Agency, Priesthood, and Black Powder

Keep in mind some choices and their consequences are immediate. Some are not. For instance, here is a balloon and a pin. It is not hard to predict the outcome. However, the choices you are making at this stage of your life will not necessarily have immediate consequences. In fact, the consequences may take a lifetime and longer.

The Evidence of Things Not Seen

 True believers will always be challenged by those who refuse to see. In a very real sense, believing is seeing. No member of the Church need feel embarrassed when they cannot produce the golden plates or the complete Egyptian papyrus. No member of this Church should ever feel hesitant to bear testimony of those verities that remain in the realm of faith. 

In a State of Happiness
 

 All that our Father gives to us and all that He requires of us is designed to promote the very happiness that is the object of the plan and of our existence. Obedience is neither a chore nor a burden; rather, it is the source of true happiness in both mortality and eternity. We do not yield or give up our happiness when we obey. Obeying causes happiness.

Friendship, Courtship, Physical Relationship 

If friendship is of such paramount importance in the teachings of our prophets and our Savior, shouldn’t we be striving to be great, covenant-keeping friends? To be such a friend is Christ-like; to have such friends is heavenly…. Our goal should be to spend eternity enjoying the sociality of Christ and Christ-like others.