Chapter 12: Commandments, Conscience, and Progression

Commandments are situational snapshots of God’s character

Commandments are absolutely essential in order to help someone come to God.

9 The fear of the Lord is clean, enduring for ever: the judgments of the Lord are true and righteous altogether.
10 More to be desired are they than gold, yea, than much fine gold: sweeter also than honey and the honeycomb.
11 Moreover by them is thy servant warned: and in keeping of them there is great reward. (Psalm 19)

Commandments are a critical source for training our model of God. Commandments expose differences between how you and God would act in a particular circumstance, facilitating your choice to change in order to become more like him in that thing.

The term commandment generally refers to a rule which prescribes a specific behavior in a specific circumstance. But commandments are not limited to just rules, nor are rules the highest form of a commandment.

Commandments are given as a way to help train us towards a character more like God’s. All commandments are not equal in this task.

The finite nature of rules ensures a disconnect between static commandments and the fullness of God’s character and knowledge. Rules can only provide snapshots of God’s character as it applies to a specific degree of understanding and a specific situation. God’s character and knowledge predict his behavior and desires in all situations.

Rules do not apply to all situations—just the situations for which the rule is given. Principles, on the other hand, are general. They can be applied across a broad swath of circumstances.

The more general a commandment is, the less prescriptive it is in how to live it. For example, while God has commanded us to be like he is, or to love others as he loves us, knowing how to do those things would require either knowing him or receiving many more commandments more specific than the first.

As we learn a new commandment, we don’t need to stop at merely obeying the immediate context of the commandment. We can use the commandment to tune our model of God by expanding or improving our understanding of how God would act in other situations. In this way, commandments can reveal more of God’s character to us. We learn God’s character in the same way we get to know the character of other people: through observing them in different situations in order to become successively more correct in our prediction of how they would act in others.

There are many more commandments than you presently know

You are not aware of all of God’s commandments. You are probably not even aware of all of the commandments he has given that are recorded in the scriptures. But even this list does not contain all of his commandments.

God has on several occasions explained that his instructions never cease:

And I do this that I may prove unto many that I am the same yesterday, today, and forever; and that I speak forth my words according to mine own pleasure. And because that I have spoken one word ye need not suppose that I cannot speak another; for my work is not yet finished; neither shall it be until the end of man, neither from that time henceforth and forever. (2 Nephi 29:9)

And, behold, thou art my son; wherefore look, and I will show thee the workmanship of mine hands; but not all, for my works are without end, and also my words, for they never cease. (Moses 1:4)

Consider what it would mean to know all of God’s commandments. You would be as capable as God of describing how to act optimally in all situations.

Because rules are specific and situational, to prescribe optimal behavior in all situations would require a list as extensive as creation itself. Principles, on the other hand, while broad in application, take more time, discipline, and intelligence to learn and correctly apply.

Getting to know God’s commandments requires you getting to know God, and this is a process, not an event.

Ready to replace

As new commandments come, they don’t always address new topics. Often, new commandments will expand and elaborate on previous commandments, and sometimes they will even contradict former commandments. This shouldn’t be so shocking. The fact is that God begins to reveal himself to us at very low resolutions because that is all we are able to bear.¹ We should not be any more surprised at abrupt shifts in what he is revealing than we are when a very blurry picture looks different as it is brought into crisp focus.

Are you ready and willing to replace the good things in your life with something better? If not, you will find yourself rejecting or abandoning the paths to the great things God has prepared for you.

Consider the experience of the young man who reverently sought out Jesus for more instruction, only to reject what he was told:

17 And when he was gone forth into the way, there came one running, and kneeled to him, and asked him, Good Master, what shall I do that I may inherit eternal life?
18 And Jesus said unto him, Why callest thou me good? there is none good but one, that is, God.
19 Thou knowest the commandments, Do not commit adultery, Do not kill, Do not steal, Do not bear false witness, Defraud not, Honour thy father and mother.
20 And he answered and said unto him, Master, all these have I observed from my youth.
21 Then Jesus beholding him loved him, and said unto him, One thing thou lackest: go thy way, sell whatsoever thou hast, and give to the poor, and thou shalt have treasure in heaven: and come, take up the cross, and follow me.
22 And he was sad at that saying, and went away grieved: for he had great possessions.
23 And Jesus looked round about, and saith unto his disciples, How hardly shall they that have riches enter into the kingdom of God! (Mark 10)

There are several things to note about this experience. First, this man was not superficial in his devotion to Jesus. He ran towards him, and he knelt down before him. He was no slouch—he truly had obeyed God in all ways of which he knew to that point, something few can say. And, he bravely asked what else he could do. However, when Jesus “loved him” by telling him the next increment of truth, the man not only went away, but he did so sorrowfully. He did not appreciate the instruction, and he did not obey it.

Past faithfulness is no indication of future faithfulness. Beware of the limits of your faith, and always prepare your heart to trust God, even and especially if he commands you to do things you thought he never would.

Truth is a wedge. When additional light comes, it reveals contradictory aspects of a person’s understanding. Good people love to have their faults exposed, because they want to be better. Evil people hate to have their faults exposed, because they want to feel good as they are:

19 And this is the condemnation, that light is come into the world, and men loved darkness rather than light, because their deeds were evil.
20 For every one that doeth evil hateth the light, neither cometh to the light, lest his deeds should be reproved.
21 But he that doeth truth cometh to the light, that his deeds may be made manifest, that they are wrought in God. (John 3)

You must choose which newly resolved portion of yourself to embrace and which to eject. You cannot keep both. A person is like an astronaut floating in space. When an astronaut throws something, the object flies away from them like it would on earth, but unlike on earth, they will also move in the opposite direction.

Reactions to new commandments generate shockingly extreme transformations in people. When exposed to great light, seemingly normal people can become really good people or really bad people. It is shocking how exposure to further light can reveal things about people you never would have imagined.

When people obey difficult new commandments, they grow towards God in a dramatic manner, because his word sanctifies them, making them holier than they were. Jesus prayed: “Sanctify them through thy truth: thy word is truth.” (John 17:17)

When people turn away from new commandments, they undergo a shockingly extreme transformation toward evil. A person who you thought loved you can become so full of hate that they wish you harm with every fiber of their being. As hard to believe as this may be, consider that the Savior of the world was betrayed to death by one of his twelve closest friends, after having been actively persuaded by his unbelieving brothers to do what they expected would lead to the Jews killing him,² thus ending a mission where his purpose was to give 19 everything he had for those who ignored, diminished, fought, hated, and killed him.

Be vigilant in receiving and obeying all of God’s commandments so that you don’t blind yourself:

27 Yea, wo be unto him that saith: We have received, and we need no more!
28 And in fine, wo unto all those who tremble, and are angry because of the truth of God! For behold, he that is built upon the rock receiveth it with gladness; and he that is built upon a sandy foundation trembleth lest he shall fall.
29 Wo be unto him that shall say: We have received the word of God, and we need no more of the word of God, for we have enough!
30 For behold, thus saith the Lord God: I will give unto the children of men line upon line, precept upon precept, here a little and there a little; and blessed are those who hearken unto my precepts, and lend an ear unto my counsel, for they shall learn wisdom; for unto him that receiveth I will give more; and from them that shall say, We have enough, from them shall be taken away even that which they have. (2 Nephi 28)

When you turn away from God’s commandments, you deliver yourself into the hands of Satan, and you will be more capable of horrific harm to others.

Not the mark

Unfortunately, one unavoidable pitfall of commandments is the human tendency to make them the end instead of the means. Recall that the Hebrew word for “sin” means “missing the mark.” To make commandments the end is to make them the mark, instead of Christ.

The target is not a list of rules. God’s rules are a means to knowing him. They are not equivalent to knowing him. Knowing him is knowing his character.

Commandments are instructions to direct you towards the mark. They are not the mark itself. They are approximate estimates that bring you closer to how God is: what he does, what he experiences, and why he does what he does and experiences what he does.

Keeping Christ as the mark requires remembering that, no matter how many commandments you receive or what benefits you have seen from them, there may exist a more advanced understanding of God that expands or contradicts what you have already learned. Jesus did not refuse the Father when the Father taught him higher laws which superseded the law of Moses.

There are people who use an understanding of progression to excuse themselves from what their conscience dictates to them. As we follow Jesus’ example in being open to higher laws, we ought to exercise caution that we are not inventing exemptions from situations because they are difficult or costly. As Jesus grew in knowledge of the Father,³ he received increased persecution. If you find your life getting easier as a result of what you believe is following God,⁴ you might reconsider your presumptions.

There are people who use their obedience to certain rules, which they believe are commandments from God, to feel confident that they are in alignment with God. When you make a static list of commandments your gauge of obedience to God, you make the stepping stone of commandments into an impassable stumbling block.

As a prophet taught in the time when Israel was under the law of Moses:

14 Therefore, if ye teach the law of Moses, also teach that it is a shadow of those things which are to come—
15 Teach them that redemption cometh through Christ the Lord, who is the very Eternal Father. Amen. (Mosiah 16)

Those who replace obedience to God with obedience to a list of rules can only do so by ignoring what their conscience is saying. Their conscience will identify situations outside of the scope of the rules, and it may even directly contradict the rules themselves.

Those who limit their obedience to a list of rules are not only living in sin, they are measurably worse off than those who freely admit they are living in disobedience to God.

People who believe that their responsibility is limited to keeping a few commandments will be tricked into thinking they are qualified for everything God has to give, that they know everything there is to know, and that they have a relationship with God.

They will find out, sooner or later, that their belief has prevented them from receiving what God wanted to give them, including the many things they did not know and the relationship with God they could have had.

Commandments are subordinate to conscience

Reality is complex, continuous, and nuanced. Rule-based commandments, by nature, are limited. They only apply to specific situations. There is no nuance.

As you study the scriptures, don’t just stop at literal rules. Seek to extract higher order principles. Study the teachings of Jesus and John the Baptist in the New Testament. A great deal of their sermons attempted to expand the peoples’ understanding from rule-based commandments to principles.

Learn to develop and use your conscience as the seat of your model of God’s character. Rules are limited to specific circumstances.

Your conscience, on the other hand, is a model fitted to the commandments you’ve been told by others and those you’ve been given directly from God. It extends beyond the situational limits of the commandments you know. Your conscience circumscribes God’s commandments of which you are aware and projects light onto situations beyond your previous experience. It will inform you in all situations, not just those situations for which you know specific commandments.

While rule-based commandments inform or “train” the conscience, the conscience is the superior entity. Your obedience to some rules will not qualify you for the blessings of full obedience to your conscience. What God says includes what he says through your conscience. In fact, this is the primary channel through which he will communicate to you.

Your conscience can contradict the specific commandments you know. If a commandment contradicts your conscience, always go with your conscience. This is a hard saying, but those who abide by it will experience unprecedented growth towards God. Though this circumstance is one where you must exercise extreme caution to prevent yourself from inventing excuses to ignore commandments, finding the limits of a commandment is the only way to find something better. Your obedience to a few rules does not free you from responsibility for what your conscience tells you, whose domain includes everything, not just the limited domain of your rules.

Those who think salvation comes from obedience to a few rules will continue their lives without knowing Jesus and without obeying him, because they think they already are, in spite of actively opposing his voice to them in the conscience.

Their claim that the rules come from God will not absolve them of responsibility for breaking what God placed in their conscience. They will be surprised when, at the judgment day, God says he does not know them.

And why call ye me, Lord, Lord, and do not the things which I say? (Luke 6:46)

They profess that they know God; but in works they deny him, being abominable, and disobedient, and unto every good work reprobate. (Titus 1:16)

They will never receive higher commandments than what they already possess, and because God delivers outcomes based on obedience to law, they will never receive the higher blessings corresponding to those higher commandments.

Increasing the breadth and accuracy of our conscience

You can increase the breadth and accuracy of your conscience through living according to it and exercising effort to learn more about God.

When you disobey your conscience, you attenuate it. You will find it harder both to know what is right and to do it.

When you obey your conscience, you strengthen it. You will find it easier to both know what is right and to do it.

Learning more about God will increase both the number of situations where you have an idea of what God would do and the accuracy of your idea.

Beyond acting according to what you already know, the primary way to learn more about God is to learn more about those who know him better than you do. The scriptures provide a valuable, alwaysavailable resource of these people. As you do everything in your power to extract information about God’s character from the scriptures, you will be more apt to recognize and value the living resources he gives you access to in the people you will encounter who know him better than you.

Reality will teach you about God. The Lord created everything in this world to testify of him. As you pay attention to how things work, you will learn more about him. What you see in things and people, and in yourself, will teach you more about him if you are open to see and willing to learn.

Sources of invitations toward improvement

Invitations to improvement can come from your conscience, life, and other people.

Our conscience is a fruitful source of invitations toward improvement. God designed our bodies as living seer stones which constantly emit a vision of greater potential in all things. God will teach you more about whatever you pay attention to.

Life itself provides a constant stream of invitations for improvement through falsified putative relationships of cause and effect. Paying attention to what you or others do, then asking why you or they do it, and then asking whether there is a better way will yield many invited improvements. When you experience undesirable outcomes, it is an invitation to find the path to desirable outcomes. When you experience a problem, it is an invitation to find a solution. Anytime you observe inadequacy, it is an invitation to find adequacy. If you are late to an appointment, ask yourself what you could have done to be on time. If you don’t have enough money, ask yourself what you could do to have more. If you are overweight, ask yourself what you could do to lose weight.

Other people can be a helpful source of invitations toward improvement. They are not blinded by familiarity with our situation. What is jarring to them might be normal to us. Furthermore, they may have more wisdom than we do and be able to see potential that we do not.

The more you learn, the better off you are

Almost no one obeys God. Still, among the few who do, there is a great difference in the amount of diligence exercised in learning more about God.

The justice of God requires that those who exercise greater heed and diligence receive a greater inheritance after this life than those who exercise lesser heed and diligence.

24 Behold, my brethren, do ye suppose that such an one can have a place to sit down in the kingdom of God, with Abraham, with Isaac, and with Jacob, and also all the holy prophets, whose garments are cleansed and are spotless, pure and white? 
25 I say unto you, Nay; except ye make our Creator a liar from the beginning, or suppose that he is a liar from the beginning, ye cannot suppose that such can have place in the kingdom of heaven; but they shall be cast out for they are the children of the kingdom of the devil. (Alma 5)

God would cease to be just and therefore cease to be God if he treated two people of differing heed and diligence in the same way.⁵ For example, it is not possible for God to treat someone who has given their life in sacrifice to him the same as one who has not.

Each and every individual has a unique quantity of knowledge from God that they obey. Because glory comes from what is understood and lived,⁶ afterlife circumstances are as numerous as characters are unique.⁷

God operates inside of your limits

Commandments are snapshots of God’s character as applied to a specific situation and a specific degree of human understanding.

Commandments may or may not convey God’s degree of knowledge. Rather, commandments are the pathway whereby people can take a step closer to that knowledge.

Commandments are designed to convey the greatest share and degree of blessings that come from God’s breadth and depth of knowledge to people who do not yet possess God’s breadth and depth of knowledge. Commandments are constrained by the understanding of the individual,⁸ the individual’s degree of trust in God,⁹ and the rules of reality. God’s goal in giving a commandment is to construct a rule that maximizes a person’s outcomes given these limitations.¹⁰

God operates according to your limits:

Behold, ye are little children and ye cannot bear all things now; ye must grow in grace and in the knowledge of the truth. (D&C 50:40)

Expect new and different instructions from him as you grow in capacity.

God will send further light and truth the moment you are capable of noticing and obeying it. If you find yourself in a position where you are not being sent further light and truth, it can only mean that you are not prepared for it. Consider how much trust you have in him, whether any potential actions he might ask of you are off limits, and, most importantly, whether you are already aligning with the best you can imagine in all things.

Everything is sequential

Learning doesn’t come through disjointed jumps. You can’t just be shown how God is and jump to that point. There are innumerable steps in between, and these steps are embodied by people. They are the many “mansions" within his kingdom. We hop from “house” to “house” by learning line upon line the law which sanctifies us, or quickens us, or provides the basis of our experiences—the source of our joy, the substance of our suffering, and the purpose of our pain. It is the source of our power and our ability to understand and contend with things as they really are.

Everything must be explained to a person in terms of where they presently stand. All understanding builds organically. Everything must be built from what is already there.

All additional understanding comes through what you will choose to do with what you already know.

All outcomes will come to you through what you choose to do with what you have already received. The path to all knowledge and the receipt of all things lies along a trail that already stretches from where you immediately are.

And by giving heed and doing these things which ye have received, and which ye shall hereafter receive—and the kingdom is given you of the Father, and power to overcome all things which are not ordained of him. (D&C 50:35)

This is why the little things are the big things. That little sin that no one else knows about is a terminal blockade to everything God has to give you. It will permanently stop your progress in becoming like him and receiving all he has to give.

He that is faithful in that which is least is faithful also in much: and he that is unjust in the least is unjust also in much. (Luke 16:10)

The path to everything you desire lies through what you already know but aren’t doing.

The next sequential step of our progression lies in what is already obvious to us—or should be.

God requires you to be true and faithful to what you already know before he will instruct you further. If you desire more light and truth, you should obey all you have been given before you expect anything else. You must reach the point where you can sincerely pray, “Lord, I have been true and faithful in all things.”

Jesus frequently appealed to what his listeners already knew, but weren’t living according to. He knew that in order to progress closer to him, they first had to live according to what they already knew:

You think you have eternal life in the scriptures, but they testify of me (see John 5:39), and you don’t listen to me (see John 5:40). You claim to believe in Moses, but you don’t do what he said (see John 5:45, 47). Because you don’t do what he said, you don’t believe in me, even though he witnessed of me (see John 5:46). You haven’t seen the Father or heard his voice (see John 5:37) and you won’t, because you don’t believe whom he has sent (see John 5:38).

Jesus taught this principle through the parable of Lazarus and the Rich Man:

19 There was a certain rich man, which was clothed in purple and fine linen, and fared sumptuously every day:
20 And there was a certain beggar named Lazarus, which was laid at his gate, full of sores, 
21 And desiring to be fed with the crumbs which fell from the rich man’s table: moreover the dogs came and licked his sores.
22 And it came to pass, that the beggar died, and was carried by the angels into Abraham’s bosom: the rich man also died, and was buried;
23 And in hell he lift up his eyes, being in torments, and seeth Abraham afar off, and Lazarus in his bosom.
24 And he cried and said, Father Abraham, have mercy on me, and send Lazarus, that he may dip the tip of his finger in water, and cool my tongue; for I am tormented in this flame.
25 But Abraham said, Son, remember that thou in thy lifetime receivedst thy good things, and likewise Lazarus evil things: but now he is comforted, and thou art tormented.
26 And beside all this, between us and you there is a great gulf fixed: so that they which would pass from hence to you cannot; neither can they pass to us, that would come from thence.
27 Then he said, I pray thee therefore, father, that thou wouldest send him to my father’s house:
28 For I have five brethren; that he may testify unto them, lest they also come into this place of torment.
29 Abraham saith unto him, They have Moses and the prophets; let them hear them.
30 And he said, Nay, father Abraham: but if one went unto them from the dead, they will repent.
31 And he said unto him, If they hear not Moses and the <u>prophets, neither will they be persuaded, though one rose from the dead. (Luke 16)</u>

God will never do for you what you will not do for yourself. It violates God’s perfect justice. While a truth lies in your capacity to understand through studying and pondering the scriptures, he will not send you an angel to explain it to you. While a truth lies in a book you have the ability to acquire and read, he will not reveal it to you through out-of-the-blue revelation. While your friend knows something you do not, he will not send some prophet you don’t know to teach it to you. You are responsible for all the truth you have access to. As you pray for more light and truth, also pray for help in seeing what truth you already have access to that you are taking lightly.

Preparation for further light and truth is solely a factor of your ability to notice and accept it. If you have not noticed or obeyed what you currently have access to, you will not receive further light and truth. To provide such to you would only trigger negative judgment against you.

As you learn more of what God knows, you will do more of what God does because you will share more of his reasons for what he does. You will begin to see what he sees, to feel what he feels, and, inasmuch as you choose to be honest about it, you will act more like he acts, for all the same reasons he does.