In Utah, a debate is currently going on related to whether the Utah government should promote "school choice", meaning that the government is proposing giving tax money to those not in the public school system, thereby allowing them to pay for private school or homeschool. Some people feel that the government saves money when kids aren’t in the public school system, but the families of those in private school or homeschool still pay the taxes. Due to this, some want the money that would have gone to public school to go instead to help pay for the other types of school selected by the parents.
 
While it can be appealing at first to have additional money come into our bank account, there is a reason to be extremely wary of situations where the government offers money. It is to understand the power that comes to a government that redistributes tax money.
 
Money is becoming the root of modern regulation, allowing the government to regulate more than it could before. The Founding Fathers established a system of checks and balances to put limits in place on what the government could regulate, but money is proving to be a way to circumvent many of those limits.
 
Consider the lessons learned from Covid-19 so far. The federal government issued a variety of mandates concerning vaccinations. Some of these were upheld by the Supreme Court and some were not. Notably, the vaccine mandate that the Supreme Court upheld related to health care workers.
 
Basically, any healthcare entity that receives federal funds through Medicaid or Medicare has to follow the vaccine mandate imposed by the federal government. In other words, entities that received federal funds were subject to the political whims of the President, as the President is allowed in some situations to say what “guidelines” or “requirements” are associated with those funds.
 
It hasn’t always been this way though. As the federal government grew in size over the years, the Supreme Court became more and more involved in telling Congress and the President “no” to various laws that were passed. Education, for example, is an area that Congress does not have constitutional power to directly regulate. So then, why is the federal government so involved in education?
 
Well, in the early 1900’s, the federal government convinced the states in America to amend the Constitution. The federal government had passed an income tax law prior to 1900, and the Supreme Court struck it down as unconstitutional. So, following this Supreme Court decision, the Constitution was amended to give the government power to institute an income tax with the 16th amendment.
 
With the power to tax income, the federal government was able to collect far higher amounts of taxes than before. With extra money in the treasury, the federal government started returning the money to the states, but only if the states followed the associated ‘guidance’ or ‘requirements’ for receiving the funds.
 
In the 1930’s, the Supreme Court heard a few cases on these issues. Ultimately, the Supreme Court concluded that Congress has the power to tax, and that Congress has the power to spend that tax money for the “general welfare”. So, according to the Supreme Court, Congress can choose to spend its money however it feels will promote the “general welfare” of those in the United States.
 
So, starting with things like Social Security, the federal government began returning money it had taken from the states with the income tax, so long as states passed laws and set up programs that were required to receive the money. No state was required to do so, but since unemployment was so high and so many people were struggling, states quickly signed up.
 
It is the same with education. The federal government began using some of the tax funds to help states fund education. No state was required to accept the funds, so technically, the federal government wasn’t passing laws that had to be followed. They only had guidance that a state could follow to get the funds or reject and not use the funds.
 
The Supreme Court determined that this type of government action was constitutionally acceptable. Since that time, federal and state governments provide funding to a wide variety of causes, entities, and people. However, Justice Butler in the case of Steward Machine Co. v. Davis prophetically stated:
 
“The provisions in question, if not amounting to coercion in a legal sense, are manifestly designed and intended directly to affect state action in the respects specified. And, if valid as so employed, this "tax and credit" device may be made effective to enable federal authorities to induce, if not indeed to compel, state enactments for any purpose within the realm of state power, and generally to control state administration of state laws.” Steward Machine Co. v. Davis, 301 US 548, 616-17 (1937).
 
In other words, he saw that the federal government could usurp all power over the states through the use of money it took from the states.
 
Since the Supreme Court allows the federal government to take our money and then return it to us with strings attached, the federal government can regulate virtually anything it wants, even if the Constitution does not allow it to otherwise. So long as an entity or state does not have to take the funds, the government can put almost any requirement or stipulation on receiving the funds that it wants to.
 
Of course, if the rules are too onerous, people won’t take the money. But, if states get used to the money, such as with education funding, it is very difficult for the state to stop accepting the funds if requirements change at any point.
 
In the corporate world, the concept of the “golden handcuffs” refers to this type of situation, where the lure of money keeps a person tied to the company or their job, even if they hate the job.
 
Since the government can regulate so much when it gives money back to people after having taken it from them, the power of the government can increase significantly. And, nobody blames the government. Instead, people simply say “you have the freedom to not take it, so what’s the big deal?”
 
The government is essentially buying our freedoms from us. When it does, it distorts the free market. Hospitals that do not take Medicaid or Medicare will significantly struggle competing with those that do. States that do not accept federal funding will either have lower amounts to spend on their students or they will have much higher taxes in the state. Families that do not take state money for private education will soon be unable to afford private education because the cost of private education will increase to the level funded by the government.
 
When the money starts to flow, it creates a strong competitive disadvantage to those that do not take it. They can’t keep up with the others as well, and the market diversity starts to languish, creating cookie-cutter type entities that all follow the same governmental regulations.
 
Currently, Utah’s proposed school choice bill will pay tax money to private schools, thereby helping more people in Utah to be able to afford private school. While the school choice bill may not start out as having many strings attached to its funds, it will give families that take the funds additional advantage over those that do not.
 
Also, the tax funds paid to private schools will enable private schools to charge more, which will lead to price increases, again making it harder for those that did not take the funds to be able to participate.
 
Ultimately though, the most serious concern is that as soon as the government starts funding something, it can start regulating it. People left the public schools to get out from under the government’s hand, so the government is now looking to buy back its ability to regulate the children outside of the public school system. Why do we want to open up those outside the system (the families, students, and private schools) to government regulation that they are working to leave behind?
 
Ultimately, it is interesting to see that this situation was prophesied of around 2000 years ago. In the Book of Revelation, John discusses the “mark of the beast”, a symbol of significant evil. Interestingly, John does not say that the government forced people to take the mark through oppressive laws. Rather, it says that the enforcement mechanism for causing all people, “both small and great, rich and poor, free and bond, to receive a mark” was that “no man might buy or sell, save he that had the mark.” Revelations 13:16-17.
 
It is important to understand that John foresaw that freedoms would be lost because we would be shut out from buying or selling. In other words, we would not have to take the mark, or the money, but if we didn’t, we couldn’t buy or sell, or have a way to live.
 
While this article is not equating the school choice bill or other government programs to the actual mark of the beast, it is suggesting that there is a serious danger in further entrenching the power of the government to return money it took from us, as it further gives the government more power to regulate us.
 
Private schools will be the recipients of a lot of the scholarship funds. What happens when the private schools can only exist due to the government funds involved? When the government then says that all funds can only go to private schools that require vaccinations, or that teach CSE, or that require classes on subjects the school morally opposes? If people have grown reliant on the funds, they will not have much of a choice, especially since the market will be too distorted to have kept other options alive.
 
So, while the receipt of funds today can feel exciting, it is important to remember that the government is buying our freedoms from us. If the Founding Fathers were willing to give their lives for freedom, are we willing to forego some of the riches of the world to help keep the government’s power in check?

There is a story in the Old Testament that fascinates me. In the days of Elisha, the Syrians laid siege against the city of Samaria. This was during a time of famine, and the object was likely to starve the Samarians into submission. The siege was working well for the Syrians, as people became so hungry that they started buying “the fourth part of a cab of dove’s dung for five pieces of silver.” 2 Kings 6:25.
 
Conditions became extremely bad, and the King of the city sought out Elisha. Elisha prayed and was told that the next day, food would be so plentiful that “tomorrow about this time shall a measure of fine flour be sold for a shekel, and two measures of barley for a shekel...” 2 Kings 7:1.
 
The King and the others listening did not understand how this was to be. When the Samarians awoke in the morning, they saw tents of the Syrian army, but saw no soldiers. They felt that the Syrians were likely trying to trap them, and waited awhile to see if they could detect the Syrians anywhere. Eventually, they ventured out and discovered that the entire Syrian army was gone, but that they had left all of their food, jewels, and provisions. Suddenly, there was more than enough food for the entire city.
 
What happened? The Old Testament records that “the Lord had made the host of the Syrians to hear a noise of chariots, and a noise of horses, even the noise of a great host: and they said one to another, Lo, the king of Israel hath hired against us the kings of the Hittites, and the kings of the Egyptians, to come upon us. Wherefore they arose and fled in the twilight, and left their tents, and their horses…, even the camp as it was, and fled for their life.” 2 Kings 7:6-7.
 
In other words, a very dire situation changed overnight, and all that was necessary was for a noise to be made. A simple noise changed everything for that city.
 
Fast forward a few thousand years. When Utah was first being settled, the pioneers that came worked hard to grow their crops. They were devastated when large swarms of insects appeared and started eating their crops that would be necessary for their survival. This situation changed quickly for them as large flocks of seagulls arrived and ate the insects. A simple act of nature changed everything for them.
 
Fast forward now another 150 years or so. SARS, a virus cousin of Covid-19, hits in 2003. SARS also originated in China, as did Covid-19. During this time, I was a missionary in Taiwan. When SARS came to Taiwan, Taiwan implemented quite a few restrictions, closed meetings, banned handshakes, required masks in public, etc. The fear associated with SARS was palpable, and SARS was having a significant impact in the lives of many. A good friend of mine lost his father to SARS.
 
After a few weeks of restrictions, Taiwan was set to implement far more serious lockdowns. We were preparing as missionaries to be stuck in our apartment for weeks or months as they continued to battle SARS. Soldiers were walking the streets spraying disinfectant everywhere. Suddenly though, instead of more serious restrictions, all restrictions were lifted. SARS had disappeared from Taiwan almost overnight.
 
When we asked what happened, we were told that the heat had killed SARS. Taiwan had warmed up quite a bit, and SARS had suddenly disappeared. It was no match for the heat. Current websites state that SARS disappeared due to the effective quarantine measures that were taken, but the reason put forth at the time were that the disappearance of SARS was a direct result of the heat. Regardless of the reason though, SARS disappeared quickly.
 
These stories all highlight a principle that there can be a very simple solution to a large-scale problem. Everything has an Achilles heel. While we haven’t discovered Covid-19’s Achilles heel yet, Heaven can help us in that process. Perhaps a solar flare from the sun can fry Covid-19, perhaps there is a simple mixture of herbs that kills it, perhaps the quarantine measures will be effective. The sun is flying through space at breakneck speeds as it circles the galaxy, and Earth is as well as it circles the sun. Maybe there is a large wall of radiation, dark matter, or something else sitting in space that we pass through in the next few days that kills Covid-19.
 
Or, maybe Heaven simply stops Covid-19, in ways that we don’t understand. Whatever happens though, we can exercise faith and call upon the powers of Heaven to help us. There is real power in faith, and the combined faith of our brothers and sisters in this world can have a significant and lasting impact on the course of Covid-19.
 
Good Friday, April 10, 2020, has been designated a worldwide day of fasting to seek Heaven’s help on obtaining relief from Covid-19. Fasting is a way for us to connect with the powers of Heaven, and we fully believe that the united fasting and prayers of those around the world can dramatically shift the course of Covid-19.
 
We invite you to join us. Come be a part of changing the world. Whether the solution is a loud noise, a bunch of birds, warm weather, inspired understanding of Covid-19’s Achilles heel, or some other assistance, fasting can help us connect with Heaven as we seek miracles on our behalf and the behalf of the countless others impacted by this pandemic.
 
As Isaiah states: “Is not this the fast that I have chosen? … to undo the heavy burdens, and to let the oppressed go free, and that ye break every yoke? … Then shall thy light break forth as the morning, and thine health shall spring forth speedily…” Isaiah 58:6-8.
 
Fasting is an appointed means to break every yoke, undo the heavy burdens, and have our health spring forth speedily. Please join in a worldwide fast this Good Friday, and call upon the powers of Heaven to help at this time. Even though it may be simple, your faith and efforts may just help us obtain the solution we need as we work to stop this pandemic.

A few years ago, I decided to try something different as I worked to find answers to my life. I decided to set an appointment with God.
 
Perhaps I was presumptuous or misguided in my thinking, perhaps I was tired of the hollowness I felt inside, or perhaps I simply needed a way to make it another day. I’m not sure, honestly, but I learned some valuable lessons, regardless of the accuracy of my thoughts or emotions at that time.
 
Leading up to this time, I read in D&C 88:62-63 when God commanded to “call upon me while I am near—Draw near unto me and I will draw near unto you; seek me diligently and ye shall find me; ask, and ye shall receive; knock, and it shall be opened unto you.” As I thought about the times I felt I had tried in the past to come to God, I also thought about two words, “call” and “knock”.
 
Previous to this time, I had always viewed the word “call” similar to ‘calling’ on a phone. In other words, I thought it meant to pray. However, I never understood what it meant to ‘knock’. I had some basic concepts about seeking, asking, and drawing near, but ‘knocking’ simply did not make much sense.
 
As I sat thinking, I realized that when the scriptures were written, there were no phones to ‘call’ anyone, and images from movies depicting the 18th and 19th centuries came into my mind where a young man would ask a woman if he could ‘call’ on her. When I saw these images, I looked at the scripture differently, thinking that maybe God was inviting me to come and be with Him. If that was the case, and I was ‘calling’ on God by going to where He was at the time, then ‘knocking’ made a little more sense to me as well, since I would knock on the door of a person if I arrived at their home to ‘call’ on them. It was all part of the greeting process.
 
At that time, I was quite busy with plenty of deadlines, church responsibilities, and family responsibilities. My life was booked from sunup to sundown, and I still didn’t get everything done that I needed to. I tried to find a time to fit in a trip to the Temple to ‘call’ upon God, but my mornings would begin before Temple sessions would end, and my nights wouldn’t end until Temple sessions were done.
 
So, at that time, I decided that maybe, just maybe, if I set aside some time just for God, Him and I could visit during that time.
 
With that in mind, I told God in prayer one night that I was making an appointment to meet Him in one of my basement rooms at a certain time in the early morning. I hoped He would understand due to how busy my life was and all of the responsibilities I had, and I asked Him to be with me during the appointed time.
 
I woke up the next morning, somewhat hopeful that I would be able to connect with God in some meaningful way. I had felt a distance for some time, and wanted to be able to feel something, even if it were just the Spirit again.
 
I proceeded to my basement at the appointed time. I prayed, told God I was there and that I ‘knocked’ in a figurative sense. Then, I waited. And waited. And waited.
 
Soon, the little time I had for my appointment with God was over. Life was calling me again, deadlines were pressing on me, and I hadn’t felt or sensed God during the appointment. Somewhat disappointed, I decided that maybe I needed to try again and set another appointment, just maybe a little further out.
 
So, I set another appointment as I prayed, telling God the next time I would be available. This process continued for a few weeks, mainly because when appointment times came, sleep often overpowered me, and I did not wake up for them. I don’t remember exactly why I was so tired, but I’m sure there were plenty of good justifications to be so tired between my children, church callings, and work.
 
I felt a little guilty missing various appointments I had set with God, but reasoned that God knew that I had tried. So, I set other appointments. I tried to make them, but I missed most of them, honestly, due to sleeping straight through the appointed time. Yet, I was never once late to work, no matter how little sleep I had the night before.
 
After a few weeks of setting appointments, missing most of them, and not feeling any different for the ones I kept, I gave up the experiment, disappointed that God had not reached out to me while I had tried.
 
It took some time for me to start to understand where I had gone wrong, and I am still realizing things about myself from my attempts to set an appointment with God. Some of the things I realized include:
 
First, I learned how little self-control I had when it came to spiritual things. I had enough self-control to wake up for work—regardless of how many times kids threw up the night before—but I would sleep straight through designated times for me to be involved in reading, studying, and pondering spiritual things.
 
When I finally realized that I was never late for work, but often missed my time set aside for spiritual things, I realized that my priorities were quite askew. I could arrive on time for work each day (no matter how tired I was) because I placed that as a high priority in my life. In other words, my internal priorities gave me power to override fatigue, exhaustion, and the like, and I still worked. Yet, spiritual things were not enough of a priority for me to sacrifice sleep for.
 
Second, I learned how pridefully and ignorantly I viewed my life. When I set my appointment with God, asking Him to meet me in my basement, I was, in effect, saying that my pursuit of money and my desire for sleep were more important than me figuring out a time to go to God’s house. I was busy, yes, and I justified it saying I was doing what God asked me to—providing for my family, working hard, caring for children, and fulfilling a church calling.
 
Yet, my view of life was centered around me. I was willing to give up sleep for a chance to get ahead at work, but not for a chance to connect with God. As an attorney, I could somehow change my entire schedule to be fully prepared for a court date (the time would somehow exist for me to review and memorize all necessary documents and arguments), and I would be up, dressed in a suit and tie, and leaving early enough to court to still arrive on time regardless of the weather outside. I had to be that way, I thought to myself, because I am representing other people in court.
 
As I started reflecting on why I could appear in court at any time set by a judge but could not make it to God’s house, I realized I had the power sufficient to still arrange my time, despite my busy schedule. For some reason though, I would only exercise that power of mine if something physical and tangible demanded it. A child crying in the night, for example, would force me to get up, or a judge issuing a court date would require me to prepare for the legal arguments at the hearing.
 
But when it came to spiritual things, nothing compelled me to prepare. Nothing compelled me to get up, and I missed out, day after day, week after week, and year after year, because my priorities were off, my pride was high, and my ignorance ran deep.
 
Third, I was telling God how He should work in my life. That, I have come to realize, happens far more often than I am okay admitting. I consistently find myself believing that things should be a certain way, rather than believing that God has already appointed the way. My role or obligation is not to blaze some new path, method, or way to God or Heaven, it is simply to walk the path that is already there.
 
I still often find myself falling into this trap. There are so many things I do not understand about God and His ways that it is easy to criticize His plan and His ways. I usually don’t publicly criticize, but find that spirit of criticism running through my heart, and find dissatisfaction with people, church, and my perception of God’s treatment of me.
 
Why can’t I just love people? I thought to myself one day. “You can” came a thought in response, “but you have to let go and do things God’s way.”
 
God has a path. He walked it, He blazed the way, and my job is to follow rather than tell God that there is a better path for me at any particular time in my life.
 
Fourth, I learned how much I lacked in faith. When things were physical, I could respond and adjust my life to meet those demands. I did not need faith to know my baby was crying, I could simply hear that and know I needed to respond. I did need faith though, a lot of faith, to believe that setting aside time to study the scriptures was worthwhile during periods where I already missed so much sleep, or that I could take a morning off from work and go to the Temple to truly call upon God.
 
Fifth, I learned that appointments with God can be an amazing thing, when they are done in His way. Dedicating time each day to awake and read the scriptures (rather than quickly reading a few verses before falling completely asleep at night), or time each month to attend the Temple (rather than missing another month and another month), has brought me more in line with God, has helped change my priorities, and has helped light return.
 
I still don’t have any amazing visions to share, I still haven’t seen angels descending from Heaven when I read scriptures or attend the Temple, and I am still working through plenty of internal issues that block my view of Heaven and my relationship with God.
 
However, as I work to gain enough self-control to make spiritual matters a priority, to set spiritual appointments for myself that I structure the rest of my life around so that I can study and seek God (rather than telling Him where and when to be to accommodate my pride), and as I work to do things in the way God established, light is returning to my heart.
 
It’s a line upon line, day by day process for me. I don’t change all at once, I still struggle with misplaced priorities, pride, and lack of self-control, and I still have periods where God feels far away. Yet, I have learned that it isn’t God that is not where He is supposed to be, it is me, but I can change and make the life journey necessary to truly ‘call’ upon God where He is in Heaven.

           Journal writing has the potential to bless our own life, as well as the lives of those who come after us. I often find it very difficult to write a good journal entry though, especially because it seems that no one will care that I worked in the office again that day, picked up toys off the floor for the 1,972 time that month, or made it through another round of meetings for the day.
           In other words, I often view journal writing as a detail of my daily routine. When I view it this way, I rarely write in my journal, and rarely get anything out of it. I then feel somewhat guilty though when I hear a church leader speak about the importance of journal writing.
           To help myself better understand journaling, I have started looking through what actually makes a good journal entry. As I look at the lives of my ancestors, the things that really stand out to me are when something is recorded that gives me a glimpse of who the person was. As I have thought on this, I have realized that journaling is an amazing opportunity for us to learn about who we really are, as well as to leave a legacy for our posterity after us.
           Somehow, when we take the time to write down and record thoughts and feelings, we learn. Writing forces us to give structure to our thoughts and feelings. As our thoughts and feelings become structured, an identity forms within us. We began to understand and see more of why we feel as we do, why we think as we do, and why we act as we do. As we gain this identity, we also gain the ability to change as we see ourselves more clearly, and understand what is taking place inside.
           Additionally, as we begin to record our thoughts and feelings, we are beginning to record pieces of ourselves that can stay alive long after we go. These pieces of ourselves can bless our posterity. All of us are drawn to stories that truly reach and touch the emotions and feelings that take place inside of us. The more we are able to write about who we are inside, the more drawn to and connected others become to us.
           There is a lot of power in sharing our fears, our sadness, our joy, and our current understanding of life, of politics, religion, or the like. No matter how simple we are, we matter to those around us. Further, when we record these things, we gain the ability to see our progress.
           Without a journal, or external record of our internal feelings and thoughts, we can never see our progress or growth. If we want to understand if we have gained more spirituality, more patience, or similar intangible attributes, we have to actually record where we are at with those things. As we do, and as life continues on, we can look back on and actually see how far we have moved from where we were at earlier. The ability to see our progress or change is invaluable as we make course corrections in our lives, and as we recognize what is working and what is not for us.
           Recently, there has been a renewed focus in the Church on “making the Sabbath a delight.” During the week I am often so busy that I rarely write in a journal. However, I have decided to try and make “the Sabbath a delight” by trying to actually write a journal entry that would be meaningful for me and my family. As I have sat and tried to write, I still struggled coming up with a topic for that week, as my mind usually goes blank when I sit down to write.
           To remedy that problem, I made a list of topics I can use if nothing else comes to mind when I sit down to write. I share this list simply to help you come up with topics or to perhaps start a tradition of journal writing that will help shape you and your posterity. I know that we often fear describing many of these things, but these are the things that our kids and others find most interesting about us, the things that we usually don’t share with them.
           There are many ways, of course, to keep a journal, and so just pick what works best for you. For me, typing works best. I type all day for work, so it is a form of writing that I can do quickly. Also, you can keep journals for children, family, or other situations, and I am trying to maintain a journal I record things in occasionally that affect the entire family as well as my own personal journal.
           One day, I may actually get good enough at this to record things daily, but for now, my goal is just to make a meaningful entry once a week. Hopefully the following list is helpful to you as you consider ways to make the Sabbath a delight and as you take the time to record things that will be interesting and helpful to you in understanding who you are as well as to your posterity.

1. Describe yourself as if you were writing a letter of introduction to someone you had never met.
2. Describe your work you do each day, and describe how it affects you and why you do that work. (It’s a job, I enjoy it, it pays the bills, I really wish I had something else, it causes too much stress, etc.)
3. Tell about a person who is a hero to you, or about someone you look up to. Describe their qualities and how they have impacted you.
4. Record a conversation you had with a child during the week.
5. Write about your favorite holiday memory. Add in details about the things still alive in your memory.
6. Describe something you wish you could do and why.
7. Tell about a topic you have a hard time understanding. If the topic is one that comes up frequently, talk about how you deal with it when it comes up.
8. Describe your strengths and your weaknesses.
9. Describe some of the spiritual gifts or talents you’ve been given.
10. Tell about what you think your life’s mission may include.
11. Record a favorite scripture and explain why it is a favorite.
12. Describe some of your family traditions during your childhood.
13. Write about things you fear. Describe how often you have to deal with each thing.
14. Write down a goal and a timeframe to accomplish it in.
15. Tell about if you had to live in a different country, where the ideal place for you to live would be.
16. Describe your ideal job and the factors that would make it ideal.
17. Write your impressions of world events and other important happenings.
18. Think of a book you’ve read, and explain why it has made a difference in your life.
19. Describe your earliest memory.
20. Share your testimony in an honest way. Write down what you know is true, what you believe is true, what you hope is true, what you struggle with, and how you deal with things you don’t know.
21. Describe your busiest day from start to finish, giving details of everything you did and why.
22. Tell what makes you happy.
23. Tell how you deal with loneliness, sadness, or discouragement.
24. Describe the characteristics of your family members.
25. Write down experiences that made you smile as a child.
26. Record your opinions and thoughts on the proper role of government.
27. Take a guess as to what things will be like 10, 20 or 30 years from now based on your take on current events and where they are leading us.
28. Tell about some of the hot topic current events in society, or ones that you are concerned about.
29. Write down your ideal meal, the foods you love, and the foods you don’t like.
30. Describe what faith means to you, and how you use faith in your life.
31. Describe your relationship with God and things you think you could do to improve it.
32. Tell what you thought your life would be like when you were a child, and the differences now from what you expected or hoped for.
33. Record what you think could help the country improve.
34. Write down and describe a time when you had to do something that required pushing through fear, anxiety, or other internal blocks to complete the task.
35. Tell who your favorite religious leader is and why he/she is your favorite.
36. Share your thoughts and feelings on the Book of Mormon and its impact in your life.
37. Record a dream you have had that has stuck with you.
38. Write about your worst haircut or hairdo ever.
39. Record your most embarrassing moment, or a collection of the top embarrassing moments.
40. Write about the hard times that have shaped your life, for good or bad. Include things that helped you through them, or things you could use if you are currently in them.
41. Make a list of popular grocery stores, and tell which ones you like and why, and which ones you refuse to shop at and why.
42. Describe places or companies that you feel are too dishonest or unethical to do any type of business with or patronize in anyway.
43. Share about a time you lost something or had something stolen and the efforts you went through to try and get it back.
44. Tell about a time you didn’t follow the crowd, or about a time you did and wished you hadn’t.
45. Pick some long-term goals you can work towards and list them, along with things you will need to do to accomplish them (attend school, learn to wake up earlier, etc.).
46. Describe what it means to be a “[Insert your last name]”. Every family has an identity of some sort, something that makes them unique from other families, and you can write about that identity. If you can’t think of something, start with thinking of things you would never do that other families do. If, for example, you would never ride a roller coaster, then begin with recording “‘[Last name]’s’ don’t go to amusement parks.” You can write about how your family uses their time and things they generally don’t do.
47. Share about something in your past that you regret.
48. Write about something you would love to see made into a movie and why.
49. Tell about your favorite winter activity (even if that’s sitting inside wrapped in blankets watching a movie). Describe some of the times you can remember doing that activity.
50. Record your favorite vacations or vacation spots. Tell about some of your memories from those, and describe things that make them your favorite.
51. Share about whether you are a city or country person, and the ideal place for you to live based on that and other factors, such as weather, distance from other family, etc.
52. Describe what makes you you. Interests you have, things you don’t like, things you do like, ways you contribute to others, etc.
53. Write down something you wish your family or posterity could understand and internalize.

           I am sure there are plenty of things and topics to add to this list, so feel free to comment on things that should be included in this list. That way the list can be updated and stay a good resource for others as well.

Capitalism has changed our world in so many ways, including, I have discovered, by extending its virtues into our personal lives where these virtues may not always belong. Capitalism lives and breaths through a constant effort to increase efficiency and lower costs, and unfortunately, we have begun to accept these principles as virtues in our personal relations with other people.

I see efficiency lauded as a virtue in many places in society. At work, those who produce the most in the shortest amount of time are celebrated. Managers have praise heaped upon them when they make things more efficient and reduce the number of necessary employees. Parents feel they are successful based on whether they were able to check a large number of items off of their to-do list that day. Friends feel they did their part to offer support to someone struggling because they sent a text message.

We constantly measure our success or worth by the mistaken virtue of efficiency. When a car breaks down, we are upset because we don’t accomplish things. When a child gets sick, we are frustrated that we couldn’t get more accomplished that day. When a co-worker needs to talk for a few minutes, we are upset that we were delayed in our work.

While we often don’t consciously put efficiency as a virtue in our minds, we often place it as a virtue that we strive to live by in our hearts, and our self-worth and measure of success is often tied to adding up how much we can or can’t accomplish.

While efficiency has a place, time, and purpose, it has no place as a governing virtue in our lives. Here’s why.

Good is not efficient. Love is not efficient. Kindness is not efficient. We all need kindness, love, and good in our lives. As individuals, we live each day striving to provide for ourselves and our family, and we live in search of peace, joy, and happiness. All of these things though will never be found by acting efficiently. We log on to Facebook because it is fast and easy to do in search of a meaningful interaction or exchange with another human or sometimes just something to dull and entertain the senses. We send a text hoping to get one back. We pray for friends, for someone who really understands, or who can help with something we need.

Despite this, we rush through each day, focusing so much on producing results, finishing things, cleaning up floors, and meeting deadlines. On these days we have no time for kindness, we have no time to show love, and we have no time to enjoy everything amazing around us.

Efficiency trims most of the meaningful and good away from life. Efficiency causes us to believe there is one thing important in life (making money, accomplishing a list, etc.), and it cuts everything else out, even though those other things are often what we are really looking for. As a father focused on efficiency, I might feel proud when I’m able to discipline children that are fighting and talk to them sternly in under two minutes so that I’m not late to my next meeting. If I do though, I miss out on opportunities to sit and talk, to understand why they are having problems, and to show them love to help them have a reason to change.

While driving to appointments or to home I can’t count the number of times I have passed a car stranded on the road. I didn’t stop because it would take too much time, time I didn’t think I had. When I would let members at church know about an activity, I would type one text and send it to everyone, glad that I could spend so little time letting so many people know about the activity. However, it was extremely rare that anyone I texted would actually come to the activity.

Texting can be a very efficient way to communicate. Mass emails can be too. Same with social media. However, the more efficient the communication becomes, the less meaningful it becomes. This is true about all things efficient. The more efficient something becomes, the less meaningful it becomes. Getting a text about an activity at church is nice, but it usually means little to the people receiving it. Getting a phone call with a personal invitation means more, while having someone show up and say "hi" will mean the most. In other words, the most meaningful things in life are often the least efficient things.

As a Dad, I can come home from work, read a quick story to the kids, say ‘I love you’, and then run out the door again. While this isn’t bad, it doesn’t do anything to really connect with the kids. Love is found in putting aside things that matter to show my kids that they are the most important thing to me. Love is found in spending lots of time sitting on the bed talking and listening. Love is found through having no deadline attached to everything I do.

Life is most meaningful and happy when we have good, meaningful interactions with other people. Money doesn’t bring happiness. To-do lists don’t bring happiness. Getting the daily chores done in one hour doesn’t bring happiness. Inefficiency brings happiness though. Sitting down and laughing with a child while ignoring the chores forges a meaningful connection. Stopping by to see a friend to just talk on the doorstep rather than sending a quick text creates another meaningful connection. Giving an employee the chance to explain how they really feel about things helps create meaning at work.

The reason we struggle so much with stopping to take time for what matters most is because we have to exercise faith to do so. The truly good and meaningful things in life aren’t quantifiable. We can’t assign a number or value to the level of kindness we showed on a given day. We can’t assign a number or value to how well we connected with our children that day, and we have to be able to look at our dirty house confident that we used our time to forge something eternal that day.

The more we demand efficiency, the less faith we have in our ability to do truly great things, as efficiency always follows the need to count and add up our value, and great things aren't built on the quantifiable. Truly great things, or masterpieces, are great because they capture and touch upon far more than can ever be quantified. Masterpieces, the type that lasts through the ages, aren’t efficient. They take hours of effort, tries, and retries, they take connecting to and understanding people at a level never reached through efficiency, and they take patience and devotion.

We try to build businesses with efficiency as the top priority. Those businesses come and go quickly, employees aren’t happy, and the competition is always lurking. It’s a race to the bottom for the efficient business, and the only ones that survive are those who are able to cut the good and meaningful from the work and somehow convince people to keep working there despite that.

Great businesses though don’t place efficiency as the governing principle. They spend resources and time on people, on connecting and understanding, and on creating something that truly has value to it. A business that can create a masterpiece doesn’t have to charge the lowest cost for it. Apple tends to follow this approach and focuses on creating an experience for people, and Apple can charge almost whatever it wants for its products. If it demanded efficiency from all of its employees, it would be cutting out its ability to connect with the unquantifiable factors that transcend its product itself. Apple does well because it has faith in its ability to connect and deliver something that can’t be quantified.

Families aren’t efficient. Raising children isn’t efficient. They need time, they need our attention, and we help even when we don’t have time to do so. If we focus too much on getting dinner done in 30 minutes, the chores done in 45 minutes, and everyone in bed by nine o’clock we’ll miss the moments that will really matter in the lives of our family members. The same with friends, and the more we miss these moments, the less happy we become.

Efficiency drives us to feeling frustrated, angry, on edge, and unhappy as we aren’t able to stop and take a minute to smell the flowers, to really talk with someone, to stop and help a person stranded on the road, or to have meaningful time just shooting the breeze with our friends or kids. If we want to be successful, be happy, or create a masterpiece, we have to learn to exercise faith in how essential it is to invest in the inefficient, the unquantifiable, and the unseeable. We gain so much through embracing kindness, goodness, love, and decency, and these things change our very outlook on and experience with life itself.

If you want happiness, if you want to get past the void inside, if you want meaning or purpose in your life, do something inefficient. Truly connect with someone. Don’t text them, don’t call them, just go and say hi. Have no deadline that you have to meet after. Ask the person how they are doing, and just listen. Stop measuring your success or self-worth through how much you accomplish, and instead focus on placing faith in the importance of the unquantifiable. Be more kind, lend a hand to someone who needs it, plan on getting to your next appointment 15 minutes early so you can stop and help someone you see in need. Yes, it is inefficient, but it will build far more in your personal life than efficiency ever would.

It’s time to recognize efficiency for what it is – a mistaken virtue that robs us of the most meaningful things life has to offer. Efficiency has a place in business and in our work, but it should not govern nor be the most prized in how we interact with others or in how we view ourselves. Life has so much more to it than efficiency will ever let you see or experience, but you can access the beauty and meaning life has to offer through faith and a devotion to always taking time to do the right and good thing.

The Ordain Women group took the time to write a response to my original post on Women and the Priesthood. I was impressed by the civility and questions asked, and am providing a response to the questions they raised, especially since I highly value a civil and appropriate exchange of competing ideas. If you haven’t read the original or the response, I recommend doing so before reading this. The questions raised by Ordain Women are listed first, followed by a response.
 
Q: Do you believe that women, as a group, lack some capacity or ability to hold the Priesthood?
 
A: In the way of physical capacity, no, I do not. To be honest though, I don’t know what may or may not prevent someone from holding the Priesthood, although I sense it is not related to our physical body. The Gentiles were unable to hold the Priesthood for many centuries, but it probably wasn’t due to their physical body.
 
The original article never stated that women were physically unable to do so. The example of the boy not being able to play football was simply a physical example of a principle many people often miss – we are all different, and we don’t get everything we want. As a society, we like to pretend that we can all be anything we want to be, but it simply isn’t true. I was not given the talents to be a football player, basketball player, great artist, or charismatic guy.
 
We often miss that God gives us our talents. Sure, we are expected to work and improve them, develop them, and increase them, but the foundation for what we have (and the opportunities for what we have) come from God. No matter how hard I try, I will never be a professional athlete, and that is the same for the majority of America. I can improve my physical abilities, yes, but I do not have what the professionals do. Most in America will simply never be President either, no matter how good, talented or deserving they are.
 
Spiritually and Priesthood speaking, the majority of Priesthood holders will never be a Bishop, they will never be a Seventy, and only a small handful will ever be the Prophet. Many Priesthood holders will lack many spiritual gifts, may not teach as well as another in the quorum, and may struggle because they don’t get the same spiritual experiences or opportunities as another in the quorum. My question to you is – Is God unfair and unequal for denying me every opportunity in the Priesthood that other men get?
 
Many men struggle feeling accepted and okay when they are passed over for callings. No one in this church gets to choose what their own calling or opportunity is. So, if women had the Priesthood, would that be sufficient, or would we start feeling slighted when passed over for a particular calling time and time again?
 
So, the little boy highlighted a principle – we are all given different opportunities, be it physical or spiritual. Our opportunities give us a chance to do something and accomplish something. If I don’t have the opportunity to serve as a Patriarch, I do have the opportunity to use my time and abilities for something else. Similarly, for those who don’t have the Priesthood (be it men in China, women in the church, or children), they now have the opportunity to show others the most powerful type of love, God’s love, and to act entirely of their own choosing and to be “anxiously engaged” in a good cause of their own “free will”.
 
Q: Are we better off with more than half of our people not fully participating? And as a follow-up, I would also ask: Are members better off in branches because there aren’t enough Priesthood holding men in a ward area?  Are men better off carrying the burden and responsibilities of Priesthood to bring about the kingdom of God without the equal yoking of women to help them?
 
A: I would ask a similar question, just on a larger scale. Is the world better off with more than 99% of its people not fully participating? Is God so unjust as to deny full and equal access to the Gospel to most of His children on this earth?
 
As mentioned in the original article, our view of things is skewed. From within the church we often fail to see how the same principles are affecting our brothers and sisters – God’s children – the world over. This world is a fallen world, one where things aren’t perfect, one where we are born missing very important pieces of things we need for eternity. In this world, we will all miss out on significant opportunities that could have helped us, including the Gospel itself for so many of God’s children that traversed this earth. While it is important for us to work to correct our fallen nature to the extent possible, it is more important for us to take the opportunities given, even in light of everything we don’t have, as we will never be given every opportunity in this life that would make us all ‘better off’. (This is discussing far more than the Priesthood here, and is not saying that our fallen condition prevents women from holding the Priesthood.)
 
We aren’t here on this earth to have every opportunity possible. The stark reality of that stares us in the face as we look at our own lives and the lives of countless people before us. We aren’t here to enjoy optimal conditions. We’re here to be ‘tested’, to be tried by imperfections, things that don’t work well, things that break, opportunities that simply never exist to us.
 
So, is God’s church and kingdom benefited by women? Absolutely. Are members better off today with more members and more Priesthood? Yes. Is that God’s will for every member of the church to live in a large ward with plentiful Priesthood? Maybe, maybe not. Maybe some of us need the growth that comes from a small branch, from struggles, and from the exercise of faith. Maybe some of us don’t. Maybe some of us need the Gospel spelled out to us to find God, maybe some of us don’t. Maybe what benefits us today will rob us of what we need tomorrow, or in eternity.
 
We are all different, we all have different opportunities. I fully believe that while we don’t have everything we want or see as beneficial to us, God gives us everything we need to fully contribute to His kingdom. Rather than being upset with what we don’t have though, we can only fully contribute by embracing what we do have.
 
So, I don’t agree with your assertion that over half of the church is not “fully participating”. Countless people are actively participating to the fullest extent given them, whether or not they have the Priesthood. Just as I don’t have to be a Bishop to fully contribute, so too women can still fully contribute in the church, as they are given opportunities and talents that men simply don’t have. God intends for us to work together, and has never intended for one person to perform all of the roles assigned to His children on this earth.
 
Q: Wouldn’t expansion of Priesthood authority for women be the next logical step?
 
This is a very logical step, yes. Nearly all men I know would welcome serious reinforcement to the Priesthood duties they carry. The lesser the chance of being called as a Bishop, for example, the better for many of them.
 
I have never known an instance where human logic dictated would God would or wouldn’t do though. Wouldn’t it be logical that an apostasy for over a thousand years didn’t happen? That all of the Tribes of Israel had the Priesthood? That God would simply prevent the mass shootings that occur? Yes, all of those things are logical too, but they simply aren’t the way things are. I’m certainly not saying that women will never have the Priesthood, but I’m also not saying they will. I just don’t know the future there.
 
I do know though that God’s ways are higher than our ways, and He is working to refine each one of us. He has a plan for each of us, and no opportunity that we truly need will be forever withheld from us. We may not get it in this life (like the billions of people who never learned of the Gospel in this life), but we will receive what we need at some point.
 
Logic alone doesn’t work here because it cannot properly figure and take into account things pre-mortally and post-mortally. We can only understand the “why’s” of this life by turning to God for the big picture, including seeking to understand that our calling here is to exercise the talents and opportunities we have been given, rather than continually seeking to be given something we simply do not need at this moment for what we’ve been asked to do that impacts eternity. Peace will only come as we understand and embrace our purpose on this earth, and will not come to us through logic produced by a mortal mind that can’t see the beginning from the end.
 
Q: Do you believe that fatherhood is important?
 
Absolutely. The article was not written about fatherhood though. As might be imagined based on my overlength blog posts, I could write books on these subjects. There are so many factors playing into things that it is impossible to address them all in any sense of internet limited fashion.
 
To be clear, I do not believe that Priesthood = Motherhood. I do believe though that Priesthood complements Fatherhood, and that the lack of priesthood complements Motherhood. While Priesthood and Motherhood aren’t directly equivalent, the relationship they carry can help us learn important things about each role as a father and mother.
 
On this point, my question to you is: Is God unjust, unfair, or unequal to assign eternal roles to us? We’re taught that gender is part of our eternal identity. Is there any difference anywhere between genders? If so, what are they? If not, how is gender part of our eternal identity if it means nothing to differentiate us?
 
We’re taught that there is opposition in all things. I’ve always taken this to mean that we have opposites. Most people look at opposition as a destructive thing, or something that is at odds with something else. However, I believe that God’s way is to create eternal things as complements. Fathers and Mothers are examples of complementary opposites. We each have beautiful, sacred roles to fulfill, roles that will continue for eternity. Fatherhood and Motherhood are the highest and noblest callings in eternity.
 
The Priesthood and all other opportunities existing in this life are meant to complement, not destroy, our roles as Fathers and Mothers. Priesthood supports both roles, but so does the opportunities afforded by having no Priesthood. Fathers and Mothers are critical parts of our identity and life, and so too are the complementary roles played by those who act as a Bishop and those who do not. In other words, Priesthood, the Church, and everything else in life exist to complement Fatherhood and Motherhood, and by viewing what opportunities God gives us currently, we can further understand our sacred roles in each of these great responsibilities.
 
Q: Do you truly not know the many ways this line of thinking has lead to the subjugation of countless groups throughout history?
 
I’m sorry if something in the article made you think this. However, I do not see where I made the claim you assert. Since it is a point of confusion though, I will clarify it here.
 
I raised our physical differences to highlight a question deeper than women and the Priesthood – the question of women and their Creator. Just as Priesthood helps us understand Fatherhood, so too does the man’s physical characteristics help us understand Fatherhood. We aren’t given these things by chance, but as part of a great plan.
 
Women, however, often claim they are denied equal treatment by virtue of not having the Priesthood. If that is true, then it raises a much more troubling issue of them being denied equal treatment by virtue of the way they were created. No matter how much we campaign against it, we aren’t able to change the stark reality of how men’s physical bodies allow them to overpower a woman. There is simply not equality, in a logical mortal sense, in our physical bodies.
 
This doesn’t mean that anyone is justified in hurting, harming, or subjugating another. However, if we are to continue pursuing a cause on the basis of equality alone, we have to consider, at some point, how that equality claim squares with the realities of our existence. My only point was that since the actual reality of our existence is so far removed from our current understanding of equality, either our understanding is wrong, or God is wrong in the way He created us all so unequally. I personally believe in God, and the simple reality of our extreme physical differences show me that our modern version of equality has never compelled or constrained God in how He acts and treats us here in this life.
 
In other words, our modern understanding of equality is not the highest principle driving God’s works, and until we seek to understand the highest principles, we cannot understand where or how equality fits into the picture, and we will end up dissatisfied or empty as we continue projecting an assumption onto our view of the world that is simply not the way God acts.
 
This doesn’t mean women will never have the Priesthood, and it doesn’t mean they will. Answering this question though requires us to look deeper and explore other principles, and that is all that was meant by the reference to our physical differences, as they serve to illustrate that more is at play than modern equality alone.
 
Q: Do you think so little of men that you believe they require coercion to love and serve? and Do you think so little of women’s contributions to “authoritative direction” that we can be easily cast aside to demonstrate a nearly invisible distinction between love and duty?
 
Great questions here. I think these are valid concerns based on what is written. To answer honestly, no, I do not think so little of men, or women. I do think so little though of our fallen, mortal condition, that I believe we are all in the same boat with these matters.
 
I’ll give examples. These aren’t meant to demean men or women, but are meant to highlight the realities of our fallen nature as humans on this earth.
 
I served as Elder’s Quorum President for four years. I was responsible for helping to coordinate service opportunities, such as yard clean ups, moving, blessings, etc. If I stood up in Elder’s Quorum and asked for a volunteer, I would rarely get anyone to respond. If I talked to someone directly about their duty to help, I would get more of a response. I would often spend hours calling and texting people just trying to find help to give someone a blessing. Most men appreciated an opportunity to give a blessing, but most were simply too busy with their other duties in life to be able to break away, felt overworked or stressed, or simply thought that someone else should help that day.
 
I’ve attended countless Priesthood leadership meetings over the years. I have yet to meet more than one or two people excited to go and be trained on everything they aren’t doing right and on all of the duties they aren’t fulfilling. Attendance at those meetings is mostly out of sheer duty, and no, I do not fault anyone or think any less of them to say that. If we were to ask, in church, for people to volunteer and wake up early on Sunday morning to go to an extra meeting to be told other things they need to add into their life and schedule, there would be few, if any, volunteering to go.
 
So yes, I have watched duty motivate someone, men and women alike, time and time again. Both respond to duty. I think that is the problem though. Duty makes things easier, in a sense. I can justify not visiting my neighbor because I was fulfilling my duty of attending Priesthood training. I can justify not visiting the older, lonely, neighbor because I have hometeaching families to visit instead. I can pretend that I’ve done what God wants, simply because I did the minimum required by duty, and again, this is the same for men or women.
 
So, do fallen mortals require duty to help them be motivated to look outside themselves? Absolutely. Hometeaching has always been a struggle. It is a duty based concept. Without the duty, who would go around and visit the home of every member? What would motivate us to get up and go see people who don’t like us? True love would, if we possessed it, but again, the realities of our mortal condition mean that we need additional help, albeit it in limited quantities, as duty is not the reason we came to this earth.
 
You mentioned a “nearly invisible distinction between love and duty.” I agree that there are times it is a fine line, but there are other times where the distinction is miles thick. I’ll give a real life example that highlights both extremes.
 
A woman moved into a ward I lived in once who was not active in attending church. I stopped by, pursuant to my duties at the time, to see if we could request her records and assign visiting and home teachers. She thanked me for stopping by, but said it would not be necessary to assign her any visiting teachers because she already had some assigned from her old ward that was a few miles away (as an aside, since this ward was in Utah, that also meant her old ward was a few stakes away).
 
She went on to tell me how her visiting teacher had visited consistently every month for 10 years, and how they were the best of friends. She was certain the visits would continue, especially since she still lived so close. I explained that those visits usually change with a change in ward boundaries, but she was certain they would not due to the friendship she felt existed with her visiting teacher.
 
To my knowledge, there were no further visits from her visiting teacher. She went from feeling truly loved to feeling the harsh reality of the limits of duty, and things hurt, a lot. I still feel sad as I reflect on the pain I saw in her. While duty can help someone feel loved for a time, it is entirely insufficient to maintain a true and lasting love, the type that truly changes hearts. Heavenly Father didn't assign Jesus to atone for us. There was no duty to Christ's atonement. It was an act of pure love, which means it has no bounds, and which means it carries the power to change.
 
To be clear, I don’t fault that visiting teacher at all. I have had dozens of people I was assigned to hometeach, and I simply don’t have the time or ability to keep in touch with every one of them. I have had callings stop, and guess what? I didn’t continue to visit people as I had before. I received new callings, and simply didn’t have time. All of those people experienced a taste of something approaching love, but then also experienced the miles still to go before they had someone who was visiting simply because they truly loved and cared. In other words, no lasting change or work occurred when I acted solely out of duty, as it came to an end.
 
So no, I do not think poorly of men or women. I also do not believe that men or women or inherently more evil or righteous than the other. I am not blind to the reality of our existence though, to the reality of what motivates many of us to act. If we don’t have the duty to go visit a neighbor, we rarely do, especially when it is someone that offers us nothing in return. It’s easy to visit a friend because of what they do for us, but it isn’t easy to visit and show concern to someone that doesn’t want us there.
 
I have worked with countless men and women in the church. Great people, trying their best. The ones that have really impacted me though were the ones that took interest in me, that reached out when they didn’t have to. It’s been nice to have hometeachers to call when a blessing is needed or I need help moving a heavy piece of furniture, but those people haven’t changed my life or heart.
 
The most powerful influence I’ve ever personally experienced is that of true love, the love that comes from a person who is not required to visit me, not asked to visit me, and who is not asked to say anything specific to me. I have experienced the harsh realities of the limits of duty (and have had others experience the pain associated with my duties ending or changing), but have also experienced the amazing goodness that comes from a never-ending love.
 
So, is the church better off placing every member under duty to act and using up what little time we have running about chasing duties that are necessary to exist in this life, but are not what really make up eternity, or are its members “fully functioning” and better off when we all take the amazing opportunities that are ours in the absence of duty to develop, create, and spread true eternal love, love that has no bounds or end?
 
While I don’t know whether women will ever have the Priesthood in this life, I personally think the church as a whole, every member in a small branch, and every person in the world is better off when we follow the admonition in Doctrine and Covenants 58:26-27.
 
“For behold, it is not meet that I should command in all things; for he that is compelled in all things, the same is a slothful and not a wise servant; wherefore he receiveth no reward. Verily I say, men should be anxiously engaged in a good cause, and do many things of their own free will, and bring to pass much righteousness.”
 
Being ordained to the Priesthood is not necessary to do great and wonderful things, or to be "anxiously engaged in a good cause." There is more to this world than church, and we need people who can keep the church going, yes, but also those who can use the limited time we have to do so much more in the world itself. We are all better off without the stark reality of the end and limits of duty. Duty does help push us towards love, but it does not get us there. Again, the Celestial Kingdom will not be filled with individuals acting out of duty, it will be filled with those acting out of love.
 
Please ask me whatever questions this article raised. I've tried to honestly and thoroughly answer your questions, but may have missed something. As it’s impossible to cover everything in a blog post, I’m guessing there are pieces missing. Also, to respond to a comment left by another on the original post, yes, this is not doctrine, and I do not profess it to be. It is simply thoughts that may help us see things from a different angle. I do appreciate your response though, and sincerely respect the deep questions that exist, the contributions of women to my life, and the contributions they make to the church.
 
My last question is: Would the church and world be better off if we simply all acted because we loved? Maybe, just maybe, what the world needs is more love, more actions by those not constrained to act, and not more Priesthood opportunities (which includes duties, programs, and trainings) to try and motivate us to do the basics each day. Maybe love means more to God than Priesthood alone, and maybe that’s why the sheer majority of those who have come to this earth never held the Priesthood while on this earth. In other words, maybe, just maybe, there is more than equality to consider in understanding God, women, and the Priesthood.

As the equality spotlight becomes ever stronger and more practices are subjected to scrutiny, religion is not spared examination and critique simply because it is religion. The question naturally arises as to why only men in certain religions hold the Priesthood, a power and authority associated with church governance and operation.
 
For many people today, this is an important question. While there is not a lot of specific doctrine on this question, there are a few things largely missing from the usual discussion, things that may change the way we approach the issues we see. This article shares some of those things, in hopes they can help add to the discussion in a meaningful way.
 
In the search to understand equality, we often miss what we do have
 
Understanding equality requires us to look at what we have, instead of what we don’t have. Answers are usually not found in what doesn’t exist, and answers to equality questions related to God do not come from looking at what we don’t have. In other words, we likely won't ever find the answer to equality and the Priesthood by looking at what women don't have. This idea is mentioned here at the beginning to highlight this principal, as it touches on each of the items considered below.
 
As an example of how answers don’t exist in what we don’t have, consider a small boy who has always wanted to play football. However, he never had, and will never have, a body big enough to play football. High school and college football were never an option for a kid like him, due, in large part, to his body shape and size. Many kids like him feel it’s very unfair to be left out of something they value so much, simply because they didn’t get the right body.
 
If this boy focused his questions to God on trying to understand how things were equal or fair for him between the college football players he watched as a kid and himself, he would be left with a void, as there would be no good answer to him. When focusing on what he didn’t have, he could never understand God or His treatment of him.
 
The things of God are complex enough that they will never be understood simply by looking at what isn’t there. What is there has to be taken into the equation as well, as it is only in understanding what is and isn’t a part of us that we can see the complete picture. Therefore, in our search to understand equality and God, we have to consider what the Priesthood gives, and what the absence of the Priesthood gives as well.
 
Our current view of the Priesthood is skewed
 
Often, in the equality spotlight, the Priesthood is viewed as something that is available to all worthy men, but not to worthy women. However, this has only been the case for a very limited time in the earth’s existence, and still is not entirely true due to large portions of the earth's population who have no real ability to join God's church.
 
Consider this same question of equality and the Priesthood related to why some didn’t get the Priesthood during the time of Moses. Then, males in most of the 12 tribes weren’t allowed to act as Priests, with that authority being limited, generally, to the Levites who served as Priests. For those worthy males, why were they excluded from the Priesthood?
 
Consider this same question with the Jews and the Gentiles. For a very long time, the Gentiles were banned from receiving the Priesthood. Even after the Gentiles were finally allowed to participate in the Gospel, the LDS Church believes that the Priesthood was taken from the earth with the deaths of the apostles, and that an apostasy occurred.
 
This apostasy lasted for well over a thousand years, where the Priesthood wasn’t even available to any person looking for it. What makes our current situation equal in any way to the situation of those who lived during this time, or to those born in countries without full access to it?
 
In other words, the Priesthood has been restricted in access for most of the earth’s history and to most of the earth’s population. Our current view of the Priesthood in America tends to ignore these facts, and just focuses on the fact that there is still a group of people in America (women) who don’t have the Priesthood. While it is a very important question, the reality of the lack of Priesthood access for the majority of most of the men in the earth’s history has to be taken into account as well in seeking answers to this question.
 
Motherhood vs Priesthood
 
Attempts to explain the lack of access for women to the Priesthood often revolve around how women can be mothers. This explanation, as many women know, doesn’t fully explain things, and the Priesthood and Motherhood are apples and oranges in many ways. While there is more to this question than simply saying things are equal for men and women because women can be mothers, there is also a piece missed by women who are very adamant against any use of this comparison.
 
Some women become very vocal that there is no equality or similarity between Motherhood and the Priesthood because they suffer extensively in pregnancy, labor, and nursing, while men bless the babies and baptize the kids when they are of baptismal age.
 
While it doesn’t fully answer the equality and Priesthood question to simply say “well, women can be mothers,” it is also apples and oranges to refute this statement by comparing childbirth to blessing a child because it takes the hardest part of being a mother (the low point) and compares it to a baby's blessing (the high point) of the Priesthood.
 
However, the reality is that women aren’t pregnant or nursing their entire life, and men aren’t blessing babies and baptizing kids each day. Motherhood has highs, and Priesthood has lows. Priesthood obligations extend to disciplinary counsels, excommunicating individuals, and dealing with extremely unpleasant and difficult situations. Obligations also include more mundane tasks such as countless meetings, trainings, reminders of duties, calls to shovel church walks on Christmas day, etc. Motherhood extends to forging bonds and relationships that don’t exist anywhere else on earth, and that cannot be achieved by men. Mothers simply always have a place and relationship that dads do not.
 
So, are the highs and lows of the Priesthood and Motherhood comparable? No, they aren’t. They’re different, but they do provide some insight into exploring what each has been given by God. However, for an honest discussion, we should never compare the low of an orange situation to the high of an apple situation. Those are false comparisons, and lead to nowhere but frustration and misunderstanding.
 
Women and the Priesthood ties into a deeper question
 
The question of women and the Priesthood drives to the heart of a much deeper question – a question surrounding our creation itself. What makes a man a man, or a woman a woman? Society currently is caught trying to understand this critical question. Regardless of what is learned about gender though, the physical bodies of males and females highlight a difficult question – why were each created as they were?
 
The most obvious physical difference for males and females is their reproductive organs. While both sexes have a sexual drive, the male’s is easily aroused, satisfied, and over. The female’s, however, brings with it heavy burdens if she becomes pregnant. Some studies have shown that if an unmarried woman becomes pregnant, the rate of depression is largely the same whether she aborts the baby, carries the child to term and adopts it out, or tries to raise the child on her own. In other words, she is suddenly saddled with a lifetime of consequences, whereas the father may have simply left as quickly as he came, possibly never even knowing he created a child. Add to this the natural strength of men to overpower and force a woman, and the balance seems radically tipped from an equal footing between sexes in the physical world.
 
Please don’t take this to say that women don’t have the Priesthood because they can have children. This is not what’s being said. Rather, it’s important to understand that God, as our Creator, created us in significantly different ways, with significantly different consequences, burdens, and experiences. These differences show that equality, for God, is not the same as it is for us. We are all created in very different situations and ways, with very different opportunities before us. Those in America have much more opportunity, usually, than someone in a war-torn country in Africa. Why is that equal or fair?

God promises that all of these things will be worked out though. This life is an extremely short blip in existence, one where we came to experience things we've never experienced before, and may never experience again. We're here to learn something, and God gives us each a unique path to tread to learn the things we need to.

Because of this, the women and the Priesthood question is really a deeper question of women and their Creator. In other words, to have an answer to the Priesthood question, we will have to also find an answer to the Creator question, or to why there is such a stark difference in the sexes stemming from creation itself.
 
There is no religion, no philosophy, and no place that has a good answer for why men and women are created differently, especially as it relates to the burdens associated with reproduction. In other words, there is nowhere yet to turn to find all of the detailed answers about the physical disparity in creation or the physical disparity in power, experience, and burdens placed upon each sex.
 
There is, of course, an answer, and we fully believe that God has a good answer. We don’t have that answer yet, but believe that we can get it as we work together in faith to find it. In other words, don’t walk away from the church over a question that is deep as life itself, a question yet unanswered, as there is nowhere to go for that answer but to God and His prophets. A main source of hope to understand the question is to work to receive the answers and information, line upon line, precept upon precept as God always does. Staying the course with the Prophet of God is the surest way to finding answers to such a deep issue.
 
Our path to answers has to begin by recognizing what God has given us
 
The small boy’s answer to the question of why he didn’t get to have a football body are found in focusing on what God did give him. God gave him other talents, skills, and abilities, because He had something else in mind for him other than football. While the boy may not have had what he valued for a long-time, he was given other things, and as he learns to value what he has, the things he doesn’t have, such as a football body, become less important.
 
So, what do women have? If they don’t have the Priesthood, then, by definition and as discussed further below, they have something extremely powerful, something that most people simply never see or appreciate as they are too focused on what they don’t have.
 
There are two ways (at least) that God’s power is manifest on the earth. The focus of that power tends to be the Priesthood. However, we are also taught, quite consistently, of the transcendent power of true love. Hold on for a moment for a more detailed explanation of this power.
 
There was a fascinating General Conference talk given on this power of true love. Elder John H. Groberg, in the October 2004 General Conference, related the following story of his time as missionary:

This talk is a fascinating one. “Never underestimate the power of true love, for it knows no barriers.” The power of a person’s love pulled him from the depths of the ocean and gave him the ability to continue swimming. The power reached across time and space. This is a power that changes hearts, lives, and people. It is truly the power of God.
 
What is true love though? Love, in its simplest form, is a voluntary recognition of the inherent worth, beauty, and value of an individual. Love involves placing someone’s interests before our own.
 
While love can be expressed in many forms, there is one thing common to all forms – the entirely voluntary aspect of it. If a robot were programmed to give nice hugs, compliments, and say “I love you”, we would not feel true love from that robot as love can only extend from something that has exercised the agency to truly appreciate and value our worth.
 
True love can only come from a being who is not obligated to feel as they do, to think as they do, or to act as they do. True love is powerful because it forms connections that do not exist otherwise to other individuals. True love brings meaning, purpose, and completeness to life. However, any form of force or compulsion to say nice things, to do things, or to think things, takes away the power inherent in love, as it turns us into beings acting like a robot.
 
Agency is essential to feel and convey love. Love has to be both voluntarily given and voluntarily accepted. When it is, the power knows no barriers.
 
This power of true love is likely truncated or inhibited by the Priesthood though. Priesthood is nearly always synonymous with duty, and duty inherently implies a motivation for doing something slightly below that of the entirely voluntary aspect of true love. While we commend people for acting pursuant to duty, the feelings associated with those who act out of no sense of duty, simply love, are much greater.
 
We came to earth to develop the ability to be like God, which means we’re working to develop the ability to truly love. The Priesthood duties, obligations, and responsibilities make this hard to accomplish though. Think of hometeaching. Many people don’t like having an “assigned” friend that stops by once a month. Imagine though the power of having a true friend stop by once a month, out of no obligation, duty, chance to report numbers, or the like, just to see how you’re doing. While the monthly visit from a hometeacher and friend could be the exact same in form, they would feel radically different, even from a hometeacher that really cared, simply because the hometeacher is obligated to be there.
 
Priesthood is essential to form a foundation for our existence on this earth. We’re in a fallen state and the basic needs of us all must be met. We need an ability to know where to turn for authoritative doctrine. We need a common judge to talk to at times. We need someone to assign responsibilities to others so that we at least keep people alive spiritually.
 
However, from a historical view of the world, it appears that the Priesthood is only necessary in limited quantities to accomplish God’s overall purpose. What is really necessary to accomplish His “work and glory” is for us to learn to exercise the power of true love, the power that comes from an entirely voluntary recognition of the worth and value of those around us.
 
In other words, it may be possible that if we all had the Priesthood, we may all lose access to an important form of God's power on the earth - true love from others in this life.
 
Because women don’t have the Priesthood, they have an amazing opportunity before them – the opportunity to be agents of a power of God that transcends time and space and knows no barriers, of a power that does more for the world than anything else.
 
Women, by virtue of having no duty to act, think, or feel certain ways, possess great power because their actions, thoughts, and feelings are entirely voluntary. Men and women are supposed to be equal partners, and it’s often hard, for example, for a wife to feel equal when her husband is a Bishop. God doesn’t call just a Bishop though, He calls a partnership. Yes, the man is currently given assignments, responsibilities, and duties, while the woman receives no such assignments, responsibilities, and duties. This lack of a specific ‘calling’ though endows the wife of a Bishop with exceptional power.
 
The visit from the wife of a Bishop to a member of the congregation can mean far more than a visit from a Bishop. Bishops are obligated to visit, wives aren’t. Everyone in the church knows this. So, while it may be important for the Bishop to visit at times, the power that a Bishop’s wife carries means so much more in a visit to a home because there was no duty associated with it. The visit simply came because she truly cared. In other words, the marriage partnership consists of one who has duties to make sure basic needs are met, while the other one carries the power to convey true love to others. Both are necessary, and both should work together as equal partners.
 
Our fallen world obligates us to have duties. However, our fallen world doesn’t mean that we’ve lost access to true love. God has always kept the large majority of the world entirely free from stated duties, as He is inviting us to learn to love, and to act as beings of love. The Celestial Kingdom will be filled with those who are agents of love, not agents of duty.
 
So, while there are some ‘highs’ associated with the Priesthood, there is exceptional opportunity in not having the Priesthood, opportunity to carry a power that gets negated or lessened by duty. This isn’t to say that Priesthood holder can’t also love someone truly, but it makes it so much harder for us to feel it when love and duty are tied together.
 
The opportunity to act and be an agent for God is missed by most people when discussing women and the Priesthood. When we focus on the power that can flow from voluntarily loving someone, from visiting when we have no obligation to do so, from taking a meal when no call came in, from doing something without any form of worldly recognition attached to it, we begin to see the power women are endowed with. We begin to see how individuals are to feel true love, and how hearts in the world are to be changed.
 
Yes, true love isn’t flashed around the world. It isn’t celebrated by millions, it isn’t seen on TV. It takes setting aside the vain things of the world to act without needing others to see it. It takes understanding that God's way isn't a path of high recognition or self-gratification. True love is mostly invisible and doesn’t feed our pride. It takes really caring about someone to feel the joy that comes from the opportunity given by God to love them. It takes getting outside of our stresses, doubts, questions, and worries to simply take a moment to truly care about another.
 
However, when we do, our joy transcends all depths, meaning comes to life, and we find ourselves embracing the opportunity that is ours to be agents of God’s power that transcends all known facts – an opportunity that exists to women because they do not currently hold the Priesthood.
 
Maybe women don’t hold the Priesthood because the power of God is manifest in different ways. Maybe women don’t hold the Priesthood because of the opportunity it gives them to partner with God in a free-will offering necessary to bring true love to the earth. Maybe women don’t have the Priesthood because the world won’t be saved by Priesthood alone, but by a partnership with true love, expressed at the individual level the world over.
 
God has an answer for why things are as they are. Exercising faith is important, yet we still need to remember and follow Him and His path, a path forged in love, not duty, a path freely taken, freely assumed, and a life freely given. If we want to change this world, we need to learn to be like Him, to act without compulsion or duty, to act simply because we love and recognize the worth of those around us. To act simply because of how important the individuals are around us.
 
Not having the Priesthood gives women a tremendous opportunity – an opportunity to exercise their agency to act and change the world through love. While God needs agents who respond to duty, He needs those who respond to and carry love far more. Of course, there are probably many reasons why, but perhaps love is one reason why the Priesthood has always been limited in access to the large majority of the earth’s population.

In other words, maybe, just maybe, God restricts the Priesthood because He loves us, and wants to help us learn to love in the same way He does - entirely voluntarily.

I believe in, follow, and worship Jesus Christ. “Why?” many people have asked me. “Why?” many people have wondered, but haven’t dared to ask. As this is a question deserving of a response, I took the time to write “why”. There are many reasons, of course, for my belief in Jesus Christ, but I’ll focus on three of the main ones for now.
 
First – We Exist
 
While it may not be theologically correct, I have often thought about a Universe of only one. My mind takes me back to a place and time when only God existed, and the thoughts that would go through His mind in deciding whether to create other life. While I don’t profess to have much of an idea of the depth of God’s thoughts, I do imagine that a critical issue would have been forefront in His mind. If other beings were created, what would happen if one injured another?
 
In a Universe of one, there would be options, of course. Beings could never be given the power to harm another. If there was no power to harm, however, there would be no ability to feel love. God, I’m sure, knew what love really meant, that it was most powerful as a choice made by someone to recognize your inherent value and treat you in a way they didn’t have to. If we were forced to never harm, then we could never experience what it really felt like to have a being choose not to harm us. Agency to choose respect, support, friendship, etc. is absolutely required for us to feel or experience another’s love as love is a voluntary and free-will choice of another being.
 
Robots can be programmed to never harm us. Robots cannot be programmed to love us though. If a robot were programmed to do something nice, it wouldn’t feel special or nice to us. We would know it was simply acting as directed, and we would continue to hunger for true love, the love that recognizes and values our worth as an individual, the love that motivates a choice inside an individual to act in a way that shows our worth. Banning the ability to harm would simultaneously be a ban on the ability to love as it would remove the free-will possibility of another being to decide against harm and for recognition of our true value.
 
Therefore, I imagine, this option was ruled out. The power to harm had to exist in order for the power to love to also exist, as love could only exist in an environment where beings were not programmed but made their own decisions. What, then, would the remedy be for beings harmed by other beings?
 
After going through all of the options, I’m convinced that God saw something else that love required – it required justice and mercy, consequences and second chances. If I truly love my child, I will teach my child about the realities of life, about work, about effort, about consequences when they steal, lie, or hurt another. However, I will also give them another chance when they make a mistake.
 
On the other hand, if somebody killed my child I would demand that the person be locked up. I would suffer a lot by the person’s choice to kill, but would start to receive some relief through the person receiving a just consequence for their decision to kill. Justice is essential to our healing process, as individuals harmed by the choices or actions of others, especially when the wounds go exceptionally deep, cannot receive full healing without knowing that the perpetrator is being taken care of appropriately. If an individual were to steal, for example, and then continue to steal over and over again, each person that had items stolen would only begin to feel at peace if the individual were apprehended and just consequences dealt. If the individual received no consequences ever, hurt from the act would continue as well. If there were no consequences for our decision to harm others, there would be no healing from the harm as just consequences are a critical part of the healing equation.
 
However, we all make mistakes. We all hurt others in some fashion, yet we all need another chance, a chance to improve, to try again, to change. Mercy begs that the consequences be withheld based on a hope of who we can be, instead of who we have been. Mercy’s demands operate to plead for the individual, while justice’s demands are essential to maintaining a system that all can exist within. Neither the system can overpower the individual, nor the individual the system, but both need a way to function together.
 
With all of this, and much more, in His mind, God could certainly see the need for a Savior, an individual possessed with the power to satisfy both the demands of justice and mercy. The perfect reconciliation of justice and mercy exists in Jesus Christ, our Savior. He reconciled these competing and conflicting demands through a love so deep that it transcends us all. He atoned for us, making it possible to repent and change of our wrongdoings, and be healed from the wrongdoings of others.
 
I can see no way that the Universe or individuals could exist if it weren’t for the competing demands of justice and mercy, and a way to reconcile them. Many people often criticize Jesus and His Gospel for having conflicting things in it. Of course there is conflict though. Justice and mercy have always conflicted, with entirely opposing demands. When we view things from our perspective, we may see conflict. However, from God’s perspective, He sees love, the perfect way to overcome and reconcile all conflict and opposition. When we are stuck seeing conflict, it simply means we need to lift our sights higher and see things from a different perspective. Good can have competing demands and still be good, so long as it is reconciled through the love of Christ.
 
There is much more to discuss on love, conflict, justice, and mercy. However, for me, the fact that love exists, that harm exists, and that we exist are proof of the necessity for a Savior. For us to exist with our differences, some Being would have to be the Great Reconciliator, and that Being is Jesus Christ, who I wholeheartedly believe in, follow, and worship due to the depth of His love for me.
 
People will always criticize God for conflict, suffering, and other bad things existing. However, when they do, they are criticizing Him for creating them. Why does conflict, suffering, and bad really exist? Because we exist. Because we have the ability to make choices. If we were to exist as independent beings, unique from all other beings in existence, then we had to be different in some way, shape, or form. Our differences naturally bring conflict to existence, but they also bring life, as it is through our differences that we can have an identity separate from anyone else.
 
In other words, Jesus Christ atoned for us so that we could live, so that we could be different, so that we could exist and experience the overwhelming feeling when someone voluntarily recognizes and values our eternal worth as an eternal being. To me, there is no way for all of us to exist with all of our differences if the conflicts we create and the principles that operate were not reconciled by the Being who created us. To me, every person I see, meet, or interact with helps me see that Jesus Christ also exists, as we would be powerless to exist without His Reconciliation for us.
 
Second – Jesus is the Only Name Whereby Salvation is Provided
 
When I look at myself, those around me, those I once knew, and those who make the news, I see something familiar – we’re all struggling to make a go of it in this life. Many of us, if not all, make some serious mistakes. We have imperfect bodies subject to sickness, injury, and death. We have imperfect hearts, minds, emotions, and feelings. In other words, I can readily see the “fallen” side of mankind.
 
Yet, I also see something in stark contrast to our fallen side. I see beauty, I see goodness, and I see potential in every person I meet. We are all beings with potential to do good or evil, and we all have a piece of goodness and darkness inside of us.
 
Jesus Christ is the only name under Heaven that offers a way to overcome our dark parts and fully embrace our good parts. He is the only name under Heaven that offers a way to be resurrected from the dead. In other words, He is the only name under Heaven that offers salvation from our present condition.
 
The claims made by Jesus Christ are exceptional. He says He can help us repent, change, be made new, and rise from the dead. Other religions and other gods worshipped on this earth do not offer what He offers. I can come back as a bug, I can reach Nirvana, or I can live this life and then become extinct. Jesus Christ is the only means to obtain salvation, to obtain a life eternal. He provides this opportunity to us all, asking, of course, that we also walk the competing line between justice and mercy, between employing our own effort and relying on Him for help.
 
I believe in, follow, and worship Jesus Christ because He has provided a way for us to continue to live, a way to be free from our mistakes, and a way to rise from the dead to be with those we love again. There is no other way or path to achieve these things.
 
Third – I Want What He Offers
 
I am a member of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints. As a member of Jesus Christ’s church, I am taught of the promises He has made to all of us. He has promised to give us all that He hath, and allow us to be partakers of all that He enjoys. He offers family, love, power, creation, and an eternal place of value, worlds without end.
 
I have a deep desire to find the true meaning to life. God knows what the true meaning of life is – it is you. He knows that life comes through others, that it is not good for a being to be alone, or to die forever. He knows that all happiness comes through recognizing and celebrating the beauty and value of those around us, and by sharing the things we have.
 
Jesus Christ has offered to share everything He has with me, and with you. I’ll be honest – I want what he offers. I want something better than the darkness of this world, than the hate, envy, and violence so readily here. I want something more than death. I want purpose, I want a place, and I want to live long beyond the bookends of my short passage on this earth.
 
Jesus Christ offers all of that to me. He teaches me how to live to appreciate others, to serve them, and to walk in their shoes. He teaches me how to be part of a family, how to be a friend, and how to forgive others so that I too can be forgiven. He tells me when I do something wrong, and He gives me another chance to try again. He wants me to become someone capable of experiencing everything He can experience, and so He allows me to try, mess up, and try again. He allows me to suffer so that I can experience love, and He allows me to live, despite the tremendous cost my life, choices, and actions required of Him.
 
I believe in, follow, and worship Jesus Christ because He is willing to share everything He has with me. I want the good that is there, I want the life, and I want all that He offers. This world simply offers nothing even remotely comparable to what He offers.
 
I Believe
 
There are many reasons I believe in Jesus Christ. Jesus Christ provides a way for me to come to know Him, to know of his truths, to know of the reality of His existence. The way He provides is a way of change. I can only come to know Him if I’m willing to change myself and who I am. When I’m not willing to change who I am, I stop myself from knowing and experiencing what He has to offer. When I’m willing to change and let go of myself and my wants, I come to know Him and His ways.
 
I know Jesus Christ lives. He loves us immeasurably. He wants the best for us, and to get us there He will give us everything we need to experience, good and bad, to help us get past ourselves and recognize that the true meaning of life is those around us. As the only way to satisfy the competing demands of the existence of multiple beings is through a Savior, Jesus Christ, our Creator, atoned and died for us to give us the means to overcome conflict and opposition, to become like Him.
 
I invite you to seriously consider your deepest desires. Is it really to have fun for a few years on this earth and then die? Is it really to do everything you want to do? Or is it deeper than that? Do you have any desire to live in a better state? Do you have any desire to have an eternal place where you are valued and loved? Do you have any desire to escape your past and embrace a future of limitless potential?
 
Jesus Christ is the way. I invite you to seriously consider what He offers, and seriously consider if there is any other way to achieve it. He is the only way to eternal life, eternal love, and eternal fulfillment. Of this I willingly testify and share with you.
 
We can all come to know Him. Read His words. Change yourself.  Seek His Spirit. Exercise faith. Draw near unto Him, and He will draw near unto you. Seek Him diligently and ye shall find Him. If you’re not finding Him, change yourself to more fully draw near to Him. He teaches us through living prophets of the many areas of our lives that need change and improvement to find Him.
 
Eternal riches require some work or effort on our part. We cannot simply expect a handout with no serious input from ourselves from the Being that transcended all known evil and opposition to be able to enjoy the depth of what this Universe offers. God worked for His life and for our lives, and we must do the same to begin to touch the depths of what He has to offer.
 
His path may require sacrifice, it may require faith, it may require letting go of our deepest doubts and fears, of letting go of our laziness, but it brings us to Him, to the Author and Finisher of our salvation, to the place of greatest meaning.
 
Please join me on the path to Him and what He offers us, and believe in, follow, and worship Him with me. It is the path to the riches of eternity.

Can a loving God ask His homosexual children to never marry? I get asked this fairly often, and think on the question a fair amount myself. I have watched many people lose their faith in God, or faith in their religion, over teachings related to homosexuality, and fully understand that it is a deep and sensitive issue for many. The issues are intensely personal, and there is no one answer that will satisfy everyone. There are, however, principles that help paint a bigger picture of God, principles that help shed some light on the subject and that should be part of our attempts to understand homosexuality and God.
 
Christian churches are generally not fully united in their teachings on homosexuality, adding perplexity to the issues. Teachings range from fully banning anything homosexual to fully embracing homosexuality. I am a member of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints, a church that teaches it is not a sin to be homosexual, but that it is a sin to act on any homosexual desires. This teaching places homosexual members in a rough spot, as they have to live an abstinent life to be in good standing with the church. For many people, this is simply more than God would or should ask of His children, especially if they were born homosexual.
 
I fully recognize and respect that being asked to live an abstinent life is a tall order, one with very serious implications and losses for an individual. Because of the depth of what is asked of homosexual members, I too have pondered much of the same questions, and I have serious respect for anyone that is faithfully working to understand such issues themselves.
 
As I have pondered on the issues related to homosexuality, I have seen many other people struggling with very different issues. With my work and church service, I visit a lot of people, in their homes, at their office, or in public meeting places. Many are seriously struggling, and many of them are alone, internally isolated from others they interact with each day. Many carry deep pain, heartache, or confusion, and most would love to find peace, lasting happiness, or joy, but are unable to do so.
 
Here is a short list of the burdens I have personally seen people face, burdens that hit even the most faithful church members:

• Depression
• Anxiety
• Paralysis
• Loss of Limbs
• Social Disorders (leaving them with no friends or loved ones)
• Emotional Disorders (unable to feel or process love)
• Death of Children
• Entire Loss of Self-Worth
• Suicidal
• Victim of Abuse
• No Relationship with God (even after serious effort)

 
Seeing the breadth of the issues faced, and seeing the depth of the pain carried by countless individuals, I have wondered where God is in the lives of many people. I have wondered why trials are given, or allowed to occur, to different people. In addition to the above burdens, in my church service in various places across the United States I have seen other burdens related to sin. As an example, in a short list again, I have seen things such as:

• Addictions
  • Pornography
  • Alcohol
  • Drugs
• Anger
• Adultery
• Greed
• Pedophilia
• Lust

 
Most of these people did not want these burdens, but felt driven by an overpowering force inside of them to act on things they knew would cause them issues later. For all of these people, the question is often the same, why would God give this to me?
 
The Mixing of Temporal and Spiritual
 
The story of Adam and Eve sets the foundation for much of Christianity. Adam and Eve partook, as the story goes, of some fruit that caused them to “fall”, or to receive a temporal nature that was subject to death. This meant that their physical bodies would be “fallen”, but would also be a house for their spiritual body that would live forever. In other words, Adam and Eve’s “fall” introduced what the scriptures refer to as the carnal, or natural, state into our physical bodies.
 
Christianity goes on to teach that God has a plan to redeem us from the fall, to enable us to become free of our fallen state, and to obtain an immortal physical body. This concept is understood by many, but the real rub comes in asking the question “why?” Why would God allow this? What purpose does it serve?
 
The answer is often along the lines of “because it is a test.” A test of what though? A test of cruelty where one is given homosexual desires but told to never act on it? A test hardcoding most men to view pornography, but telling them never to look at it? A test filling many people with depression, but telling them to find happiness anyways?
 
A Test to Become Like God
 
The answer to the question “a test of what” is that our test in this life is a test to become like God. To me, the key to understanding “like God” is the key to understanding many of these other issues. In other words, understanding “like God” helps to paint a picture broad enough to highlight principles at work in our temporal world.
 
What God Is Not
 
Sometimes, to understand what something is, it is helpful to first understand what it is not. God is not a being controlled by His passions. God does not act on selfish desires. God does not use His infinite power improperly, even to force me to do what He would like me to do. In other words, God is not a being controlled by any force except His own will.
 
Consider if you or I had infinite power in our “fallen” state. In a moment of intense anger, would that power be used to significantly harm or kill someone? Would a grudge fester into putting an eternal curse on somebody? Would physical attraction to another not similarly attracted result in them being forced to be with you? While some may laugh at such questions, it opens up a bigger picture to reflect on our times of weakness and what we might have done had we had the power to do so.
 
What God Is
 
God is the most free being in the Universe. God acts, and is not acted upon. God bridles all of His passions. God acts out of pure love, a love deep enough to allow me to learn and walk an individual path, one unique to me alone. God’s love is deep enough to recognize the value in physical suffering in a world with limited time attached to it in setting a proper course for an eternal life. In other words, God has the strongest, purest, most developed will in existence, a will powerful enough to submit to the most intense suffering possible when necessary to further eternal life.

God does not use His power for His own purposes. He uses His power for us. His work, His glory, is “to bring to pass the immortality and eternal life of man,” not to gratify the lusts or other forces that exist in the Universe. God is in control of the Universe because He is in control of Himself, and He is not subject to or accessible by the other powers that operate, entice, and encourage us down other paths.

Becoming Like God
 
To truly become like God then, we have to develop an exceptionally strong, an exceptionally pure, and an exceptionally good will. Our choices have to become the determining fate in our eternal existence. On this earth, all types of things will happen to us, and the “test” is in developing the willpower to respond in accordance with our eternal nature, in accordance with the God who gave us life.
 
Wills, in my mind, are created through the refinery of fire, affliction, and temptation. Wills are tested, or made stronger, when they encounter serious resistance, or serious pulls. Individual wills will simply never develop in a state free of heat, conflict, opposition, or friction. Just like metal is truly forged, tested, and tried in the midst of great heat, so too are our wills so created.
 
What is will truly? It is the power to resist. It is the power to act in the face of everything else saying no. It is the power to maintain individuality in the midst of our fully interconnected world. A truly developed will is the only way to be a free individual, and is the only way to become like God.
 
Consider the Savior Jesus Christ for a moment. Why is He a God? There are many reasons of course, but one is that He had the will to submit to the most suffering possible. When everything inside Him, including His physical DNA, screamed to stop and not drink the bitter cup, He maintained the power to act as an individual. He maintained His own destiny, and drank, sweating drops of blood from every pore.
 
King David, on the other hand, never developed the will to stay in control of himself. He had many wives, but when he saw the beauty of Bathsheba, He could not refrain. His will never developed enough to keep him in control of himself, and he became subject to the pulls of his temporal state, leading him to commit adultery and murder as he tried to cover up what he had done.
 
God’s Power
 
We came to this earth to become like God. In other words, we came with the hopes of developing and progressing to the point where we could enjoy “all that the Father hath,” which, in my mind, means His power and abilities. He wants us to become like Him, we are His children, but He knows that since His power can affect eternity itself, it can only go to those who have truly developed their wills to keep them free and independent of any other force in existence.
 
In other words, we can only become like God if we are truly in control of the forces that operate without and within us as individuals. Because of this, God asks us all to forego acting on serious passions and feelings. God asks men to avoid all pornography, even though their DNA may compel them to view it. God asks the depressed to keep working, the introverted or anxious to talk to others and share the Gospel, those attracted sexually to children to never act on those desires, those too socially awkward or simply without the right opportunity to ever find a marriage companion to stay fully abstinent, and those with a homosexual nature to never act on it.
 
Yes, sexuality is a massive force. It operates and pulls on all humans in existence. Lusts of all sorts operate powerfully on others as well, physical conditions severely limit or entice, and darkness may exist inside many individuals. Despite all of this, all are asked to “put off the natural man,” or are asked to truly develop their wills.
 
All of us have natural, carnal, or temporal conditions inside of us. Every day we must decide whether to embrace our natural, physical state, or to embrace our eternal, spiritual state. If we embrace our physical state, and let our passions and physical natures control us, we are relinquishing our eternal will, and our eternal potential, for a life that dies and ends. We do not rise in the resurrection with the temporal things of this life. Our physical DNA does not define us eternally. Rather, our spirit, created by our Eternal Father, defines us eternally.
 
The Opportunity to Become Like God
 
Our opportunity to become like God is our opportunity to experience the pulls, desires, and passions of everything that may keep us from becoming like Him. Yes, those things will be a part of us. Yes, God will ask us to forego acting on our temporal DNA and conditions and act instead in accordance with our eternal DNA found in our spirit.
 
This earth is our time to develop a will, a will that can withstand all forces that may be in existence, a will that makes us truly free from all constraints – so that every decision we make is the decision of our eternal being, the being that we will live with forever.
 
For all who are asked by God to remain abstinent in this life – whether homosexual, heterosexual with no opportunity to marry, or simply someone with a condition preventing them from maintaining a relationship – God’s request can be seen as a horrible thing preventing the experience of things of this life, or it can be seen as a significant opportunity to develop and forge an intensely strong will, a will commensurate with that of God’s. To truly reach the height of God, we must experience the depths of the pulls that operate at that level.
 
Christ forsook all on this earth, and he asks us to do the same, to forsake everything that is not in line with an eternal nature. He loves us enough to allow us to experience all of the forces that exist, and it is up to us to decide if there is a force we choose to succumb to, whether it be darkness, sexuality, greed, selfishness, or anything else, or whether we push back sufficiently to maintain our eternal freedom. This principle is the same for all of us, regardless of what force operates on us.
 
God doesn’t leave us alone in this process. He will push back with us, He will give us strength, and He will give us deep fulfillment and meaning as we strive to overcome the forces that exist in the Universe. God has walked this path Himself, and He knows of the depths it takes us to, as well as the heights that are ahead.
 
The big picture is simply that God knows maintaining our individual will and freedom is far more fulfilling, eternally, than acting on temporal natures that die when we do. Yes, God asks us to give up a lot, to give up even things that define us so significantly in this life, but He promises “all that He hath” to those that work to overcome, to build, and to forge a will of eternal character and significance.
 
Christ voluntarily experienced all of the possible pulls and forces in existence. When He said “not my will, but thine be done,” He was submitting all of his personal desires, pulls, and passions aside to pursue the path of eternal life. This process caused extreme suffering, suffering that was necessary to try, or temper, even the will of a God. God’s refusal to give in to any opposing force produced the will and power to truly overcome all things, as power can only come through choosing to turn away and resist the forces that be.
 
Similarly, in our walk on this earth, in order to gain spiritual power, we must be faced with enticing forces, forces that are so strong and prevalent and stem from within that the only way to not act on them is through our will alone. Our wills are tested, tried, and forged on our path to become like God, and this is so for all of us, regardless of sexuality, nationality, or personality.
 
So yes, teachings from the LDS Church put homosexuals in an extremely difficult spot. However, teachings from the LDS Church also put many others in an extremely difficult spot. When faced with this, we must decide whether we continue to push and develop our wills and capacity to be like God, to be free from the forces of the Universe, or whether we throw in the towel, so to speak, on eternity, and embrace the fleeting moments of our temporal existence.
 
From what I can see, homosexuality is not an anomaly and fits into God’s big picture, just like everything else in this life. The fact that Church teachings conflict with the human experience, with individuals, and with DNA even is evidence of a God in charge, a God interested in helping and loving us enough to become like Him, to become free from all known opposing forces in existence.
 
To truly be an individual, we have to have a pure will, and to have a pure will, we must be refined and tested by all opposing forces, as wills can only be created, built, and strengthened through our daily choices to resist. God’s power came through the exercise of His individual agency, or will, and our eternal potential and power comes the same way, through a daily walk of giving up the temporal for things of eternity.
 
God loves you, He loves me. He wants the best for us in eternity, and so He lets us experience all that the Universe offers, thereby enabling us to develop a strong will, a will like His, similarly forged in the furnace of affliction, conflict, and opposition present on this earth and inside each one of us.

             Faith in God is often correlated with miraculous healings, and there are many scriptural and current day examples of such healings. Science, even, acknowledges that faith can play a role in the healing process. When sickness, injury, or turmoil occurs, many people petition God in prayer, believing that He has the power to make them whole. However, for many people, as the sickness, pain, or inner turmoil drags on, there seems to be no miraculous healing, and no good result from the efforts and hopes put forth in faith.
 
            In today’s world, we often wonder where the scriptural miracles are. We often wonder why the blind are not blessed to see, the deaf are not blessed to hear, and the lame are not made to walk, as they were in Jesus’ time. Although we hear of some miracles in today’s time, we do not see them coming in the same way or to the same degree or magnitude as in Jesus’ time. This can cause us to question the reality of scriptural accounts, of religion, of faith, and of God.
 
            In addition, we hear of stories in our times where people are suddenly cured from cancer, where they miraculously survived a car accident unscathed, or where their neighbor, Bishop, or friend showed up at just the right time – when they needed them most. However, for many who hear of these stories, their cancer may be getting worse, they may have lost a relative in a car accident, or no one showed up at the moment the person really needed them, or ever really showed up at all, for that matter. God, faith, and religion, just do not seem to work in the lives of many – many who exercised faith, but who were left alone and suffering still.
 
             Why is it that faith can be miraculously responded to or, it seems at times, simply ignored? Why does the pain persist, the problems continue, and the loneliness deepen, even after believing and doing everything that can be done? Does God love others more than me? These are questions that tend to spin through the minds of those who pray in faith, yet still are left without.
 
            I have been on both sides of things. I have had times when I was miraculously healed or my life was miraculously preserved. I have also had times where I have prayed and prayed for help or healing, and only felt the loneliness of silence from Heaven and the continued pain from the problems at hand. While I don’t know the answers to all of the questions surrounding these issues, I have learned a few things that have been helpful to me.
 
1.         It often takes more faith to NOT be healed than it takes to be healed.
 
            Being healed of something, quickly, takes believing in the fact that God has all power and can immediately influence what is wrong. This faith is a quick faith, one that expires with the healing and loss of pain, meaning that it does not often add much to one’s character, provide direction through hard times, or offer a spiritual food of long-term sustenance. It is like an ice cream cone given to a child, quickly eaten in happiness, but often forgotten the next day, with a request for even more ice cream then and each day after.
 
            Not being healed, however, requires a very different type of faith. For those who are not healed, they still are faced with believing that God has all power, but that He is not exercising it for some reason. Because of this, they have to develop faith in a host of other things in addition to God’s power.
 
            For example, those not healed have to develop faith that God still loves them, even though they are being allowed to suffer. They have to develop faith that God must know something that they don’t, that God has a bigger plan in mind. They have to develop faith that there is purpose in suffering. They have to develop faith in themselves that they are capable of surviving or enduring through the hardship. They have to develop faith, ultimately, that a loving God and suffering can co-exist together.
 
2.         God has more in mind than we do.
 
            God understands us, but we believe that we understand us too. We often think there are things that would make life better, whether it be health, friends, money, etc. Yet, God doesn’t give us these things, despite our faith. In addition, we want to relish in today, to be happy, free of pain, and enjoying life.
 
            God knows what we need to become a better being eternally. God wants us to enjoy today, but never at the cost of eternity. God cares more about the eternal nature of our soul than He does about the physical pleasures and blessings of this world. God will withhold things that we petition for when He knows it is not what we need, and will, in kindness, withhold our petitions when we ask for things that may do us more harm than good in the eternities.
 
3.         Our purpose in life is not to avoid pain and trials. It is to become like God.    
 
            Our physical existence often encourages us to work hard to avoid pain and suffering. However, our physical existence also readily shows us the weakness that comes as we avoid exertions and labor and our muscles and body weakens. We understand that exercise, or exertions, develop strength and power, but we pray in faith, hoping that we can avoid all such exertions at the spiritual level.
 
            As part of our test on this earth, we will be faced with decisions where we get to see and determine what we want. Do we want to live easy and free of pain, or learn to pass through that which is required for ‘right’ to prevail? For God, His passage on this earth meant the most suffering ever known to any being as He atoned for us. For God, the status of ‘God’ means willingly traversing any suffering required, rather than avoiding suffering at all costs. If God were like us, He would have avoided the suffering and pain associated with the atonement, rather than submit, even though He possessed the full power to stop his own suffering at any time.
 
             The only way for us to truly become like God is to develop faith in a bigger picture of existence. We have to learn that life is not just about us as individuals, it is about us as a human family. Eternal life comes as we learn to live for and serve others, and we can only develop that outlook when we can learn to see past the walls of our own existence.
 
              Suffering ultimately helps us to develop faith in the fact that meaning and purpose is found outside of our own existence, a critical aspect in our pursuit of becoming like God. God chose to endure suffering for us, and our times of enduring something allows us to shape our inner selves into more Godlike selves, focusing more on others than on our own sufferings. In other words, our suffering helps us to see more of the world than we would otherwise see, which helps us develop a view from God’s perspective on life.
 
4.         Trials are hills in life. They take us to new heights or depths, depending on our faith.
 
            God is way above me. His ways, His life, His existence, is far above mine. If I take a path of no resistance, I will never reach the heights He has achieved. For me to follow in His footsteps, I need hills and mountains to climb to reach where He is located.
 
            Our times of no healing are like hills and mountains. Of course, like any hill or mountain, these times can take us up or down. The same path that takes us up is the same path that can take us down, as the only way for something to have a path up is for it to have a path down as well. It just depends on the way we choose to travel. Thus, stumbling blocks for some can be stepping stones for others, just as times of no healing can greatly strengthen faith for some or can diminish or damage it significantly for others.
 
            For times when we are not healed, we have to remember that we are now on an incline, and our faith becomes ever more essential to carry us up the incline closer to where God is. If the darkness is closing in, we may need to reach out in faith to others for help to continue climbing up the path together or otherwise work to reverse our course on the incline we are on. Ultimately, we have to ensure that even though we have not been healed, despite our faith, that our faith keeps us point towards God, so that we always move up, rather than down, the path of trial.
 
5.         Healing can come through increased understanding.
 
            Oftentimes, we plead for healing by pleading for the problem to disappear or be removed. Healing, to us, frequently means removal of pain. However, our real problems often run far deeper than our physical body, and some of the most extensive pain can be associated with questions of “Why?” or of not understanding where God is during the hard times.
 
            When people can, for example, develop the right outlook on exercise, exercise can become rewarding, even in spite of some pain associated with it. For us, it is the same. As we pray in faith, for example, for healing from cancer, but the cancer continues, it can be useful to pray for understanding, to pray, in faith, for eyes to see what God sees, to understand what God understands about the situation.
 
            As we obtain insights into ourselves, our situation, and others around us, we can find real healing, a deeper healing that surpasses the physical condition we are enduring at the time. Our souls long for understanding, and praying for knowledge and understanding can be a route to a more complete healing than simply praying for the physical ailment to disappear. When no healing comes, God is often willing to give us understanding about certain things, we just have to be willing to be open to receive the information.
 
6.         True faith is about changing our own circumstances, about creating something new.
 
            Ultimately, to pass our test on Earth and become like God, we have to develop the ability to create, to use our faith to develop and produce something that did not exist before. At some point, we have to be left on our own, so to speak, in a place where we cannot feel or see God, but where we feel may need Him or His miracles. These are our places that define us, that allow us to develop a critical type of faith – a faith that brings the power to create.
 
            I know people who have lost hands, loved ones, eyesight, internal strength, and hearing. I know people who carry burdens of depression, anxiety, mental illness, and other issues. Amazingly, I see many of them take what they have left, and begin to create beauty and opportunity around them. Creation is a slow process, however, and so patience, endurance, fortitude, and a whole host of other wonderful traits come to the individuals as a result of this process as these individuals endure through their physical shortcomings.
 
            Our times of not being healed leave us with a choice that will ripple through eternity – do we simply accept our fate and give up, or do we take the things we still have and create something with it? God wants us all to be creators like Him. God took His suffering in the Garden of Gethsemane as He atoned for us and created something beautiful as He allowed us to repent and be forgiven. He took His suffering and death on the cross and created new life, new life for all of us. God, ultimately, takes all bad, and turns it into something beautiful and good. Amazingly, He gives us the opportunity and chance to do the same.
 
            If God always healed us, or always gave us everything we wanted, we would never learn to create, and thus would never become like Him. In order for us to grow, develop, and progress, we have to learn how to shape our situations, determine our destiny, and move forward in faith to create a way or path that may not have existed before. This isn’t, of course, a path to get to Heaven, as Christ is the only one who can create that path, but rather is a path through life, through our time on this earth.
 
            While God provides a way to Heaven, He does not provide a way through this life. We each get to determine and shape our path through this life. There will be miracles as we work and strive to get places, but there will never be enough miracles to make it so that we didn’t expend our own efforts in this life. In other words, the times of not being healed may need to last long enough to enable us to be agents unto ourselves, choosing our path and what we want in this life, and creating beauty and goodness along the way, no matter the depths of darkness reached.
 
             Our brokenness serves to open us up to the power of our faith and will. If we are completely whole and always have the necessities of life, we would be able to rely on our body to accomplish things. However, if we are sick, broken, afflicted, or lacking a necessity of life, then our creativity, efforts, and faith have to kick in to survive, or, to say it another way, our soul has to take control for us to make it through. In other words, our weaknesses lead to giving us more strengths overall, strengths of the soul that bring us closer to God.
 
7.         God loves us.
 
            God truly loves us, even when we don’t feel it or feel alone. He allows us to become the master of our destiny by allowing us to be in places and situations where are bodies are broken so that we can develop the traits necessary to be like Him. God’s love causes Him to balance the interests of today against those of eternity, and to ensure the optimal conditions for our eternal progression.
 
            Remember, it takes more faith to not be healed than it takes to be healed. If you have not been healed even after exercising faith, please recognize that God knows your level of faith, and that your broken or sick state may be due to a development of a greater form of eternal faith inside you – a faith that will develop into knowledge that God loves you regardless of where you find yourself, a faith that you are a child of God, a faith that gives you the power to create, shape, and change your circumstances, and a faith that you are part of something much bigger than yourself.
 
            Due to the many facets of faith that can be developed through not being healed, God will not heal us in some way or another as we go through this life. Our faith has to transcend the ability to be healed to embrace a deeper, more expansive, and more sustaining faith – a faith that allows us to return to God. As we still work to develop true faith inside of us, a faith not dependent on our physical state, but one that feeds our eternal state of being, we may learn that we don’t need healing to succeed or enjoy life. Rather, our times of not being healed may end up being the times that brought our true self to the surface, and the times that most define us on our path back to God.