ provides divine comfort through the Holy Ghost when we face burdens we cannot carry or resolve ourselves.

Key Quotes

• “All of us, regardless of experience, talent, or willpower, will sooner or later encounter burdens we cannot possibly carry ourselves.”
• “Without divine comfort, we risk losing hope, and without hope, we can lose our faith and stop trying.”
• “Living worthy of the constant companionship of the Holy Ghost should be one of our highest priorities.”

Key Teachings

Elder Matthew J. Eyring opened with a friend’s helplessness after his son’s unexpected death and described comforting a couple who had lost a twin before birth, a loss he and his wife had also experienced. These experiences illustrated the limits of self-reliance: “All of us, regardless of experience, talent, or willpower, will sooner or later encounter burdens we cannot possibly carry ourselves.”

Whether listeners face hunger, illness, loneliness, strained relationships, or persistent habits, Elder Eyring urged them to protect their faith and turn to Jesus Christ. He explained why the Savior can offer personal comfort: “He knows exactly how we feel, especially in our darkest and most trying times.”

Answers come on the Lord’s timetable and may include tools, resources, and help from others, guided by the Spirit. Elder Eyring emphasized the need for the Holy Ghost amid increasing turbulence, warning, “Without divine comfort, we risk losing hope, and without hope, we can lose our faith and stop trying.”

Drawing on President Dallin H. Oaks’s teachings about resurrection, Elder Eyring explained that mortal limitations and even death are temporary through Jesus Christ. He placed present suffering within the Savior’s eternal work: “Even as He comforts us through temporary times of challenge and pain, He has prepared our rescue from permanent tragedy.”

Returning to the grieving couple, Elder Eyring described giving the father a priesthood blessing that promised peace through his loss and throughout his life. He concluded by teaching that the Holy Ghost conveys the Savior’s peace through inevitable hardships and urging, “Living worthy of the constant companionship of the Holy Ghost should be one of our highest priorities.”

Elder Ronald A. Rasband

Jesus Christ can change the hearts of loved ones who have turned away from Him, and we can entrust our anguish to Him while continuing to love them.

Key Quotes

• “We love our family members and friends profoundly, but they are foremost children of our Father in Heaven, who knows and loves them even more than we do.”
• “Love is being interested in their lives, their successes, and their challenges. Love is being there with arms outstretched and a cheerful countenance.”
• “First, let go of any guilt. We fail only when we give up, and we stop trying. So never, never give up on those you love.”

Key Teachings

Elder Ronald A. Rasband addressed the heartache of watching loved ones abandon faith and covenants, acknowledging that attempts to pressure them can deepen the divide. “By design, brothers and sisters, everyone must choose for themselves to follow Jesus Christ.”

He urged listeners to surrender their despair to the Savior, who can reach hearts they cannot change themselves. “By the power of Jesus Christ’s Atonement, there is always a way back.”

Elder Rasband explained that love involves continued interest, kindness, and support without sanctioning another person’s choices. “Love is lifting with faith and hope in our Lord and Savior.”

Alma the Younger’s transformation illustrated the power of faithful prayer and remembered teachings about Jesus Christ, while the prodigal son’s return showed the importance of a home where love remains available. Elder Rasband taught, “Love, brothers and sisters, is the answer to connecting with all of our loved ones.”

He concluded with three suggestions: release guilt without giving up, follow President Thomas S. Monson’s counsel to value a person above a problem, and seek Jesus Christ through study and earnest prayer. His concluding promise assured listeners that the adversary’s storms need not drag them into misery when they are built upon Jesus Christ.

What quote from Saturday afternoon do you want to remember? Share your thoughts in the comments!

Holly Wallace

Holly Wallace is a writer and storyteller drawn to meaningful questions and overlooked details. Her work explores Latter-day Saint life and culture through faithful inquiry, inviting readers to pause, consider, and engage more deeply with what matters most.