Ragerunner

4 hours ago, manol said:

Just so we're on the same page, I don't claim to "know"; the first sentence of my post was "In my opinion:".

My opinion comes from the 13th chapter of Matthew, verses 36-43, wherein Jesus interprets the parable for his disciples:

"...his disciples came unto him, saying, Declare unto us the parable of the tares of the field.  He answered and said unto them... the reapers are the angels... The Son of man shall send forth his angels, and they shall gather out of his kingdom all things that offend, and them which do iniquity..."

I may be wrong in my interpretation of what the angels' job is, but the main point of my post was this:  Those who consider themselves wheat are not given the job of deciding who is wheat and who is tare. 

And if "the last shall be first, and the first shall be last", imo we may easily be WAY OFF in our judgments of who is wheat and who is tare.

"Judge not, that ye be not judged" is a more straightforward teaching of this concept, and is all too often rationalized away.  I wanted to show that the concept that "judging others is not our job" is actually consistent with a parable which is often used in a judgmental way, and which had been mentioned upthread.

Once again, this is just my opinion.   

 

 

Thank you for the info, it is greatly appreciated.

On 4/13/2024 at 1:28 AM, manol said:

In my opinion:

Something that gets overlooked when the parable of the wheat and the tares comes up in the Sunday School lesson:

It is not the job of the wheat to decide who are the "tares"!   In the parable, that is the job of the ANGELS.  So unless any of us are able to see from the same perspective as the angels, and with the same wisdom as the angels, we would be out of place to presume we can judge who is wheat and who is tare.  That is simply not our job.  We do have jobs, but that is not one of them.  

To put it another way, if "the last shall be first, and the first shall be last", then obviously none of us are in a position to judge those we disagree with (or anyone else) to be among the "last".  That is simply not our job.  We do have jobs, but that is not one of them. 

Or as Brigham said (thanks for the quote @Doctor Steuss!): 

Let us observe the "Mormon Creed" - let everyone mind their own business. Everyone has weeds enough in his own garden to attend to without attending to the weeds in his neighbor's garden, for while you are attending to the weeds of your neighbor, those in your own will grow very thick and tall and will finally spoil the good seed.

 

No way do I belong on the same list.  I'll trot out my apostate credentials if I have to.  But, thank you anyway! 

Manol,

Honest inquiry. Can you point out how you know it’s Angels being referred to?

thanks

19 hours ago, ZealouslyStriving said:

I think several of you are missing the point of my original post.

The whole point is to NOT worry so much that the goats are baaa-ing so loudly. What needs to be cleared will be cleared in the due time of the Lord.

I don’t think people are missing the point of your post.

22 hours ago, bluebell said:

I don’t disagree with you.

But I’m always wary of these kind of pronouncements because inevitably what the person making the announcement seems to be saying is that “what needs to be cleared away is everyone who doesn’t believe the exact same way that I do.”

We have another Bingo!

39 minutes ago, The Nehor said:

I think it is wise to make a presumptive verdict based on how it is being presented.

I am not watching those videos but from a quck jump around in them they seem to spend all their time talking about the find but not actually presenting it. Where are all the photos of the pages? The photos of the find from all angles? The photos of the site it was found in?

This is the kind of teaser you use when you don’t want any scrutiny.

Also is that photo to scale? If so, that is one TINY book.

I am not an expert on antiquity era writing but the pages they show look to me look like caricatures of medieval manuscripts.

Also:

LOL

LOLOLOLOLOLOLOLOL

And you can learn all about it if you spend thousands of dollars per person on his personalized tours!!!!!

Also wrote a book claiming prophecy required Trump to win in 2020.

Sounds like we might have a winner?!!!!😳

AI and AGI is going to change the world in profound ways. I think it has the ability to be a tool that helps bring about a Terrestrial existence for the earth and Heavenly Father’s children.

I also found this statement interesting. 

“Emergent technologies including in construction, communication, and transportation have allowed the restored gospel of Jesus Christ to reach out to every nation, kindred, tongue, and people.”

1 hour ago, SeekingUnderstanding said:

The questions are worded in a way that poisons the well pretty strongly for non traditional interpretations. 

Agree and I think he/she knows that. Which is a shame as it creates an orthodoxy leaning survey that wishes to take the approach we know all we need to know on this topic from a revelation/doctrine point of view.

Which just isn’t true as the Church has and continues to modify and even walk back many of its positions on this topic. 

7 hours ago, ZealouslyStriving said:

Mosiah Hancock had an interesting vision of the pre-mortal life where it seemed to him spirits were created in pairs as "mates":

http://mormon-chronicles.blogspot.com/2007/12/mosiah-hancock-vision-of-preexistence.html

Mosiah Hancock’s visions mean nothing. It’s not doctrine in anyway. It wouldn’t even make the last page of the Friend magazine.

On 3/9/2024 at 11:26 AM, Smiley McGee said:

Just went to their website (and what appears to be their affiliate site ldsanswers.org) and boy was that a trip. Here are a few things learned:

• Joseph Smith only used the Urim and Thummim to translate the BoM; it's the fault of progressive historians (Bushman primarily) that the false narrative of a seer stone in a hat has taken off.
• Our modern culture wrongly seeks to "humanize" Joseph Smith and suggest he's just some "common man" (Bushman's fault because of Rough Stone Rolling)
• "Progressive historians" (Bushman) falsely claim that Joseph Smith dug for treasure. They debunk this with "real data" in a multi-part video series. 
• A little bit of fundamentalist Christian thought:
  • "Darwinism" is destructive to faith and contrary to the Gospel
  • The earth is no more than 7,000 years old
  • Carbon dating is garbage
• Under the section "Culture and Standards" the first two linked articles are "Recommended books on Christian Persecution"  and "5 reasons our family does not celebrate Halloween", tldr:
  • Reason #1: The power of Satan is real.  Never tell your kids witches aren’t real.
  • Reason #2: Satan causes extreme suffering.

  • Reason #3: Halloween and other elements of Satanism mock God & His Priesthood

  • Reason #4: Engaging in Satanic rituals, witchcraft and so forth is condemned in the Bible, Book of Mormon, Doctrine and Covenants & Pearl of Great Price.

  • Reason #5: I know the history of Halloween ("Our righteous forefathers refused to celebrate Halloween and similar festivals originating from Satanic worship")

Such a fascinating collection of ideas. Curious what makes this site a "place of sanity." 

This post deserves more likes. Many of the things they claim don’t align with today’s Church teachings and beliefs.

I would say they are the ones leading people away from the gospel.

Has he ever come forward with the details of why he felt he had to resign? 

On 11/17/2023 at 8:14 AM, CV75 said:

I'm working on a Poppycock Prophecy.

That has a better chance of being right.

On 10/7/2023 at 10:49 AM, Tacenda said:

For those true believing LDS members who don't believe Joseph Smith lived polygamy, I wonder if this evidence is enough to prove it. 

https://imgur.com/CGPtHwn

I am surprised any member would think this would even be up for debate. It very clear at this point he live polygamy. 

2 hours ago, The Nehor said:

So did that choir just legalize facial hair?

We could only hope.

3 hours ago, Maestrophil said:

I missed the make up of this choir in the Saturday afternoon session.  Who are these people?  I am so excited to see beards and variet of hair, color, ages, etc.  

It was amazing. Loved it.

1 hour ago, Calm said:

Seriously, what is the benefit of gossiping about whether a member is leaving or not?

You want to challenge his positions, fine.  Questioning his faithfulness, especially future faithfulness or not is not something other members should be doing.

BINGO!

17 minutes ago, mfbukowski said:

Good points.

AI can also be seen as pretty scary.  I am not sure I would trust any "AI Translation" of anything important, though. 

AI technology will be used for good and bad. Just like the internet, computers, etc.

It will open a whole new world of possibilities that have the potential to do a lot of good for humanity. 

1 hour ago, mfbukowski said:

Agree fully.

But now the BIG QUESTION:

Does having Stakes based on culture (language) help or hinder  "figuring it out through Christlike love"?

Help - I think they serve a current need and help those grow in the gospel with their native language.
Hinder - Because of the language barrier it does restrict the ability to better communicate and understand each other with different cultural backgrounds.

I really do think AI will break these language barriers within five years with new seamless technology. As that technology grows the need for language based wards and stakes will disappear and our ability to better breakdown those cultural barriers will increase significantly. 
 

Hopefully helping us become even more Christlike to one another.

I think AI has real potential in the next 5 years to break down the language barrier and make language translation instantaneous.

The cultural acceptance we will have to figure out how to do through Christlike love.

It just feels like cultural dogma. 

The focus that a certain type of dress, shirt, a tie, pants or grooming standard will make you ‘more worthy’ truly seems to be missing the mark.

The reverse also seems trivial. A colored shirt, facial hair, an extra earring, shorts, a tattoo will some how make you ‘less worth’. 

Take all this effort and energy that goes into ‘creating and enforcing’ all of this and use it to help people become more loving, caring, compassionate, less judgmental and more Christlike. Now you have real change that actually matters. 

The church has struggle with this subject with many different viewpoints and positions over the years. They still have no official position on how homosexuality ultimately fits into the plan of salvation. They have made many guesses or said in their opinion, but no defined revelation. 
We even have the church supporting the rights to same sex marriage for all Americans.
I think we have not heard the end of this subject. 

Just curious. How many have had this letter read in their ward as instructed?

I know they have not read it in our ward, I have asked other friends and they have not had it read in any of their wards. I then checked with family in different parts of the Midwest and nothing has been read in their wards either.

Usually when the First Presidency directs a letter to be read from the pulpit it’s done quite religiously (no pun intended).