“All truly wise thoughts have been thought already thousands of times; but to make them truly ours, we must think them over again honestly, till they take root in our personal experience." -Johann Wolfgang Von Goethe
Something like what Goethe was saying – this definitely is not an original thought. But why not add to the “thousands of times” it’s been thought about.
People don’t get addicted to reading the scriptures. When was the last time you heard someone say to you, “I just can’t stop myself from going to the temple?” Does a bishop ever help people control a compulsive desire to pray too much? I know that’s ridiculous, but hear me out. To illustrate, let’s say… carrots. You decide to start eating lots of carrots. Maybe you’re a rabbit – none of my business. But after weeks of eating lots of carrots everyday would you find it hard to stop? No! You might miss eating carrots, but you wouldn’t find yourself having to exercise a lot of self-control to keep yourself from the fridge. It’s the same with good habits. Why is that?
In the simplest terms – the very simplest terms – it seems to me that good things make you free. They make you free to choose more good and to stop doing good if you wanted. Not only does it keep you free to make choices, doing the good strengthens your desire to keep doing the good. The bad on the other hand, keeps you in bondage - as we like to put it. The deeper you find yourself in destructive habits the less free you become. It’s just harder to stop.
The Gospel is all about freedom – freedom to choose good from evil. But when we choose the “evil,” we lose our freedom to choose the good. When we choose the Gospel, not only have we chosen the good, we’re free to keep choosing the good. In other words, we’re free.
Isn’t that
Keep eating your carrots.
“And under this head ye are made free, and there is no other head whereby ye can be made free. There is no other name given whereby salvation cometh; therefore I would that ye should take upon you the name of Christ, all you that have entered into the covenant with God that ye should be obedient unto the end of your lives.” Mosiah 5:8
"He hath given unto you that ye might know good from evil, and he hath given unto you that ye might choose life or death; and ye can do good and be restored unto that which is good, or have that which is good restored unto you; or ye can do evil, and have that which is evil restored unto you." Helaman 14:31
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