2 responses
In the Name of the Father Jesus’ love for us in his role as God the Son of God has a strategic as well as a personal character. He wants people to grow their natures. He wants them to have many opportunities to experience the value of loving and sacrificing for the sake of that love. That ability characterizes what it means to have eternal life. We all will be seeking our own level of growth of our natures. It’s a fair test. Many of the lessons we earn unto ourselves are gained through real, even extraordinary suffering. What appears to us to be random has a component of planning by an intelligence whose operation we can only understand in its declared intent: to bring about the eternal life of man. Priesthood is an advanced degree of service to God and its accompanying relationship with God reflects that, but it is founded on fundamental principles of Jesus’ love for us, and at whatever level we attain to, Jesus treats us according to what we can bear. Brigham expected people to be able to bear more, because a heart’s core of them were already supposed to be converted from the Kirtland encounter experience. How can we communicate love to others if we don’t feel it? How can we communicate the love of Christ if it’s contrary to what we’ve experienced? There is a need to change the environment in which people experience the Lord as we should know him. “A rising tide raises all boats, (all boats that are seaworthy, that is).” God is a God of reward. Jesus has taken special pains with a chosen people who have been given a wider range of reward and also punishment. We understand that expectation has a great deal to do with our contentment or misery in the worlds of reward to come. Only a minority have the opportunity to receive even a portion of the gospel in this life, but the law of knowledge of the gospel is that once we are hearers, we must respond favorably, or a penalty must be incurred. We in the Work are at the top of the heap as far as light and knowledge are concerned among those in this mortal probation, so it is of paramount importance that we get a true and pure gospel from which to order our lives. It is likewise of great importance that we, once we have that gospel, maintain it in its purity reflected in our actions and pass it on to our children. Thus, it follows that we must look at ourselves and see how much of what we take for living the gospel is, indeed, living the gospel and how much of it are folkways and customs and understandings altered by the minds of men. Do the traditions by which we live actually coincide with the way the Lord would intend us to? This we must know. Each generation of people and each family has to renew the gospel unto itself. This is a big task and God has warned us that we can only improve the quality of our salvation by how much of His teaching we learn and understand and practice. The foundation for all this is the attitude and intent side. Light cleaves to light and the more we can include like-minded people in our strivings, the stronger and wiser we shall become. Laziness is a characteristic of the spiritual preparation of too many people. Just passively listening is not good enough. The gospel must be acquired through personal effort. Listening can pique an interest for follow-up. One way to shift from part-time religiosity to full-time involvement is to apply mindfulness to daily situations and imagine one were a just man made perfect circulating among the children of men to leave good in one’s wake. Inquire of the Lord after the spiritual welfare of acquaintances. This should not be onerous as it becomes a habit. This exercise is a door-opener to spiritually-based progress. We have to get over being the objects of admonition and fault-finding and recognize that we are a part of Jesus’ team, and the Coach’s name is, “Abba”. We have to want this. If the truth be told, most of us at one time or another have to be helped to want this. People have gotten into the habit of being driven, not led. Those holding advanced degrees have gotten into the habit of being drivers, not leaders. The presence of ongoing, uncorrected secret sin and cover-up doesn’t help with the art of leading or the solemn obligation to lead in paths of righteousness, at all, nor does it inspire confidence in men or in the Lord. If we would be barred by others from knowing God as He is, or do not have loyalty to God as He is in our hearts, then what is the degree of our salvation that we know? (Man’s version of God, biased in favor of self-serving limitation and control of other men, is not God’s version of God.) One of the principles in which we believe is that the unqualified cannot lead the qualified. This is applied to the operation of patriarchy and seniority of office. It should also be applied to those whose standard of personal rectitude is not sufficient to raise a people to a closer, confident, knowing relationship with God grounded on correct principle as taught in the Joseph Smith church. Weigh, don’t ignore evidence. You can’t lead with full effectiveness where you haven’t been. The spirit that dwells among us as a group has been characterized as stultified, stagnant and unmoving. Is this so because of an inherited disability due to the sins of the past that must be concealed because it can't be recovered, or is the spiritual silence that shows no direction due to causes closer to the present tense? Considering the Lord’s standard for consistent integrity, not just an error here and there that can be mended through wholehearted repentance and acceptance of the full consequences, has the train already left the station as far as authority goes? Considering the grossness of some of the offenses listed and the malicious spirit characterizing the denial and that thus they reveal traits of character inimical to identity as a holder of priesthood, is there a rug long enough or wide enough or thick enough to put these matters to rest? “Who told thee that thou wast naked?” (Gen. 3:11) This one has even got me stumbling. Do we have anywhere anybody who wants to go back and look where lost authority may be lingering? The present Council is in denial. And, I am grieved to say, understandably so. When Nebuchadnezzar commanded all in his kingdom to crouch down in the sandy dust in front of the golden image (winged bull with Nebbi’s head) at the sound of the braying of every conceivable noise-maker, only three sons of Judah remained standing. (Dan. 3:12) At least we have one courageous son of Ephraim who will not offer the kiss of peace to the image. One thing is going to lead to another, but will the chain of events lead us out, or further into darkness? Only the kinds of decisions we make will determine that. And the kinds of decisions we make are determined by how we make them. Either we will decide with the Lord’s voice and by his standard of two-sided deliberation, or we will dismiss and refuse and leave the decisions to the doubtful judgment of those who are themselves in doubt. Who, besides the Council itself is going to declare openly with the power of the Holy Ghost that the Council has a God-empowered authority? The formula is well-rehearsed, but what of the energy that impresses itself upon the hearers, who should be likewise in possession of heightened sensitivity because of the way they habitually employ prayer? Those of us who hear should know as well. One-sided prayer is not the same as prayer for a decision that furthers the course of making righteous judgments. It is just another form of one-sided judgment as in a one-sided trial against a brother, or an arbitrary release from a Celestially-ordained marriage (without due process). So is what passes for brotherly love, reconciliation, healing, and redemption (tant mieux). That consideration and respect was supposed to be an integral part of administering the dissolution of an eternal covenant. (Willst du dies?) Is this the signature of those who have been anointed and sustained by the Lord to make this Work whole? “As for my people, . . . women rule over them.” (Is 3:12) Jesus said we are to see his Father in him. Do we see the Son in those who rule in his name? In order to advance in competence and trustworthiness, a man must be consistent in finding the way himself along with the promptings of the Holy Spirit when given. Imagine that we are blind in these things or vision impaired, and the Holy Spirit is there beside us, prompting and correcting, but not all the time so we can develop sureness within ourselves and thus be worthy of greater responsibility in the Lord’s kingdom of kingdoms. In the use of a personal computer, the administrator is advised to run diagnostics on the healthy organization of the stored data and the soundness of the programs and operating system. The concept of running a prayer-diagnostic on the state of one’s religion before God is unheard of. Perhaps, it’s perceived as disloyal. Perhaps things have been accepted for so long with no controversy that it’s beyond comprehension that anything could be fundamentally wrong in fundamentalism. The emotional rewards of belonging to family loom large in the foreground of perception. If we do not seek the voice of our guide, we cease to progress. As this becomes our way: praying, but not being willing to take to mind the truths that compose our religion and measure all things by them (run a diagnostic) then we will assuredly become in bondage to and with men who have turned off their cockpit warning system. “It can’t happen here,” is not an adequate response before the Lord when the evidence of the learnjustice blog, that has not been refuted, clearly shows otherwise. What we do or fail to do. How we handle a question of worthiness to have an approved Work at all is a test of our willingness and ability to examine core issues as an apprentice to be an elect of God. If we deny to weigh, listen and choose, we deny judgment to God by default. If we default in seeking for ourselves to know the Lord’s will, manifested in power upon us, as though we were the only one on earth with that responsibility, we shall not have his spirit in power upon us when further delusions come. Is it sloth, is it fear, or is it hidebound tradition that causes us to deny justice to God? Examining the issue with care as a matter of concern for our salvation as saints does not mean the conclusion will necessarily be against these men. God’s standard of justice for His Work is one of impartiality for all. But let the (evaluation) not be refused. The Lord wants our hearts loyally and resolutely turned toward him, never mind what follows next. This is the Lord’s Work and we are his stewards, not his peers. In the Name of the Father 4 We are supposed to be a priesthood, developing our powers and ability for independent, yet confor-ming action, not a school of fish. In a large flock, the head shepherd can have assistants. It’s up to this bunch of sheep to recognize the head shepherd and follow his assistants only if they are moving as he does. What can be more plain than that? We don’t progress to the next stage of attainment that opens the way to eternal life-giving life by being independent of God; we progress by being independent with God. We don’t progress to the next stage of attainment that opens the way to eternal life-giving life by being dependent on men (particularly men who have by their actions shown that they are independent from God.) 12 Then said he unto me, Fear not, Daniel: for from the first day that thou didst set thine heart to understand, and to chasten thyself before thy God, thy words were heard, and I am come for thy words. (Dan 10:12) 10 Neither have we obeyed the voice of the Lord our God, to walk in his laws, which he set before us by his servants the prophets. 11 Yea, all Israel have transgressed thy law, even by departing, that they might not obey thy voice; therefore the curse is poured upon us, and the oath that is written in the law of Moses the servant of God, because we have sinned against him. 12 And he hath confirmed his words, which he spake against us, and against our judges that judged us, by bringing upon us a great evil: for under the whole heaven hath not been done as hath been done upon Jerusalem. 13 As it is written in the law of Moses, all this evil is come upon us: yet made we not our prayer before the Lord our God, that we might turn from our iniquities, and understand thy truth. (Dan. 9:10-13) As for my people, children are their oppressors, and women rule over them. O my people, they which lead thee cause thee to err, and swallow up the way of thy paths. (Is 3:12)
— A posthaven user
Love’s Labors Lost (See An Appeal to My Judges, particularly Blog 35.) When you have men who are listening to and hearing God you don’t need a trial process. When men don’t hear God so well, then they need something to fall back on. A trial process may not answer every exigency, but what it does do is act like picket posts along the side of a road that focus a driver’s even minimal attention on the way ahead. It’s on the honor system. What Bro. Steve “Abinadi” Murphy faced is a bunch of men who, it appears, weren’t consulting with God or listening to Him. And I have to be the little boy in the crowd who says, “I don’t see the magnificent robes.” The reconstructed transcript of the Bro. Owen Adultery Episode in learnjustice.posthaven.com doesn’t read like the product of men who speak from a sense of including a lifetime of learning to integrate their minds with the mind of God in the matter of searching out truth and valuing the search for truth. They have already made it a matter of friends and enemies. Extending even the appearance of faith and credit for the concerns of Bro. Steve as they apply to the wholeness and soundness of this Work before God is no more an issue than the call of a dog whistle to any of us. The reality behind the whole thing is wherein God’s judgment wasn’t consulted. Nobody said so. Nobody’s words have that shape to them. Priesthood shouldn't be making up their minds independent of God, without consulting God. The history of Kirtland shows even a justice system run on the outline of God’s rules can't make up for men who have ill-will and animus, rather than the spirit of God to search for a justice that uplifts, edifies, and heals. The O.A. Adultery Abfall played out as it did in an eccentric version of a trial because all down the line on the prosecuting-defense side God wasn’t made a part of it, either by consultation or after His manner. When men won't listen or can’t hear God, they can still be substantially right if they will follow procedure and get out the law books and act with an attitude of good will and fairness to all. Impartiality gives the best chance of finding the truth, and shouldn't that be what priesthood is all about, or is priesthood just an operating term to define an organizational construct, used as a Halloween mask to frighten ignorant children? God can even prompt his key-holding listeners to order a trial when his man or men already know from Him what the outcome should be in order to teach people how things are to be done or show all parties that justice has been done according to the principles of due process. I believe that when a litigant or an interviewee is open to having God’s mind expressed to him and God’s will be done to him, it will be done if the person on the other side of the table is in tune. God can be as forthcoming and instructive as we are able to receive. In the matter of the OAA Episode’s approximation of a trial, God is no respecter of persons. Men, however, know who butters their daily bread. When I pick my way through the transcript, what emerges is not in keeping with the spiritual alignment and maturity to be expected of practiced men of God. It is discouraging, even frightening that there should be so many who cannot see this – and there are so many more that are not even willing to look. Are we who are priesthood holders, the elect of God, apprentices to the Gods, discerning, even reasoning men, or are we accepting the role of mushrooms? I have to come back to it again and again: What does God think about what we should be doing, whether we should be practicing using a trial process or paralleling a trial process, or even in the same spirit as the trial process laid out in the D&C? “The men who lead us ought to be doing right, therefore they must be doing right, even if we don’t think they’re doing right,” is not the same as, “We know of the Lord that they are doing right” – or “We know of the Lord something else concerning them.” If we don’t know of the Lord that they are doing right, we need to “get right with the Lord” and take up the blessings we received at baptism to have the Holy Spirit to be our constant companion. Are they doing right, do they stand approved of God despite the appearance of the evidences contained in learnjustice.posthaven.com? In spite of the evidences of their deeds and thinking in the blog, do they have the approval of God to be in fact even what they profess to be? This is a matter of the life and death of the spirit, and within the span of our lifetimes it will be a matter of life and death of the body. The future assignment of spirits to mortal tabernacles under our stewardship depends on our acceptance of God’s way and God’s authority as God sees it. The Issue Beyond The assertion in Bro. Steve’s crusade for an open, impartial justice system is that equal justice is not being done and if they’re claiming (by standing implication and assumption expected on our part) to invoke direct intervention by the Holy Spirit, the evidence of the eye shows “ ‘taint bein’ done, neither.” The order of disfellowship, our version of the infamous gag order of the gentile courts, is to my mind a bath towel grabbed when a member of the opposite sex invades a private place. We don’t need a well-regulated judiciary system, if we’ve got God calling the shots. If God isn’t calling the shots, we need a judiciary system. If men are saying or would have us believe God is calling the shots, but He’s not, we need more than a judiciary system to fix the mess. If we’re not going to work with God now, He’s going to get His general contractor, the One Mighty and Strong, LLC. to do the work and the first order of business of the business of setting in order is going to be clearing the work site. Could the dirty little secret be that God hasn’t been calling the shots since Rulon died (or shortly thereafter, if you want to be generous)? The spirit of respect for God as a senior partner, the attitude of honoring God as though He is right here among us just hasn’t been in the evidence, or has it? We should ask, “How would God go about it?” “How can we do honor to God?” “Acting as though” must include acting according to known principles, not seat-of-the-pants reasoning. “. . . but I have called you friends” (Jn. 15:15), he said, but we have to do our part. He also said, “If ye love me, keep my commandments.” (Jn. 15:14) “Who died and left you boss,” when the Lord is supposed to be the boss? I was taught that the “bind on earth to be bound in heaven” power required the Senior Partner to be in agreement every step of the way, and that power was only entrusted to somebody who was trustworthy enough to either feel the Lord’s will or get it through prayer. (Boy, have I got a lot to unlearn!) Haven’t they been using the keys they supposedly have to make God a part of their decisions? The transcript records ought to show to anybody at all familiar with the subject that they’re not conversant with God. They apparently represent themselves as though they think having the keys is an entitlement, but is it? Having the keys gives you access to God, not endorsement of your own ideas. The best and brightest among us weren’t quite helping each other to get the spirit and voice of the Lord and safety-check each other. Respect for sensibilities of men, not respect for the will of God has governed too many of the decisions made with regard to sustaining or destroying covenant marriage. In their highest councils, have the guardians of the work been off the clock for years? You would think that living up to all these principles daily would give men a powerful boost in hearing the Lord in strength, but a man has to choose to listen. Unrepented sins and the need to defend yourself from detection are like a monkey on your back: you can’t get it off by yourself. After awhile, you stop trying. Here’s a point to ponder. Our interpretation of doctrine holds it that the seventh president of the LDS Church changed the ordinances to remove priesthood from the equation (“a distinction without a difference”), thus incurring the indictment given in Isaiah 24:5. We take note that David O. Mackay in ordering a repair didn’t clean up the defects where they stood (possibly to avoid damaging the image of infallibility). Exact wording of an ordination or a covenant or a scripture outweighs other considerations. God is definitely a “say what you mean and mean what you say” personage. Why else is Jesus known as “the Word of God?” By words was this world brought about, and by words is this world brought along. You can change the ordinance in two ways. You can change the words themselves, as the LDS Mormons did, or you can change their meaning, their interpretation in the minds and hearts of men, through the concept that “possession” of such things (priesthood, ordinance, keys) is retained despite a sin, pattern of sin, or an attitude of serving sin, or refusing to undertake the conditions required to effect a mighty change of heart and get right with God -or sustaining such sinners while practicing and denying their sins. The counterfeit proceeds as though it doesn’t really matter the purpose to which the sacred endowments (priesthood, ordinances, keys,) are put. When worthiness to hold an endowment or office is deemed optional, it doesn’t take long before worthiness to receive an ordinance is likewise optional in favor of the recipient’s social value. It’s like transacting the business of the Lord with Monopoly money. Are we to be content with only a pass-through priesthood? This divorce of ordinance from the requirement for righteousness is just as deadly to the effectiveness of the ordinance as removing the enabling words. In a spiritual sense, it is far worse, because people who feel somehow entitled and protected will do worse than those who do not include such a belief in their understanding of their responsibility before God. It’s the mote and the beam, all over again. (Mt. 7:3-5) Practicing the deeds of devils, while claiming the authority of Jesus is practicing a false gospel. Whether or not “the keys” remain with us, it’s as though they do not, if they are not exercised from righteousness, in righteousness, or with righteous intent. It’s as though they don’t hold priesthood, either. What Jesus said to Joseph still applies, “all their creeds were abominations in his sight, . . . having a form of godliness, but denying the power, thereof.” (J.S. 2:19) How does one deny the power? When one purports to exercise priesthood (or pronounce from a position of trust by others of one’s authority) and not act in agreement, in concert with the immediate will of our priesthood head, even Jesus Christ. When anyone seeks to cover sin, exercise unrighteous dominion in the home, give unequal justice, condone persecution of the innocent and pillory their defenders, falsely accuse as to motive and intent, they have denied the name of him whom they claim to serve and represent. You can make up your own list. It will be longer than mine. When does the pattern of these departures and misdeeds cross over from being the mistakes of stressed men, in over their heads, and become indications of willful, bad intent and a secret, undeclared state of independence from God and His gospel, and His kingdom, and His priesthood? What more lies behind Bro. Ron’s assertion that exposing the truth would wreck this Work? (Blog 8) I suggest we had better take the steps to correct, rather than wreck, this Work before God applies His remedy, like unto what the sinful and separated inhabitants of Sodom and Gomorrah got, and the dwellers in Jerusalem got twice. America’s past the tipping point, already. A certain kind of leader would be preparing this people, not only calling for repentance but showing us how to repent and prepare. Bro. Musser is reported among us to have said that Heber Grant did not wear the garments of the priesthood before his God. How much more so is this true of men who pervert the ordinances through misrepresentation, disobedience, and unholy deeds conducted and sustained as a pattern? Does anyone among you believe that you can participate in forming an adulterous marriage and not have your priesthood suspended? Does anyone among you believe that you can commit adultery, fornication, incest, sodomy, pederasty, and molestation, and without any atonement administered through others -have the right to administer in God’s name? There is only one word that is fitting to apply to such beliefs and such practices, and it is the word the Holy Spirit thought-formed to me on the subject. You may remember the prophecy of President John Taylor (Truth Jan. 1938, p. 153) saying that members of the LDS Church would think they held the priesthood, when in fact they did not. This was in consequence of what had been done to the words of the ordinance. What have those among us done to the spirit in which priesthood is held and sacred ordinances exercised? “I shall not always strive with man.” (Gen. 6:3) It’s past time to return to fundamentals: the Father is God, Jesus is Lord, their intent, exercised continually in self-denial, “is to bring to pass the immortality and eternal life of man.” (Moses 1:39) If we are to be with them, as is our covenanted intent, we must be like them not trying to find a way around them. (See blog 35, learnjustice.poshaven.com.) They do not excuse sin, precisely for the reason we are seeing, today. It feeds upon the human soul like a cancer and it spreads like Ebola. Where did we lose track of a holy priesthood? When did we let go of a holy priesthood magnified in righteousness? It didn’t happen with one “ordination by office.” That ordination had to happen in the midst of an environment. Whose priesthood is it, anyway? If it is Christ’s priesthood we hold in trust, we are saved; if it is “our” priesthood we hold in the name of Christ independently, then are we damned. The ordinance is an authorization. The power of the ordinance comes from exercising one’s priesthood in behalf of others, loving them, respecting them and valuing them the way Jesus would, because priesthood is the power to act for the loving Heavenly Father God. We don’t own a priesthood ordinance any more than we own the body or spirit of another person. Misuse of priesthood under cover of supposed authority is attempted theft ! If we think we own anything and our unsupported (by the Holy Spirit of truth) and unaligned word is somehow as good as that of Jesus, we have misunderstood God, and our benighted enemies are right to say we worship another Jesus than the real one. Priesthood and the things of priesthood are not God’s version of the OO designation of special agents in Her Majesty’s Secret Service (with the possible exception of O. Porter Rockwell). If I exercise “my” priesthood that I hold in trust, I must act with the same attitude and spirit as Jesus would, as near as I can get to it. If I have undertaken a priesthood of a more responsible nature, and it’s just that, more responsible, then I am personally and solely accountable for my mistakes, misdeeds, and apostasies. God is about raising us through a cooperative effort, not giving anyone at any time the license to sin without consequence. Whatever our saved condition, God will not entrust evolving spirits to men who remain flawed, particularly by people who are fundamentally disconnected from the spirit and purpose of priesthood. “Be ye therefore perfect, even as your Father in heaven is perfect.” (Mt. 5:48) Where is the love of God and neighbor nurtured in the hearts of such people? “Jesus is coming again and this time he is really . . . clothed with a vesture dipped in blood.” (Rev. 19:13) OMERTA and the Priesthood When there are so many principles that men gloss over, or justify a liberal interpretation of, it is noteworthy that they will cling resolutely to the one about speaking out against the Lord’s anointed. That one can carry onerous social consequences. See blog 35, p. 16. “I will give you one of the keys of the mysteries of the kingdom. It is an eternal principle that has existed with God from all eternity. That man who rises up to condemn others, finding fault with the church, saying they are out of the way while he, himself is righteous, then know assuredly that that man is on the high road to apostasy, and if he does not repent, will apostatize as God lives.” (HC 3:385) I am looking at this statement by the prophet Joseph globally (i.e. combined with all I can call to mind about the gospel of Jesus Christ and how it should be understood – and lived), and I compare it to the corrected scriptural admonition to not judge with unrighteous judgment. Common sense, as well as defending the righteous, holy, and pure way of God among us, requires that we take that quote in perspective of the requirement to preserve God’s spirit among us. It’s not that we should ignore the poison of sin in any quarter, it’s how we should not go about identifying it and remedying it that is the subject of this warning. This statement does not take into account the accumulation of evidence, or the admonition of the Holy Spirit, or the independently derived concerns of others who are in agreement that things are not right. It does not say the man described is already in apostasy, but is headed that way. The difference between emotionally charged and reasoned assertions is great. It does not mention the remedy of taking serious concerns before a priesthood court; it is presumed that forum is the proper place to bring concerns (the present state of the Work, possibly excepted). Notice, the word condemn is used, to condemn (together to damn) is to pass judgment one’s self as the result of a sort of personal court in which one is judge and jury and verdictor (ver-truth, dic-to say, tor-one who does), i.e. proclaimer of truth. “While he, himself, is righteous” implies a person promoting himself, as though to draw a following of supporters. This is out of keeping with the spirit in which a member of the kingdom of God should conduct himself and speaks to the spirit such a man carries. It also points to the man persisting in making noise, but not seeking resolution. Needless to say, I do not find Bro. Steve’s character, concerns or actions are defined by this quote. And another thing, sanctioning Bro. Steve as though he were a malefactor will not change truth, or the witness of truth to the prayerful. At the climax of the trial, the central issue was ignored. It doesn’t matter how faithful the lady was in the difficult circumstances of the marriage; it matters if her release was accomplished according to God’s law and to God’s approval, and whether or not God’s approval was sought, and with it, the witness of His power. The distress that Bro. Owen expressed subsequently speaks for itself as to whether he exercised an authority in concert with the authority of God. There are others who do not bloom with the roses, either. I see two sorts of adultery: one is adultery with malice towards God’s way, or with sin as the accepted consequence, and the other, I’ll call a technical adultery in which the people violated God’s protocol out of well-intentioned ignorance. I do not know that the law that God has given us on the matter of adultery makes a distinction between the two. What I do understand and accept is that where the possibility of adultery exists, God must be consulted and His approval must be expressed strongly enough to override the mental cogitations of the man who holds the ultimate responsibility on earth for unbinding. Petitions for release must be considered in the same way. To authorize an improper release, a sin, in order to prevent a potential sin is out of bounds. We are each responsible for our own sins. Contrast the stand of President Taylor as described in learnjustice.posthaven.com 38 Appendix J-1,2 The Law Against Adultery and its Consequences. In one sentence, (53 Appx. R-1 ) uses the words “dozens and dozens” to describe the numbers of mar-riages that have been dissolved. This is alarming for the spiritual health of this Work. President Taylor’s admonition comes to mind, quoted below. A basic tenet of the gospel plan of salvation is potentially being misused. Truth Magazine 3:20-21 John W. Taylor: A Return to Fundamentals Advised March 3, 1889 “We are getting into such a condition that if we were to meet the Lord, we could not look him in the face, and the way we are going it will soon be impossible to tell what we do believe….” I think this particularly applies to our difficulty sorting out how to deal (or even if we should deal) with gross, defiling iniquity found among us. Are we really such terrible folks that we can't stand each other? Are we a people who live by the love of Christ or bush law, like Tasmanian Devils? (From the noises they make, you can't tell if they’re fighting, which they do a lot, or mating, which they do, also.) What do our divorce (that’s what I’m calling it) practices say about who we are? What do they show us about how we treat each other? What are the attitudes people hide in their hearts going into marriage? What do people expect of each other and of covenant marriage? What does it tell us about how our leadership is exercising its responsibility to teach aright, not just punitively? This disability to maintain unions is a scandal in which there are many participants, not only a few at the top. Leo Tolstoy (War and Peace, Anna Karenina) said every happy marriage is alike, but every unhappy marriage is different. Would that we had an advocate with the Father who would say for us, “Father, forgive them, for they know not what they do.” Love’s Labors Lost 7 Since we’re taking it upon ourselves to make marriage fit our human needs, why not have marriages in which the consequences for dissolution are not so dire? We appear to be doing this, in effect, anyway, and men feel they have the authority to dissolve marriages for the convenience of the parties (or sometimes third parties, see blog 3) or the good of the service. Get the eternal, indissoluble out of it, until the parties have had some practice. Better yet, and in keeping with obeying and doing honor to God, safeguard the Eternal Covenant by raising the bar. We should never be in the business of enabling damnation, permitting any of those who should be our brothers and sisters to get in over their heads, having made only a token effort to prevent it. Is the rancor and discontent of those who are frustrated more to be feared and catered to than the eternal consequences of a union that ends in defilement and a wrecked and confused lineage path, as well as their damnation? There is a scripture that reads it is better to marry than to burn (1 Cor. 7:9), but how much worse is it for an eternal marriage to founder? One of the stains on the Mormon Church is their failure to defend the temples; their rate of divorce rivals the world’s and their rate of release is a disgrace. Part of the remediation and reform, if it is ever to be undertaken, must be pre-marital counseling that is performed in a manner more effective (as to outcome) than what has been done heretofore. Giving and taking offense must be sacrificed to the Christian spirit of charity and forgiveness for the protectors of marriage, or are we living a lie? Actually, presented in the right spirit, thoughtfully, it should not give offense. That’s a good general question, “Are there too many of us living a lie?” Are there too many of us living a lie such that we can’t be sure of the voice of the Lord and don’t know what we believe, so we have to depend on others? 62 Appendix V-2. View the prophet’s warning to apostles about betraying the brethren. When do we, by not “betraying” the brethren, betray God instead? The two are not indivisible. O ye Twelve! And all Saints! Profit by this important Key---that in all your trials, troubles, temptations, afflictions, bonds, imprisonments and death, see to it, that you do not betray heaven; that you do not betray: Jesus Christ; that you do not betray the brethren; and you do not betray the revelations of God, whether in the bible, Book of Mormon, or Doctrine and Covenants, or any other that ever was or ever will be given and revealed unto man in this world or that which is to come. Yea, in all your kicking and flounderings, see to it that you do not this thing, lest innocent blood be found upon your skirts, and you go down to hell all other sins are not to be compared to sinning against the Holy Ghost, and [thus?] proving a traitor to the brethren. (History of the Church 3:385) All these aspects of the gospel: heaven, Jesus Christ, brethren, scripture and teachings acquired through revelation, and the Holy Ghost, are presented as a unity. Again, what is our concept of God: a mysterious, deeply hypocritical, terrible tyrant, or the One earnestly upholding holiness throughout? Ask yourself, what is the weak link here? And it is men. Men in the 4th century had the same problem long after a scripture was given in which Jesus told Peter he was the rock, “and upon ‘this’ rock I will found my church.” (Mt. 16:18) Those who became the Church of Rome, unable and/or unwilling to obtain the word of the Lord to clarify, chose to interpret it to mean that Jesus was setting up a man (and by logical extension his successors) to govern his church (and do so according to their lights, as being endorsed by Christ, separation from him being their operating condition). Thus, Christ’s church became their church and they became Rome’s church. Possess the oracles of God? They dare not presume, lest they be caught in a lie. Heber Grant, likewise; Owen Allred, LeMoine, Lynn, et al where did they stand? The words “innocent blood” appears as part of this admonition. How much of God’s law has to be broken and how often do men have to be in violation before they are no longer “innocent blood?” (Another clue to interpretation is the phrase “and proving”. To prove means to confirm.) Since when does exposing allegations of sin within our household of faith constitute betrayal of the innocents? Should the trials launched against Joseph Smith be considered by that loving and tolerant man of God to be acts of betrayal when they were conducted according to principles of fairness and disclosure and safeguards for impartiality? Those who subsequently admitted themselves to the spirit of mindless mobbing that sought to usurp his office and take his life were the proven betrayers. Upholding and protecting those who uphold light and truth is one thing; upholding conspirators in their multitudinous offenses against God’s gospel, God’s people and God’s name is altogether another. (I feel led to interpret “the brethren” in the sense of colleagues, not some other entity separate from the rest. Who are the brethren, anyway, but those who keep the Father’s commandments? ) See Mt. 12:48-50, also Jn. 14:23 and 15:10. Both ignorant and wicked men have turned the understanding and the point-of-view inside-out. “If a man abide not in me, he is cast forth as a branch, and is withered; and men gather them, and cast them into the fire, and they are burned.” (Jn. 15:6) The scriptures we have from Joseph do not supersede any of the words of Christ. Indeed, we are accountable for all the scriptures – as you should know. Since when, is bringing miscreants to justice before God, or at least before the light of day, a betrayal of the innocent? If you cannot see and discern the difference, what priesthood do you hold? To what effect are you praying to God? Who is the God you are praying to, is it the head thief, the head lover of lies, the head violator of little children, the head outlaw, or the head compromiser? Bro. Ron says the council can’t be effective if these matters continue to be aired (blog 8); others say, the Council can’t be effective if it persists in being defective. What does God say? If you can’t trust God to will that His law be upheld and His justice prevail and His servants be pure in heart, and that He will vindicate His valiant ones, why are you here? Jesus says the fearful will not be admitted to the heaven in which he presides as a God to us (Rev. 21:8). This fearfulness to pursue justice, uproot entrenched wickedness, accede to the path of least resistance is the sort of fearfulness that allows the kingdom of Satan to muscle in and cast out godliness and the knowledge of God and the love of God from our midst. It is just the sort of fearfulness Jesus intends to punish with the most severe of punishments because of the harm it causes in thwarting the plan of salvation and to the souls of the Father’s children in his charge. We will always have the seedlings of sin popping up and along with it the tendency to spread its corruption like mold in fruit. What do we love? What do we care about? Do we care about God and His righteousness? Do we are about the safety of our wives from misguided waywardness and predation? Do we care about the spiritual welfare of our children? Do we care enough about our own salvation to want to finish right? Deal with it now, in this probationary state! * * * A dozen years ago, the late Reverend Malachi Martin, SJ, a spiritual brother to truth was undergoing a prolonged and intense crisis of faith. He had encountered the occult revelations of their Lady of Fatima (Mary). These contained prophetic unveilings of severe “chastisements” of the Catholic Church, some of them so terrible that even the keepers of the secret dared not reveal them. He had been sworn to secrecy by his Jesuit superior and thus would only confirm what others had brought to him. One that was revealed to a radio audience of hundreds of thousands was, “Satan shall rise to the pinnacle of power, and the pope shall become the spokesman of Satan.” His unspoken cry from the heart could be discerned as, “My God, My God, why hast thou forsaken thy faithful Catholic people? Have we not obeyed your instruction and strictly followed the papacy you ordained for us?” This master of several languages, personal associate of three popes, front-line exorcist, and author of scholarly works on Church history, was utterly at a loss. He believed that salvation for faithful Catholics lay in rallying around priests who would keep themselves clean of the utter apostasy, as sign of which they would conduct the sacrament of the mass in the Latin language! It was beyond the power of his great mind to have it occur to him that it was not Jesus who had forsaken them, but the Church that had forsaken Jesus and was the subject of indictment in the Book of Revelation four times (Rev. 2:12-3:5). He could in no way get past the Mary franchise, invented by the Church in the Dark Ages and realize the portions of the Fatimid revelations characterizing the person of Jesus were Satan-inspired blasphemies. Jesus has not abandoned any of his territory to the Devil; men had begun that process at Nicaea in 325 AD when they inaugurated a church of men. This illustrates the power of the counterfeit commandments of men over the minds of other men who open themselves to it. The Reverent Martin had been a Jesuit, raised and trained in their school of mental and spiritual “alignment,” (e.g. “. . . without any reservation, or purpose of evasion”). And now here we are. We have men claiming great authority among us who know the forms of the faith and the words that evoke wonder, but the heavens are silent. Voices continue to cry out against these men from under the altar. There are two paths open to us: the path of least resistance, to say and do nothing the way the majority of the LDS Mormons did before the buffetings of Heber Grant, or the untrodden path of which many of us are unsure given our own moderate conversance with scripture and the Spirit. What, I wonder, constitutes betrayal of the brethren? Most assuredly it would be turning them over to the enemies of the Work of God, but how is God just if He allows no remedy for the sins and crimes of the brethren that could be done against the Work? Does the law of the land have no merit at all when we cannot obtain justice among ourselves for gospel and soul-destroyers? To my mind this goes to a fundamental understanding of who God is and what God intends. We do have remedies and they involve submitting the matter to a priesthood court, being denied that, going to the Lord, in numbers together, and praying for guidance. If guidance isn’t coming from where it’s supposed to come, does our responsibility end there? The remedies include, after obtaining the will of the Lord through prayer, declaring the manifest will of God as to the fact (whether or not) of having already vacated the power of office and suspension or forfeiture of priesthood, likewise. So which will it be for us? Will we have God’s system in which we seek to do all things with Him, advised, warned, admonished, approved, but not commanded in all things, or will we submit to a system of proven effect as promulgated by the Roman Catholic Church, or the LDS Mormon Church in their wake? “The king (or the Wizard) can do no wrong.” Will we have equality of standing before God with regard to access to impartial justice, or will we have justice after the manner we have seen and not seen of late? Will we cravenly assume when we should KNOW by the power of the Holy Spirit? Is it The Wizard of Oz & The Emperor’s New Clothes, Circus - Combined Shows?
— A posthaven user