I make no secret of the fact that I loved serving a mission where I was in the temple nearly every single day for a year and a half. I miss it. The reason I miss it is because I feel so aware and in tune and intelligent in the temple and now that we only go once a week, I don't get the connections I used to have so much of the time. Recently I read a book in the New Testament at home. Most of it just went right over my head. Today I had the opportunity to read it in the temple. It was like reading a totally different book! It really requires effort to shut out this world and connect with the spiritual realm. It's real but it's far from the thoughts and doings of the physical world. Here we worry about how foolish the president is, how much the weather is changing, what style clothing or hairdo we should have so we look our best, what to do with our excess time because our life is really simplified by not having to chop wood and grow crops to sustain our life, and what to do with our excess money because after our food which is so cheap and other than stuff we really don't NEED to sustain life, we have funds left over. God is so happy to bless us. He is also happy when we use whatever excess we have to try to bless others, but we don't always know the best way to do that. We just end up obsessed with all the wrong things- temporary temporal things. As a result, despite all of our blessings, we aren't happy. We quarrel with others, we get anxious and depressed. So many things need to be fixed! Changed! Oh no!! It's just not how our Father in Heaven wants us to feel.
One of Paul's main points in his letter to the Galatians is that we simply can not earn our way to perfection and back to being with God, which is the ultimate in being content. The children of Israel were given rules by Moses to guide them in the right direction but "the law" can never sanctify or justify ANY one. Paul points out, "Cursed is every one that continueth not in all things which are written in the book of the law to do them." In other words, if you plan to try to live a perfectly holy life, you will never achieve your goal because as long as you are amiss in even one tiny part of the law, you are not perfect, you are cursed. The point for our mortal experience is not to achieve perfection. It's to simply change from a rebellious, independent, self-centered child to a humble, loving child sincerely desiring to learn to be better rather than just seeking justification for being the way we currently are. When you add that, what is called "repentance", to faith that God loves us enough that He gave us the unfathomable gift of His only Begotten Son to atone for us- THAT is when we achieve sanctification. That is how we have the "peace that passeth all understanding", the "unspeakable joy". No matter how many laws we add or alter, no matter how much money we raise or spend or save, no matter how many words we multiply, we will never achieve heavenly peace and happiness. There is no point in looking around with anxious, critical eyes. We can't change anyone but ourselves. None of us are in charge of the world so we can't change the world. All we can do is change ourselves. We just need to prepare ourselves to meet the Savior and stand before God. Sure, part of that involves helping others- in fact that's a major, essential part in following the example of Jesus Christ. We can learn more from strengthening a spiritual connection to an omniscient Being than we ever will by reading books and listening to wisdom put forth by other mortals. If we combine our earthly education with a sincere effort to learn from God through the Holy Ghost, now that will result in some success!
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