"Yes, All of Them"

My mom and I went to the temple last night. during part of the temple ceremony, Adam says that he intends to obey all of God's commandments. Is that even possible? Theoretically, God never gives His children commandments that they can't keep, but keeping all of God's commandments is incredibly difficult. Thousands, if not millions, have tried; only One has ever succeeded. In fact, we're told in scripture that we won't succeed. "For all have sinned, and come short of the glory of God" (Romans 3:26). How, then, can God expect us to become perfectly obedient to His commandments?

Becoming perfectly obedient to the commandments is only possible because God gives us all the time we need to practice doing it and because Christ Atoned for the mistakes that we would make along the way.

I am taking a piano class. The first time I'm told of a song I'm supposed to learn to play, of course I can't play it perfectly. Theoretically, by reading the music and following all the directions exactly, I could potentially play a song perfectly, despite having never seen it before, but it is practically impossible. However, as I practice playing the song, I become better at it. Gradually, I make fewer and fewer mistakes. Eventually, I become so well practiced at playing that song that I can do it perfectly. With enough practice, I can learn to play it perfectly consistently. Then, I might say that I had mastered that song.

None of us have mastered keeping the commandments yet. And no wonder; we've only been practicing for a few decades. Some of us, not even that long. Perfection isn't attained overnight, or even over the course of a human lifetime. It will take centuries to master keeping the commandments we've been given so far, and the better we get at keeping the commandments, the more commandments we're given to master. Will we ever reach the point where we not only learn all of the commandments, but actually master them all?

Yes, we will, so long as we continually strive for that goal, and that begins today. While we are still mortal, we can begin practicing the commandments and we can make the decision to never stop. When Adam said that he intended to keep all of God's commandments, that might not have been a practical goal at the time that he made it, but it was something he could strive for, and it wasn't too soon for him - or for any of us - to start.

We are not perfect today, and we won't become perfect tomorrow, but we can eventually become perfect if we commit to continue to try. We may not be able to keep all of God's commandments perfectly now, but as long as we never stop trying to keep the commandments, we will eventually master them all.