Fobsvithing Obediently

Master Fob's thoughts on obedience, as inspired by a discourse delivered in church last week:

Obedience is a valuable tool in raising children. S-Boogie is not quite old enough to understand (despite previous experience) that taking off her own diaper can have disastrous consequences, but she is old enough to understand that she should obey Mommy and Daddy's counsel to not remove her own diaper. Similarly, she is not old enough to understand that running in the street or parking lot could have even more disastrous consequences, but she can understand that obeying her parents when they tell her not to run into the street is a good thing. Therefore, it is in her own and everyone's best interest for her to learn obedience.

This principle extends into adulthood only insofar as God understands consequences that we, like children, do not. I might not understand the full extent of the consequences of killing people I do not like, but I can trust that God does and therefore I obey his commandment that I shall not kill.

This is God telling adults what to do, though, not adults telling other adults. I acknowledge that God often speaks to people through other people. As a self-proclaimed follower of God, it is my responsibility to determine when people are speaking for God and when they are not. Theric, for example, might suggest to me that I eat more raisins. I might not understand why in the world I should eat more raisins, but if I pray about it and I feel that this suggestion, counsel, or commandment comes from God, then I will trust that God knows why I should eat more raisins and act accordingly. If I determine that the counsel is Theric's alone, though, I am under no obligation to follow it and I would appreciate if he would respect that. (The jerk.)

Here's my take on Gordon B. Hinckley's counsel that good Latter-day Saints should not have more than two piercings if female and none at all if male: I honestly have not prayed about it because it doesn't matter to me. I have no desire to pierce my body so I don't need to know whether God considers it a sin. If you have prayed about it and you feel the counsel is from God, please follow it and please ensure that your underage children do so as well. If other adults don't feel that the counsel comes from God, though, and choose not to follow it, I believe it is everyone else's responsibility as decent human beings to respect that. I can't speak for everyone, but I find it annoying when my fellow adults call me to repentance on some counsel or commandment that I honestly do not feel comes from God. Determining what is right and wrong is every human being's right and responsibility and should be respected.

A lot of people explain the piercing thing by saying that it's not really about how many piercings you have but how obedient you are. You are welcome to believe this if you choose to, but it does not fit with my personal understanding of God and the universe. God has plenty of opportunity to teach his children obedience with commandments that really do matter; I can't imagine why he would throw arbitrary commandments at us just to make sure we'll obey the important ones.

So if you are ever speaking at a meeting where the congregation is spread thin and you politely ask everyone to move forward, I probably will comply with your request just because that's the nice thing to do. But please don't try to make a moral issue out of it. I obey God as much as I can, but I feel no obligation to obey people on power trips.