Obey With Exactness

I am a huge fan of quotes. Church related or not, I think philosophy is fascinating. And the greatest part is, the vast majority of them can be directly paralleled to gospel truths. I read a few quotes recently that stood out to me.

“There is no terror in the bang, only in the anticipation of it”- Alfred Hitchcock

Being a senior in high school, and having so much life before me, I have much to fear. Fortunately, most of the things I fear lie under my jurisdiction to choose. And yet, the fear of a bad decision seems to degrade my moral to the point that I sell my own self discipline short. When in reality I can withstand more temptations than I really believe to be possible. When I think of opportunities to be unrighteous in any way, I fear nothing more than the option posed to choose wrong. Not necessarily the consequence of choosing wrong.

Being born and raised in the church I think I have set my focus too much on the choice and not enough on the consequence. The choices we make always have gray areas. From a high school perspective, you could say “There’s no way I’d ever cheat on a test, but cheating on homework isn’t too bad”. It is one of those things you will not really see the consequence of until it is too late and the “test” has come. It can be applied to morality, kindness, honesty, and just about anything else. And it all winds down to Satan’s power to influence us to rationalize. But the consequences will never change. If we would just be able to see all the small steps the led to the big consequence from the start, every small decision would become black and white. Which will instantly immune us to any fear of choosing wrong.

We learned in Sunday school today that the Armies of Helamen were protected because they “Obeyed with exactness” every commandment given them. That statement seems awfully overwhelming. And could be simply terrifying to anyone who approaches it thinking of all the small choices they will need to make every day. But for one who approaches it thinking of all the terrible sins, guilt, heartbreak and pain they will avoid as a consequence of choosing the right, it becomes a comfort rather than a challenge. So as I anticipate those “bangs” that will inevitably come every hour in every day, I pray I can meet the challenges with honor, not thinking of fear or the difficulty of the choice, but the glory found in the consequence.