Foundations

One of the fundamental principles is a knowledge of what God is.  In a prior post it was posited that omnipotence is an attribute typically given to deity.  The dictionary defines omnipotence as “the quality of having unlimited power.”   Do we take that to mean the ability to do anything at all?  We can easily propose a paradox demonstrating that the concept is worthless; Can an omnipotent being create an immovable object?  If so, we have demonstrated that they are not omnipotent, the entity should be able to move any object that exist.  If not, they are unable to create an object of particular characteristics, hence limits on the power. Omnipotence is what then?  Maybe we must then define what is meant by “unlimited” power; something along the lines of: an omnipotent being has unlimited power to enact its will.  In this definition we are constraining the power, but not the individual. 

Two basic questions arise from this: (1) what are the constraints on the power, and (2) what is the will of the entity?  Are these rules self-existent, external to God?  Most of Christianity thoroughly condemns this idea, proposing that God encompasses all that exists, everything flows from God, and God is an infinite, eternal being who has existed, static and unchanging, from all of the past to the utmost future.  The LDS view rejects that concept of godliness.  Our concept of a god is defined as an individual who is in absolute compliance with the natural laws.  A god comes into being from a lesser state, one in which all the laws are not fully known and hence not fully followed; that divinity is a progressed state, one that has been obtained by our Father in Heaven, and accessible to us, his children, under the same conditions whereby He obtained it.   

We must then accept that there are laws that are existent external of God; that he has learned those laws, and obeys them; that he has brought his will in complete compliance with their dictates and hence his will flows unencumbered and complete in its desires.  God is absolutely free.

At this point you might be tempted to think, “I thought this was a political blog.  Why are we digressing into kookinanny-hie-to-Kolob theology?”

This life is a small, and utterly vital, step in our progression either towards becoming as God, or away from that end.  We have spent an untold amount of our existence in the presence of our Father, learning laws, developing our individuality, seeing the fruits of those labors.  We are given an opportunity to step out on our own and see what our will truly is.  Are we able to live by the laws that exist?  How well did we learn those premortal lessons?  Now we are finally able to demonstrate who we have really become.

God has given us the magnificent gift of agency.  He has declared that we are free to act.  Indeed, he has commanded us to act and not be acted upon.  He has spent thousands of years transmitting, preserving, disseminating, and teaching principles of action.  It then falls upon us to actually implement them.  

The majority of human history has been a story of repression, conquest, and enslavement of others in an effort to destroy this liberty.  One scheme after another is put into place where a few try to rise to the “freedom” of despotism and force all others to become nothing but an extension of their will.  What a perversion of the glory of God’s offering!  God offers to everyone complete independence; mammon professes to offer power at the complete reliance upon subjugation of others.

The grandeur of the gospel message is a full revelation of freedom.  The commandments inform us of natural law and set an example of godly living.  They tell us of the conditions that provide opportunity for liberating action and warn us of those that would bind us.

Thus, if we have any desire for liberty and freedom, it becomes imperative that we gain the utmost familiarity of the characteristics of God, that we learn what the natural laws are, and we do everything we can to bring into existence a social structure that allows, and even promotes, the ability to act in accordance with this knowledge.  This is the foundation of political action.