Mormon Direction

Recently an Anti-Mormon contacted me and tried to present himself as a ex-member of this Church, likely because he wanted to gain some favour in my eyes. During our email conversation he brought up his disbelief in this Church based on his view of historic events and one of them was the story of Joseph Smith putting a stone into a hat, using it as a seer stone to translate the Book of Mormon. Suffice the say the correspondence ended quickly due to his argumentative style of writing, but that encounter spurred me to write about the “seer stone” and the Urim and Thummim which was used by Joseph Smith to translate the Book of Mormon.

Before writing, I took the position as an investigator, one who has a background in the scriptures. I investigated the validity of a seer stone within the Bible. I started with the Bible because this pertains to religious matters, not worldly matters. Here is what I found.

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From time to time, I hear fellow members of the Church express disappointment and discouragement about a lack of a testimony born from a spiritual experience. Another is the disappointment expressed in regards to the lack of personal revelations or the infrequency of them. For some time now, I wondered why other members had such a difficult time obtaining a testimony, or why they have such a lack of personal revelation while other members obtained a personal testimony by the Spirit and experienced many personal revelations.

We know that either a personal testimony or personal revelation are born of the Spirit and each full member has the gift of the Holy Ghost. We know that each member has the right to the counsel and guidance of the Holy Ghost, yet some members claim they do not receive such guidance while others have. So why is it that some members do not experience the Spirit of God?

I pondered this for some time and even prayed to the Father for answers until recently I felt impressed to write this particular article.

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Usually it is the simplest thing that eludes our perceptions such that, what we think we see or understand is actually not the truth.

Life holds many such experiences, yet people take these experiences and facts of life (in mortality) for granted. Not realizing that these simple things have profound affects on our minds and hearts.

One such event came into my life years ago when I was beginning my membership into the Church. At that time I had no experience with the gospel, but had my own ideas and beliefs about spirituality and life. Of course, these personal ideas and beliefs were born of the world.

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