A Cherished Gift

      I love the gift of agency that was giving to us through the plan of salvation.  The gift that we have to choose shows me just how far the love of our Heavenly Father can reach. To let us make our choices, wether it be right or wrong, is one of the basic principles of the Plan. It allows for the most growth, the most faith, and the most humbling of ourselves. 

      From the beginning our agency has been at the top of the list of protected gifts from God.  Part of Satan's plan was to take away our agency.  To control us as puppets to make sure we all returned to the Father.  Even though the end result is what we want anyway, the means to get there would not allow any growth.  Which would be a contradiction to the reason way we needed bodies in the first place.  We needed to grow past what we already had. 

     In the beginning Adam and Eve where commanded not to eat from the Tree of Knowledge of Good and Evil, but was also told that they could choose for theirselves. It was the first act of agency against the commandments of God. That was what was needed to start the world and to start the Plan because without choice there could not be any real salvation. 

     The atonement is centered around agency. We have to choose to ask for forgiveness. In Luke 11:9 the statement is made to: "Ask, and it shall be given you.... knock, and it shall be opened unto you." We have to make to decision to let Him in and choose to get the answers we seek.  It is all based on our choices that we make wether it be good or evil we are the ones that are making them not anyone else.  

      He loves all of his children and wants them to return to him so he gave us the other gifts that are included in the Plan of Salvation.  He has given us a commandments, the atonement, the scriptures, a prophet, all that is included the the gospel of Jesus Christ. Yet it is still our responsibility to choose, listen, obey and use all that has been given to us. 

     Now it is a gift that was given to us, that Satan was trying to take away before we came. So beware because he is still trying to take that away. There are choices that he wants us to make that would hinder our ability to keep choosing for ourselves. Things like addictions take away our agency. Choosing to not use the atonement can take away choices of our eternal life.  Our agency is a gift that we fought for and we need to continue to fight for and make the choice to live a righteous life. It may not be the easiest but on an eternal scale it is the best way