LHB and I watched this documentary about an Amish family that is trying to come to grips with tradition and truth.

The leaders of this sect will have a heavy burden to bear, like all who preach using God's name in vain, having not authority as they deny God's spirit to the individual. But these circumstances seem necessary to make us like Him. Will we be true to the desire within to be free despite the leaders we have developed a deference for? If we were all innocence, never having to deal with the wickedness of others, we could never return, having become stronger. Having become holy, enduring in more powerful contradictions. The wickedness of others is good for us.1

I really felt sad for that woman too as she broke down. My heart melted for her and I wanted to reach through the screen and put my arm around her. Truly, she was a reflection of me, and I of her. Truly, our nature is to love.

Adam and Eve lived the exceptional life in the Garden, much like the Amish. They lived in innocence. But like Lehi said, there was nothing to compare it to. It wasn't until they partook of evil, and evil sprouted, that they gained the knowledge of good and evil. They gained a knowledge that what they had was good,2 and the object of their existence was to again have joy. To meet the cherubim, returning with wisdom.

 

Notes

1. "Woe unto the world because of offenses! For it must needs be that offenses come; but woe to that man by whom the offense cometh!" (Matthew 18:6)

See also: D&C 122.

2. "And I, God, saw everything that I had made, and, behold, all things which I had made were very good; and the evening and the morning were the sixth day." (Moses 2:31)