From his book ‘To Draw Closer to God,’ Henry B. Eyring wrote: “There is a paradox in today’s world. Over the last several years manufacturers, service providers, and consumers have become increasingly quality-conscious. For instance, on the cover of a a recent issue of Business Week appeared the word “Quality” along with this headline: “Manufacturing: The Next Goal Is Perfection.” But at the very time when more and more of us are choosing quality in the products and services we create and use, a strange thing is happening: more and more people are making the opposite choice for their personal lives. They choose to design lives for themselves that put the chance of moral failure high, coolly accepting the expectation that sin will come and apparently hoping that they can somehow take care of it, at little cost. There is even a phrase for that choice, borrowed from the world of cars: “Live in the fast lane.”
Because those choices seem to be made consciously and seldom out of raw emotion, they must appear reasonable to the people making them. Years ago a professor of mine, Ray Bauer, corrected me when I put a label of “irrational” on someone’s behavior. He said: “Hal, you’ll understand people better if you assume that people’s behavior is rational, at least from their point of view. Try to see what they see.”
Well, then, if people are choosing to make sin—moral defects—highly likely, they must see the world in a way that makes that choice reasonable. Why would people choose to put themselves in the places, listen to the sounds, see the sights, be with the people, entertain the thoughts, and do the things that will require them to face the effects of sin?
First, they might believe that there is no God, and therefore no moral law, and thus no sin. A second possibility is that they believe that we are so good by nature, and God so kind, that whatever we do is right. You remember King Lamoni, the missionary contact of Ammon from the Book of Mormon? He believed that—at least he believed it at first. In Alma we read: “Now this was the tradition of Lamoni, which he had received from his father, that there was a Great Spirit. Not withstanding they believed in a Great Spirit, they supposed that whatever they did was right.” But even with all that tradition, Lamoni could feel the Spirit of Christ. You remember the next phrase: “Nevertheless, Lamoni began to fear exceedingly, with fear lest he had done wrong in slaying his servants.” (Alma 18:5.)
A third reason to risk sin would be to believe that the Atonement makes correcting the effects of sin, even of the most terrible kind, a simple matter. There seem to be more and more people who act as though they believe that. They believe the “eat, drink, and be merry” promise. They must think that easy forgiveness can come from their Bishop in this life in the same way the deceivers in 2 Nephi said it would come from God in the next life. Here is the lie, which the Book of Mormon prophesied would be told by many. I feel it is being believed by many: “And there shall also be many which shall say: Eat, drink and be merry; nevertheless, fear God—he will justify in committing a little sin’ yea, lie a little, take the advantage of one because of his words, dig a pit for thy neighbor; there is no harm in this; and do all these things, for tomorrow we die; and if it so be that we are guilty, God will beat us with a few stripes, and at last we shall be saved in the kingdom of God.” (2 Nephi 28:8.)
My testimony is that the facts are contrary to each of those assumptions. First, there is a God. I testify to you that the Prophet Joseph Smith was accurately describing God and sin with these words. . . see Doctrine and covenants 76:22-26
~Henry B. Eyring, To Draw Closer to God (Salt Lake City, Deseret Book, 1997), 61-63
To be continued. . .
