Sunday, March 20, 2011

Sunday thoughts

Today the topic of our sacrament meeting was choice. The rights and responsibilities of free agency. I love this subject. (Except when it applies to my children, then I struggle sometimes.)

A young woman spoke who is leaving for the Belgium/Netherlands mission. She gave a great talk and was obviously an inspired choice for this topic, as she really seemed to have a lot of experience in this regard.

  • We are free to choose, but we cannot choose the consequences of those choices. It's the law of the harvest – you cannot plant carrots and expect to harvest corn.
  • Some choices that will affect our future success and happiness need only be made once. Make them early and stick by them.
  • The best choice is to follow Christ, and he will help us to make other freeing decisions.
  • At one point in her adolescence, she was prompted that she needed to become fully and completely honest. She worked hard toward this end and was rewarded with an unexpected consequence of increased confidence and lightheartedness because she no longer had anything to hide. (I had this same experience.)
  • She said that the Savior has freed her from addiction, an eating disorder, and various insecurities. (I love this concept, that the atonement can free us from any form of shackles, whether physical or spiritual.)
  • Our bishop stood at the end and reminded us that our agency came at a very dear price, and that we should do all we can to respect both our ability to choose and our responsibility to choose well – and then accept the consequences of those choices, for good or for ill.

3 comments:

Jill said...

This is definitely a bittersweet topic when our children are involved. I am so glad I understand this concept and am always trying to make (and teach) good choices. It's frightening to think how drastically things can (or could have) changed because of a few key decisions.

Claire said...

I think the fifth point is my favorite because it is something I have been experiencing a lot recently.
I love, love, love how the Atonement helps us to overcome all our bad habits and also helps us to accomplish any worthy goals we may have set for ourselves. It is so empowering and I am so grateful to the Savior for His gift!

jt said...

I really like this point:
Some choices that will affect our future success and happiness need only be made once. Make them early and stick by them.
Oh, to remember that daily.
when did you have a similar experience with honesty?
The last point made me remember something I read recently (source?) that said that 'free' agency is a misnomer. It's a colloquialism, and our agency was definitely NOT free.

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