Mormon Direction

Here are some of my thoughts, a commentary, on prophecies and 2012.

I was pondering a few days ago when the thought came about prophecies, which said that we receive prophecies in accordance to our faith in God. This applies to all people in the world no matter the beliefs. Prophecies generally speaking, when given, are not meant to encompass all people. Said another way, there is not any one prophecy and one outcome that applies to everyone, save the prophecy of the second coming of Jesus Christ. I will explain.

Would it be proper for God to apply a prophecy to his faithful on one hand and to the people in the world of no faith on the other? Is this not what God spoke of, how the left knows not of the right?

Prophecy must fulfil its purpose, but it must apply in a just manner. Justice is one of God’s foremost requirements, to be just and true at all times. This is why God told us that he will judge each person in accordance to their faith and works. A prophecy to the wicked will certainly not apply to the faithful because that would be unjust. For example a prophecy of death and destruction because of wickedness would not be a just and fair prophecy to wield against the faithful.

When rain is to fall on the righteous and unrighteous, as described by the Bible, is a statement that refers to the principle of trial and tribulation given in a just and fair manner. All people will suffer trials in their life, yet trials for one person or a group do not apply to others, so the type and manner of the trial will vary in accordance to the people it affects. And so the same with prophecies.

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A new update to Mormon Messages entitled, Book of Mormon: An Introduction, narrated by Jeffrey R. Holland of the Quorum of Twelve Apostles, spoke about the authenticity of the Book of Mormon, stating that this book are the words of ancient prophets of God, spoken by the Spirit of Prophecy and Revelation.

Can we believe this?- The answer is Yes, it is believable, as it is also believable that the Bible is the word of God.

The Book of Mormon is as believable as the Bible.

Many outside the Church, even those who disaffected from the Church would deny my statement that the Book of Mormon is as believable as the Bible. Those that doubt or deny will claim that the Bible is clearly the word of God, but not the Book of Mormon, but have they really thought about it?

Many who read and believe the Bible do so by their personal choice. Many have not researched the Bible or read history or seek historic evidence of its existence in past centuries, but they still believe. They have not sought out physical proof that Jesus lived on this earth and died on the cross, yet they simply believed it when they read it. They may believe the words spoken by others, by a local pastor or friend who speaks to them about their local Christian church. For a large number of these people, what it comes down to for them, is they simply believe. An act of mind and heart that is no different for those who simply believe the Book of Mormon.

Some may claim that the Bible is backed up by historic fact, proven that it was written by ancient people, but none of these temporal claims can prove it is the word of God.

Please read that last sentence again, it said that no historic evidence can prove the Bible to be the word of God and no historic evidence can prove the Book of Mormon to be the word of God.

For anything to be the word of God must be proven by the Holy Spirit, not by historic evidence.

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Has anyone noticed in general, there are many people who cannot act well on their own, have problems making good choices and decisions and in general have a poor sense of spiritual direction? Do these people find their way, spiritually, all by themselves? This, of course, shows that no one is perfect and no one has the ability, by themselves and by their own personal beliefs to return to God.

For the least people, God provides direction and leadership. This is the very pattern God set up in all the scriptures in the Bible and in the Book of Mormon. When God cares for his people, if they have not fallen badly to corruption and wickedness, God provides by giving them leadership. This is called a prophet and in all cases in the scriptures throughout time, there has always been a prophet directing, teaching, supporting, caring and loving the faithful people of God. Only when the people abandon God, has God left them to their abandonment, to again later, reclaim them by and through his prophet.

Why then is it that many Christians in this world reject the idea of a prophet for God? – Well the answer is they are not faithful as they could be.

Without leadership and a structured religious organization, God’s faithful would get lost and fall to many follies. This example is seen many times within the scriptures, in particular the New Testament. Many times God’s Apostles had to address false (Greek influenced) beliefs and doctrines in the early Christian Church. How many times in the Old Testament people ignored God, resulting in the loss of the Church, their faith and spiritual direction? Of course, the number is far too many.

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I read a recent August 2010 – Ensign article entitled, “Being Worthy to Enter the Temple”. It was a basic article on temple worthiness but the word “worthy” stood out in this article. As I focused on that single word, the word “exclusion” came into my mind.

I then began to pondered why many Non-Mormons attacked this LDS Church since the first day they heard the words from Joseph Smith speak about his First Vision and what God said to him. As I pondered, I began to see a pattern appear and the single word that would describe this pattern is the word “exclusion”. The word “exclusion” is to omit or to exclude.

What God said in the First Vision about other Christian churches was in fact, an act of exclusion by God and that appears to have triggered the sour resentment by others. There were others since Joseph Smith who claimed prophecy from God, but none have suffered the persecution and attacks more than this LDS Church, because none of the others have “excluded” other Christian creeds to the extent that God had in the First Vision and none received any visions equal to the First Vision by Joseph Smith.

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IN the scriptures, it is said that if we deny Christ, he would deny us (Matthew 10:33,Luke 12:9,2 Timothy 2:12) and those who deny Jesus Christ are also denying his power thereof (2 Timothy 3:5). It was warned for these latter-days that many will deny him even though they profess to be with him. When hearing all the claims by Christians, one may wonder how this can happen, well it already has.

I was reading a magazine published by the Seventh Day Adventists named “Adventist World”. In it was an article titled, “Adventists and Muslims: Five Convictions – How to build on what we have in common”, written by William G. Johnsson. This article appeared OK until I came to a paragraph at the bottom of page 26. What William G. Johnsson said surprised me. In light of the intensity that most Bible only believers call themselves Christian, his paragraph on page 26 addressed the usage of the name “Christian” when interacting with Muslims. In the context of that article, William G. Johnsson wrote about how he chose to interact with those of the Muslim faith. Mr. Johnsson said,

“In meeting Muslim leaders, I emphasize from the outset that I prefer to be known as an Adventist rather than as a Christian. For Muslims the name “Christian” carries such negative associations—associations that do not belong with Seventh-day Adventists—that I would rather avoid the term. And “Adventist” captures well the driving pulse of who we are—our hope in Jesus’ return and sense of divine calling to tell it to the world.”

On-line URL: http://adventistworld.org/article.php?id=708

As I re-read that paragraph and then again the remainder of the article, I understood Mr. Johnsson to say that he does not want to be identified as a Christian because of the negative reputation it has and the negative reaction by the Muslims. Was I incorrect in reading this? To get some clarification, I emailed the magazine asking for clarification and I received an answer from William Johnsson himself and is as follows.
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I have read the claims, I have heard the claims and I have read and researched the Bible and its history and having done the latter, where do these other Christians get the justification to make the claim that “only the Bible”, or “it must be based on the Bible” and so on. I have had other Christians almost demand to me that I am lost and misguided because I accepted “another gospel” (quoting Paul the Apostle from Galatians 1 and 2 Corinthians 11), but when the truth has been revealed by the Holy Ghost, I have come to understand the truth about the “Bible” and about the “gospel” showing me that these others are sorely mistaken and misguided and puffed up in their pride of their own beliefs.

The Bible the Bible, they claim they have the Bible, so let us take a hard look at the Bible and see if what they say is true.

The Bible did not exist, as it is called, during the Old and New Testament times. The word Bible or “Holy Bible” has been used to denote religious writings for either the Jews or the Christians. The Bible that I refer to here in this article is the Christian Bible.

During the time of the New Testament Christian Church, also referred to the Early Christian Church or the Ancient Church, there was no Bible. What the Ancient Church had were the Old Testament texts which was the same as the Jews, as Jesus Christ taught from them and the writings and teachings of the Apostles which they obtained through revelation of Jesus Christ. The Apostles had a difficult time dealing with false doctrines and false teachings that infiltrated into the Church Membership from Greek philosophies, Pagan influences, Gnostic groups and Jewish pressure. Paul’s epistles mentioned it many times in his writings to Church membership.

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Outside of this Church, how many Christians believe that the Holy Ghost continues to give revelation, which is direct communication? That has become a crucial question in light of worldly events that are happening and due to happen in these last days on the earth. Biblical prophecy dictates that a storm of evil is forthcoming. War skirmishes, unknown diseases and encomomic collaspe are but a small example of what this world is to suffer, which Christians agree.

Christendom has repeatedly claimed that all we need is the Bible and nothing else. They claim that the Holy Ghost is in them and all revelation they need is in the words read in the Bible. Many other Christians believe that they get all the guidance they need for their life from the Bible, but is this true in all respects? It is true the Bible holds God’s wisdom for the common aliments of life and gives counsel of what we are to do and believe, in general, but a serious problem arises in light of the ongoing fulfillment of prophecies for these last days. Will the Bible be able to provide the right counsel for these times, at the right moment, to tell or warn you of things not yet seen and give the right counsel and direction? In fact, the Book of Mormon, Doctrine of Covenants and Pearl of Great Price face the same problem. What then is the answer to this concern?

In Christendom, there are more than 34,000 different Christian denominations across the world. All are different and they do not all have the same beliefs in Christ and salvation. In other words many have differing doctrines about the same thing. Some believe in baptism by water, others believe baptism by sprinkling, others baptism by desire and others, no baptism at all. Some believe Jesus Christ is a real person and others merely an expression from a greater single being. Some believe the Holy Ghost still communicates, others claim such communication has ended with the end of the early Christian Church and believe that the Holy Ghost is no longer needed since we have all we need in the Bible. Yet there are many different Bible versions which exclude scripture, added scripture, mistranslated the original Hebrew and Greek texts or purposely left out some things for some unknown reason. It is these Bibles that other Christians claim are sufficient.

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Within the Bible, Apostle Peter had said in 2 Peter 1:20, that private interpretation does not qualify as scriptural knowledge nor does it provide the mind of the Lord. Peter continued to say that scriptural knowledge and knowing the mind of the Lord is when a man of God is “moved” by the Holy Ghost.

To be moved by the Holy Ghost clearly sets out the state of mind and heart of a person who receives revelation from God. Since the Holy Ghost does not have a physical body as ours and does not exist in this temporal realm, he then “moves” us from the spiritual realm. The Holy Ghost does this by his power more so than he enters into us, because the Holy Ghost has many people to inspire, even at the same time so he cannot be in one person to inspire and also inspire another a far distance away. Hence he “moves” us by his power which he affect many at the same time. This example was proven in the Bible at the Pentecost, where many were moved by the Holy Ghost at the same time.

Having said that, what then is the value of personal opinion? - There can be only one truth, not many truths and personal opinion has unfortunately been falsely believed as truth.

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I am sure that many remember this doctrine spoken of by Joseph Smith and that is still reverberating throughout Christiandom today. How this doctrine, that God was once a man, upset so many people and their false doctrines, that no person outside the Church was able to read the Bible properly to see that same doctrine within its bindings.

My other website named “innerlightvision.com” holds the Biblical explanation for this famous doctrine spoken by Joseph Smith. It shows, by the Bible, how God the Father was mortal like us and became exalted and he showed or taught Jesus Christ the same thing. The example of this doctrine was actually given by Jehovah-Jesus Christ who clearly proclaimed that he followed the will and example of the Father in heaven, doing only what the Father had done.

Simple concept and most importantly, Biblical, meaning that the Bible holds that very doctrine for other Christians to read and learn.

Please attend that web page at: http://www.innerlightvision.com/article/God-was-once-a-man.php

Not long ago, I was in conversation with a fellow who quit the Seventh Day Adventist church because he was against it’s membership in the World Counsel of churches (WCC). He claimed that he believes in Jesus Christ, yet he quit his chosen church which preached salvation by the Bible. This saying that he quit what he believed was his chosen church and his means of salvation because of his personal disagreement with his church. 

Our conversation began about the false traditions of other Christians where he spoke of his short findings about the WCC, but when he asked me if I belonged to a church and I told him, his tune quickly changed, hypocrisy and ignorance began to rear it’s ugly head. 

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