2 Nephi 2:11, 15-16, 27

[pam]

Reference Search: 2 Nephi 2:11

11 For it must needs be, that there is an opposition in all things. If not so, my first-born in the wilderness, righteousness could not be brought to pass, neither wickedness, neither holiness nor misery, neither good nor bad. Wherefore, all things must needs be a compound in one; wherefore, if it should be one body it must needs remain as dead, having no life neither death, nor corruption nor incorruption, happiness nor misery, neither sense nor insensibility.

Reference Search: 2 Nephi 2:15-16

15 And to bring about his eternal purposes in the end of man, after he had created our first parents, and the beasts of the field and the fowls of the air, and in fine, all things which are created, it must needs be that there was an opposition; even the forbidden fruit in opposition to the tree of life; the one being sweet and the other bitter.

16 Wherefore, the Lord God gave unto man that he should act for himself. Wherefore, man could not act for himself save it should be that he was enticed by the one or the other.

Reference Search: 2 Nephi 2:27

27 Wherefore, men are free according to the flesh; and all things are given them which are expedient unto man. And they are free to choose liberty and eternal life, through the great Mediator of all men, or to choose captivity and death, according to the captivity and power of the devil; for he seeketh that all men might be miserable like unto himself.

Quotes for Discussion

Opposition—Agency

We are free to choose, but we are not free to alter the consequences of those choices.

Ezra Taft Benson, Come Unto Christ, p. 40

Difficulty comes when agency is used to make choices that are inconsistent with…covenants. Study the things you do in your discretionary time, that time that you are free to control. Do you find that it is centered in those things that are of highest priority and of greatest importance? Or do you unconsciously, consistently fill it with trivia and activities that are not of enduring value or help you accomplish the purpose for which you came to earth? Think of the long view of life, not just what’s going to happen today or tomorrow. Don’t give up what you most want in life for something you think you want now.

Richard G. Scott, Ensign, May 1997, p. 54

Sadness, disappointment, severe challenge are events in life, not life itself….A pebble held close to the eye appears to be a gigantic obstacle. Cast on the ground, it is seen in perspective. Likewise, problems or trials in our lives need to be viewed in the perspective of scriptural doctrine….Some people are like rocks thrown into a sea of problems. They are drowned by them. Be a cork. When submerged in a problem, fight to be free to bob up to serve again with happiness….When you trust in the Lord, when you are willing to let your heart and your mind be centered in His will, when you ask to be led by the Spirit to do His will, you are assured of the greatest happiness along the way and the most fulfilling attainment from this mortal experience. If you question everything you are asked to do, or dig in your heels at every unpleasant challenge, you make it harder for the Lord to bless you.

Richard G. Scott, Ensign, May 1996, pp. 24-25

Our destiny is not based on chance. It is based on choice!

Boyd K. Packer, CES Religious Educators Symposium, Aug. 10, 1993, p. 9

Sometimes the solution is not to change our circumstance, but to change our attitude about that circumstance and its difficulties so that we see more clearly….There are those today who say that man is the result of his environment and cannot rise above it. Those who justify mediocrity, failure, immorality of all kinds, and even weakness and criminality are certainly misguided. Surely the environmental conditions found in childhood and youth are an influence of power. But the fact remains that every normal soul has its free agency and the power to row against the current and to lift itself to new planes of activity and thought and development. Man can transform himself. Man must transform himself….Man has in himself the seeds of godhood, which can germinate and grow and develop. As the acorn becomes the oak, the mortal man becomes a god. It is within his power to lift himself by his very bootstraps from the plane on which he finds himself to the plane on which he should be. It may be a long, hard lift with many obstacles, but it is a real possibility. In other words, environment need not be our limit. Circumstance may not need to be our ruler….

Spencer W. Kimball, Ensign, July 1978, pp. 3-7

We who lived in concentration camps can remember the men who walked through the huts comforting others, giving away their last piece of bread. They may have been few in number, but they offer sufficient proof that everything can be taken from a man but one thing: the last of human freedoms—to choose one’s attitude in any given set of circumstances, to choose one’s own way.

Victor Frankl, Man’s Search for Meaning, p. 104

…the Father’s plan, which required that all people obtain mortal bodies, be tried and proven in all things, and have opportunity to choose of their own free will….Lucifer—a personage of prominence—sought to amend the plan, while Jehovah sustained the plan. The central issue in that council, then, was: Shall the children of God have untrammeled agency to choose the course they should follow, whether good or evil, or shall they be coerced and forced to be obedient? Christ and all who followed Him stood for the former proposition—freedom of choice; Satan stood for the latter—coercion and force. Because Satan and those who stood with him would not accept the vote of the council, but rose up in rebellion, they were cast down to the earth, where they have continued to foster the same plan. The war that began in heaven is not yet over. The conflict continues on the battlefield of mortality. And one of Lucifer’s primary strategies has been to restrict our agency through the power of earthly governments. Proof of this is found in the long history of humanity. (see Teachings of the Prophet Joseph Smith, p. 357).

Ezra Taft Benson, The Constitution: A Heavenly Banner, pp. 2-3

Sydney Harris wrote, in the Chicago Daily News:

I walked with a friend, a Quaker, to the newsstand the other night, and he bought a paper, thanking the newsie politely. The newsie didn’t even acknowledge it.

“A sullen fellow, isn’t he?” I commented.

“Oh, he’s that way every night,” shrugged my friend.

“Then why do you continue to be so polite to him?” I asked.

“Why not?” inquired my friend. “Why should I let him decide how I’m going to act?”

Boyd K. Packer, 1966-67 BYU Speeches of the Year, Oct. 4, 1966, p. 9

We are…the sum of all the choices we make. We should always remember that our choices do not begin with the act, but in the mind with the idea. As a poet stated, “Sow a thought, and you reap an act; sow an act, and you reap a habit; sow a habit, and you reap a character; sow a character, and you reap a destiny” [Anonymous]. Given our agency, we are therefore individually responsible for our ideas, acts, habits, character, and, yes, even our destiny.

Richard B. Wirthlin, Ensign, Nov. 1997, p. 10

No virtue can exist without its corresponding evil: without the evil of danger there could be no courage, without suffering there could be no sympathy, without poverty there could be no generosity, and so forth. Without darkness there could be no light, without cold there could be no hot, without depths there could be no heights. Thus there must be wickedness so there might be righteousness, death so there might be life, that which is satanic so there might be that which is godly. Were there no opposites, all things must remain "a compound in one." Imagine a world in which all things were the same color, were the same size, and had the same functions world in which one could neither have nor be without; a world with neither sound nor silence; a world in which there was no beauty or lack of it; a world without love or hate, the sweet or the sour, virtue or vice.

Joseph Fielding McConkie and Robert L. Millet, Doctrinal Commentary on the Book of Mormon, 4 vols., 1:, p.195

Evil is with us, it is that influence which tempts to sin, and which has been permitted to come into the world for the express purpose of giving us an opportunity of proving ourselves before God, before Jesus Christ, our Elder Brother, before the holy angels, and before all good men, that we are determined to overcome the evil, and cleave to the good, for the Lord has given us the ability to do so.

Brigham Young, Discourses of Brigham Young, p. 70

Man is on earth under a plan provided by God, the Father of the spirits of men. This plan is for the good and welfare of man. The ultimate purpose of the plan is to enable every person to develop his every power, and thus to progress eternally.

Imbedded in every part of the plan is the right of every man to act for himself, to choose one or the other of the opposites which present themselves before him. If he chooses to do that which is for his welfare, which enables him to progress, he chooses the good. If he chooses that which retards his progress, he chooses the evil. Whatever conforms to the plan of God for His earth children is good; whatever is in opposition to the plan is evil. That is a simple, plain definition of evil.

John A. Widtsoe, Evidences and Reconciliations, pp. 205-6

Notice the major points…as to why there must be opposition before a man can be truly free and…experience real joy: (1) Every law has both a punishment and a blessing attached to it. (2) Disobedience to law requires a punishment which results in misery. (3) Obedience to law provides a blessing which results in happiness (joy). (4) Without law there can be neither punishment nor blessing, neither misery nor happiness…. (5) Thus happiness (or joy) can exist only where the possibility of [the] opposite…also exists. (6) In order to exercise free agency a person must have the possibility (and the freedom) of choice.

Daniel H. Ludlow, Companion, 125

[rameumptom]

I do a lot of reading, and in the past year have read many books on happiness and change, etc. There are a few themes that run through all the books.

First, happiness is a choice. If we're miserable, it is because WE have chosen to be miserable. Sometimes it is because we choose to do things that bring about bad consequences, and sometimes it is because we choose to react to things that happen to us.

The Lord expects us to ACT and not be acted upon. This means we must thoughtfully choose our responses, rather than react emotionally and without thought.

Alma taught his son, Shiblon to "bridle all your passions, that ye may be filled with love..." (Alma 38:12). This tells me that we are to control our passions and emotions, and not the other way around.

If we "fall into love" or "fall out of love" it is because we have chosen to react, rather than act. Any of us can make the decision to love another, regardless of how they treat us. Jesus does this every single day, but somehow we tend to have an excuse on why we cannot or will not forgive or let something go. We refuse to learn to accept our lives, and choose gratitude for what we have, and for the trials that teach us the things we need to be exalted.

Isn't it time we learned that opposition is a good thing, even though it may not feel so good while we are going through it? And isn't it time we learned to rely upon God and trust Him enough to bear our trials humbly and faithfully?

[harpangel]

these are the verses that converted me to a complete believer in the Book of Mormon at first reading, and prompted me to continue reading (I read the book in two days) and join the church. These verses said the things I had always known but had never heard in any book before.