Agency

I do not believe that bad things happen in our life because God said that this tragic horrible thing would happen on such and such day to this person and so on.  I believe that often times trials in our lives come from agency...the direct result of our own agency or often others. We can't control others choices and they don't control ours. We also don't determine the consequences of the choices that are made either and whether or not they will affect us.  I think it's an effect of the Fall of our first parents Adam and Eve using their agency when they partook of the fruit that allowed them to become mortal and multiply and replenish the Earth. Maybe that doesn't seem fair....but when has life really been fair?  It's part of being human. My roommate brought up a good point that agency is just another way for us to understand how God is and how He lives. God has all knowledge and all power. He has the ability to make and change things to be exactly how he wants or needs them to be. Agency allows us to choose our own fate as God can choose His. Our choices and decisions determine how our lives will become but there are millions of other people on the Earth who are doing the same thing and we become subject to the effect of their choices as well as they are to ours.  I'm grateful for that though because it makes me learn and grow a lot more than I would choose for myself often times.