The phrase: “crown of righteousness.” What is that? Why would I want it? If I’m going to labor and toil in obedience, shouldn’t I expect something a bit…more exciting? Like a fatted calf (Cf. prodigal son’s brother), or a mansion with servants, or at least a crown of gold? What’s with this crown of righteousness and why would I want it?

I can’t help but be personally excited that you’re teaching these lessons. :)

I really like your point that obedience implies some kind of resistance. I don’t think that point needs to be stated too strongly, such that obedience always involves a despising or detesting of what we have been asked or bidden to do. Rather, the resistance, it seems to me, is simply a question of exteriority: it isn’t obedience if it originates from our own wills, only if it originates from the will of another.

Perhaps we could say that obedience is the confession on my part that a gift is a gift, that is, a gift from another person. This would imply at once that the relationship is one of giving (rather than obligation, duty, servitude, or employment) and that there is always some kind of gap between myself and the giver of the gift and hence that there is a kind of resistance buried in the obedience.

Or maybe we could put it this way: obedience is always the (spiritual) rewriting, redefining, or reworking of (natural) resistance. If obedience is always a question of familial relation (as I suggest above), then it always encounters some kind of Oedipal resistance. Obedience is the turning of the heart of a child to the father(s)/mother(s), as in Malachi 4.

Maybe.

In the first place, I have stated above [p. 53] that Mormonism is truth, in other words the doctrine of the Latter Day Saints, is truth; for the name Mormon, and Mormonism, was given to us by our enemies, but Latter Day Saints was the real name by which the church was organized. Now, sir, you may think that it is a broad assertion that it is truth; but sir, the first and fundamental principle of our holy religion is, that we believe that we have a right to embrace all, and every item of truth, without limitation or without being circumscribed or prohibited by the creeds or superstitious notions of men, or by the dominations of one another, when that truth is clearly demonstrated to our minds, and we have the highest degree of evidence of the same; we feel ourselves bound by the laws of God, to observe and do strictly, with all our hearts, all things whatsoever is manifest unto us by the highest degree of testimony that God has committed us, as written in the old and new Testament, or any where else, by any manifestation, whereof we know that it has come from God: and has application to us, being adapted to our situation and circumstances; age, and generation of life; and that we have a perfect, and indefeasible right, to embrace all such commandments, and do them; knowing, that God will not command any thing, but what is peculiarly adapted in itself, to ameliorate the condition of every man under whatever circumstances it may find him, it matters not what kingdom or country he may be in. And again, we believe that it is our privilege to reject all things, whatsoever is clearly manifested to us that they do not have a bearing upon us. Such as, for instance, it is not binding on us to build an Ark, because God commanded Noah to build one. It would not be applicable to our case; we are not looking for a flood. It is not binding on us to lead the children of Israel out of the land of Egypt, because God commanded Moses. The children of Israel are not in bondage to the Egyptians, as they were then; our circumstances are very different. I have introduced these for examples: and on the other hand, “Thou shalt not kill. Thou shalt not steal. Thou shalt not commit adultery. Thou shalt not bare false witness against thy neighbor. Thou shalt not covet thy neighbor’s wife, nor his ox, nor his ass, nor his man servant, nor his maid servant, nor any thing that is thy neighbors.”

See here for full letter.

One thing I’ve been pondering is what it means to be obedient. You discuss this above, and I want to be careful that you and I don’t misunderstand each other over a difference of definition of terms, but I want your thoughts on this. Here is what I have been thinking: That it isn’t really obedience if you have no reason or desire to not do it. As a simple example, if God says, “Joe, don’t put your hand in the fire,” and then you don’t put your hand in the fire, you’re not being obedient in any meaningful sense. There has to be some opposition to the commandment. Now take Abraham when commanded to sacrifice his son—now there’s opposition! The point (and result) of this line of thinking is to say that one can do (or not do) something and have it not weighed out or measured as obedience. I used to study scripture because I was told to; now I do it because I want to. The Lord could say, “Brian, I command you to study the scriptures!” and I would sort of laugh because I would have studied anyway. It’s tempting to say that eventually we will love doing all that is good and will no longer need to be commanded—hence, no longer be obedient—but I don’t think that’s really possible. Even Christ himself suffered out of obedience to the Father.

Well, here is what you wrote above, and I think you are working with a slightly different definition (but not soooo different):

“…obedience out of guilt is not obedience. It is to take God as our employer, to be watching over our shoulder to make sure that He doesn’t punish us for not doing things right on the job, to be worried that He might fire us. If number (1) here is essentially to reject the relationship of grace offered to us, number (2) here is to accept it only on our own terms: we would rather be servants or slaves than sons and daughters, something like the prodigal son on his way home.”

Very, very helpful thoughts on the prodigal son. Both when he left home and when he returns, he did not want the responsibilities that are part of being a son. I was already trying to make sense of a phrase at the bottom of page 165 and this really nails it, I think. The phrase: “crown of righteousness.” What is that? Why would I want it? If I’m going to labor and toil in obedience, shouldn’t I expect something a bit…more exciting? Like a fatted calf (Cf. prodigal son’s brother), or a mansion with servants, or at least a crown of gold? What’s with this crown of righteousness and why would I want it?