Anyway, there were just some flat anti-Mormon types on there that I could no longer stomach. Someone on that forum said that I appeared to be a one-man army - and so I was. I find a cancer and I set about destroying it. I always have, and I always will. I have a strong defender mode and wield the sword strongly when protocol calls for it. I do not want to find myself lacking when I am weighed in the balance as to whether I am cold, luke-warm, or hot ( www.lds.org/scriptures/nt/rev/3.15-18?lang=eng#14 ).
So, there are many out there who I think are striving (seeking growth beyond the Sunday School SMAs; Standard Mormon Answers and not just coasting complacently along in life), who may fall into unknown and even forbidden paths. It is one of the ways that the devil seeks to ensnare some of the choicest spirits that exist. Good folks who are seeking further light and knowledge - but who get sucked into groups or thinking that goes beyond the mark. I am extremely concerned that this blog never become a vehicle for that - I never want to have another's blood or sins upon my head for having said too much in a "beyond the mark" kind of way. For the record, I am just an ordinary joe, attempting to do extra-ordinary stuff. I am riddled with sin and weakness and shortcoming - so I merit no special attention or praise or noteworthiness. When I have arrived at some level that is noteworthy, I will do a post letting you know of my special status..... The one thing I do have, is an indomitable spirit and faith in the Lord and His future plans for us. I never give up - because I know it will all work out in the end. We just have to stumble along in faith and never give up.
A striving reader recently made a comment about some activity by a group that sounds to be extra-doctrinal and was laying some doubt on the leadership of the Church and talking letting go of tithing in favor of Consecration. Let me be clear here - I feel after reading many statements by various of the Brethren that there is some level of schism at the top of the Church - just as there is by the general membership. I have to believe that it will be no different than it was in Nauvoo around the time of Joseph's martyrdom when things reach critical mass:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WvSYj2pE7NI
I also believe that we will have to go through HARDER trials than the Pioneers went through in order to get to the level that we need to in order to become a Zion people. It didn't work the first time, now did it?? In fact, we were not even close the first round. On a trip down to Zion, UT I also took the occasion to swing up and check out Orderville on the North side of Zion's on Hwy 89 - as a failed testament to that end. The people after all they had been through, and after the best efforts of a lion leader (Brigham), could not get it done! If they could not get it done under those circumstances, how much harder will the purge have to be this time around in order to accomplish the Lord's designs!! I believe that there will have to be many Judas's and many false Christs in order to complete the sifting process prior to the refining process. Prior to refining, there is always the sorting of the ore in order to toss out the stuff that is not worthy of being crushed and then refined. Those without the Spirit simply will not survive the sorting, let alone the refining by fire that is still to come. Many schisms, many fragments will exist and there will be those who simply follow the tried and true rule of "follow the majority of the Brethren and the records of the Church". I have to find the quote now so that it can be put in context, but the Lord will never allow the records of the Church to fall into bad hands - even if it must be done by intervention as it was when Joseph's body (and specifically head) were not allowed to fall into the hands of those who would have profited from the $1,000 bounty that Lilburn Boggs had put out on it. The sealed portion of the Book of Mormon still has to come out along with the goodies the Church has on archive that must (I believe) go south along the spine of the Everlasting Hills to meet up with the righteous descendants of Manasseh who stream north along with their treasures that they bring with them to the New Jerusalem for the building up and beautification of that city. I still have to post some incredible stuff about the 1949 earthquake in Cuzco, Peru that exposed part of that treasure that was hidden up for that purpose. Its mind boggling!
There are many who think that just going to Church will provide salvation. True, it CAN lead you to life and salvation, but it will NOT transport you there. So what is to be done? We have to knock, then seek, then find on our own. Salvation is a very personal thing - well, mostly personal as the most effective method to find it is in conjunction with a worthy spouse who is also seeking. The Church just provides the infrastructure in order to bring people to a knowledge of it - and to then propel them forward to the greater blessings of Temple covenants and beyond.
The antidote to falling down forbidden paths is personal scripture study - grounding ourselves in revealed truth. Personal prayer - the Holy Ghost cannot witness to error. Frequent temple attendance (where possible) and having inordinate amounts of patience. Sometimes, we just have to knock and then wait on the Lord to open to us when we are ready. If any change or return to a fullness is in order (when the Saints finally get their stuff together as a people and can handle it) will always be done through His authorized servants under the Savior's direction. I have to laugh at the folks who went extra-doctrinal down in Manti and also those in Hillsdale, Utah. Ten years ago, when I flew down to go to a nephew's mission homecoming in St. George, I took the Zion's loop and drove through that area. I was dying to see how they lived, as a group. They - and their close apostate cousins in Manti - always are, of necessity, required to look to the trunk of the tree in order to receive their temple blessings that even they cannot ignore. If things were really off the tracks in the Church, and they had correct authority, they would have had things properly revealed to them and would have gotten their wine from new bottles and not from the old. While visiting Nauvoo a decade ago, I was impressed with the complexity of (the construction of) the Masonic Lodge in Nauvoo, but recognized that it was a pre-cursor of having the fulness of the Temple ordinances revealed in the much more grand edifice that was finally finished (erected) after Joseph's death. The many things that had been lost along with the few things that were part of the remaining narrative were restored and presented in the new bottle of the Nauvoo Temple - so there was no confusion between the two. So it is in the restoration after things have been lost - as some apostates declare has occurred in the Church as it currently stands.
Historically, there have been some groups that have gotten off the path. We have the Strangites, the RLDS, and a whole host of other splinter groups. In Jesus' time, there were the folks down at the Dead Sea who had restored baptism and a whole host of other things that had been lost in the 400 year apostasy since Malachi was gone. Even John the Baptist was doing stuff that was doctrinally correct - but not accepted by the leadership of the day, when he was baptizing down in the River Jordan. It was for this reason he was eating locusts and honey. He was a social outcast - and probably being hunted by the power-structure of the day that felt threatened by his actions which they could not deny were correct. An ever-pressing populace was seeking after him knowing that something was amiss from the practices of the day - but that had been practiced since the times of Adam (see my original article about my co-worker Elkan and baptism among the Jews of India).
In our own time, you can read the scriptures and clearly see we are apostate as a people - even as we have living oracles among us. Not because the leadership has willed it - but because we have rejected it as a people. Unless I am a complete dolt, I read our scriptures and go through our temples and see that we should be living the Law of Consecration, the higher law of marriage, and a whole host of other things. We mock the Jews of Jesus' day for being blind - but we ourselves are no better; living with a lesser law of tithing and marriage and while the carrot of the Sealed Portion of the Book of Mormon is dangled in front of us, rotting on the string. How stupid are we?? I say, collectively? Pretty damned stupid! We have it all sitting there - a veritable feast - and we do nothing to partake. Probably because we do not know how - probably because we are just too carnal and sensual and spiritually lazy. I thank the Lord for President Benson who awakened me just a little to what I was selling myself short of. I mean no offense here to current leadership - and maybe their tongues have been stayed to say only the simple things for a spiritually atrophied people - but he was the last prophet that cut me to the bone and let me know how bad things really are. I need not hear any fluff or to be told that all is well in Zion. I need to hear straight talk to jolt me out of my deep slumber and make me aware of the awful state I am in.
I need to be told to get my crap together because time is short. If I am the one doing the heavy lifting at the grass-roots level, something is indeed wrong at the top. Or a majority of the people at the bottom are past feeling. Its either one or both. Which - I do not know for sure.
This I do know when it comes to personal apostasy. Until the Lord speaks, I hold my tongue and stay my ground and continue to live the lesser law of tithing and am satisfied with my station, but desire with all my heart to live the greater law when the Lord commands it. Any time someone says they are absolved from the lesser law and are going about practicing a higher law without a duly appointed oracle pointing the way, they are out of the way. Several of the early Brethren were given experiences/revelations before Joseph made it known to them. Those who followed protocol waited for the Lord's anointed to make it known - and then moved forward. Those who did not were tossed and became some of the most bitter enemies to the Church. I have to wonder if there is more to the narrative of Judas Iscariot than what is presented in the scriptural narrative. He followed the Bennett profile of Joseph's day.
So, we just need to have our hearts in the right spot and patiently stay the course. Sooner than we expect, I believe we will have our Millennial day. But it will be on the Lord's time-line.
"If I am the one doing the heavy lifting at the grass-roots level, something is indeed wrong at the top"
ReplyDeleteFor a post on "The Road To Personal Apostasy" that comment sure has apostate overtones to it!
I think Anonymous above doesn't understand our Brother "Iraq". If there be an error it might be just this little fact. The "heavy lifting" spoke about above needs to be done by everyone in my opinion. We are waiting for the go ahead from God and the brethren. I love this site I don't see any apostate overtones here. I see a man working very hard to put information up for us all to devour. Not all is perfect and I would not expect it to be. I honestly don't know how he does it but heavy lifting is truly what he is doing. Many of us are doing it in our own way and some day we will understand that this is our job. Nothing is wrong at the top they are simply waiting for us.
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