The Road to True Happiness

Today I read Deuteronomy 6 where Moses urges the Israelites to love God and to keep the commandments and other statutes that God has given them.  As I read this chapter I am reminded of the New Testament where Jesus tells the Israelites that if a man says he loves God but hates his brother, he is a liar because you cannot love someone you've never seen if you don't love someone you have seen.  I'm also reminded of John 14:15 which of course says "If you love me, keep my commandments". 

By these definitions, there are very, very few people in this day and age that truly love the Lord.  They have no interest in keeping the commandments or going to church on Sundays.  It's really quite sad honestly.  God really doesn't require very much of us at all and yet even that little bit that He does ask of us, so many people cannot or will not do.  Satan is just too enticing and the flesh is too weak.  The people have no desire to overcome it and become better.  It is all about pleasure and the next fix be it drugs, money sex, alcohol or anything else that comes along to make humans feel good.  And yet the whole reason people turn to drugs and alcohol is because their lives are miserable.  I am generalizing of course but the vast majority of users do it to escape.  So they are miserable and they know it, but they don't realize that they are miserable because of what they are doing. 

The road to true and everlasting happiness is through living the commandments and the Atonement.  Through the Gospel of Jesus Christ we can overcome any hurt, any sin that we have ever done, with a few exceptions, and can be truly happy.  I remember when I was a missionary I was teaching an English class to some people from mainland China and the topic of happiness came up.  They gave me all the usual answers of what makes people happy: money, power, sex, and some others.  They laughed at me at first when I said those things did not bring true happiness.  Said I was too young to understand the world.  They stopped laughing when I told them what brings true happiness, righteous living.  None of them wanted to hear the discussions after that but I like to think that I gave them something to talk about.  It's sad to me how backwards this world is.  Satan has done a marvelous job of turning things around on us.  We need to o as God has commanded us so that we can show the world that they are wrong.  So that we can show them where true happiness comes from.  Until tomorrow.