Agency

Agency is one of God’s greatest gifts to mankind which each individual has to use in his or her own desired way, and which God will never take away from us.  It is because God has given us agency and because he respects that agency that we may sometime find that our choices have led us down an incorrect path which may cause heart break or sorrow.  However, I know that when we choose to use our agency to follow God’s will for us, we will be blessed.  As my mother has often said, “We are free to make our own choices, but we cannot choose the consequence for those choices.”

"All of His commandments are given to make blessings available to us.  Commandments are opportunities to exercise our agency and to receive blessings."

President Dieter F Uchtdorf, April 2014 General Conference "Grateful in Any Circumstances"https://www.lds.org/general-conference/2014/04/grateful-in-any-circumstances?lang=eng

"Agency was manifested in the Council in Heaven as we chose to follow our Heavenly Father's plan and come to mortality for this probationary period.  Agency allows us to be tested and tried to see whether or not we will endure to the end and return to our Heavenly Father with honor.  Agency is the catalyst that leads us to express our inward spiritual desires in outward Christlike behavior.  Agency permits us to make faithful, obedient choices that strengthen us so that we can lift and strengthen others.  Agency used righteously allows light to dispel the darkness and enables us to live with joy and happiness in the present, look with faith to the future, even into the eternities, and not dwell on the things of the past.  Our use of agency determines who we are and what we will be."

Elder Robert D Hales, April 2006 General Conference "To Act for Ourselves: The Gift and Blessings of Agency" https://www.lds.org/general-conference/2006/04/to-act-for-ourselves-the-gift-and-blessings-of-agency?lang=eng&query=Agency

"Next to life itself, free agency is God's greatest gift to mankind. ...Each choice you and I make is a test of our agency - whether we choose to be obedient or disobedient to the commandments of God is actually a choice between "liberty and eternal life" and "captivity and death."

 Elder L Tom Perry, April 2013 General Conference "Obedience to Law Is Liberty" https://www.lds.org/general-conference/2013/04/obedience-to-law-is-liberty?lang=eng&query=Agency

"The Lord promises that if, in the exercise of our agency, we follow His example and always do those things that please Him and the Father, then we will come to know and understand all things."

Elder D Todd Christofferson, June 2009 Ensign "Moral Agency" https://www.lds.org/ensign/2009/06/moral-agency?lang=eng&query=Agency

"An obedient horse which is part of a well-trained team of horses needs little more than a gentle tug from the driver to do exactly what he wants it to do.  This gentle tug is equivalent to the still, small voice with which the Lord speaks to us.  Out of respect for our agency, it is never a strong, forceful tug...Obedience is a choice.  It is a choice between our own limited knowledge and power and God's unlimited wisdom and omnipotence.  According to the lesson my grandfather gave to me, it is a choice to sense the spiritual bit in our mouths and follow the driver's lead."

Elder L Tom Perry, April 2014 General Conference "Obedience through Our Faithfulness" https://www.lds.org/general-conference/2014/04/obedience-through-our-faithfulness?lang=eng 

"We teach that agency is the ability and privilege God gives us to choose and "to act for [ourselves] and not be acted upon." Agency is to act with accountability and responsibility for our actions.  Our agency is essential to the plan of salvation.  With is 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."

Elder Robert D Hales, October 2010 General Conference "Agency: Essential to the Plan of Life" https://www.lds.org/general-conference/2010/10/agency-essential-to-the-plan-of-life?lang=eng&query=Agency

"Eternity is at stake, and our wise use of agency and our actions are essential that we might have eternal life."

Elder Robert D Hales, October 2010 General Conference "Agency: Essential to the Plan of Life" https://www.lds.org/general-conference/2010/10/agency-essential-to-the-plan-of-life?lang=eng&query=Agency

"Had agency come to man without the Atonement, it would have been a fatal gift."

Elder Boyd K Packer, April 1988 General Conference "Atonement, Agency, Accountability"  https://www.lds.org/general-conference/1988/04/atonement-agency-accountability

"...Many do not realize the quality and blessings of [the] gift of agency... If we would by reason the matter we would come to realize as is expressed in this thought: "Choice is an element of human dignity. Without the power of choice, a man is a lot less than a man. Without the exercise of choice a man never discovers what he can be or what he can do.  Choice is the key to the future."

John H Vandenberg, April 1973 General Conference "The Agency of Man" https://www.lds.org/general-conference/1973/04/the-agency-of-man

"Since the authorship of the agency of man is God's, should we not look to him...to help us to control our choices?"

John H Vandenberg, April 1973 General Conference "The Agency of Man" https://www.lds.org/general-conference/1973/04/the-agency-of-man