"The gospel of the Savior is not simply about avoiding bad in our lives; it also is essentially about doing and becoming good. And the Atonement provides help for us to overcome and avoid bad and to do and become good. There is help from the Savior for the entire journey of life - from bad to good to better and to change our very nature."
- Elder David A. Bednar
One of the main things non-members with whom I interact focus on is the things that we, as members of the church, are not allowed to do. Things like the Word of Wisdom and tithing come up (even though these elements exist in many other religions as well), and they wonder how I can choose to live such a life. Of course, many of these same conversations talk about how friendly Mormon's are, and those who are better acquainted with the Church comment on how they are impressed with our humanitarian efforts.
As Elder Bednar suggests, the church is not just about denying ourselves worldly things. It is about improving ourselves - about becoming perfect (see Matthew 5:48). On their website, the Church now has sections that talk about how we can become more independent through avoiding the shackles of the world such as debt and addiction, how we can prepare ourselves for whatever contingencies might arise in our lives, and in short about improving our life. Of course, all of these temporal preparations will avail us nothing without the Atonement. As we strive to become perfect, we will make mistakes. Because of the Atonement, however, we can overcome those errors and have hope that the path we are on will lead us towards perfection and our Heavenly home.
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
No comments:
Post a Comment