Strait is the way, and narrow the gate...

I had an amazing Sabbath today, and was definitely spiritually filled and uplifted.

It started with a talk given by a member of our congregation. He based his talk on one given by Elaine Jack. http://speeches.byu.edu/?act=viewitem&id=721

It was titled "Never Take No Cutoffs." She goes on to reference the story of the ill-fated Donner Party and likening it to our own path to exaltation, and how we can go off in unbelief when we choose to follow a different path.

"For the Donner party there was a proven trail. It was longer, but it was sure. Gambling on their own abilities and personal ambitions, they took a road that had never been tested. The result is history.

The Lord says, “Enter ye in at the strait gate: . . . Because strait is the gate, and narrow is the way, which leadeth unto life, and few there be that find it” (Matthew 7:13–14).

As you follow the path of the Savior, keeping your covenants and his commandments, you will be assaulted from all sides with offers to take other roads, other travel packages. Anything the adversary can do to pull you off course, he will do. He’ll stop at nothing to catch your attention, and then, ever so slyly, he will lead you away from the work of the Lord."

When we cease to follow the path of the Savior, it becomes easier to justify that which is wrong. It is easier to do the things we know we shouldn't. It is easier to look at past commitments and covenants, and see them as faulty. And then, when we have gone far down that path of darkness, it is easier to mock and condemn that which we once held as truth and light, until it becomes impossible to see the goodness for what it truly is.

God's way is the only way. It brings to mind a quote that I really like : " Elder Neal A. Maxwell likes to quote William Law, an English clergyman of the 18th century, who said it this way: “If you have not chosen the Kingdom of God, it will make in the end no difference what you have chosen instead.”