The universe is billions of trillions of miles in every direction and the number of planets is at least as many. We are here to develop, endure, experience and BECOME! God is great. If he wanted to he could put each one of us on our own planet and act as a gardener to each of us. He could teach us, test us, love us, and bless us. We could become all that we could....almost.
Instead God put each of us on this one tiny planet and gave us instruction and commandment to love, serve, and help one another. He did not put us here to criticise, condemn, or otherwise isolate each other. We are all here together and we are told we will not get off this planet alive. We also will not get off this planet without making mistakes, or needing help of one kind or another. We are here to bless one another and encourage one another while we all grow together.
I have found that the word "relationship" has so much meaning and importance in this world. It is so important to find the right friends to enjoy and share life with, helping each other. When you need a doctor it is so important to have one that you already have a good relationship with. He does best when he knows you and all about you, cares about you and is sensitive to your feelings, and outlook. The mechanic who works on your car is best when he is one who is just not interested in making money or finding things he can fix on your vehicle. He has to care about the vehicle that you drive and your needs for that vehicle. He needs to like and/or respect you and want to be on your side in your troubles and challenges with your vehicle. Even the church and congregation you attend needs to be one you can trust, love, and support 100%.
Why? Each of those people, institutions, agencies, or groups need to be or are in a postition to influence you. You need to know them well enough to have confidence in and knowledge of them so that you know when and in what areas you should ask for or accept their advice. From the other perspective, each of us needs to desire to love, support, serve our companions, neighbors and stewardships. We need to work on learning about each other and our talents, crafts and callings. We need to develop relationships of trust and service to each other and have a paramount desire to do our best.....do our best for each other.
Too many of us don't do well in making choices of friends, or service providers. We need more quality and pride in our work in this country. We need more righteousness in our dealings with each other. We need more transparency in our activities.....more forgiveness, more acceptance of differences in each other.
The key is relationships. If you are in a good relationship with all the qualities right within it, then the influence will flow. You will influence and be influenced. you will know that your friends, relatives, and others around you and with whom you deal care about you and want to do their best for you. You will know that they care about YOUR concern and service. What can we do to bring this about? Commitment to each other. May those who read this blog entry know that I have that commitment and concern for them. I will do my best and I DO love those who seek for me to care about them, and I want them to care about me, as well.
Tuesday, April 21, 2009
Saturday, April 11, 2009
Why am I a Mormon?
I am said to be a convert. That means that I was baptized into the Church as an adult, but we are told that we will not know if we are truly converted until we are across the veil (after death) and the Holy Spirit of Promise (Eph 1:13-14) tells us “Well done, thou good and faithful servant.” Until then we are only trying to follow our Savior ever more perfectly until we either get it right or we die.
In the Church we have a scripture that reads:
“For I will forgive you of your sins with this commandment…that you remain steadfast in your minds in solemnity and the spirit of prayer in bearing testimony to all the world of those things which are communicated unto you. Therefore, “go ye into all the world” and unto whatsoever place ye cannot go ye shall go ye shall send, that the testimony may go from you into all the world unto all the world unto every creature.” (D&C 84: 60-62)
I have received this scripture as the word of the Lord unto me and it came with power in an overwhelming witness of what the Lord expected of me for all my life. So in that spirit I express the following:
Why am I a Mormon? Because of spiritual experiences and scriptural evidences associated with the Church that told me I needed to be one. I was drawn to become a member of this Church (John 6:44)
1) Matt 7:15-20 (“By their fruits ye shall know them”)
My sister and I are direct opposites. As we grew up, she was aggressive and loud and a bit of a bully. When she married we all watched her bully and henpeck her husband. We were appalled but thought we could do nothing. She joined the Church and I went to visit her expecting her to be as she always was. Too my surprise her spirit was different, her voice was different and her home was completely different. The gospel had changed her and her family completely. They now exemplified the perfect Christian home.
2) Eph 2:19-20, 4:11-13 (Officers-“for the perfecting of the saints,…..until we all come into the unity of the faith)
I have studied churches with lay ministries, like the Mormon Church and I see that the best leaders, administrators, and the best spiritual motivators are in this church. The youth programs are remarkable in their ability to influence and keep youth on track, sending thousands on volunteer, unpaid, 2 year missions each year. The programs of welfare, employment, and building are the envy of many organizations and governments in the world.
3) Moro 10:3-5; John 17:3 (Read, pondered and Prayed about the Book of Mormon)
The first thing the Missionaries have you do when you start to investigate the Church is to start reading the Book of Mormon and praying about its teachings. I read the book and everything else the missionaries gave me to read. I studied all that and have continued to study for the last 32 years of my Church membership. Over the years I have continued to read, study, teach, and live its teachings. Jesus in John 17:3 said “If any man will do his will he shall know of the doctrine, whether it be of God, of whether I speak of myself.” I know the Book of Mormon and the teachings of the Church are true and the teachings of Christ for our day.
4) I Cor 2:13-14 (The Spirit can teach us what the mortal mind will not understand)
Since becoming a member of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, my study of the scriptures has opened a whole new world of understanding and a closeness to God. I often feel my prayers are miraculously answered in understandings and wisdom that I know is not of myself or my own understanding.
5) John 17:3 (This is life eternal, that they might know thee the only true God, and Jesus Christ whom thou hast sent)
Studying and living the gospel as taught by the Church has helped me to come to know God and Jesus Christ in new and special ways that I never experienced as a member of any other Church. Not only that, but I feel that God knows ME better (Gen 18: 17-19) and we are closer than we have ever been because of this Church.
6) Luke 10: 1-2, 17; James 5: 13-15 (Priesthood Experience)
After I was baptized into the Church, I was ordained under the hands of authorized servants of the Lord and commissioned to teach what I had been taught and what I had experienced in my own life to be true. I was also told to lay hands on the sick and afflicted and to heal them of their infirmities. I was later sent out on a mission to teach the gospel and administer in the ordinances thereof. Since then I have experienced priesthood power in my own life and I have laid hands on the sick and they have recovered. I have been able to bless people saying and knowing things that only they could have known. In doing so I have experienced the connection between heaven and earth and I have felt and know the mind and will of God much better. It is a marvelous thing to me.
7) Amos 3:7 (Surely the Lord God will do nothing but he will reveal it unto his servants, the prophets)
As I have listened to the teachings of our leaders of the Church, especially the president, whom we sustain as prophet, seer, and revelator, I have seen the effect of the voice of the Lord. Sometimes we hear “Thus saith the Lord” and other times we only feel it. There have been times when I thought “This cannot be the Lord’s will in this man’s teachings” but when I spend time in prayer I receive my answer that it is indeed the mind and will of the Lord and I am altogether turned from my previous opinion and can not even entertain that I might have been right. I know this church is true because of our Prophet’s teachings, the experience of the priesthood I hold, the Gift of the Holy Ghost in revealing things and helping me to understand scripture, The Book of Mormon, the organization and fruits the Church exhibits, and because I have previously received an absolute witness (before baptism) that these things are true. I invite all to investigate, study and pray about these things and promise them that they too, like I, may find out for themselves that the Gospel has been restored and the voice of God is once more heard from the heavens saying “This is my beloved son, Jesus Christ, hear him.”
In the Church we have a scripture that reads:
“For I will forgive you of your sins with this commandment…that you remain steadfast in your minds in solemnity and the spirit of prayer in bearing testimony to all the world of those things which are communicated unto you. Therefore, “go ye into all the world” and unto whatsoever place ye cannot go ye shall go ye shall send, that the testimony may go from you into all the world unto all the world unto every creature.” (D&C 84: 60-62)
I have received this scripture as the word of the Lord unto me and it came with power in an overwhelming witness of what the Lord expected of me for all my life. So in that spirit I express the following:
Why am I a Mormon? Because of spiritual experiences and scriptural evidences associated with the Church that told me I needed to be one. I was drawn to become a member of this Church (John 6:44)
1) Matt 7:15-20 (“By their fruits ye shall know them”)
My sister and I are direct opposites. As we grew up, she was aggressive and loud and a bit of a bully. When she married we all watched her bully and henpeck her husband. We were appalled but thought we could do nothing. She joined the Church and I went to visit her expecting her to be as she always was. Too my surprise her spirit was different, her voice was different and her home was completely different. The gospel had changed her and her family completely. They now exemplified the perfect Christian home.
2) Eph 2:19-20, 4:11-13 (Officers-“for the perfecting of the saints,…..until we all come into the unity of the faith)
I have studied churches with lay ministries, like the Mormon Church and I see that the best leaders, administrators, and the best spiritual motivators are in this church. The youth programs are remarkable in their ability to influence and keep youth on track, sending thousands on volunteer, unpaid, 2 year missions each year. The programs of welfare, employment, and building are the envy of many organizations and governments in the world.
3) Moro 10:3-5; John 17:3 (Read, pondered and Prayed about the Book of Mormon)
The first thing the Missionaries have you do when you start to investigate the Church is to start reading the Book of Mormon and praying about its teachings. I read the book and everything else the missionaries gave me to read. I studied all that and have continued to study for the last 32 years of my Church membership. Over the years I have continued to read, study, teach, and live its teachings. Jesus in John 17:3 said “If any man will do his will he shall know of the doctrine, whether it be of God, of whether I speak of myself.” I know the Book of Mormon and the teachings of the Church are true and the teachings of Christ for our day.
4) I Cor 2:13-14 (The Spirit can teach us what the mortal mind will not understand)
Since becoming a member of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, my study of the scriptures has opened a whole new world of understanding and a closeness to God. I often feel my prayers are miraculously answered in understandings and wisdom that I know is not of myself or my own understanding.
5) John 17:3 (This is life eternal, that they might know thee the only true God, and Jesus Christ whom thou hast sent)
Studying and living the gospel as taught by the Church has helped me to come to know God and Jesus Christ in new and special ways that I never experienced as a member of any other Church. Not only that, but I feel that God knows ME better (Gen 18: 17-19) and we are closer than we have ever been because of this Church.
6) Luke 10: 1-2, 17; James 5: 13-15 (Priesthood Experience)
After I was baptized into the Church, I was ordained under the hands of authorized servants of the Lord and commissioned to teach what I had been taught and what I had experienced in my own life to be true. I was also told to lay hands on the sick and afflicted and to heal them of their infirmities. I was later sent out on a mission to teach the gospel and administer in the ordinances thereof. Since then I have experienced priesthood power in my own life and I have laid hands on the sick and they have recovered. I have been able to bless people saying and knowing things that only they could have known. In doing so I have experienced the connection between heaven and earth and I have felt and know the mind and will of God much better. It is a marvelous thing to me.
7) Amos 3:7 (Surely the Lord God will do nothing but he will reveal it unto his servants, the prophets)
As I have listened to the teachings of our leaders of the Church, especially the president, whom we sustain as prophet, seer, and revelator, I have seen the effect of the voice of the Lord. Sometimes we hear “Thus saith the Lord” and other times we only feel it. There have been times when I thought “This cannot be the Lord’s will in this man’s teachings” but when I spend time in prayer I receive my answer that it is indeed the mind and will of the Lord and I am altogether turned from my previous opinion and can not even entertain that I might have been right. I know this church is true because of our Prophet’s teachings, the experience of the priesthood I hold, the Gift of the Holy Ghost in revealing things and helping me to understand scripture, The Book of Mormon, the organization and fruits the Church exhibits, and because I have previously received an absolute witness (before baptism) that these things are true. I invite all to investigate, study and pray about these things and promise them that they too, like I, may find out for themselves that the Gospel has been restored and the voice of God is once more heard from the heavens saying “This is my beloved son, Jesus Christ, hear him.”
Saturday, April 4, 2009
Not the Faith of my Fathers
Being a Christian means to me that I have an example in Jesus Christ and a way of life outlined in scripture. Those things bring me closer to the spirit and enable me to be in closer harmony with Heaven and Earth. I am highly into being spiritual and feeling God's will and understanding by his point of view. just because a church teaches a certain thing doesn't make it true and just because SOME Christians do wrong things doesn't mean that being a Christian is wrong. You can experience God's truth and understand God's ways and thus have a spiritual life that is fulfilling, meaningful, and wonderful. I have tried life without Christianity and with it. I definitely ly prefer "with it" I too have studied all kinds of world religions and although I respect them all, I am committed to Christianity.
Friday, April 3, 2009
What is Immoral?
Immoral: Not moral, not conforming to moral law. Wickedness, sexual impurity, unchastity, depravity.
“Im/moral”
Im = a form of the prefix word “in”
-- before b, m, and p prefix words change N to M.
-- (1) not, opposite of
-- as in “imbalance” = “not in balance”
-- as in “impossible” = “not possible”
-- (2) in, within
-- as in “imbibe” = “drinking in” (bibe, from beber “to drink)
-- as in “impart” = “to give another part in” something
Moral = right conduct, what is right and wrong, ethics, manners (from “mano” from the hand, hence the way of “handling things”) customs…conforming to those accepted societal standards or norms
Latin: (moralis) = of manners, custom
From Indo-European: Mo/ma = desire strongly
Cicero was said to have used the word to translate the Greek word “Ethikos” (ethics). It descended to English and other Romance and Germanic languages alike.
French, Spanish, Portuguese = Moral
Italian = Morale
German = Moralisch
Dutch = Moraal
English and Scandinavian = Moral
A cognate is the word “Mod” = Mood (mind, heart, courage) in other words, “what is in your heart to do? What do you have the courage to do?” Later it took on the form of “emotion” Moral shows the switch between D & R in a word as the spoken language evolves.
“Im/moral”
Im = a form of the prefix word “in”
-- before b, m, and p prefix words change N to M.
-- (1) not, opposite of
-- as in “imbalance” = “not in balance”
-- as in “impossible” = “not possible”
-- (2) in, within
-- as in “imbibe” = “drinking in” (bibe, from beber “to drink)
-- as in “impart” = “to give another part in” something
Moral = right conduct, what is right and wrong, ethics, manners (from “mano” from the hand, hence the way of “handling things”) customs…conforming to those accepted societal standards or norms
Latin: (moralis) = of manners, custom
From Indo-European: Mo/ma = desire strongly
Cicero was said to have used the word to translate the Greek word “Ethikos” (ethics). It descended to English and other Romance and Germanic languages alike.
French, Spanish, Portuguese = Moral
Italian = Morale
German = Moralisch
Dutch = Moraal
English and Scandinavian = Moral
A cognate is the word “Mod” = Mood (mind, heart, courage) in other words, “what is in your heart to do? What do you have the courage to do?” Later it took on the form of “emotion” Moral shows the switch between D & R in a word as the spoken language evolves.
Thursday, April 2, 2009
Spirituality VS Religious
I believe that spirituality and religious faith are not mutually exclusive. I believe that they have to go hand in hand. i have been spiritual since the age of 7 or 8, and have had many spiritual experiences and came to know my God in that way. Then as a teenager I found a church who taught me many things. I loved that church but I didn't leave my own spirituality. The Church gave me structure and direction and guidance, explaining to me the spiritual feelings I had had all my life. If I only had the Church I would feel disturbed when I see hypocrisy in my chosen church. Instead I just lean more on my spiritual experiences and appreciate what I have learned from those who have taught me. I try to be humble in my own life, love those around me and tolerate those who are different and perhaps negative. If I have to choose i would rely on my personal spiritual experiences and color them with the teachings and truths in my church experience.
Wednesday, April 1, 2009
Suicidal Thoughts
For anyone who is befriending someone who speaks of ending life, it is absolutely essential that they understand and can feel compassion for those who may be feeling on a downward spiral of life or an increasing desire to end their lives. As a child growing up I could never think of doing anything to myself that would hurt or make me die. It was something I feared for one reason or another. Then, as I was taught the gospel I learned that prematurely ending one’s life was a sin and would come with consequences across the veil which might not only disqualify one for blessings but would lead to pain and suffering in regret and realization. No matter how sad or uncomfortable life got I could not consider such an alternative.
Before 1984 all that was true and a guidepost of my life. That year was when my life was not only turned upside down but was made meaningless. Things began to change. Things happened in my life that led me to such a downward spiral as I described above.
I was so devastated that God could let all this happen to me and I felt that God had failed me and everyone had abandoned me. My life was over and everything I believed about the gospel and how things worked was destroyed. As I spiraled down in emotions and self esteem a blackness came over my soul and mind. I did not want anything but to die and I had the prescriptions in my medicine box to do the job. I was not trying to get someone to help me, I did not want to hurt anyone by my death, I was not trying to make a social or other statement. I just wanted to end it all and I was going to do it. I had friends that supported me who were critical instruments in helping me. As the months continued to pass on and my tolerance for what was going on in my life increased I learned to live with it and kept putting off my death until I didn’t need to do it.
Some people choose to end their life as a unsuccessful or successful plea for someone to take an interest in them and be by their side and help them deal with their pain or lonliness, or just be there for moral support. You deal with that plan by letting them understand that you WILL be there and you DO understand, and you value them and their life. You will help them to stand it, and to live.
Some people feel that they have been wounded by someone or someones. Their death will hurt those people back and make them feel wounded as they have wounded that person. This is a counseling situation where interpersonal relations and help in working out the bad thoughts, feelings, and perceptions does the trick.
Some people are going to show this person or that, or prove a point to the world or some people in it by their death. They need someone to understand and to hear their complaint and help them deal with the source of their pain. Friendship and talk can do the job if it is careful and intelligently monitored.
Mine and others is a blackness that needed spiritual counseling and fellowship. I needed and I think others like me needed to not only have feelings identified and interpreted but also I needed help in feeling not so alone, not so abandoned, and not so wronged. I needed to be helped to see that with the help of my friends (I had no help from family) I could not only survive but also progress beyond it. I felt like the church abandoned me. I thought I was in the right and they should have been on my side instead of helping the evil guy persecute me….but they weren’t. It was a very dark and bad time for me.
Some "friends" tend to take the attitude that this is just being stupid and the person should snap out of it. Other friends try to shame the person into realizing what a wrong thing they are doing and that they will be damned to hell forever. Still others talk about what it will do to those they leave behind (a variation on the shame tactic). None of these is a valid support for someone in trouble. We need to feel that we have someone there who will stand by us and help us to be strong. OR we need to have someone to show us reality in that we are making a mountain out of a mole hill that together we can handle. Anyway...it stems from a feeling of being alone, of being threatened or being valued so little or being of so little worth that the world would be better off without us.
As a great psychologist told me....all these reasons sound like twisted thinking. That is true! But you can't solve these kinds of problems by yourself. You need to have someone who can see reality more accurately than you can and be someone whom you trust, respect, and believe more than anyone else in your world.
Something to think about.
Before 1984 all that was true and a guidepost of my life. That year was when my life was not only turned upside down but was made meaningless. Things began to change. Things happened in my life that led me to such a downward spiral as I described above.
I was so devastated that God could let all this happen to me and I felt that God had failed me and everyone had abandoned me. My life was over and everything I believed about the gospel and how things worked was destroyed. As I spiraled down in emotions and self esteem a blackness came over my soul and mind. I did not want anything but to die and I had the prescriptions in my medicine box to do the job. I was not trying to get someone to help me, I did not want to hurt anyone by my death, I was not trying to make a social or other statement. I just wanted to end it all and I was going to do it. I had friends that supported me who were critical instruments in helping me. As the months continued to pass on and my tolerance for what was going on in my life increased I learned to live with it and kept putting off my death until I didn’t need to do it.
Some people choose to end their life as a unsuccessful or successful plea for someone to take an interest in them and be by their side and help them deal with their pain or lonliness, or just be there for moral support. You deal with that plan by letting them understand that you WILL be there and you DO understand, and you value them and their life. You will help them to stand it, and to live.
Some people feel that they have been wounded by someone or someones. Their death will hurt those people back and make them feel wounded as they have wounded that person. This is a counseling situation where interpersonal relations and help in working out the bad thoughts, feelings, and perceptions does the trick.
Some people are going to show this person or that, or prove a point to the world or some people in it by their death. They need someone to understand and to hear their complaint and help them deal with the source of their pain. Friendship and talk can do the job if it is careful and intelligently monitored.
Mine and others is a blackness that needed spiritual counseling and fellowship. I needed and I think others like me needed to not only have feelings identified and interpreted but also I needed help in feeling not so alone, not so abandoned, and not so wronged. I needed to be helped to see that with the help of my friends (I had no help from family) I could not only survive but also progress beyond it. I felt like the church abandoned me. I thought I was in the right and they should have been on my side instead of helping the evil guy persecute me….but they weren’t. It was a very dark and bad time for me.
Some "friends" tend to take the attitude that this is just being stupid and the person should snap out of it. Other friends try to shame the person into realizing what a wrong thing they are doing and that they will be damned to hell forever. Still others talk about what it will do to those they leave behind (a variation on the shame tactic). None of these is a valid support for someone in trouble. We need to feel that we have someone there who will stand by us and help us to be strong. OR we need to have someone to show us reality in that we are making a mountain out of a mole hill that together we can handle. Anyway...it stems from a feeling of being alone, of being threatened or being valued so little or being of so little worth that the world would be better off without us.
As a great psychologist told me....all these reasons sound like twisted thinking. That is true! But you can't solve these kinds of problems by yourself. You need to have someone who can see reality more accurately than you can and be someone whom you trust, respect, and believe more than anyone else in your world.
Something to think about.
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