The Commandments = Freedom
Imagine you volunteered to be part of a social experiment. They put you and a bunch of other people on an island and told you to build a boat in order to leave the island. Those are the only instructions you are given. You look around and there are no tools. There are trees but you can't even begin to figure out how you are supposed to build a boat with no tools whatsoever. You and the others are pretty much in chaos. Some of you are trying fruitlessly to throw some things together to build a boat: branches and leaves and even a few fallen logs. A few others have decided it's going to be impossible to get off the island. I mean, how in the world do they expect you to build a boat with no tools whatsoever? This is NOT what they signed up for. So instead, they focus on making camp and surviving until the experiment is over. Then there are others who pretty much fed up with this whole thing so they start yelling for the people who put them there. "I didn't sign up for this!" they yell, "Get me off this island!" Meanwhile, they make no preparations to care for or feed themselves. It sounds pretty chaotic.
Now imagine, after a while, a letter is sent to the island with instructions on where you and everyone else can go to find tools that have been hidden on the island. Further, they instruct you on what food can be found on the island. They tell you what berries are poisonous and warn you about certain snakes that can be deadly. They tell you what kind of wood will be the best for building a boat. Shoot. They even give you a set of blueprints for building a boat that will be sufficiently large enough for everyone to ride in.
So immediately the tools are found, however, contention immediately arises because one guy in the group insists that he knows a better design that will be easier to build. After all, after only a few days, all anyone wants to do is just leave! The people end up being divided because some want to follow the instructions while the others want to go with what that guy said.
A couple people want to have nothing to do with building the boat. "This is ridiculous," they think. "If we just stay here long enough, someone will come get us."
Meanwhile, some are building boats. As time goes on, the work is frustrated as disagreements arise as to how to interpret the blueprints. Still others have decided to ignore the blueprints altogether. They are coming up with their own design. They note that the blueprints seem to be especially cumbersome to deal with because some parts of the design seem unnecessary.
One particular group of people spends a lot of their time scoffing at those building boats because they point out that there was no map included in the instructions. "If we build a boat, how will we know where to go? We could be lost at sea!"
There also those pleasure-seekers that decide they'll just enjoy their time on this island, eating and drinking and laying on the beach, not participating in the effort to get off the island.
A few become careless and forget about the warnings concerning the poisonous snakes and are bitten and die.
As soon as there are real deaths, many become distraught. Something is very very wrong. People should not be dying. There is much wailing, complaining, plots of revenge against those people who have orchestrated this experiment.
Meanwhile, a small group of people have been working diligently with the long discarded blueprint and instructions. They follow each instruction as well as they can. They work day in and day out constructing this boat, being careful to follow the other instructions in the letter. They eat well. They spend their days working and actually kind of enjoy the time away and the challenge of building the boat. They make mistakes along the way and the work is incredibly slow, but they keep at it until eventually they have a seaworthy craft.
The letter that was sent to these people is like the commandments. You know, in case you didn't catch on to that. People are often immediately turned off by all of the rules we follow in the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints. And people rarely take the commandments seriously thinking that something that was written so many thousands of years ago cannot possibly apply to us today OR that God is so outdated he wouldn't be giving us new words like The Word of Wisdom. The rules, they claim, keep us narrow-minded, keep us trapped, keep us from having fun, from enjoying life to its fullest.
I contest that they are a great blessing. Life can feel like being thrown on a deserted island with no instructions. It was by God's goodness that we were given instructions, not desiring that we should walk aimlessly. He gave them yet many of us believe that they are merely guidelines and should only be employed when it fits into our own personal system of ethics or when society agrees.
However when we do follow those instructions as best as we know how, we find a contentment in the work, a freedom from the chaos that so easily engulfs the rest of the world. It's freeing to know where you're going and what you are doing to get there. We all want to get off the island. We all do.
Then there are those who believe that grace has rendered the commandments unnecessary. Christ gave us the gift of His atonement so we can just sit back and allow the free gift to change our lives. I reject this idea that what we do in this life doesn't mean anything... that all we have to do is accept Christ's atonement and bam, we're saved. If all I have to do is that, I'd like do die exactly after I say the magic words, thank-you very much. Life is much too hard for all this to mean nothing.
To me, everything I do, everything I say, every choice I make matters. It shapes who I become and whether I am am closer to being like Christ who will, if I ask, make up the difference by His grace. But grace is given after we have done all we can. Otherwise, this is a worthless life. And a god who would put me through this kind of hell just for entertainment's purposes is NOT my god. So it doesn't matter if the task of building a boat on a deserted island seems impossible, I will be anxiously engaged in that cause by following the blueprints I have been given because people make mistakes and their blueprints will always be flawed. God's are not. And I'm happy when I do. Because I'm not wasting the time I've been given here in this life. I know where I'm going. And as I said before, there's nothing worse than not knowing where you're going and not being able to place a value on every moment of your life. I place great value on every moment of my life. The commandments are not just the Law of Moses. They aren't obsolete. They allow us to stay on the path of self-perfection that we embark upon in this life and keep us free from the temptations that so commonly beset us. When we choose not to follow them in pursuit of "freedom" we almost always ensnare ourselves in the addictions of diverse kinds that will hold our will captive and take away that very freedom we thought we were embracing.
Obeying the commandments keeps me free. I love this Church that strives to remind me every day of those things I should be doing. I'm grateful for modern revelation that addresses issues of our time and helps me to navigate what only becomes a more and more difficult world to live in.
The commandments are my gateway to freedom.
Now imagine, after a while, a letter is sent to the island with instructions on where you and everyone else can go to find tools that have been hidden on the island. Further, they instruct you on what food can be found on the island. They tell you what berries are poisonous and warn you about certain snakes that can be deadly. They tell you what kind of wood will be the best for building a boat. Shoot. They even give you a set of blueprints for building a boat that will be sufficiently large enough for everyone to ride in.
So immediately the tools are found, however, contention immediately arises because one guy in the group insists that he knows a better design that will be easier to build. After all, after only a few days, all anyone wants to do is just leave! The people end up being divided because some want to follow the instructions while the others want to go with what that guy said.
A couple people want to have nothing to do with building the boat. "This is ridiculous," they think. "If we just stay here long enough, someone will come get us."
Meanwhile, some are building boats. As time goes on, the work is frustrated as disagreements arise as to how to interpret the blueprints. Still others have decided to ignore the blueprints altogether. They are coming up with their own design. They note that the blueprints seem to be especially cumbersome to deal with because some parts of the design seem unnecessary.
One particular group of people spends a lot of their time scoffing at those building boats because they point out that there was no map included in the instructions. "If we build a boat, how will we know where to go? We could be lost at sea!"
There also those pleasure-seekers that decide they'll just enjoy their time on this island, eating and drinking and laying on the beach, not participating in the effort to get off the island.
A few become careless and forget about the warnings concerning the poisonous snakes and are bitten and die.
As soon as there are real deaths, many become distraught. Something is very very wrong. People should not be dying. There is much wailing, complaining, plots of revenge against those people who have orchestrated this experiment.
Meanwhile, a small group of people have been working diligently with the long discarded blueprint and instructions. They follow each instruction as well as they can. They work day in and day out constructing this boat, being careful to follow the other instructions in the letter. They eat well. They spend their days working and actually kind of enjoy the time away and the challenge of building the boat. They make mistakes along the way and the work is incredibly slow, but they keep at it until eventually they have a seaworthy craft.
The letter that was sent to these people is like the commandments. You know, in case you didn't catch on to that. People are often immediately turned off by all of the rules we follow in the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints. And people rarely take the commandments seriously thinking that something that was written so many thousands of years ago cannot possibly apply to us today OR that God is so outdated he wouldn't be giving us new words like The Word of Wisdom. The rules, they claim, keep us narrow-minded, keep us trapped, keep us from having fun, from enjoying life to its fullest.
I contest that they are a great blessing. Life can feel like being thrown on a deserted island with no instructions. It was by God's goodness that we were given instructions, not desiring that we should walk aimlessly. He gave them yet many of us believe that they are merely guidelines and should only be employed when it fits into our own personal system of ethics or when society agrees.
However when we do follow those instructions as best as we know how, we find a contentment in the work, a freedom from the chaos that so easily engulfs the rest of the world. It's freeing to know where you're going and what you are doing to get there. We all want to get off the island. We all do.
Then there are those who believe that grace has rendered the commandments unnecessary. Christ gave us the gift of His atonement so we can just sit back and allow the free gift to change our lives. I reject this idea that what we do in this life doesn't mean anything... that all we have to do is accept Christ's atonement and bam, we're saved. If all I have to do is that, I'd like do die exactly after I say the magic words, thank-you very much. Life is much too hard for all this to mean nothing.
To me, everything I do, everything I say, every choice I make matters. It shapes who I become and whether I am am closer to being like Christ who will, if I ask, make up the difference by His grace. But grace is given after we have done all we can. Otherwise, this is a worthless life. And a god who would put me through this kind of hell just for entertainment's purposes is NOT my god. So it doesn't matter if the task of building a boat on a deserted island seems impossible, I will be anxiously engaged in that cause by following the blueprints I have been given because people make mistakes and their blueprints will always be flawed. God's are not. And I'm happy when I do. Because I'm not wasting the time I've been given here in this life. I know where I'm going. And as I said before, there's nothing worse than not knowing where you're going and not being able to place a value on every moment of your life. I place great value on every moment of my life. The commandments are not just the Law of Moses. They aren't obsolete. They allow us to stay on the path of self-perfection that we embark upon in this life and keep us free from the temptations that so commonly beset us. When we choose not to follow them in pursuit of "freedom" we almost always ensnare ourselves in the addictions of diverse kinds that will hold our will captive and take away that very freedom we thought we were embracing.
Obeying the commandments keeps me free. I love this Church that strives to remind me every day of those things I should be doing. I'm grateful for modern revelation that addresses issues of our time and helps me to navigate what only becomes a more and more difficult world to live in.
The commandments are my gateway to freedom.
WoW very thought provoking especially for me...because you know what, I do not know where I am going!
ReplyDeleteBeautifully stated.
ReplyDeleteAWESOME Blog post!
ReplyDelete