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Ex Carcer [Out of the Prison] The obstacle to favor with God we face as a Work is a four-warded prison. These are: pride, fear, family, and threat from the world. These factors have made too many of us cold-hearted, insular, elitist, hypocritical and uncharitable. Brother Steve’s blogs tell the story of how we got that way, where we are now with respect to God’s standard for His people, and what we need to do in order to change course, to repent. (I don’t like applying that word because it’s so often used as a whip and seldom accompanied by a pathway to correction or encouragement.) The first ward or enclosure is fear. Rulon was the real thing. The members, prominent and undistinguished alike held him in awe. The mantle of his authority was assumed by his successors, who did not live up to his standard, if Bro. Steve’s blogs have any truth to them that any will recognize. Irrespective of the testimonies of the victims of injustice, the way Bro. Steve’s advocacies have been handled tells the same story. The membership, used to thinking in terms of men as exemplars and trained under implied threat not to be critical of leaders, have accepted those who claim the mantle of God’s approval in fear that despite whatever may not seem right, the presence of authority of the Lord’s anointed outweighs the authority of scripture, God’s unchanging word.* Those who believe this way are like the Catholics who believe God has given to men His sovereign glory to do with as they see fit. If you remember the story in the Book of Moses, you will know that Lucifer wanted the same thing: authority to make his law in God’s name. No man stands between the believer and his God, unless he is ignorant of God – or worse. Man putting themselves between the believers and God and skewing God’s teachings to favor themselves are committing the sin of the Nicolaitanes, the conquerors of the people, “which thing I hate,” says Jesus Christ. See Rev. 2:15 The belief that we have living oracles and the keys in our midst has its roots in the past, because we did; but the principles upon which continuing to have those oracles and exercise those keys are based is overlooked in part because the people don’t remember what it was like to have God’s spirit in power among them. “It’s there, but subtly.” “It’s there but not being exercised because it’s not needed; all is well.” “We have God’s oracles among us in the form of Bro. Lynn and his council and that in itself is enough.” Fear also has a connection to the way humans behave in societies. Left to themselves without great effort, people feed on each other with fault-finding and petty criticism. This social warfare whose goal is to preserve one’s face and deface others, both individuals and the families they represent, is a common feature of close-knit communities. Our early prophets used to preach against this destructive pastime. ________________________________________________________________ * In the matter of precedence in whom we are to follow, in first position is a living prophet who speaks under the influence of the Holy Spirit in consonance with the standard works and the pronouncements of former prophets of God who were verified and recorded as having been under the influence of the Spirit of God overall and with regard to a similar pronouncement they made. In this way God through His prophet gives guidance and makes adjustments and clarifications appropriate to the present time. It takes the form of an interpretation, not a departure. This is not the same as accommodating to that which is not of God or setting aside the law upon which receiving a fullness of reward is predicated. God is strictly law abiding and expects His people to be the same way. Jesus came to fulfill the law and his judgments layer in a higher law. The truth of such a pronouncement will be verified to you personally as the result of prayer in the form of the response you receive from the Holy Spirit. Some Mormon scripture has been understood to mean that leadership shall be protected from even questioning and out of blind fear of breaking what has grown into a social taboo; this is being honored, where the government of God is not. People do not recognize the gross imbalance, because it has been the consistent bias of teaching over the course of our brief span, that our leadership is assumed to be, aside from occasional and un-noteworthy human failings, impeccable and infallible. We share this belief with the Catholics and the LDS Mormons. In the absence of the leadership and prophetic gifts of a Rulon, there is no teaching that puts respect of leaders in its larger context of insisting they do right before God, or we are all out in the cold. Only a true prophet can preach this message to this people and – the prophet has gone before us. The second ward or prison enclosure is pride. Too many Mormons in private, incautious moments, pride themselves that they are better than the rest of humanity because they have extra scriptures and secret ceremonies and God talked to their founder and his early successors plainly. For over a century, non-Mormons have been vilified as gentiles, a mean pejorative that denies virtue to any by disdaining all. Advocates of a full portion of Mormonism, notably Brigham Young, have painted the sins of some of his political adversaries as though they were the sinful standard of all. The us vs. them mentality has taken hold and many see themselves as a sort of Herrenvolk, (which was the name of the master race of the Nazi religion). In its retreat from its peculiar status among men, the LDS Church has tried to moderate its cultural insularity and pride. People in the work pride themselves that they go the Church one better because they actually live up to principles the Church has discarded and would bury as historical artifacts. Signing up to a program is only part of living the Principle, however. Scripture, the Owners (God’s) Manual, and our Shop Manual, says the Principle must be lived in righteousness and that means such things as, “He who would be greatest among you, let him be the servant of all; love one another as I have loved you; if anyone offend one of these little ones who believe in me . . . , love thy neighbor as thyself; thou shalt not commit adultery,” and so on. The gospel has two arms, two legs, two eyes; bi-lateral symmetry. One of these is conformity to (God’s) law and outward custom, and the other is the Spirit in which that law-abidingness shall be lived. God would that His people have one heart and of a single mind. That mind is given as the Holy Ghost and that spirit is also called the mind of God. (Acts 2:4) And that spirit is characterized by the word, love (imperfect to our understanding). The working definition of the word, however, does not give it great exercise among the children of men. For many, love is a Sunday word, along with wearing special clothes and carrying the scriptures around. It appears to prick consciences, but is finished as a transforming, guiding principle when the books are closed. (Just let it be preached; that is sufficient testimony to the preacher’s virtue in itself and the job is done.) The third ward or enclosure is family. Shortly after World War II a German spoke frankly to an American soldier who asked him, “If you knew you were licked, why did you keep on fighting?” The reply has survived in the mind of the now 97 year-old veteran: “We Germans are a family.” Human nature is such that family comes first, because if there is any source of good will and support, it comes to the child from the family. Children pattern themselves on the behavior of the adults. There is a good deal of dynastic marriage in the work, as it was in the days of ruling royalty in Europe. The alliances cement loyalty that goes beyond other considerations because its rewards and daily reinforcements are real, whereas religion is an external, a Sunday thing. “You talk with outsiders; you live with family.” A family has traditions. A family has its own version of reality. A family has its own reality of government. Inside one of the hearts of darkness of Islam, the Islamic State of Iraq and Syria, women, some of them victims of ungodly outrages, have joined the ranks of the enforcers of the bizarre and grotesque code of behavior upon the unwilling. They are a part of a culture that behaves in an imitation of a family. People are so desperate for intimate connection with others that they will accept wrong as right and suffer just to belong, whether it be to a dictator, a tyrant, a gang leader, or a pimp. In a sense, therefore, family bonds are strong enough to take the place of God, in defining conduct and belief. The sacred obligation of a family member (of any family) who wishes to remain in good standing is loyalty. This is a higher law than whatever gets preached on Sunday, because this governs how one will be treated by those one is closest to. An extreme and horrific extension of this theme lies in the motto of the inner circle of Hitler’s national family of evil artifice: “The name of my honor is loyalty.” There is yet another enclosure and that is threat from outside. The work has been in a state of war with the outside world. Aside from the usual social discriminations committed by adults and their children, there is the threat of the law. This threat in the minds of those who grew up with it is reality, itself, like the deprivation of the Great Depression was for those who suffered through it. Mormonism is a religion of necessary secrets, but the specter of secrecy governs the life of those within the confines of the Work. It protects the guilty as they physically exploit and psychologically maim their victims. War distorts morality and creates a new standard of right and wrong. It’s a them against us thing. Anything that weakens our sense of ourselves and the strength of our protector-leaders, anything that makes us less than our adversaries, anything that exposes us or our family to being devalued in the community is to be hidden. Witness the vehement outbursts against the separation of Bro. Joe by members of his family. It’s right here. Family first is a fact of life; the gospel may influence for a little while on Sunday where we pay our dues to our authorities and nominally to God, but life goes on. One of our sins that is made manifest by almost universal member silence in the face of the issues raised in Bro. Steve’s blog is fear of the present government of the Work and its very real power to ostracize and even separate those who raise concerns who are not of the same visibility and competence that he is. The fear of breakup of families was cited by the spokesman for “the brethren” in blog eight. The threat comes from the world’s ability to overcome any who are isolated from the group, because the outside world is the Devil’s playground. So family outweighs truth, justice, and the Heavenly way (law). Even a child, not tainted by living among us, who has attained the age of reason, when shown God’s standard in scripture and our behavior can discern wherein we have left the way. Bro. Steve has presented facts for examination and witnesses, not railing accusations or sketchily reported incidents from persons unknowable. The deniers coat themselves with pride in their own virtues and project the image of themselves as understandably flawed, but substantially faithful in keeping to the heritage entrusted to this people by God, such that they will not be questioned by anyone. As a result of this fear, pride, family, and threat, the members of the work in a significant majority have accepted a distorted version of the gospel that fits the convenience of a few and gives to the rest of the brethren peace of mind to manage as it suits at home. Vae Victis. Woe to the victims. The Sins of Bro. Steve: Bro. Steve’s sin in this “family” is to bring discredit to us all in the permanent record of the outside world, a blow to our pride and arouse the threat of a new wave of scrutiny from outside. Brother Steve’s sin is to aggrieve our leaders by sowing dissension and raise the fear of their wrath. Bro. Steve’s sin is to hold this family called the Work of God to a higher standard of public and private behavior than men would have. Bro. Steve’s sin is to show us clearly the difference between God’s righteousness and ours that would make us afraid of the Savior of mankind. The unforgivable sin, that Bro. Steve is called to repent of and recant is the sin of disloyalty to this family of men. They can have it no other way. (learntruth.posthaven.com Blog 8.) So whose family do we belong to? God’s eternal family and the name we all call ourselves by every time we partake of the Sacrament, or that of Lynn Thompson and his confreres? There is a difference that words can’t cover up. All of you who chose to sustain the present government of this Work are joined to them with eternal consequences. They are fated. If we aren’t on the right track to begin with, scripture does not represent the voice of God when compared to our leaders, our families, and our own personalities. Bro. Steve’s blog shows me, anyway, that we are living a lie. I believe that Bro. Steve’s blog is the last call. The next we will hear from God as a people will be in the form of judgments. “And upon my house shall it begin . . .” (D&C 112:25) Moi, aussi, Atticus Finch “We need the light of the Holy Spirit continually, day by day, as you have been told hundreds of times. How easy it would be for your leaders to lead you to destruction unless you actually know the mind and will of the Spirit yourselves. That is your privilege.” Brigham Young (J.D. 4:368) (“Knowing the will of the Spirit is also our duty.” A.F) (Is the LDS Church right, after all? Perhaps the living prophet and the stand of his counselors do outweigh and supersede that of his predecessors, whether in conflict with them or not, who have been made silent by their graduation from this life. We don’t need to verify; “the thinking has been done.”) “I want you to have faith enough concerning myself and my counselors for the Lord to remove us out of the way, if we do not magnify our calling, and put men in our places that will do right.” Brigham Young (J.D. 9:142) What that means to me is to put the matter before the Lord to either vindicate them or arrange events for their removal. The overwhelming silence suggests neither will occur and the Lord’s will is going to be expressed, not through his oracles, but by future events. Christe eléison. Amen.
— A posthaven user
Shall the Youth of Zion Falter? It was said to me that the youth of this Work are confused and uncertain. The issues and implications of the scandal bubbling up among us like a fumarole are such that it should give all of us pause. It is just as well to face a crisis of faith before becoming so deeply imbedded that you lose the ability to think altogether about why you do things. It is said that young adulthood is the time when a person is at their peak of idealism. This is where some of us made the decisions that have shaped our lives. My life was shaped by little experiences and so I had time to adapt and come to conclusions gradually. My understanding of religion was ever growing. I didn’t have to rework a model or discard beliefs, I just had to adapt and enlarge. If I had a crisis of faith, it was spread out and a fog of ignorance and diffidence kept me from confronting issues – or that’s how it seems now. This worthiness issue has been a bit different. In confronting it, I have discovered I have been coasting, relying on the expertise and presumed worthiness of others to handle a heightened degree of relations with God that I never had or believed I could have. Here is a moment in my garner of experiences that combined with other things eventually brought me to a point of decision about the LDS Mormons. While walking along deliberately under a load of academic obligations, I was confronted by the teacher of my religion class. (God must have arranged this.) He stopped me and blurted out, no doubt motivated by what he thought was a brotherly regard for my welfare, the following: “Follow the Prophet, even if he’s wrong, and God will bless you for it.” It was unsettling, but from my point-of-view, I simply assumed that everybody has trouble hearing the voice of the Lord and we all make mistakes. Not for a moment, did I assume that I was to follow the prophet in his wrongness, if I knew it to be wrong. Following a man in his wrongness is what got the 290? men of the 7th Cavalry killed at the Little Big Horn in the summer of 1876. Eighty million Germans were led and driven by one man’s wrongness to lose 1/3 of their country and 500,000 dead from strategic bombing. I think the harvest of their young men was in the order of four million. Some of the elements of this scandal have to do with the presence of wrongdoing among us and how widespread it is, and how serious it is in the eyes of God and how it affects our standing with God and the validity of our ordinances and lastly, what ought to be done about it. Since the locus of the alleged wrongdoing is among the most distinguished and prestigious among us who live apart and whose counsels are secret, it makes official remediation a practical impossibility. It’s like the difference between a wound to the body that you can cleanse, bandage, and splint, or clean up and close with an operation and a wound inside the brain, the very organ that directs the life of the whole body. Brother Steve advocates a restoration of a vigorous justice system to include an “internal affairs” investigation so the work can “get right with God.” This would be the equivalent of brain surgery to investigate and remove a tumor, or to use another analogy, trying to learn to swim while drowning. The model I use to summarize our condition is that of the Hans Christian Anderson fairy tale about the Emperor’s new clothes. So-called fairy tales are called a species of myth by social anthropologists. They contain within them truth about life that are disguised and can stand independently out from the ages in which they were created, because they are about the working of human nature. The purpose of the plan of salvation as I understand it is to provide a way including admonitions and incentives for people to give up their own, independent, selfish nature and invest their efforts, mental and physical to transform themselves to have an intimate partnership with Jesus Christ and by so doing become a very likeness of him, but within the sphere of their condition and experience. How is this to be done? I believe within this Work there exist two models. One model requires close following, mental and physical of file leaders, not going beyond them and another model invites one to develop one’s self through interactive prayer and independent action to find agreement with file leaders. I assert that the first model describes an organization of men and a government of men, while the second model is that of what I call the Joseph Smith church, or the true gospel of Jesus Christ. When the relationship with God via the Holy Spirit is broken, or is not really made in the first place, then we must understand ourselves and other people using models that describe the operation of human nature, or we shall be deceived. It is thus that I understand the story of the Emperor’s New Clothes to apply, as it operates on the plane of human nature. The story centers around the idea of something that is universally accepted to exist, in fact does not. Only fearless common sense of an outsider causes everyone else to recognize a ridiculous truth that has been staring them in the face all along, but because of their commitment to a social outlook, “Having eyes, see ye not?” (Mk. 8:18) Youth stands outside, not yet having earned or been given a place in society and experiencing the rewards and restrictions that societies of men impose on each other. Youth also has the desire to improve upon things – innovate – shake things up. I believe you can see things clearly, if you are given the tools, points of reference and the will to pray to receive answers. You may not establish a relationship with God of the intensity of Joseph Smith right away, but you will establish a relationship of sufficient strength to know your way. The emphasis on the life of Joseph Smith can be distracting when it is seen as something you aren’t achieving, but it is the method that matters more than his miraculous success story. Joseph was a known quantity with a mission to perform within a limited amount of time. Build with the tools you have. Jesus has said you have the same opportunity. Take Jesus at his word, he won’t mind. One big tool is care about others outside of yourself, because this is the nature of Jesus. Your prayer life and relationship with God is greatly accelerated when you are conspiring (do you like collaborating better?) with the Holy Spirit in understanding how to help people as well as praying that they may be blessed. The Lord wants people who are trustworthy, because trustworthiness becomes more important as you mature. God can't arrange things with you as his agent if you aren’t trustworthy. A lot of life and building of people’s souls goes beyond purely social interactions and business dealings; it has to do with being a friend, keeping trusts and confidences. A lot of the trouble the leaders of this work are in before God is putting secrecy to preserve and protect ungodliness as equivalent to the obligation to disregard unsubstantiated rumor and do no harm to colleagues through our own sin. Getting the priorities right is an integral part of building spiritual maturity and magnifying the privilege you have of representing God. Representing God is not a right, but a privilege we hold in trust. To understand the differences between truth and error, we are put in this world to see with two eyes – one to understand men functioning apart from God, and the other to understand things as God does. We are to be “wise as serpents but harmless as doves,” (Mt. 10:16) not dumb as bunny rabbits. Acculturation, the process of integrating oneself to become a more fully contributing part of society gives social rewards, but it also takes one’s ability to exercise critical (exercising independent judgment) thinking as well as the freedom to be openly critical. Sociologists speak of “groupthink” to describe how individuals harmonize themselves with the view of leadership, or the view of the group reinforced by “opinion leaders.” “The thinking has been done,” as a philosophical construct in circulation among the LDS Mormons would have it. The Catholic Church version is, “Rome has spoken.” In our case, the official line is that our leadership, the Council, stands approved of God and he who is at their head, likewise is approved, and that should be the end of the matter. Jesus Christ sustains the sanctity of authority once conferred by him against all impeachment. A corollary to this idea is that in effect when an office is conferred by ordinance, or any other endowment to govern, it is the permanent possession of the recipient. Its removal may be subject to the will of God, but that will has to be made manifest, and because it has not, things stand as they are. I see this understanding of the working of God (or imposition on the true gospel of Jesus Christ) in the fact that two, we’ll call these reputed disciples of the Other Side and a sexual madman afflicted by satyriasis (addicted to “love”) were only dropped from the Council, and only the “nookie monster” declared excommunicate. By the way, in so doing, their wives were denied the opportunity to make better eternal arrangements. Mormons have grown into a collectivist society, at first made necessary by surviving against punishing odds in a harsh physical and social environment. It is natural for these conditions to forge a people used to taking orders, with questioning being a social taboo, even considered in some cases to be a sin against God. Critical that is to say independent analytical thinking has been unwelcome with us as well as with our pioneer forbears. Substituting obedience for coming together in independently derived agreement is deadly for spiritual survival and defense from collective error. Lack of respect and trust in juniors accompanies this error. We are paying the price for stressing obedience unaccompanied by prayer-based agreement in having a leadership that will not submit themselves to examination or correction. Why do you think there is so much distress and confusion among us? The distressed and confused aren’t sure in their communication with the Spirit of the Lord on weighty matters. Unhappily, as a part of the plan of salvation that requires a person change inwardly and take the decision to become open with the Lord as an initiative, he doesn’t force his truth or his will upon us and we are left to our own timidity and indolence. You have the power to judge aright, you just don’t have experience. Take the Lord at his word and get that word from scripture and from consultative prayer. It will be on the test. An essential requirement for a people of God, a House of Israel, to succeed according to the Savior’s intent, is for them to communicate with him. In Moses time, the people appear to have, with a few possible exceptions, contented themselves with relying on Moses to do the heavy lifting. Brigham Young, at one point told his people that their leaders would take them to the brink of hell if they didn’t seek to know truth for themselves. How can this happen, unless the people aren’t doing their spiritual homework? The problems the Work is facing are problems of long standing; they date back to whatever time men of high ordination began to put self-interest ahead of Savior-style servant-leadership. Such men have altered the character and contaminated the decisions of Councils long past. In the course of the history of Mormonism there occurred a paradigm shift in how God was understood and how the operation of prayer was understood, as well as the role of the individual member. What we have now in the Work is close enough so as to be able to be supported by scripture, and, of course, tradition. It is the rule of men over the rest by dint of ordination and not necessarily in concert with God’s laws or God’s will and intent. The authority they claim shall and must be sufficient for us to defer and obey and not question either their authority or themselves. God the unapproachable is represented by privileged men who are likewise unapproachable. The Mormon Church, after successfully battling a crest of dissent in the 1960’s and 70’s does this with smooth and saintly style, with velvet gloves. The Catholic Church until recently in the aftermath of Vatican II presented the mailed fist to support this same doctrine that is bedrock to the understanding of men and antithetical to the gospel of Jesus Christ. What do we do when our faith is rocked by questions of worthiness to represent, our direction, and the rest? I am recommending that you set about to build your own spiritual muscles – prayer muscles, conscience muscles, discernment muscles, courage muscles. This takes exercising them by doing the things that call them into being. Building a testimony that things are true, however strong it may be is not enough. It is overemphasized to displace the “how to” of magnifying your calling to represent God. You must build your ability to know the mind and spirit of God and your capacity to act with him for the benefit of others. You must open yourself to enjoy the things Jesus enjoys in terms of blessing and feeling and showing good will. When you set about to learn the faith (belie and by believing, do) from scripture and by prayer and through action for by yourself, as though it had never been done before, you will build into yourself a conviction of what is true and a confidence in God that a follower, however long in experience and prestige will never have in this life. In other words, Jesus is approachable and sufficiently understandable for us to grow up and be like him. The book of Revelation, second and third chapters describes the rewards of overcomers and that tells the truth of the matter. The way we are overcomers is to handle each moral decision we face right here, right now as Jesus would. The way we are overcomers is we follow the example of Jesus while he was here with us and pray so that we are open to being guided, instructed and corrected. It’s up to you to exercise your faith and take Jesus at his word and do as he did with his Father. This religion is yours. You are not some extra in somebody else’s movie. It belongs to you as you make it a part of who you are. You are like part of a hologram, containing all the elements and possibilities that just need to be discovered and grown. You do not depend exclusively on others for your sense of right and wrong. The advice and admonition of others is like training wheels on a bicycle. You are not to be perpetually incompetent, but be perpetually about increasing your competence and your judgment. If the quality and intent of leadership is in doubt, as this one is, I strongly recommend you gain your sense of who God is and what he intends from scripture. Expand your understanding and apply your faith to these core values that Jesus, who accepted the most fiendish tortures known to men of that time and sealed his testimony thereby, taught. If you are on your own hill of your own apprenticeship with the Savior, working to expand your understanding and your trust that you are in a partnership with the Lord who wants you to succeed, the worries of those who depend on the structure and the formalities and on the things claimed by men will have less significance to you than making the path of the Lord straight and bringing about the kingdom of God. Stand ye in holy places, and make the places wherein ye stand holy. Certainly, it is important to have everything correct and approved by God as to priesthood, ordinances, covenants, and those who hold them, but if it is not so, this must be known. The remedial action must be rooted in a change of attitude and intent and if it won't come from men, then it must come from you in your own sphere. This is one way in which the religion belongs to you, and you must claim it. Those who are in distress to the point of meltdown are being as spectators. Those who are in distress are in a state of worshipping or following or relating to, or whatever, the unknown God, a God whom they have kept themselves away from by not claiming this religion for themselves. One of the experiences of young men in the world outside ours was the anxiety that they would not have sufficient courage in a shooting battle to do their part and not go to pieces or panic and run away. Here you are, not of the same tradition, but somewhat untested in being valiant. Courage is like a plant. It has to be put into the ground as a seed and that is being about building your personal faith in God as a practitioner of his way: attitude, laws, and actions. Following others from the base of having your own personal religion containing all the elements is not the same as being a timid, dependent follower who doesn't respect his own judgment. When I would pray for those at the visible summit of our possibilities, I would always add the phrase “in their righteousness.” One part of applying courage is recognizing the need. Recognize the need of others for whom you care and recognize the need to act with courage to, on your own, seek the Lord in prayer and listen to what he tells you. “IF any of you lack wisdom . . .” from James 1:5. Take God at His word. Then it is a matter of saying after you have presented the problem to make yourself aware and mindful, “Father, what would you have me do?” The next step is to do it. Each of these steps takes courage and the risk of suffering the judgments of others. The question remains: what work is this? Is it the Work of God, or is it the work of men who call it the Work of God for lack of a more appealing name? Don’t let anybody, friend, authority, or whomever, get in the way of your relationship with Jesus Christ, because impeding and blocking that listening, trusting relationship is the beginning of how the Adversary leads erstwhile followers of God carefully away and even down to hell, right in the midst of a religion that calls itself of Jesus Christ. While you’re at it, you must be proactive in establishing and maintaining and expanding that relationship. “Knock and it shall be opened unto you.” (Mt. 7:7) “Getting in the way” includes any teaching that would get you to edit or restrict your pursuit of knowing the mind and Spirit of God. “Be sure you are right; then go ahead.” It’s up to you to have faith and act on it. Do not accept discouragement either from outside or from your own self in pursuit of that sureness of communication. The priesthood is a proactive proposition. Developing the mind of the Lord requires recurring practice in finding out his will through scripture, through listening to others to develop discerning of spirits, and through actions that show Christ’s love and concern and wisdom through you. You have to want this for yourself, not just as a burden you have to carry to fulfill the expectations of others. The expectations of others are a help to move you along, Mormonism relies on it, but it is not a substitute for you being your own man or woman. Mormons all too often fall away to follow other suggestions when they are out of reach of their social environment. This is common enough to be called typical by their detractors. What is presented here by this scandal are fundamental questions, is this Work real? Even the nature of God – who is He – what does He want? Is God a real presence? Is God supposed to be a real presence? Do men of distinction in the Work have a familiar or working relationship with God as is claimed? Is this Work true – true to God – true to what it claims for itself? Is the Work true to you and your value to God? Will it help you perform your mission in life? Have we been living a lie? Just who are our leaders, friends of Jesus as he calls those closest to him, or friends of each other? I like the Savior’s answer which I shall approximate: “By their fruits shall ye know them.” (Mt. 7:20) Mormonism is supposed to confer a new, heightened understanding of God. Does the real God have different rules for those who inhabit the hyperspace of higher anointings than for those who are obliged to follow the scriptures? I offer this thought for your consideration – “It takes one to know one.” By this, I mean in order for you to discern truth from calculated counterfeit and from error, you have to –yourself – be on the true path. You have to be building your own competence, or worthiness, if you prefer, to know for yourself, because you aren’t going to know any other way. “Flesh and blood hath not revealed it unto thee.” (Mt. 16:17) Youth is a time for learning. Adulthood is the time for doing the world’s work. Maturity is the time to teach and impart. Your learning about God and the things of God is not complete unless you understand the Joseph Smith religion that featured empowerment. “I do not govern men; I teach men how to govern themselves.” Joseph handed out authority freely, but many dropped the important detail that all their equal authority was nevertheless subject to a higher authority, a first among equals, as it were. If they had exercised their offices in the right spirit of humble servant-leadership, they would have retained them out of this world. I believe God intended it to be so that men who were not of a good heart toward Him and toward the mission of the gospel (love extended to all and for all) would fall of their own desire to get around Him and take for themselves. Joseph had an elaborate system of rank, the better to allow men to exercise righteous judgment and progress in doing so. Joseph had an inclusive and participatory justice system in which he was more than once the humble guest of dishonor. All this was purposed to develop men who were to begin with already on the path of righteousness and godliness that starts and ends with a Christ-like nature. When one has one’s values and choices shaken to the core, it is appropriate to examine one’s existing core values. The journey of a thousand ri begins with but a single step. The fundamental, foundational decision is -how do you want to invest your life? Do you believe there is a God? What do you think He is? Mormonism of our experience is a package whose custodians believe they have all the answers, or have all the answers that could possibly matter. That working certainty is the nature that age and experience and having to get things done in an imperfect world builds within us, the older generation. It is the business of one specialty or branch of service within the priesthood to maintain the orthodoxy which amounts to maintaining things as they are. We who enjoy a modicum of success in this religion have taken what has been given to us (doctrines and traditions) without remembering acutely our time of questioning. Our situation is rather like living in a Ptolemaic world with the earth as the center of the universe and being confronted with the Copernican model – heliocentric, or a Newtonian universe with its fixed points encountering the theory of relativity of Einstein with the only constant the speed of light. Even Einstein struggled with the model of his scientific successors – the quantum physics people. Fortunately we are not without reference points. We have the scriptures, but they are there for us to put in order. I have wondered more than once why the religion of Jesus Christ wasn’t organized and why do scriptures contradict each other? The Doctrine and Covenants were the last chance for Jesus to make things plain to our understanding. I think I know why. One of the big tasks in carrying out the plan of salvation is to separate the wheat from the weeds, or to separate those people who belong with the Father and the Son and those who don’t. In cases of doubt or apparent opportunity, those who don’t pray to understand scripture, or who have ceased to ray while in pursuit of other interests will follow the desires of their own hearts. This is what I see we have at the heart of the scandals that have emerged in our midst. The end result for those who choose to take a little advantage here and there or transgress relying on an apparent promise of restoration will be the Savior’s severe words: “Depart from me, you never knew me.” (IV from Mt. 7:23) Brigham Young transgressed upon the rights of others under his control. This was a part of his nature, but the important thing that kept him in his place before the Savior was that in each case known to history, he stepped back from the offense, even making it right on occasion. License to commit error is an opportunity to learn, thereby. An error becomes what we understand as sin (technically, missing the mark) when it is done without correction and becomes habit, thus defining the character of the sinner a flawed (to the degree of alienated) character is what keeps us from our Savior. This probationary world is about character development. If we are faithful in small things, Jesus has promised to reward us with greater things as our capacity is proven. He said that the prostitutes and tax collectors would enter into his kingdom ahead of the priests and lawyers and recorders of that time. Those ordained offices were not respected by Jesus, and we should be mindful of the lesson. Brigham Young said salvation is an individual matter, so I shall begin there, or rather you shall. Don’t rely on your own judgment, unaided. Rely instead on your own judgment sustained by the Spirit of God whose voice you know. “My sheep hear my voice and I know them.” (Jn. 10:27) Shall the youth of Zion falter? They will if they are blinded by false doctrines and trip over other people who are lying in wait in the path. * * * From God’s point-of-view, knowing us as He does from before we entered this life, there is a great deal more to us than we think we are. It is our task to grow into our pre-mortal selves and recover who we were with additional strengths based on the experience we have gained in mortality. “Evil has no power, unless the good make themselves weak.” The Outer Limits Sin makes us weak. Consider the sins of being unloving and untrusting in God, rather trusting in men
— A posthaven user
The Glow on the Horizon Now for the saints in Rocky Ridge: It is not enough to be in some way “better than they are.” God’s standard is the same for all of us. The keys, whether they are retained or must be restored, can only be exercised upon principles of righteousness. Let the agony that is being experienced in and among the Salt Lake saints be a chastening and a warning to you, as well. What applies to the prominent among them applies to the prominent among us who are you, also. I cannot presume to call anybody to repentance; what I can do is to make you aware of God’s call to repentance, if you can feel it. Each human life in your stewardship has worth. Salvation is an individual matter. Sin is like a social disease, it does not discriminate based on any other consideration than it find an available host. That is why we had two reputed disciples of the Other Side and a confessed baby killer in positions of high trust and influence, which influence continues to cause harm. Why were they “sustained” by so many for so long? Have we made the place wherein we dwell hallowed, or is it more properly named Halloween? Have we learned anything from their presence among us? No one’s salvation is safe when they live where God’s standard of participatory justice is abrogated, or where men claim to have the powers of the priesthood (including discernment) and do not (exercise them) in regulating God’s covenant marriage. It is not just a matter of sorting out doctrines; the damage of exploitive, selfish sin against the innocent has backed up like a plugged sewer pipe to affect common decency. You can’t run a car without gasoline. In France, that substance is called essence. You can’t exercise priesthood power and authority without the essence from the Spirit that gave it. Who would want to claim before God that they could? Section 121 of the Doctrine and Covenants won’t go away just because men wish it would. Good adds itself to good so that men may grow together in godliness. Evil feeds on evil, likewise, and men grow darkened together. Our problems are of long standing to the extent of having become institutional. Does Jesus’ parable about the mote and the beam apply? Are the specters of fear, pride, threat, family, and uncertainty stalking among you, as well? God doesn’t have one standard for Salt Lake and another for Montana. “And out of my own house,” is not exclusive. Just as salvation is an “individual operation” (according to Brigham Young, J.D. 1:312), so is repentance. The Lord said, while he was with us, “But what is a man profited if he shall gain the whole world and lose his own soul?” (Mt. 16:26) If we won’t put the kingdom of heaven and His righteousness first, above the honors and comforts and transitory security of men, He has said through His revealed word, we will not be found worthy. I believe the thing that keeps men from making the extraordinary sacrifice of self by confessing their hideous sins against life unconditionally and unambiguously and unequivocally, and attempting to rid themselves of offense by offering themselves to make an atonement -is that they are essentially selfish, and have grown this way from childhood. They are selfish with regard to their brethren, their wives and families, and have largely shut out the spirit of God and conscience. Form doesn’t trump spirit with God. They do not have a sense of regard for the consequences of their actions upon others. Others don’t matter that much. That means fairness, considering the other’s situation as of equal value to our own, does not exist for them. They rely on law or selective interpretation of a portion of scripture to insulate them, if they think about the import of their actions, at all. Keeping the lesser orders in line by maintaining appearances makes everything copasetic and comfortable, and that is heaven, enough. What they espouse and proclaim and the (performances) they do in public has secured their place in heaven, while on earth, “where seldom is heard a discouraging word and the skies are not cloudy all day.” From a bible perspective, this is, “Déjà vu all over again.” Yogi Berra A change of administration is not needed here as much as a change of heart. Screwing another head on the body of a lifeless dummy is not enough. The spirit of generosity and good will towards the Father’s children, young and old in our midst must be restored. Bro. Paul of Tarsus, acting as a Seventy Apostle commissioned by revelation recited the attributes that constitute the virtue of charity. “Though I speak with the tongues of men and of angels, and have not charity, I am become as sounding brass, or a tinkling cymbal. And though I have the gift of prophecy, and understand all mysteries, and all knowledge; and though I have all faith, so that I could remove mountains, and have not charity, I am nothing. And though I bestow all my goods to feed the poor, and though I give my body to be burned and have not charity, it profiteth me nothing. Charity suffereth long, and is kind; charity envieth not; charity vaunteth not itself, is not puffed up, Doth not behave itself unseemly, seeketh not her own, is not easily provoked, thinketh no evil; Rejoiceth not in iniquity but rejoiceth in the truth; Beareth all things, believeth all things, hopeth all things, endureth all things. Charity never faileth: St. Paul – 1 Cor. 13:1-8 This is from our God; this is our religion, too! “. . . wherefore, the Lord God hath given a commandment that all men should have charity, which charity is love. And except they should have charity they were nothing.” (2 Ne 26:30) Who wants to make public confession and amend one’s attitudes in front of a congregation of spiritual strangers? That’s just it. Following the most severe and uncompromising rules of a united order do not make the character of the Savior we should be trying to transform ourselves to be. No discipline of the self that does not include the discipline of opening one’s self up to the voice of the Holy Spirit will bring about the change of heart needed to become a celestial citizen (or get us through the judgments to come on the earth, shortly). Having and even adhering to a body of regulations is no insurance against the outbreak of evil of the most basic and base kind. You know this. These things happen and persist because of lovelessness, and joylessness, among us as much as any other factor. God makes allowances for our sakes so we have the time and space to learn our lessons that will restore us to Him, but He also hears the cries of those we have harmed in such a way as to blight their ability function as normal human beings. Repentance and atonement are inalienable parts of being restored to the presence of the Father and the Son. The energy of recognizing a great sin must be put to work, not swept out of sight, or the power to effect change in ourselves is weakened or lost altogether. Those who hide sin cannot hide from God any more than Father Adam could. Read learnsjustice.posthaven.com, blog 3 to see the moment at which a conscience dies. The help to enable a brother to put God first was not given, in favor of respect for an office, allowed to become a hollow rank through habitual, abhorrent sin. Those who think God and His priesthood virtue are to be set aside, may be already set aside, trusting in their own ignorance. If we’re only brothers and sisters-in-law, because of the law, we are not truly brothers and sisters. There are too many of us, because of situations in the house (i.e. home), who do not even know what God means when He calls us brothers and sisters and friends. God didn’t spare Joseph from rebuke in front of everybody and for all time, and look what Joseph became and did -having accepted God’s guidance and correction. We are not, none of us are better than Joseph and his example must be the one we sustain as well in how we live our lives unto God. He died for his testimony. Are we so poor in spirit and in loyalty to what we profess that we will not make our sins die through repentance? If we are unwilling to separate ourselves from the sins that deny us the gifts of the spirit and only leave us with a pass-through priesthood, we shall be found by the Lord to be unworthy of him and his kingdom. We know what truth is. We know what right and wrong is. While we value our priesthood as the Lord’s, while we value and understand the significance of our ordinances and covenants, while we still have a conscience that functions correctly, we ought not, we dare not turn away from the Lord and cover our sins with the doctrines of devils, the self-justifying doctrines that others have embraced such that they do not longer know right from wrong when it comes to gratifying and prospering themselves at the expense of others. God is not a devil. God is not two-faced. God is not double-minded when it comes to one law for those of the higher ordinances; if anything their higher law carries a greater responsibility not to sin, with greater consequences. This you know. With greater privileges from God come greater obligations, not greater license to be ungodly. We are not endowed to become more skillful conformists, but to be more greatly imbued with the being of God so that we can radiate it and give it in labor, as Christ did in ministry, and as Joseph did in his calling. Jesus said the Son of man came not to be ministered to, but to minister. Our families are our ministry. If our families do not know the love of the Savior because of our way with them, we have sinned a great sin, a sin that can and often does betray those spirits God has entrusted to us. The things that are not of God, all of them are done when men pass out of this world. We shall be poor, indeed, if we have not retained the oracles of God, nor sought the gifts of the Spirit by meeting God’s standard by which they are revealed and exercised. It is not to condemn that God admonishes, but to call you to remembrance of your knowledge and what you have promised in your oath and covenants. The end of this is that you shall step up to the task of restoring and strengthening your worthiness and magnifying your callings that this Work shall not perish altogether – as it is doing for want of vision -(etc.). God will save a remnant who will dedicate themselves to Him, and would it be you were a part of that repentant remnant. It’s not repentance to more of the same, but repentance to finding reward in the things of the Lord. “For my yoke is easy and my burden is light,” Jesus said. (Mt. 11:30) It is when you have got the handcart moving from the standstill or out of the rut that the way becomes clear. “Seek and ye shall find.” So seek good things. Seek to enjoy blessing others and keeping the commandments so that others can rely on you and can call you friend. Seek the right things. You should have friends in the gospel, not associates you have to approach bearing your shield before you. Be that friend. Be that example. Be that Savior on Mt. Zion. Prepare yourself to enjoy the company of the saints and the Savior. Seek righteousness by sustaining righteousness and advocating for righteousness in your councils. If the Lord is not invoked out of your willingness of heart, out only invoked as a formality, he will be a stranger to you and you to him. We bring these things on ourselves! God is not just our God, and if we would be one with Him, we must make His cause towards our brothers and sisters our cause as well. Change can be the hardest of all. A closed community can be like a family, and in families the members get in ruts that all too often are impossible to break out of, given as we are to follow and obey the strong emotions that set our course at the beginning. If you cannot bring yourselves to observe and follow a gospel of spirit first -be at least acquainted to it so when the instruction of events comes upon you, you will be then ready then to seek the Lord. You will find that the thing called friendship will serve you better than thinking to harness yourself to a juggernaut of obligations. God wants people animated by a sense of positive reward in doing this His way. We win the celestial kingdom by the deeds and the attitudes we make a part of us each day we venture forth. The powers of the priesthood must flow through us in ministry to others that we should be able to call friends and loved ones. Sin against others should be something we grow out of and away from. If we have not love for what we are doing, we have not the Spirit of the Lord. If we have one compartment for ourselves and another for God and the balance is not changing, then we have not His Spirit. When we choose to remain in our sins and the fear and rancor that accompany this, and then partake of the sacrament we proclaim a lie against our own hearts. Communication with the spirit can be lost by imperceptible degrees, like the passage of the sun through the sky. It can be recovered in the same way as we judge situations and act according to a righteous judgment. Sometimes we are prompted by the still, small voice of reason; sometimes we just feel an urge which we recognize as a prompt to do something good. The love of the Lord shouldn't be just something we try to conjure up; it should be present because we like to do good things. A love of righteousness, a love of raising the neighbor’s spirits or fortunes, this is the work of the Lord to enable us all to feel comfortable in taking the next step towards virtue. If the Lord’s people are not a happy people, something is wrong. If the Lord’s people are quick to take offense and keep a fault-file in their minds, the better to condemn and withhold, are they acting like the Lord’s people? Undiscovered and uncorrected it will be found that they aren’t being the Lord’s people at all. You can chase out sin, but you can’t keep out sin, if you aren’t ready to replace it with other things that you like better. Take a measure of satisfaction in doing good; let that be a beginning, until you can take joy in the joy of another. These are things we can repent of if we would lead out to do the work of the Lord in bringing about his kingdom on the earth from the wreckage he has promised to inflict upon all nations who have set him aside: cold-hearted – insular – elitist – hypocritical – uncharitable. Indeed, as the effects of the judgments deepen, the only refuge for any of us will be within the kingdom of God. Do any of you, really, need to be told that the self-sacrificing Spirit of Christ needs to be present in the exercise of priesthood (even possession of a living priesthood)? Read Section 88 of the D&C. As you were told by your schoolteachers, “It will be on the test.” Concerning D&C 132. We are all in a probationary state. Just look around you, and look into your heart as you compare the being of a God to your own self and selfish desires. If we were not given laws and commandments and restrictions, instead of the School of the Prophets, God would be running the School of the Devils. In fact, is that one of the things that has happened among the Salt Lake Saints? Isn’t it better before God to substitute the (affirmation and intent), “I don’t want to sin,” rather than “I want a way out when I sin”? (The best course is to focus on seeking ways to good.) I would rather just take Heavenly Father’s word when He says, “Don’t!” I would rather do that than be a naughty little boy and try to imagine I can find a way around Him. I don’t want to match my lawyer-craft skills against the will of the One who made this world and sustains this world through law and justice – and charity. We have the better way given us. We are fools if we don’t follow it. Are we really true to our covenants when we follow the ways of this world-age and measure ourselves by their measure? They are fated. “And because iniquity shall abound, the love of many shall wax cold.” (Mt. 24:12) “Hear my words that I might -teach you – take my hand that I might -reach you, But my words, like silent raindrops fell – and echoed in the Wells - Of silence.” Paul Simon – The Sounds of Silence * * * Fixing this mess is not just a matter for a few learned Rabbis in a corner searching out what reinterpretation of the law can be discovered and advanced. It is also a matter of going to the Lord and with an offering of amended hearts and consciences, and with the assent of all the people after the matter of the king of Nineveh. The Lord wants a fundamental change of attitude and return to the Spirit of charity and love one for another that this Work was founded on back in 1820. “Where any two or more of you are gathered in my name . . .” Experience shows that just being gathered is not enough, the attitude and intent to obey the Lord in the Spirit of Section 88:63,64 and 121:34-46 must be present, as well. We go to the Lord not just to solve a problem, but to have him be our Lord and direct us in all that we do. We simply can’t make this Work work without the Lord or we’re deluding (damning) ourselves.
— A posthaven user