Inspirational Quotes: Agency

"We know there is a great purpose in Christ’s suffering because this was an act of free agency. Jesus could have called upon legions of angels to bring Him down from the cross, but He did not."
Robert D Hales, Lessons from the Atonement That Help Us to Endure to the End, General Conference, October 1985.

“Agency used righteously allows light to dispel the darkness and enables us to live with joy and happiness.” Robert D. Hales, To Act for Ourselves: The Gift and Blessings of Agency, April, 2006.

“We teach that agency is the ability and privilege God gives us to choose and “to act for [ourselves] and not to be acted upon.” Agency is to act with accountability and responsibility for our actions. Our agency is essential to the plan of salvation. With it we are “free to choose liberty and eternal life, through the great Mediator of all men, or to choose captivity and death, according to the captivity and power of the devil.” Robert D. Hales, Agency: Essential to the Plan of Life, General Conference, October 2010.

“Those who talk of blind obedience may appear to know many things, but they do not understand the doctrines of the gospel. There is an obedience that comes from a knowledge of the truth that transcends any external form of control. We are not obedient because we are blind, we are obedient because we can see. The best control, I repeat, is self-control.” Boyd K. Packer, Agency and Control, General Conference, April 1983.

“Men and women receive their agency as a gift from God, but their liberty and, in turn, their eternal happiness come from obedience to His laws.” L. Tom Perry, Obedience to Law is Liberty, General Conference, April 2013.

“Moral discipline is the consistent exercise of agency to choose the right because it is right, even when it is hard.” D. Todd Christofferson, Moral Discipline, General Conference, October 2009.

“You may be tired of others trying to run your life—always telling you what to do. After all, you have the right to make your own choices. That is correct. You have that right. It is your agency. The secret to solve problems in your life will be found in understanding and using the eternally beneficial interaction of your agency and His truth.” Richard G. Scott, Healing your Damaged Life, General Conference, October 1992.

“Agency is a divine gift to you. You are free to choose what you will be and what you will do. And you are not without help. Counsel with your parents is a privilege at any age. Prayer provides communication with your Heavenly Father and invites the promptings of personal revelation. And in certain circumstances, consultation with professional advisers and with your local leaders in the Church may be highly advisable, especially when very difficult decisions must be made.” Russell M Nelson, Choices, General Conference, October 1990.

“In the grand division of all of God’s creations, there are things to act and things to be acted upon (see 2 Nephi 2:13–14). As sons and daughters of our Heavenly Father, we have been blessed with the gift of moral agency, the capacity for independent action and choice. Endowed with agency, you and I are agents, and we primarily are to act and not just be acted upon. To” David A. Bednar, And Nothing Shall Offend Them, General Conference, October 2006.

“Do we have a guide to help us choose the right and avoid dangerous detours? Positioned on the wall of my office, directly opposite my desk, is a lovely print of the Savior, painted by Heinrich Hofmann. I love the painting, which I have had since I was a 22-year-old bishop and which I have taken with me wherever I have been assigned to labor. I have tried to pattern my life after the Master. Whenever I have a difficult decision to make, I have looked at that picture and asked myself, “What would He do?” Then I try to do it. We can never go wrong when we choose to follow the Savior.” Thomas S. Monson, Choose You This Day, General Conference, October 2004.

“Korihor was arguing, as men and women have falsely argued from the beginning of time, that to take counsel from the servants of God is to surrender God-given rights of independence. But the argument is false because it misrepresents reality. When we reject the counsel which comes from God, we do not choose to be independent of outside influence. We choose another influence. We reject the protection of a perfectly loving, all-powerful, all-knowing Father in Heaven, whose whole purpose, as that of His Beloved Son, is to give us eternal life, to give us all that He has, and to bring us home again in families to the arms of His love. In rejecting His counsel, we choose the influence of another power, whose purpose is to make us miserable and whose motive is hatred. We have moral agency as a gift of God. Rather than the right to choose to be free of influence, it is the inalienable right to submit ourselves to whichever of those powers we choose.” Henry B. Erying, Finding Safety in Council, General Conference, April 1997.