Answer to Confusion

Upon the lips and to the hearts and minds of many there sometimes comes the question: Why would an omnipotent and all-wise and just and merciful God permit such unjust and adverse events as we are all each day aware of? And, failing to find the answer that brings peace to their troubled hearts, men frequently lose faith and become critical and sometimes cynical. But they who find themselves in this frame of mind should be reminded that one of the first principles of the plan of life is the free agency of man the right of choice. It was so in the heavens before time began and will eternally continue to be. Indeed, we are told that a challenge to this right of choice was once the cause of a war in heaven and has been one of the compelling causes of all war since history has been kept and recorded. In other words, our Father in heaven does not force men to be good. If He did, there would be no reward for being good, and none of the development that comes from deciding for ourselves. The souls of men are stunted and stifled when they are compelled to live according to someone else’s pattern or forcibly made to fit someone else’s mold. That is why, in His wisdom, the Lord God does not minutely regulate every detail of our lives, any more than our earthly parents dictate everything we shall do. They teach us what we ought to do, despite which, in the headstrong use of our own free will, we still manage to get ourselves into much trouble. The Father of us all gives us commandments, here and hereafter; and, so far as the Creator is concerned, it is given unto each one to determine to what extent he will live by these rules and realize the rewards. This God-given, inalienable right of choice is essential in the highest sense to the making of a man under divine plan and purpose essential even though in the misuse of freedom some people impose evil and injustice on other people. But those who suffer injustice at the hands of others will not be forgotten; the Lord God, in His own time and in his own way, will see that all of us receive what we should receive, according to the choices we have made with the freedom we have had. And there will be complete compensation for the seeming injustices we frequently see.