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Who Keeps My Conscience I am returning to Bro. Steve’s blog, learnjustice.posthaven.com, specifically blog 53. It is a reprint of Bro. Joseph White Musser’s “Truth” Magazine. It contains a foundation for understanding who we are as saints of God and holders of the authority and power to act in his name, as well as who we must be to fulfill our part in the plan of salvation and receive our portion in the Lamb’s book of life. I feel a prerequisite to getting a sense of what is contained here is to accept the challenge and consider that the worthiness of our leaders must be weighed, as well as understand the standard by which their conduct is revealed. The lesson I take from the December, 1937 issue is that the battle to uphold truth has not begun with us, nor does it have it roots in our time. There may be different peoples, languages, and surrounding circumstances, but the drift to authoritarianism independent of God, and even in the Household of Faith, is characteristic of the natural man. We are not proof, nor are we immune from tyranny; in fact, we are more in danger of succumbing to that counterfeit because it is so close to the way God’s government is supposed to work, with the Spirit providing correction and direction – that we lack. God does not rule by the will of a man; God rules through men. This priesthood Work should be the place in all the world in which God’s overshadowing spirit is experienced with power. We can blame others; we can accept blame ourselves, but that does not get us anywhere. The solution is to consult with the Lord for guidance on specific points. A general call to hitch up our trousers, or gird up our loins, or do some great communal thing, does not address the areas that need attention. We need to pray our way out of this one, beginning with facing the issues of worthiness, justice, cleanliness, respect and regard, in our own record and in those who would be sustained by us as exemplars of these basic virtues. Whether submitting sovereign authority to a single head of state or acceding to sovereign (independent) authority in a religion, the sin is the same, and it is sin. An entire people are thereby made subject to corruption of their God-given conscience to be followed by further subjugation and exploitation. God’s prophets, Joseph White Musser among them, have been acutely aware of the enemy at the gates. Why should we (who should be their disciples and their students) not have followed them in respecting and adhering to the same principles they expounded and upheld? This drift to substituting allegiance to men who have divested themselves of direct accountability to God and His spirit and His standards is a process which we share with them. It does not stop. It does not find equilibrium, but becomes more darkened, more tyrannical, more life and soul denying as opportunities present themselves for men to exercise their ungodly and unjust license upon their subjects who become their victims. Just as every living thing brings forth progeny after its own kind, sin breeds sin. Maintaining standards of personal holiness is an important base for righteous judgment and returning to the presence of our Father in Heaven, but it is not our only responsibility. Our holiness must extend beyond our own selves to protect each member of our community in their God-given rights. When what should be justice is administered in secret with partiality, or refused to be rendered at all, we are all stultified and remain in a state of perpetual spiritual childhood. It’s all happened before, and now it’s our turn to see and experience the fruits of man’s authority and partiality and tyranny exercised upon our own heads. The mission of the work of God is shrunken to a police action among its members, while world events continue in which the kingdom of Satan is preparing to suddenly emerge in the midst of the mild and extreme socialist nations, joined to one man by cords of steel. We can't be saved in ignorance, and being in ignorance of God’s plan of salvation and our part in it is a bar to a full salvation. If we persist in sustaining men, right or wrong, like the church does, how can we expect to be accounted worthy of any of the higher degrees of salvation? Picking and choosing which parts of the whole we will live and be self-satisfied with, is a grand deception and a thief of eternal life-giving life. The Work of God is incomplete without a drive to purity in office that includes a proper and full repentance and restoration of participatory (not secret, not partial) justice that all can believe in. There has to be a reckoning and vindication for the victims, or there is no restoration of justice. * * * The chief atrocious act of long standing of the papacy during the sordid career of the Roman Catholic Church was the establishment of the Inquisition in the early 13th century (1229). This body became a state within the kingdoms of Christendom with its own courts, prisons, tormentors, soldiers, and laws. True to the Devilish nature of its inspiration, it conducted itself in an atmosphere of terror and secrecy. The accused had no rights whatsoever. Anonymous denunciations of others were obtained through torture. The accused, depending on the mind of the inquisitors, could be obliged to confess to crimes he had not committed. The acme of convincing the people was the theater of terror known in Spanish as the “act of faith” in which the victim who had insisted on conscience above conformity was burned alive. The Catholic Church was obliged to make war against its own members. Preservation of the institution was deemed of supreme importance and for that reason a crusade against Christians was declared in (1208) upon the heresy known as Catharism in which whole cities in Southern France were massacred to eradicate a faith that denied the authority of the papacy to rule absolutely in the name of God. The Languedoc region had not fully recovered from its ruin until after the establishment of the Fifth Republic post-World War II. The first reformers were priests and scholars who desired to bring the rule of the church under a consensus rule of a body, spreading the authority to govern away from one man and his cronies, the conciliar movement. It went nowhere. The next wave of reformers looked to the word of God in scripture to be the supreme rule of faith. Their effort was directed against arbitrary and unequal administration of justice, perversion of the gospel of salvation so as to deny salvation, protection of crimes by high church officials, exploitation of the members through taxation that went to support obscene luxury and practices of a few, in essence the hijacking of man’s relationship to God by the substitution of what amounted to a saintly racket. Democracy was not one of their tenets, neither was teaching a pure gospel, promoting equal justice or submission of all to constitutional rule, the constitution being the scriptures. * * * * It’s like a picture puzzle drawn for children in which you are supposed to study the picture to find the hidden objects that have been blended into the drawing. In this case, look for elements in the apostasy of past ages and find them among us, the Work of God. Who Keeps My Conscience 3 Jesus’ pronouncement on the churches of Joseph Smith’s day remains: “They draw near to me with their lips, but their hearts are far from me; they teach for doctrines the commandments of men, having a form of godliness, but they deny the power thereof.” (J.S. 2:19) In this case, the question that must be answered is whether the power the prominent that preside among us claim to have is really with them beyond the power of words to influence and intimidate. (You deny the power –i.e. stop its exercise- if you don’t honor the conditions upon which it is manifested: personal righteousness and obtaining the sanction of the Lord.) “And all things shall be done by common consent in the Church by much prayer and faith; . .” D&C 26:2. The reason for this inclusionary policy in a church (a setting where priesthood practice is to be acted out) should be to enable, encourage and require that all do their own homework, obtaining informed consent through reason applied to scripture study and prayer to obtain the mind of God (i.e. Holy Spirit). One of the purposes of a church (i.e. body of believers) is to develop the parallel and united agreement of the people and their leaders through their exercise of independent effort. When people elect to fail to make this effort and comfort themselves that by agreeing without weighing or consulting they are honoring God through trust in the Lord’s anointed, they are in disobedience, failing to honor their birthright and exercise their ability to grow in incorporating into themselves a godly sense and power of independent judgment. Having the church be a democracy is a (apparently to me) subtle way of Jesus establishing checks and balances to the top-down government of the priesthood when managed by men. In an environment in which equality in freedom of expression is honored, the decisions derived from the priesthood can stand the scrutiny of a people rooted in scripture knowledge and interpretation and secure in their relationship with God through active prayer. (If they do right, they can stand alone, vindicated by God; if they do that which is not right, they will not have a church to support them.) Authority without accountability, even to explain principles applied, is one of the big lies that are a feature of churches of men that rely on authoritarianism to further their prosperity. “Because I said so,” is not in keeping with the mind of God. Reread the 1886 Revelation of the Savior to John Taylor, to see how Jesus handles an important issue for the benefit of those who would follow him an extra mile. The interpretation of having all things in common to include the functioning of church administration and rendering equitable justice is a way to bind all to a loyalty that includes all members equally. It carries within it a spiritual check to the extent with which authority will be exercised. Having equal justice and sharing of resources enlivens and can, if need should arise, enforce valuing and respecting each member. So which came first, the chicken or the egg? Do we have all things, spiritual and temporal in common because we love God and each other, or does the sharing make us love God more? Brigham provides an answer in which I believe, in which he says that man will not be driven to heaven. (“Discourses of Brigham Young”, p. 99 – “Truth”: Dec. 1937) Those who wish to exercise compulsion in common affairs are not furthering spiritual growth, rather hidden alienation that provides a breeding ground for sin. Who Keeps My Conscience 4 Of course, the Work is not operating on the charter of a church. That takes away a principle mechanism by which wayward leaders can be brought to account. The method of a subordinate quorum rising up depends on their sensitivity to the principles involved, their sensitivity to the presence of sufficient transgression, and their calling by the Lord. Things have progressed, or rather digressed to the point to where such unity and such sensitivity do not exist in sufficient strength to effect reform from that source. Bad government that is not endorsed by the Lord according to the mainstream of gospel teaching and true prophetic inspiration is better than the alternative according to their apologist speaking to his congregation at Rocky Ridge (blog 8). How about they undertake to follow the law of the priesthood, themselves? That would be a welcome innovation. God is going to have the last word. We are citizens of the United States; we pay taxes and vote and obey the law to keep the peace, yet we do not endorse all they do. I should think the same stand should be taken with regard to those who would lead this Work and sustain the unsustainable. At least let your stand be known to God. Under persecution to the death, the rabbis instructed their Jewish congregants that it was all right before Adonai to lie to the oppressors to save life and property, the stuff of life, just so long as one at the same time denied with the mind what they spoke with their mouth. I don’t think it has reached that point with us, nor do I think that is acceptable to God. If we have done our prayers and obtain instruction thereby, it is not we, of ourselves, who judge, but the Lord. * * * There is an error on page 114 (“Truth” Magazine) in the reference to the 16th century reformer, Ulrich Zwingli. This contemporary of Luther was killed as a spiritual leader in a battle between adherents to the Protestant reforms and those committed to the traditions of Catholicism in the Swiss civil war of 1531. The quote of LDS church administrators, "We have our instructions,” is echoed by the mantra repeated with pride by Nazi officials, “Wir unsere befehle hab.” Another quote has just come into my mind, so I’ll add it thus: “What concord hath Christ with Belial?” (2 Cor. 6:15) On page 115, the test oath of the LDS church contains the phrase, “without any mental reservation whatever.” This parallels the oath and covenant of the Jesuit Order of the Roman Catholic Church with regard to obeying a superior in that order. Page 118. The testimony of John A. Bistline quoted in Truth magazine bears repeating here. “I only want to stand for the thing which I know to be right and to hold fast to my free agency. I believe the time has come when the Lord will write his laws on the hearts of men and every man will have to know for himself the will of God. I know that He hears and answers prayers, for I have proved it.” It is of interest to take a look at political history. The emergence of the Bolsheviks and Stalin came out of the foundering of a tyrannical system (Tsarism) in which the voice of the people had never been a factor beyond the government of a village, even before Kievan times, a millennium before. The Bolsheviks aroused mobs and established themselves through force, accompanied by a godless religion. Their participation in the newborn, representatively democratic Duma was a sham. By the time the people were allowed to vote, the machinery of the police state was already in place. Who Keeps My Conscience 5 Mussolini arose in response to a disastrous and humiliating war after which a weak government could not provide basic needs. The Catholic Church gave him spiritual legitimacy in exchange for sovereign statehood. He appealed to strong, mob emotions for quick and decisive change and a return to national glory via territorial expansion. He openly proclaimed the virtue of inequality with many levels of authority within his fascist system. It was party time for authoritarians and petty chieftains of all sorts. Hitler appeared at a time when a new government, a blend of representative democracy overlaid upon monarchical autocracy had only been functioning with primary responsibility for a period of 15 years with crippling exactions forced upon it by the victors of the 14-18 War. Hitler finally assumed the office of Chancellor through the vote of the people and then he converted the office of a chief executive to that of dictator (fuehrer) and supreme warlord (kriegsherr). The Roman Catholic Church supported the legitimacy of both the Fascist and Nazi governments with the Lateran Treaty of 1928 and the Reichskonkordat of 1933. Bro. Musser’s indictment of a lazy and servile people more applies to the voters in the United States. People only have a measured and limited say in their governance that is meted to them according to the will of the political class. They are channeled to believe what opinion makers, educated by wise men, tell them is true. American popular government began its decline with the organization of political parties in the 18th century. “Give us a king,” is what the influencers of public opinion persuade them to require, whether it be a Saul or a Roosevelt. I am led to believe that the transformation in government of the Latter Day Saints after the Manifesto was decided through a presentation, not openly stated, that could be condensed to that of a deal. They would be freed from the burdens of sustaining Celestial Plural Marriage and nagging calls for leveling of economic prosperity in exchange for accepting the government of men to administer the affairs of God who would accommodate to the sensibilities and the political will of the gentiles and thus enable all of them to share at the world’s table. The fullness of the gospel, it would seem, is not for everyone. The big lie that was accepted by the LDS membership is that men can guarantee the rewards of the fullness, without the people having to live according to all its requirements. Blind obedience enables the people to listen to a corrupted, edited version of the gospel repeated over and over again to their comfort and reassurance. It works even better when the speakers, themselves, have grown up sincerely believing in the innovations incorporated before their time. When the lust for statehood was over and the gun and badge boys were called off, some people began to have second looks at what the new church would be all about. It was then that the First Presidency began to build up the great wall of their sovereign authority, independent of an intimate relationship with the Lord. A majority of the people, it would seem, didn’t know the difference. And that’s where we, the Work of God, are, today. (“Follow the prophet. . .” Just who’s prophet are we following?) Our part in this is the belief that we can receive the blessings of the fullness without conducting ourselves as members and as officiators according to the spirit and truth of the ordinances and covenants we have received. Apparent deviations from our scriptural guidelines proclaimed by our leaders can only be recognized by God, if He orders it by direct voice command, as though audible, to those anointed to receive such direct commands (the keys). Who Keeps My Conscience 6 One of the slogans of the Nazi party was: “The leader is always right.” People are so used to not hearing the oracles of God in power that it is enough for their leaders just to use the language of authority and they will either doubt their own conscience or seize upon the words to feel vindicated. And their children wander in darkness. How is it with us, then? In a climate in which men are more impressed through fear than by faith, they will give in to a will of another strongly expressed, backed up by threats, stated or implied through example. Only through striving and adhering to the principles of the gospel in all its elements, both doctrinal and through dialog prayer and righteous actions, can man rise above the human condition of being subject in spirit to tyrants, sinners, and apostates. The fullness of the gospel, it would seem, is not for everyone, everyone in the Work, as well. We are not to be governed by men, rather we are to be governed by God through men (and our practice of virtue). It is their job and ours to ensure that God’s way is maintained throughout. If God’s way is not maintained in respecting the rights of all to justice and an equal place at the table, then man’s way, which is subject to the will and wiles of the Devil, will prevail and with time and circumstance, that which once was striving to holiness will become fetid and accursed. In page 119, we have presented Bro. Musser’s indictment of the “New Mormonism” of the LDS Church. I see his prophecy fulfilled in a parallel course with the LDS Church accommodating to the sins of the world (the laws of the land and political parties and their leaders)who impose abominations and carefully and systematically remove the power of the people to preserve their own freedom of conscience, and ultimately their livelihood if they do not endorse and comply with the will of the state. In other words, by not hazarding the good name they have with the world and their economic security and prosperity, they remain silent or even tacitly endorse the evils of our age. For the sake of preserving image and credibility of the institution as well as prominent members, the Church has accepted the presence of the priesthood of Satan destroying souls in their midst, (to wit. the work of Bishop Pace to expose and expunge Satanism, Blog 32, pp. 3-6). All of their members, who are of their mind to sustain their leaders right or wrong are in effect denied eternal life (godhood) as a condition of membership. One of the principles of statecraft was highlighted in the trial of Jesus Christ before Caiaphas and the Sanhedrin. It was deemed expedient that one should die rather than a nation should perish. (Jn.11:50)The politics of centrally managed government with authority resting in the executive will make some lives expendable for the sake of powerful interests. Thus we have corruption of the food supply and the medical profession become an industry based on profitability. Banking becomes a fox-and-hounds chase of profits extracted ahead of the inevitability of collapse due to rampant indebtedness. Adding abortion and infanticide to our culture will prepare us for the next step: euthanasia, killing the elderly as their social duty. Satan never rests, particularly when he’s on a roll. The concept that by following others in doing wrong and wishfully thinking that the others will bear the responsibility is yet another example of ignorance of gospel principle that furthers estrangement from the mind and Spirit of God with heaven-denying consequences. Who Keeps My Conscience 7 The counterfeit creed that has become LDS doctrine, as opposed to the Savior’s doctrine, took a generation to become dominant and accepted. It has received enhancements and improvements as the years have passed and new generations of leaders have taken advantage of the advances in the visual arts and the science of psychology and persuasion. What example do we offer to the refugees fleeing from their velvet tyranny, or do we offer them more of the same? “Truth” Magazine, Dec. 1937, p. 119. Concerning advocating blind following. The presentation in the Millennial Star bears repeating, for it is as good a psychological analysis as one is likely to get and is expressed a whole lot clearer than professional language. When the Elders of Israel will so far indulge in these extreme notions of obedience (robot-like) as to teach them to the people it is generally because they have it in their hearts to do wrong them-selves, and wish to have the way to accomplish that wrong; or else because they have done wrong and wish to use the cloak of their authority to cover it with, lest it be discovered by their superiors, who would require an atonement at their hands. (This was written at a time when the error was still infiltrating, and not yet established top-to-bottom, throughout.) “We would ask for what is the priesthood given unto men? IT IS THAT THEY MAY HAVE A RIGHT TO ADMINISTER THE LAW OF God. HAVE THEY THEN A RIGHT TO MAKE VOID THAT LAW? VERILY NO. “If a man could have as much authority as the Almighty, it would not authorize him to do wrong, nor counsel another to do wrong; and the man that will administer with partiality, for the sake of screening iniquity, will find his stewardship will be taken from him.” * * * Mill. Star 14: 594-6 (When you read the words of the Lord and the words of inspired men of God, they are not just one of a swirling cloud of arguments. Let them speak to your heart and write them there, for therein lies the bedrock of your faith.) Do not be a stranger to God; do not let God be a stranger to you. Do not let anyone get between you and the Lord, your God. The scripture, “My sheep hear my voice and I know them,” (Jn. 10:27) given by the Savior is true for all time. This is not presented as an argument, but a fact. This is Christ’s intention: to be heard in the heart of each person of the Father’s children on this earth, if it were possible. You don’t hear the Savior’s voice to you from another person, unless you feel that heightening of energy and a stirring of the light of Christ within you. You must seek that discernment and seek to enhance that discernment all of your life. Every line and every precept you take in from the pulpit and from public discourse must be taken that way, not just those portions that are repeats of what you have already accepted and know to be true. It’s not only what truth you hear, but what it truly means and how to apply it that you must understand, or you will be in the same position as the enemies of Jesus who heard his ministry in the streets of Jerusalem. When you watch a damaged DVD (digital video disk) on occasion the pristine picture will break up into brightly colored squares. This is what it is like when error or outright deceptive influencing is mixed in the message. Practice spiritual awareness when you are presented with a spiritual meal. Who Keeps My Conscience 8 If we were fulfilling the measure of our calling, it would not be advisable to describe how a prayer relationship with the Holy Spirit works over and over again. It’s the mastery of fundamentals that we are lacking. That’s why we accept men who appear mild and humble, yet iron-fisted when justice comes up. In the game of chess, a little pawn that somehow is permitted to survive and reach the back row becomes an all-powerful protector. You are that little chess piece and your value to God’s kingdom will have increase without end if you will dare to open your heart, dare to listen to the Holy Spirit for judgment and direction, dare to connect the Light of Christ within you to the promptings of the voice of the Lord, and then go and do. There is a right way to understand, (put in) order, and live by the principles of this, our faith, but each person must find these out for him or herself, since they are not altogether held in common among us. You have to do this for yourself because only you are going to be at the particular place in time where a teaching comes to you. The Holy Spirit works with your personal language and your background to help you to fill in the blanks, if you will do your part to be sensitive to the need to expand your understanding. The Savior admonishes us to be “wise as serpents, yet harmless as doves.” (Mt. 10:16) The under-standing of the motivations and utility of advocating for blindly following wrongdoing as some sort of virtue must be understood, or we follow the Will o’ the Wisp of words to further the wickedness of men who have forsaken God. Forgiveness is not a monolith. It is composed of elements and is applied to cases. We cannot endorse wrongdoing, ignore judicial abuse, and be called a priesthood of God. How long have we been used to listening to men, rather than listening and taking to heart God through prayer and scripture? How long have this people tended to remember the emotions evoked by the speakers, confirming, admonishing, occasionally comforting. There is a subtle difference between our enthusiasm, and the endorsement of the Holy Ghost. When the leaders agree with God, everything’s all right. When men diverge from God in doctrine, in maintaining standards of worthiness by which authority is potent, and in the humble and charitable spirit that inspires others to be and do likewise, then woe to this people. * * * We are in the sailing ships of our minds and bodies; we are the captains of our souls. Emotions are like winds that blow over the ocean of experience we live in. It is our job to master them, so they work for us, stirring us to be vigilant and valiant, and persevere in doing good. Emotional winds can serve to carry us to overcome tides and currents of adversity and error. Like sailing ships, we have sails to be racked on their towering masts, or swung out to use a wind abeam (jib). When the winds are dangerously strong, we can run under bare poles and let out sea anchors (canvas parachutes). We have a rudder and binnacle compass to maintain our way. If we let emotions drive us before them and not use all the means of navigation, sooner or later we will wreck on the rocks of the islands and continents of sin. Where would our aroused emotional winds drive us – to the safety of the open sea or to the rocks and shoals that lurk amid the archipelago of sin? Is the affinity we feel for our leaders based on knowing conviction, or wishful thinking rooted in tradition, or fear of the unknown mind and will of God? It is our business to know the mind of God in these matters through examination of what is made known to us from this blog learnjustice.posthaven.com and from living memory, and written scripture, and then not hold back from inquiring of Him. Who Keeps My Conscience 9 The truth of our condition and a choice of our destinies is before us like the rocks and shoals of the headland hidden by the curvature of the earth and the moonless night. Time to lay out the sea charts and make a sounding of the depth under the keel and take a bearing on a star, yes there is one. Find its course in the ephemeris book of star positions, times and movements. “If any man preach any other gospel than we have preached, let him be anathema.” (Gal. 1:8) Part of the “any other gospel” is that of blind following, elevating men because of an office and words said over them to supersede the Lord’s requirement for accountability held in common. “Having a form of godliness, but denying the power thereof,” (2 Tim. 3:5; J.S. 2:19) refers to failing to meet God’s standard by which His power is granted to men. Part of “any other gospel” is the notion that an ordinance stands valid by itself, regardless of the worthiness of the human grantor or the recipient. Believing such things is to hold doctrines in common with those under bondage to the Catholic pope. Believing such things amounts to agreeing that God has permitted some men to wrest righteousness away from Him and use His power apart from His will and intent. “. . . give me thine honor.” (Mos. 4:1) * * * Recently, I have watched the television programs devoted to the subject of nuclear radiation: the story of nuclear weapons, the aftermath of nuclear disasters, and the (paradoxical nature) of nuclear energy. I was attracted to the exploration of disaster sites. The host and spokesperson was carrying a miniature radiation meter that would emit a bit of static every time a gamma ray atom would pass through the detector. The fallout was uneven and so different locations would either pop modestly, or clear their throat with increasing, crackling menace, or roar like the ocean in one place where the contaminated clothing of those who gave their lives to limit the disaster had lain as death spread through them. In my imagination, I have passed the truth radiation detector of my mind and heart and (that which I was given right after baptism) carefully over the learnjustice.posthaven.com website material. As with a disaster site, some parts report with greater frequency than others. The parts that roar like the crowd at a football game are the parts having to do with abrogation by successive councils of the standard by which we give confident honor and respect to moral leaders. Trying to turn down the sensitivity of the meter by putting myself in the position of those whose deeds have been exposed and trying to apply the understandings, rationalizations and justifications, and imagine how authority can remain in them, quiets the volume, but does not scatter out the roar. Every paragraph of doctrinal guidance and the commandments themselves (as are to be found in “Truth” Magazine) are hot spots. Bro. Steve’s narratives are quieter, until I move to his interactions with the council. I can hardly linger for the outcry coming from the innocent victims of vicious and wanton abuse to body and soul, or the history of the behaviors of men who fit the Bible description of “wolves in sheep’s clothing.” “We only meant well.” Is that what they’re left with as the coda to their administration of marriage, what once was a garden turned into a weed- snarled field churned and gnashed by their heedless plows? They ought to know better. They grew up in the bosom of this Work. They sat before true prophets of God. They’ve been forced to wing it. Why? When and where was the power of the Spirit of God withdrawn from those who are supposed to know it? What have the saving and higher ordinances done for them? They are accomplished speakers, but what has their preaching got us to, but a continued streaked, gray canopy blanketing the sky and veiling the heavens? Who Keeps My Conscience 10 We need a return to reality. We need to clean up this disaster site, or as with the effects of radiation, little children growing their tender consciences will be harmed the worst, some irreparably as far as obtaining rewards in heaven go. We can't all have the gifts of a Bro. Steve to mine out the truth upon which our faith is correctly organized, or defend it valiantly as he has done against a counterfeit philosophy whose adherents have been reduced to operating like any good Methodist ministers with covenant matters that have eternal consequence. The blog tells it. “Priesthood is as priesthood does!” What we can do is our spiritual homework and be determined for ourselves that we will learn and obey the truth, so at least when we are challenged by those claiming powers we can know right from wrong. We can recognize the counterfeit, so that even if we have not the gift of tongues to argue it, we shall not succumb to its casuistries and threats, and drink from the savory bowl of pottage. We can’t borrow somebody’s well-used batteries for our flashlight and content ourselves to seeing as through a tunnel with a narrow, yellow glow, when we need the arc light offered to us by our Father in Heaven. The Shield of David carved on the Temple signifies God reaching down as man reaches up. We have to be reaching up, a forest of hands, not just a single pair. It’s part of our calling, and it means we do our part to create a relationship with the mind and Spirit our Savior. As the song says, “God is watching - from a distance.” Let’s close that distance. Let’s be his people and honor him by learning his laws and commandments in a saving arrangement, and doing right by them. We “can no longer live on borrowed light.” We cannot lean one-legged on the arm of flesh. We can no longer rely on leaders to show us this way. “I believe the time has come when the Lord will write his laws on the hearts of men and every man will have to know for himself the will of God. I know that He hears and answers prayers, for I have proved it. I hope the time will soon come when we will all come to the unity of the faith and do the will of the Father.” John A. Bistline in reply to his LDS judges as quoted in “Truth” p. 116 Dec. 1937. Page 163, “Truth” Magazine, January 1938: Brigham Young is quoted as stating at a Conference held in Provo, in substance, that this people will be led onto the very brink of hell by its leaders, and then the one “Mighty and Strong” would come and set the Lord’s house in order. Just who are “this people”? (Who, but the man entrusted with the affairs of this dispensation? When? At a time when the anchors that bind us to this world have been severed.) “True prophets do not attempt to prove the divinity of their calling by the menial subserviency (sic) of their followers; they need no such wavering support.” Joseph Musser, ibid. p. 163. Who keeps my conscience? I do.
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