Do not betray what you believe for the sake of external reward

The world around you will present a constant source of conflict with your inner self. This will only increase as you gain understanding and the world continues to fulfill its End Time destiny. For example, modern culture constantly pressures individuals to deny realities that they know to be true—whether through experience or logic. It likewise pressures people to affirm ideas which they know to be false.

Outward pressures will present the choice of living up to what you believe or face external threat, whether loss of status, wealth, or wellbeing. While this compromise can come in overt forms,¹ it usually occurs more subtly: in the form of saying or doing something you don’t believe in, or refraining from saying or doing something you do believe in.

Opposition between your internal compass and external threats is by design:

And the cares of this world, and the deceitfulness of riches, and the lusts of other things entering in, choke the word, and it becometh unfruitful. (Mark 4:19)

Resist the temptation to betray what you believe is right internally in order to keep what you have externally. What you lose by betraying yourself will be much greater than whatever you lose for being who you really are. You can’t think, desire, or act against your sincere understanding of what is best without damaging your eternal access to what is best, and that loss alone is greater than anything it costs to avoid.

The Lord delights to save those who are persecuted for following him.² If you lose your job, your friends, your parents, your siblings, your children, your spouse, your health, your wealth, or even your life for standing up for what you believe is right, remember the Lord’s promise:

And every one that hath forsaken houses, or brethren, or sisters, or father, or mother, or wife, or children, or lands, for my name’s sake, shall receive an hundredfold, and shall inherit everlasting life. (Matthew 19:29)

The fulfillment of this promise may take time, but the confidence you have with God in knowing that you have lived up to what you believe is instantaneous:

Verily I say unto you, all among them who know their hearts are honest, and are broken, and their spirits contrite, and are willing to observe their covenants by sacrifice— yea, every sacrifice which I, the Lord, shall command— they are accepted of me. (D&C 97:8)

Learn how to push back against the world by remaining who you really are in spite of external pressure. Seek people, places, and activities that increase the volume of your inner self. Learn to recognize people, places, and activities that decrease that volume, and do what you can to minimize the time and intensity of your exposure to these influences. Always choose the light within.