Does Leaving The Lds Church Mean Leaving God?

[pogi]

No, now I believe that those experiences, were a combination of my desire to receive the experience and confirmation bias. I kept trying until something happened that I could then contribute to being a spiritual experience.

 

What was that something?  “...an undigested bit of beef, a blot of mustard, a crumb of cheese, a fragment of underdone potato”? to quote Charles ****ens.  The problem that I have in explaining my spiritual experiences away as confirmation bias, is that they are repeatable under specific circumstances as outlined in scripture and under no other condition.  They are almost predictable and match the description of the fruits of the spirit as outlined in scripture.

 

Apparently, you can't say **** (the D word) on here

Edited December 29, 2014 by pogi

[Anteojito]

I wonder too.  If Mormonism is indeed true, then the worst they can get is the Telestial.  Even they will be saved in glory, but at what level, one can only speculate and would be foolish to judge.

Telestial doesn't seem fair it they truly were doing it because the believed they were doing God's work. Those same guys may have been great Mormons, if they had been born in Utah. Seems like a "Sucks to be you" scenario.

[Anteojito]

What was that something?  “...an undigested bit of beef, a blot of mustard, a crumb of cheese, a fragment of underdone potato”? to quote Charles ****ens.  The problem that I have in explaining my spiritual experiences away as confirmation bias, is that they are repeatable under specific circumstances as outlined in scripture and under no other condition.  They are almost predictable and match the description of the fruits of the spirit as outlined in scripture.

 

Apparently, you can't say **** (the D word) on here

"The problem that I have in explaining my spiritual experiences away as confirmation bias, is that they are repeatable under specific circumstances as outlined in scripture and under no other condition.  They are almost predictable and match the description of the fruits of the spirit as outlined in scripture." 

 

Such as?

[pogi]

Telestial doesn't seem fair it they truly were doing it because the believed they were doing God's work. Those same guys may have been great Mormons, if they had been born in Utah. Seems like a "Sucks to be you" scenario.

 

Like I said, we would be foolish to judge.

[pogi]

Such as?

 

Such as when I practice meditative prayer, there is a clarity, peace, joy, and light which fills my being, I am filled with awareness and given bits and pieces of inexplicable knowledge and direction.  When I invite the spirit to be with me in prayer, after preparing for prayer through deep breathing and visualization, almost without fail I feel a presence which envelopes me which I cannot adequately describe in words.  It opens my mind and being to a state of clarity and peace which I have found to be unmatched in my life.    This practice positively effects my whole life.  When I live contrary to the principles of the gospel, I don't receive such fruits.  In fact, I feel the opposite, I feel cluttered, confused, dark and down.

 

These fruits are not limited to the saints, Christians, or even theists.  Atheists experience the same fruits when they live in-line with the light they have been given, whether it be charity, humility, forgiveness, etc.  When you live contrary to these principles, you notice a difference, and it ain't good in my experience. 

Edited December 29, 2014 by pogi

[JLHPROF]

I agree with much of this. I see little positive evolution of doctrine today. Symptoms of an overly matured religion which "no longer emphasizes" it's important distinctive truths does not suggest positive evolution. Nor does war on science or intellectuals.

 

Perhaps "emphasizing" some of our uniqueness might return us to our roots.  I don't believe we were ever meant to be so "normal".

[Stone holm]

Perhaps "emphasizing" some of our uniqueness might return us to our roots.  I don't believe we were ever meant to be so "normal".

I agree.

[Darren10]

As an ex-mormon, I am still searching.  That being said, I can't believe an all knowling and loving God would require secret names, signs, and passwords to get into His Kingdom.  I am a child of God not a member of a secret club...I give Him more credit than tha

Secret names and signs and such have been a part of Christianity much more than Christians realize.

[Darren10]

As an ex-mormon, I am still searching.  That being said, I can't believe an all knowling and loving God would require secret names, signs, and passwords to get into His Kingdom.  I am a child of God not a member of a secret club...I give Him more credit than tha

Secret names and signs and such have been a part of Christianity much more than Christians realize. Also, if your idea of entering into God's eternal kingdom is anything less than exaltation then I think you're 100% correct. You do not need and such thing.

[canard78]

I feel some indigestion over the concept of personal apostasy having been "foreordained." Foreordination is a scriptural concept associated with having been called to minister to the inhabitants of the world (to use the phrasing from an oft-quoted statement by Joseph Smith).

Moreover, this seems too much like the notion that someone who has violated covenants and returned to the fold somehow has a greater spiritual capacity that one who never left in the first place. I have encountered this notion from time to time in my life, and I have always resisted it.

Elder Holland gave a talk (which is now a Mormon Message video) about being lost with his son during a drive in the Utah desert. They prayed about which road to take at a fork in the road and both felt impressed to take a particular one. This road soon ended in a dead end. They were reassured to know that they could do a U-turn and the other road would be the correct one.

Elder Holland seemed to be using this as an object lesson to suggest that sometimes God sends us down the wrong path to help us see the reasons why it's a dead-end and that the alternative is the right choice.

What are the imitations of this story? How far can we extend the parable? Is it possible that God would guide someone into apostasy to experience the pain of it to then help then feel more certain that full activity is the better choice?

It seems a stretch of logic to me but Elder Holland seemed comfortable with the concept.

https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=yNQC-_srxH8

https://www.lds.org/pages/mormon-messages?lang=eng#wrong-roads

The transcript:

There are times when the only way to get from A to C is by way of B. Having grown up in Southern Utah and enjoying all the wonders and beauties of Southern Utah and Northern Arizona, I wanted to introduce my son to that, and I wanted to show him places that I had seen and enjoyed when I was his age, so his mother packed a little lunch for us and we took his grandfather's pickup truck and headed South onto what we call the Old Arizona Strip. Noting that the Sun was going down we decided we better get back. But we came back to a particular fork in the road, really the only one, that at that point was absolutely unrecognizable. I asked my son to pray about which road to take, and he felt strongly that we should go to the right, and I did as well, and we went to the right and it was a dead end. We went four or five or six hundred yards and it was an absolute dead-end, clearly the wrong road. We turned around, came back out, took the other road and clearly the road to the left was the correct road. Somewhere along the way Matt said, "Dad, why did we feel, after praying about it, that the right road was the proper one to take, the correct one to take, and it wasn't?" And I said, "I think that the Lord, His wish for us there, and his answer to our prayer was to get us on the right road as quickly as possible with some reassurance, with some understanding, that we were on the right road and we didn't have to worry about it, and in this case, the easiest way to do that was to let us go 400 yards or 500 yards on the wrong road, and very quickly know, without a doubt, that it was the wrong road, and therefore with equal certainty with equal conviction that the other one was the right road." I have absolute certain knowledge, perfect knowledge, that God loves us. He is good, He is our Father, and He expects us to pray, and trust, and be believing, and not give up, and not panic, and not retreat, and not jump ship, when something doesn't seem to be going just right. We stay in, we keep working, we keep believing, keep trusting, following that same path and we will live to fall in His arms and feel His embrace and hear Him say, "I told you that it'd be okay, I told you it would be all right."

Edited December 30, 2014 by canard78

[bluebell]

Elder Holland gave a talk (which is now a Mormon Message video) about being lost with his son during a drive in the Utah desert. They prayed about which road to take at a fork in the road and both felt impressed to take a particular one. This road soon ended in a dead end. They were reassured to know that they could do a U-turn and the other road would be the correct one.

Elder Holland seemed to be using this as an object lesson to suggest that sometimes God sends us down the wrong path to help us see the reasons why it's a dead-end and that the alternative is the right choice.

What are the imitations of this story? How far can we extend the parable? Is it possible that God would guide someone into apostasy to experience the pain of it to then help then feel more certain that full activity is the better choice?

It seems a stretch of logic to me but Elder Holland seemed comfortable with the concept.

https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=yNQC-_srxH8

https://www.lds.org/pages/mormon-messages?lang=eng#wrong-roads

The transcript:

In elder Holland's example, the Lord's direction did not result in sin and involved a very short detour which had no negative consequences for him and his son.

It was not a story about the Spirit sending anyone down a bad road, just the wrong road, for about three minutes, before the correct choice was revealed.

I don't believe that elder Holland would at all be comfortable with the concept that The Lord directs some people to sin or apostasized, since his example teaches nothing of the sort.

[JLHPROF]

In elder Holland's example, the Lord's direction did not result in sin and involved a very short detour which had no negative consequences for him and his son.

It was not a story about the Spirit sending anyone down a bad road, just the wrong road, for about three minutes, before the correct choice was revealed.

I don't believe that elder Holland would at all be comfortable with the concept that The Lord directs some people to sin or apostasized, since his example teaches nothing of the sort.

 

You beat me to it.  Apostasy is sin, not a detour.  God would never cause man to sin (transgress maybe, but not sin).

[JDave]

Cause us to sin, no. But since sin is completely inherent to our existence I could see God making some good use of it. Could God inspire us to go down paths that will possibly result in different sins than if we had taken another path?

That said, we should never rationalize away our agency and we should always seek to draw closer to God and become better (ideally through the Atonement of Jesus Christ).

[Anteojito]

Such as when I practice meditative prayer, there is a clarity, peace, joy, and light which fills my being, I am filled with awareness and given bits and pieces of inexplicable knowledge and direction.  When I invite the spirit to be with me in prayer, after preparing for prayer through deep breathing and visualization, almost without fail I feel a presence which envelopes me which I cannot adequately describe in words.  It opens my mind and being to a state of clarity and peace which I have found to be unmatched in my life.    This practice positively effects my whole life.  When I live contrary to the principles of the gospel, I don't receive such fruits.  In fact, I feel the opposite, I feel cluttered, confused, dark and down.

 

These fruits are not limited to the saints, Christians, or even theists.  Atheists experience the same fruits when they live in-line with the light they have been given, whether it be charity, humility, forgiveness, etc.  When you live contrary to these principles, you notice a difference, and it ain't good in my experience. 

That's the thing about spiritual experiences. They mean so much to the person that has the experience, but very little to anyone else, especially if that person's experience goes counter to what our beliefs are. For example, if someone were to state that they were praying sincerely to know if the LDS church were true and while doing that, they received a very strong confirmation that not only was the LDS Church not true, it was an abomination in the eyes of the Lord, I would think that most active LDS members would take that all with a grain of salt. But it that same person had said that the spirit told them that the church was true, most LDS members would agree that it was indeed a confirmation from God.

[Analytics]

For me, losing faith in the LDS Church was a humbling experience.  I went from feeling like I was special--chosen by God to be one of the few people on earth who espoused the "fullness" of the gospel, to being just another guy who believed in the false church in which he was raised, no more special than anybody else.  My attitude was, "I don't know what 2 + 2 is equal to; all I've done is eliminated the answer 5 as a plausible candidate."

 

I then took a step back and began a wide, earnest enquiry into what I should believe.  I still felt spiritual feelings.  I still felt moved by various books, stories, and songs.  I still felt there must be some purpose; some meaning; some first cause.  Why was there something rather than nothing?  What caused me to be self-aware?

 

As I read and searched, I found various individuals I felt a connection to, including Emerson, George Fox (my moniker, btw), Samuel Butler, Charles ****ens, and John Woolman, to name a few.  Ultimately, Emerson's Self-Reliance became my guide for living, and I decided that for better or worse, I simply had to follow the dictates of my own conscience, to wherever they may lead.

 

Eventually I had an epiphany that dualism is quite unlikely.  In other words, there really isn't a "spirit me" that has thoughts and feelings and is apart from my physical body, so that after I die, there is this invisible spirit that floats away and continues to see, hear, think, and feel. 

 

Eventually, I came to the conclusion that while Jesus taught many profound things that I deeply believe in, he didn't really rise from the dead, and that rising from the dead isn't in any of our futures.

 

And eventually, I couldn't define a third-party "God" that was at all-well defined and that I also believed in.  I believe there is divine in all of us, so in that sense the first two great commandments are really the same commandment--loving God and serving God are literally the exact same thing as loving other people and serving other people. 

 

So anyway, I disagree with the basic argument at that kiwi blog: in general, when people make a deliberate decision to walk away from a false church because a clear-headed analysis indicates it is false, they are going to be inclined to apply that same clear-headed skepticism to other religious claims, whether those claims are a generalization of Mormonism's truth claims or whether they are competing truth claims.  In general, such people find that competing theistic religions hold up no better to scrutiny than Mormonism, and rearranging within Mormonism the Mormon-specific truth claims and the more general Christian truth claims isn't going to change that.

[pogi]

That's the thing about spiritual experiences. They mean so much to the person that has the experience, but very little to anyone else, especially if that person's experience goes counter to what our beliefs are. For example, if someone were to state that they were praying sincerely to know if the LDS church were true and while doing that, they received a very strong confirmation that not only was the LDS Church not true, it was an abomination in the eyes of the Lord, I would think that most active LDS members would take that all with a grain of salt. But it that same person had said that the spirit told them that the church was true, most LDS members would agree that it was indeed a confirmation from God.

 

The point is that spiritual experiences happen and cannot always be discarded as wishful thinking or confirmation bias.  As pointed out previously, all light given from God must unavoidably pass through the lens of culture, beliefs, etc., and result in an interpretation of truth from an individual perspective.  This is to be expected.  When we follow what we think that light is telling us, we will be given more light, and our perception expands and our previous understanding evolves.  Follow the light you are given no matter where it takes you.  That is called spiritual integrity.  Do so honestly and humbly and you will be a happier person in this life and the next. 

Edited December 30, 2014 by pogi

[pogi]

I decided that for better or worse, I simply had to follow the dictates of my own conscience, to wherever they may lead.

 

That is all that is expected of you.  Do so with humility, honesty, and integrity, always seeking after and listening to the divinity within you, keeping an open mind and not questioning your spiritual impressions, understanding that knowledge and perspective is evolutionary, and only good can come of it. 

[Anteojito]

The point is that spiritual experiences happen and cannot always be discarded as wishful thinking or confirmation bias.  As pointed out previously, all light given from God must unavoidably pass through the lens of culture, beliefs, etc., and result in an interpretation of truth from an individual perspective.  This is to be expected.  When we follow what we think that light is telling us, we will be given more light, and our perception expands and our previous understanding evolves.  Follow the light you are given no matter where it takes you.  That is called spiritual integrity.  Do so honestly and humbly and you will be a happier person in this life and the next. 

Like I said, all of that sounds great to you and those who believe like you. I don't believe like you so it means nothing to me. At this point in my life praying to the Abrahamic God is as about as useful as praying to Thor, or Apollo, or Isis, etc etc.  Millions of people who lived before believed in those and other gods and I'm sure that many of them really thought that they had spiritual experiences.  I imagine the Aztec priests that performed human sacrifices would have also claimed they had spiritual experiences. So that was just God passing through their cultural lens?

[pogi]

Like I said, all of that sounds great to you and those who believe like you. I don't believe like you so it means nothing to me. At this point in my life praying to the Abrahamic God is as about as useful as praying to Thor, or Apollo, or Isis, etc etc.  Millions of people who lived before believed in those and other gods and I'm sure that many of them really thought that they had spiritual experiences.  I imagine the Aztec priests that performed human sacrifices would have also claimed they had spiritual experiences. So that was just God passing through their cultural lens?

 

I am not asking you to believe like me.  I am saying, commune with and follow the light and divinity within you (however you define it).

[Scott Lloyd]

Nephi taught that we were born into mortality to act, not be acted upon. The notion that God directs some people into apostasy and attendant violation of sacred covenants to me reeks of rationalization for making wrong choices.

[canard78]

Nephi taught that we were born into mortality to act, not be acted upon. The notion that God directs some people into apostasy and attendant violation of sacred covenants to me reeks of rationalization for making wrong choices.

I completely understand your perspective Scott. I can see why a complete and total belief in LDS teachings would make any other step seem like a step away from God... And why would He push His children further from Him.

The experience that fundamentally challenged my perspectives, which, at the time, I shared with you, was when my wife left the church 4 years ago. I assumed certain damaging things would come next. They didn't. In fact, it has been a wonderful step for her. She has become a better, more rounded, more fulfilled person since leaving. She is more motivated and more "Christlike" in her non-Mormonism.

This is one small contribution in my shift towards a far broader perspective of Mormonism being a subset of the church of the Lamb. In my view (one also reached through study of LDS and non-LDS sources, coupled with prayer and pondering) God is a perfect educator and parent. I believe in a God of a personalised curriculum. I believe Mormonism can, at times, be part of that curriculum but only as a toolkit for some of His children.

I don't expect you to agree, I'm just explaining how I square it.

[Bikeemikey]

No one's salvation depends on anyone but Christ. But if you don't believe His Apostles you won't believe Him.

How does that make sense exactly?

[Bobbieaware]

How does that make sense exactly?

Do you believe that during the Apostolic Era a professed Christian could have rejected Peter, James, John and Paul as Apostles, and the Lord's living prophetic representatives on earth, and still be considered a true follower of the true and living Christ?

Edited January 2, 2015 by Bobbieaware

[Stone holm]

Do you believe that during the Apostolic Era a professed Christian could have rejected Peter, James, John and Paul as Apostles, and the Lord's living prophetic representatives on earth, and still be considered a true follower of the true and living Christ?

Thought Peter wasn't all that sold on what Paul was saying.

[Scott Lloyd]

I completely understand your perspective Scott. I can see why a complete and total belief in LDS teachings would make any other step seem like a step away from God... And why would He push His children further from Him.

The experience that fundamentally challenged my perspectives, which, at the time, I shared with you, was when my wife left the church 4 years ago. I assumed certain damaging things would come next. They didn't. In fact, it has been a wonderful step for her. She has become a better, more rounded, more fulfilled person since leaving. She is more motivated and more "Christlike" in her non-Mormonism.

This is one small contribution in my shift towards a far broader perspective of Mormonism being a subset of the church of the Lamb. In my view (one also reached through study of LDS and non-LDS sources, coupled with prayer and pondering) God is a perfect educator and parent. I believe in a God of a personalised curriculum. I believe Mormonism can, at times, be part of that curriculum but only as a toolkit for some of His children.

I don't expect you to agree, I'm just explaining how I square it.

I think it possible that there something of the post hoc fallacy at play here. But I hasten to acknowledge that, not being personally acquainted with the events and circumstances in question, I am unable to speak with certainty about it. Thus it is with any and all anecdotal information.