YW Lesson -- Why Do the Choices I Make Matter?

• “Everybody is doing it.”
• “Nobody will know.”
• “It is not really hurting anyone.”
• “It won’t hurt just this once.”
• “So what?”
• “You can repent later and still go on a mission and be married in the temple.”
• “Christ atoned for your sins; He will forgive you.”

2 Nephi 28:7-9
 7 Yea, and there shall be many which shall say: Eat, drink, and be merry, for tomorrow we die; and it shall be well with us.

 8 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.

 9 Yea, and there shall be many which shall teach after this manner, false and vain and foolish doctrines, and shall be puffed up in their hearts, and shall seek deep to hide their counsels from the Lord; and their works shall be in the dark.

 “Many years ago I worked for a railroad. I was in charge of what is called head-end traffic. One morning I received a call from my counterpart in Newark, New Jersey. He said, “Train number such-and-such has arrived, but it has no baggage car. Somewhere, 300 passengers have lost their baggage, and they are mad.”

I went immediately to work to find out where it may have gone. I found it had been properly loaded and properly trained in Oakland, California. It had been moved to St. Louis. But some thoughtless switchman in the St. Louis yards moved a small piece of steel just three inches, a switch point, then pulled the lever to uncouple the car. We discovered that a baggage car that belonged in Newark, New Jersey, was in fact in New Orleans, Louisiana—1,500 miles from its destination. Just the three-inch movement of the switch in the St. Louis yard by a careless employee had started it on the wrong track, and the distance from its true destination increased dramatically.

That is the way it is with our lives. Instead of following a steady course, we are pulled by some mistaken idea in another direction. The movement away from our original destination may be ever so small, but, if continued, that very small movement becomes a great gap and we find ourselves far from where we intended to go.

It is the little things upon which life turns that make the big difference in our lives, my dear young friends.”

-- President Gordon B. Hinckley

 Let us not find ourselves as indecisive as is Alice in Lewis Carroll’s classic Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland. You will remember that she comes to a crossroads with two paths before her, each stretching onward but in opposite directions. She is confronted by the Cheshire cat, of whom Alice asks, “Which path shall I follow?”

The cat answers, “That depends where you want to go. If you do not know where you want to go, it doesn’t matter which path you take.”

Unlike Alice, we all know where we want to go, and it does matter which way we go, for by choosing our path, we choose our destination.

-- President Thomas S. Monson

"Some feel they don’t have the power to choose—that their particular temptation is beyond their ability to resist. The Prophet Joseph Smith “observed that Satan was generally blamed for the evils which we did, but if he was the cause of all our wickedness, men could not be condemned. The devil could not compel mankind to do evil; all was voluntary."

"Many individuals blame their problems on others. Terms such as “road rage” suggest that those who manifest it have contracted some illness over which they have no control. Whatever happened to old-fashioned self-discipline?

"Moroni offered these soul-searching, sobering words: “Deny yourselves of all ungodliness; … then is his grace sufficient for you” (Moro. 10:32). These words suggest no shift of responsibility to someone else, no excuses, no magical way out, no blaming some biological, genetic, or addictive reason for wrong behavior. There is only the straightforward admonition to “deny [ourselves] of all ungodliness.”"

- Elder Harold C. Brown, Area Seventy Utah North Area, December 2001

Why do the choices we make matter?  Because our moral agency is key to our Heavenly Father's great plan of happiness.  We are here to prove to our Heavenly Father that we will follow His Son Jesus Christ and keep His commandments.  By making good choices we show Them we love Them and are willing to put forth the effort to attain the eternal reward of exaltation.  May we all strive to continually make good choices that we may receive the promised blessings of eternal happiness.  In the name of Jesus Christ, amen.

I printed the following in gray on color card stock and laminated to make bookmarks to hand out to the girls.