Simple Truths.

For the past semester I've been taking a world religions class. Anyone who has talked to me more than once a week has probably heard "If I didn't believe in God, I'd make an awesome Buddhist" or "I'd be an amazing Jew or Muslim if it weren't for that whole Jesus thing". I know, I've been kind of flippant in my statements and if I didn't know myself better I might think I was a bit disrespectful, but because I do know myself I can see that my horizons have expanded beyond the world that I see and it fascinates me.
So last Sunday was Easter, basically the most important holiday in the Christian world. I celebrated by picking up a copy of Tad Callister's THE INFINITE ATONEMENT. These are the two paragraphs that were written just for me.

No doctrine supersedes or even approaches the Atonement in importance. It is the grandest miracle to have ever occurred. C. S. Lewis observed that if one takes away the miracles attributed to Buddhism, there would be "no loss" to the religion. If all miracles were eliminated from Islam, he adds, "nothing essential would be altered." Then this striking observation: "But you cannot possibly do that with Christianity, because the Christian story is precisely the story of one grand miracle, the Christian assertion" that Christ came "into human nature, descended into His own universe, and rose again, bringing Nature up with Him. It is precisely one great miracle. If you take that away there is nothing specifically Christian left."
The Atonement is, as Elder McConkie observed, "the center and core and heart of revealed religion." It is indeed the keystone of Christianity and the foundation of a spiritual life. It is the beacon of light for a benighted world. It is the fountain from which all hopes spring. Any theology, any philosophy, any doctrine that teaches contrary to the Atonement is built on sand. Brigham Young taught: "The moment the atonement of the Savior is done away, that moment, at one sweep, the hopes of salvation entertained by the Christian world are destroyed, the foundation of their faith is taken away, and there is nothing left for them to stand upon." The Atonement is our singular hope for a meaningful life.

The miracle of miracles that I see in this is the fact that I know these things to be true. I feel so blessed for having known these things my whole life. I don't have to sift through all the many other religions to find the truth. ALL OF IT. not just part of it. I'm so grateful to know that I can continue to learn about all these things and that these truths will never change.