Without a stabilizer nitroglycerin was too volatile to be useful. The porous rock that can stabilize nitroglycerin to make it effectively usable was also worthless on its own. Together they are immensely valuable and useful.
The Savior’s church is only special if it is built upon His history.
Without the Lord’s church his doctrine is unstable—prone to doctrinal drift.
Jesus Christ wants nothing more than for us to repent and come unto him so that He can sanctify us.
Dynamite changed the world. It also made Nobel wealthy. Without a stabilizer, nitroglycerin was just too hazardous to be commercially valuable, as Ascanio Sobrero found out. By itself, as I mentioned, kieselguhr was of little value. But the combination of the two components made dynamite transformative and precious.
In a similar way, the combination of the gospel of Jesus Christ and The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints provides powerful and transformative benefits for us. The gospel is perfect, but a divinely commissioned church is required to preach it, maintain its purity, and administer its sacred ordinances with the Savior’s power and authority.
There is little we can individually do based on pure doctrine. Power comes as we combine our efforts to live the gospel.
The Church is simply ordinary people, disciples of Jesus Christ, gathered and organized into a divinely appointed structure that helps the Lord accomplish His purposes.
Just as {kieselguhr} without nitroglycerin is unremarkable, the Savior’s Church is special only if it is built on His gospel. Without the Savior’s gospel and the authority to administer the ordinances thereof, the Church isn’t exceptional.
Without the stabilizing effect of kieselguhr, nitroglycerin had limited value as an explosive. As history has shown, without the Lord’s Church, humanity’s understanding of His gospel was likewise unstable—prone to doctrinal drift and subject to the influence of different religions, cultures, and philosophies. An amalgamation of those influences has been manifested in every dispensation leading up to this last one. Though the gospel was initially revealed in its purity, the interpretation and application of that gospel gradually took on a form of godliness that lacked power because the divinely authorized framework was absent.
If the church were to lose the gospel it would revert to being unremarkable (at best). If it were possible for the nitroglycerin to evaporate out of dynamite the kieselguhr that would be left behind would again have no value.
I invite you to commit yourself more fully to the Savior, His gospel, and His Church. As you do so, you will find that the combination of the Savior’s gospel and His Church brings power into your life. This power is far greater than dynamite. It’ll shatter the rocks in your way, transform you into an inheritor in God’s kingdom. And you will be “filled with that joy which is unspeakable and full of glory.” In the name of Jesus Christ, amen
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