It is the morning after the 189th Semi-annual General Conference of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. There have been a couple of doctrines that have sunk deep into my being this morning. The most important being choice and agency.
Elder Gerrit W. Gong spoke about the choice to marry his wife.
Covenant marriage becomes supernal and eternal as we daily choose the happiness of our spouse and family above our own.
When I asked, “Heavenly Father should I marry Susan,” I felt peace. But it was when I learned to pray with real intent: “Heavenly Father, I love Susan and want to marry her. I promise I will be the best husband and father that I can be. When I acted and made my best decisions, it was then [that] the strongest spiritual confirmations came.”
The bulk of his talk was about “covenant belonging” but this tagent near the end about using agency to form covenant relationships was profoundly signficant.
In my patriarchal blessing there is a line “you can find a young lady of your choice…” this in discussing temple covenants and relationships.
Christ is the champion of agency and choice. Perhaps when I am studying in the scriptures and I cannot find anything that points me to Christ, a second line of strategy would be to ask, “What does this teach me about agency or choice?”
Action Item: There is a greater marriage narrative that needs to be written with this increased light and understanding.