Consequences

We are here on the Earth, in bodies of flesh and blood, and most of us, at least most of you reading this, are free to make choices.  We live in the United States, a mostly free country, and we get to make decisions every day.  I decide when to wake up.  What to wear.  What to eat.  Whether to care for my children, and how.  I choose, choose, choose, all day.  Sometimes I am baffled by all our options.

Just last night, I stood in front of the freezer and stared at all the things inside it.  Frozen fruit, ice cream, tiny little individual sized cherry pies, ground meat, frozen chicken, egg rolls, pot stickers, frozen meals.  I could go on and on and on.  (It's a big freezer.)  This is just one teensy tiny example of how many choices we make, how much freedom we have in this day and age.

What you may not remember, or what you may not believe, is that this freedom wasn't free to us.  I'm not even talking about the wars fought by American troops to keep us safe and free, although of course, I am eternally grateful for their sacrifices.  I'm talking about a much older battle on a much more dangerous battlefield.  Long ago, in heaven, there was a different kind of battle, and that battle rages on all around us every single day, every hour, every minute.  That battle is for your soul.

God had two sons, both angels of the morning.  Both beautiful, talented, smart.  Both had ideas for how all of us, God's spirit children, could go about obtaining bodies.  There was only one real difference between their plans.  In Jesus Christ's plan, we had to come to Earth, gain a body and then make choices.  We were free to choose to follow God, to love God, to become like him, or we could choose not to.  In Satan's plan (also known by the name of Lucifer at that time), we didn't have that option.  We would, like robots, come to earth, gain a body, and make all the right decisions.  We would be ushered back to God's presence to live with Him again.

God knew that would not ever result in his children becoming like Him.  We would have bodies, created in his image, sure, but we would not have become closer to Him in any other way.

To succeed, you must first be able to fail.

God chose Jesus' plan and we came to this Earth.  We make decisions every day, ranging from small to large.  We can choose to do and say and be most anything, if we are willing to work for it.  There is only one thing we can't choose:

the consequences of our choices.

My kids are learning this the hard way.  I look at them with wise, old eyes and I shake my head as they experience this truth.  Tessa will insist she absolutely must hold my cup.  She will pull and pull on it until I let her.  Then she will pour the milk, or ice water, or whatever it contains all over herself.  And then she will cry, because she is inexplicably wet.  Six years down the road of life, I watch my son Eli, who is like genius level smart, talk about how the other kids around him just aren't very good at reading.  Then I see him struggle to make friends with those same kids.  Oh, Tessa.  Oh, Eli.  Choice.  Consequence.  The one follows the other as inexorably as the tides.

As wise and old eyed as I may feel, I still learn this principle myself on a regular basis.  In fact, just last week, I sat in my house, crying, sobbing on the floor with my baby Tessa because I didn't have the proper paperwork when the entire family reached the dock in Galveston, and the cruise line wouldn't let my one year old on the family cruise.  Whose fault was that?  Mine, of course.  I made choices that landed me at home, during a vacation, with no one but myself to blame.  I am sure my Heavenly Father was up in heaven shaking his figurative head over my frustration and my hurt.  "Oh darling Bridget, it was due to your own decisions that you're in this mess."

So is this post about being depressed or upset or frustrated?  About pointing out that we are all a bunch of morons, banging our heads against the wall because we don't want to deal with the consequences of our own choices?  Well, I would be lying if I didn't admit that this country certainly seems to struggle with this simple concept.  Oh how I wish people were willing to accept the problems they create for themselves.  As a society, we seem to want to be able to sit around and have everything handed to us.  We want toned, fit bodies without working out, nay, worse.  While we scarf down cookies.  We want the world give us free health care.  Free food, free housing, the latest new gadget and by golly, we deserve it.  Why?  Because we've been told since we were born that we are super special perfect little princesses, every single one of us beyond price and precious.

That's wrong of course.  You are only you.  You are entitled to exactly what you earn, and not one iota more.  You are worth nothing more than what you can make of yourself.

Except that's also wrong.

In a miracle I may never be able to fully understand, my perfect, sinless, brother, Jesus Christ loves me.  He died for me, as most of us have heard, but what you may not know is that He also Lives for us.  Today.  Yesterday.  Tomorrow.  He lives for us every single day and He atoned for our sins, in the Garden of Gethsemane, and again on the cross.  He lived a perfect, blemish free life full of absolutely, positively perfect choices, followed by more selfless and perfect choices and more, and more.  We can't even understand Him, and yet, he did this so that He could take our sorrows, our sins, our bad, devastating, unsurmountable consequences upon Himself.

With Christmas around the corner, I am reminded more than ever of the greatest gift I ever received.  The amazing news is that you received it, too.  You truly are a perfect, precious, super special princess (or prince.)  Your older brother gave you the greatest gift of all, because He wants you to return to His presence, to live with Him forever.  He has the Grace to save you and He will save you if you will just accept His gift and let go of those treasured sins.  Hand them over to Him and accept his atonement.  That is my prayer this holiday season and every other day of the year.  We have to accept the consequences of our actions whether good or ill, but we don't have to do it alone.