Oh glorious AGENCY!

“I have always thought that all men should be free; but if any should be slaves, it should be first those who desire it for themselves, and secondly those who desire it for others. Whenever I hear anyone arguing for slavery, I feel a strong impulse to see it tried on him personally.” -Abraham Lincoln

This has to be one of my absolute favorite quotes from Abraham Lincoln. As such, I’ve read it time & time again, but last night, as I recalled it to a friend, the words within took on new meaning.

“…but if any should be slaves, it should be first those who desire it for themselves…”

I don’t know why I didn’t catch it before. Nobody desires the bonds of shackles and forced servitude. Nobody, no matter how depraved. To what then is Mr. Lincoln referring? Most assuredly to the chains born by Old Marley in Charles Dicken’s A Christmas Carol.

"You are fettered," said Scrooge, trembling. "Tell me why?"

"I wear the chain I forged in life," replied the Ghost. "I made it link by link, and yard by yard; I girded it on of my own free will, and of my own free will I wore it. Is its pattern strange to you?"

Scrooge trembled more and more.

"Or would you know," pursued the Ghost, "the weight and length of the strong coil you bear yourself?…

Oh! captive, bound, and double-ironed," cried the phantom, "not to know, that ages of incessant labour, by immortal creatures, for this earth must pass into eternity before the good of which it is susceptible is all developed. Not to know that any Christian spirit working kindly in its little sphere, whatever it may be, will find its mortal life too short for its vast means of usefulness. Not to know that no space of regret can make amends for one life's opportunity misused! Yet such was I! Oh! such was I!"

It’s tragic, as Dickens so eloquently expresses, that though the world is filled to overflowing with worthy causes, we more often than not inhibit ourselves from helping the cause roll forward. We choose instead to be indebted to the things of the world. Money or recreation become our focus & service falls second to our own selfish desires. Not one of us is excluded from this categorical “we”.

“For all have sinned and come short of the glory of God,”
(Romans 3:23)

YET

“Who shall separate us from the love of Christ? shall tribulation, or distress, or persecution, or famine, or nakedness, or peril, or sword?…Nay, in all these things we are more than conquerors through him that loved us.”
(Romans 8: 35, 37)

YES, more than conquerors, for

“The Spirit itself beareth witness with our spirit, that we are the children of God: And if children, then heirs; heirs of God, and joint-heirs with Christ; if so be that we suffer with him, that we may be also glorified together. For I reckon that the sufferings of this present time are not worthy to be compared with the glory which shall be revealed in us.”
(Romans 8:16-18)

We come short of the glory, yet it shall be revealed in us? Ah yes, the assurance remains that

“It is by grace that we are saved, after all we can do.”
(2 Nephi 25:23)

The Atonement is, in the end (& each moment in between) our only hope, but that does not excuse us from not trying our best. That does not excuse us in the formation of these extraneous chains. Of this I am sure & on this point, I will not yield.

“Think for a moment of the long chain of iron or gold, of thorns or flowers, that would never have bound you, but for the formation of the first link on one memorable day."
- Charles Dickens, Great Expectations