The foolish life of living with the Spirit

[stemelbow]

I like to use the term foolproof when speaking of the workings of the Spirit, as in it's not foolproof (sorry if it's annoying to some, as I've used it here many times.  But I don't know a better way to put it).  We're all fools when it comes to God and the Spirit, I figure, so we're all going to make mistakes when dealing with the Spirit and it's influence.  I used to attribute the Spirit's influence in my life with telling me what's true, most often.  I'm not sure that's our best bet anymore, even if in some cases it can surely be a great tool in getting us to true stuff. But as the years have gone on and as I've been able to work with that influence that I call the Spirit, I've learned that He helps me identify what's good and what works for me, more so than what's true.  So I've kind of morphed from saying things like "the Church is true" (a phrase that feels meaningless to me now) to saying the Church has many good and helpful aspects.  The Spirit's influence and direction is individual and subjective.  One can be influenced by the Spirit and be Muslim or Buddhist, just as well, and perhaps in many cases better than one can be LDS and have the Spirit's influence.  That may sound anathema to some, or some might say, "well sure other's can feel the Spirit but given that LDS are given the gift of the Holy Ghost we get precedence as it is an extra blessing to us.  So we know more truth and have better access to God".  I doubt that's true.  The Spirit's great influence, I'd suggest, is to guide us into loving others and God.  This is difficult though.  We all love other people.  We may feel we're better at it than others, but I don't know how we gauge such things.  It's unfair of us to try.  We simply can't see enough. 

Recall with me, Elder Holland's story about following the spirit.  He and his son were driving down some dirt road, heading home.  On their way they came upon a fork in the road that they didn't expect which didn't look familiar.  They each prayed and felt like they should go down the one way which turned out to be wrong.  Elder Holland says that God wanted them to know they were going to be going down the right road when they did get going on the right road.  Something about the fastest way to know they were going the right way.  Cute story, it's been shared all over the place, as you can see a video was made about it with touching music setting a mood.  But what does it tell us?

God can direct any one of us in any direction so we can head down the wrong road for a while until we learn it to be wrong.  So we can be headed down the road that is the Church's path and learn at some point it is the wrong way.  We could have gotten married having felt so influenced by the Spirit in our decision to do so, only to see years later it was the wrong road and our kids might have to deal with the effects of our bad choice. 

Where I'm getting to is this.  If we pray and head down the road, learn its bad and try to correct it, then the Spirit has directed us so we can learn that it's was bad.  If we don't pray and head down a road learning it is good, what does that say about praying, The Spirit and us? 

We will never know if the Spirit's influence is getting us where we need to go, unless at some point he leads us in the wrong direction so we can learn for ourselves that it was wrong?  Does that idea work? 

Interested in thoughts on this very important topic. 

[bluebell]

I think one of the key aspects to that story is that they learned very very quickly that they were on the wrong road.  That changes some of the things you said that story tells us.

[Rain]

The story has never connected with me and I've analyzed it trying to get it to connect.  It is obvious that it has connected with others, especially when they have used it to try to help me. 

I just have to go with the idea that it connects for other people in ways that I am missing, like the one bluebell suggested.

I don't necessarily think there is something wrong if we don't pray and find out from the Spirit that a road is good or that we find out it is bad quickly. The problem comes when the road is bad and we don't find out for a long time, especially if praying could have helped us avoid that. 

[stemelbow]

58 minutes ago, bluebell said:

I think one of the key aspects to that story is that they learned very very quickly that they were on the wrong road.  That changes some of the things you said that story tells us.

like what?

[stemelbow]

31 minutes ago, Rain said:

The story has never connected with me and I've analyzed it trying to get it to connect.  It is obvious that it has connected with others, especially when they have used it to try to help me. 

I just have to go with the idea that it connects for other people in ways that I am missing, like the one bluebell suggested.

I don't necessarily think there is something wrong if we don't pray and find out from the Spirit that a road is good or that we find out it is bad quickly. The problem comes when the road is bad and we don't find out for a long time, especially if praying could have helped us avoid that. 

Yeah, to me the story doesn't really work.  But I also acknowledge that we're all, by relying on the means of spirit communication, going to go down the wrong road many times in life.  Afterwards we can say God had us do it so we can learn, I guess.  or we can acknowledge we're fools in some sense and misunderstand or prejudice our decisions and the Spirit's influence with our ignorance (like the priesthood ban and all it's explanation). 

[waveslider]

1 hour ago, stemelbow said:

I like to use the term foolproof when speaking of the workings of the Spirit, as in it's not foolproof (sorry if it's annoying to some, as I've used it here many times.  But I don't know a better way to put it).  We're all fools when it comes to God and the Spirit, I figure, so we're all going to make mistakes when dealing with the Spirit and it's influence.  I used to attribute the Spirit's influence in my life with telling me what's true, most often.  I'm not sure that's our best bet anymore, even if in some cases it can surely be a great tool in getting us to true stuff. But as the years have gone on and as I've been able to work with that influence that I call the Spirit, I've learned that He helps me identify what's good and what works for me, more so than what's true.  So I've kind of morphed from saying things like "the Church is true" (a phrase that feels meaningless to me now) to saying the Church has many good and helpful aspects.  The Spirit's influence and direction is individual and subjective.  One can be influenced by the Spirit and be Muslim or Buddhist, just as well, and perhaps in many cases better than one can be LDS and have the Spirit's influence.  That may sound anathema to some, or some might say, "well sure other's can feel the Spirit but given that LDS are given the gift of the Holy Ghost we get precedence as it is an extra blessing to us.  So we know more truth and have better access to God".  I doubt that's true.  The Spirit's great influence, I'd suggest, is to guide us into loving others and God.  This is difficult though.  We all love other people.  We may feel we're better at it than others, but I don't know how we gauge such things.  It's unfair of us to try.  We simply can't see enough. 

Recall with me, Elder Holland's story about following the spirit.  He and his son were driving down some dirt road, heading home.  On their way they came upon a fork in the road that they didn't expect which didn't look familiar.  They each prayed and felt like they should go down the one way which turned out to be wrong.  Elder Holland says that God wanted them to know they were going to be going down the right road when they did get going on the right road.  Something about the fastest way to know they were going the right way.  Cute story, it's been shared all over the place, as you can see a video was made about it with touching music setting a mood.  But what does it tell us?

God can direct any one of us in any direction so we can head down the wrong road for a while until we learn it to be wrong.  So we can be headed down the road that is the Church's path and learn at some point it is the wrong way.  We could have gotten married having felt so influenced by the Spirit in our decision to do so, only to see years later it was the wrong road and our kids might have to deal with the effects of our bad choice. 

Where I'm getting to is this.  If we pray and head down the road, learn its bad and try to correct it, then the Spirit has directed us so we can learn that it's was bad.  If we don't pray and head down a road learning it is good, what does that say about praying, The Spirit and us? 

We will never know if the Spirit's influence is getting us where we need to go, unless at some point he leads us in the wrong direction so we can learn for ourselves that it was wrong?  Does that idea work? 

Interested in thoughts on this very important topic. 

First off I would be careful to not be deceived by an imposter spirit. We know that there are many who deceive others:

"13  For such are false apostles, deceitful workers, transforming themselves into the apostles of Christ.
14  And no marvel; for Satan himself is transformed into an angel of light."
2 Corinthians 11:13-14

It isn't just reserved for people living in mortality, but those spirits who chose to follow Lucifer rather than God before this world was even populated.

I choose to believe what Christ himself said about the Holy Spirit. He even names the Holy Spirit as, "The Spirit of Truth.":

"But when the Comforter is come, whom I will send unto you from the Father, even the Spirit of truth, which proceedeth from the Father, he shall testify of me:"
John 15:26

"Howbeit when he, the Spirit of truth, is come, he will guide you into all truth: for he shall not speak of himself; but whatsoever he shall hear, that shall he speak: and he will shew you things to come."
John 16:13

Note that the Spirit of Truth will guide us into all truth, not just what is true for some and not for others. He will also testify of Christ and his divine roll as the great mediator and savior, where there is no other way nor name given, nor other means where salvation can come from. Now that isn't to say that some will not be guided toward another religion, for a time, like Buddhism or something, but that would only be a stepping stone toward coming to Jesus, not the end of guiding to the only path that can actually lead to true salvation. I for one have been given the specific answer that indeed The Church Of Jesus Christ Of Latter-Day Saints is the only church that is being led by Christ himself and that it has all the authority and truth needed to gain true eternal salvation and that there truly is no other church or ism that has that. It's easy to be deceived, but the Holy Ghost is real and he will guide us into all truth. That wasn't a lie and any spirit that will tell you different isn't the Holy Spirit, but an imposter/deceiver.

Edited April 28, 2017 by waveslider
Wrong wording

[bsjkki]

40 minutes ago, Rain said:

The story has never connected with me and I've analyzed it trying to get it to connect.  It is obvious that it has connected with others, especially when they have used it to try to help me. 

I just have to go with the idea that it connects for other people in ways that I am missing, like the one bluebell suggested.

I don't necessarily think there is something wrong if we don't pray and find out from the Spirit that a road is good or that we find out it is bad quickly. The problem comes when the road is bad and we don't find out for a long time, especially if praying could have helped us avoid that. 

I tend to use that story to illustrate the importance of respecting people's agency. We all have our own path to follow and sometimes your loved ones may head down the wrong path but that is the only way they may learn which path is correct. A lot of people must learn through making mistakes. A friend of mine is devastated one of their children has left the church and is attending other churches. I reminded her how she gained her strong testimony of the gospel. She attended many churches and because of her experiences with other churches, she knew which church she should join. I have found often, the spirit only tells me things one step at a time. Sometimes the next step is disastrous but it ends up getting me to the proper place. Without the disastrous step, the better outcome would not have been possible. 

[stemelbow]

8 minutes ago, waveslider said:

First off I would be careful to not be deceived by an imposter spirit. We know that there are many who deceive others:

"13  For such are false apostles, deceitful workers, transforming themselves into the apostles of Christ.
14  And no marvel; for Satan himself is transformed into an angel of light."
2 Corinthians 11:13-14

It isn't just reserved for people living in mortality, but those spirits who chose to follow Lucifer rather than God before this world was even populated.

I choose to believe what Christ himself said about the Holy Spirit. He even names the Holy Spirit as, "The Spirit of Truth.":

"But when the Comforter is come, whom I will send unto you from the Father, even the Spirit of truth, which proceedeth from the Father, he shall testify of me:"
John 15:26

"Howbeit when he, the Spirit of truth, is come, he will guide you into all truth: for he shall not speak of himself; but whatsoever he shall hear, that shall he speak: and he will shew you things to come."
John 16:13

Note that the Spirit of Truth will guide us into all truth, not just what is true for some and not for others. He will also testify of Christ and his divine roll as the great mediator and savior, where there is no other way nor name given, nor other means where salvation can come from. Now that isn't to say that some will not be guided toward another religion, for a time, like Buddhism or something, but that would only be a stepping stone toward coming to Jesus, not the end of guiding to the only path that can actually lead to true salvation. I for one have been given the specific answer that indeed The Church Of Jesus Christ Of Latter-Day Saints is the only church that is being led by Christ himself and that it has all the authority and truth needed to gain true eternal salvation and that there truly is no other church or ism that has that. It's easy to be deceived, but the Holy Ghost is real and he will guide us into all truth. That wasn't a lie and any spirit that will tell you different isn't the Holy Spirit, but an imposter/deceiver.

I'm not sure we're seeing eye to eye here.  But thanks for your contribution.

[bluebell]

12 minutes ago, stemelbow said:

like what?

Like this example you provided-

We could have gotten married having felt so influenced by the Spirit in our decision to do so, only to see years later it was the wrong road and our kids might have to deal with the effects of our bad choice. 

The story doesn't tell us that 1) the spirit will allow you to go years on the wrong path and 2) you and others will suffer negative consequences because of being led to that wrong path.

In the story, they traveled on the wrong road for a very short period of time (around 500 yards), very quickly knew it was wrong, and suffered no negative effects because of it.

 

 

[CV75]

1 hour ago, stemelbow said:

I like to use the term foolproof when speaking of the workings of the Spirit, as in it's not foolproof (sorry if it's annoying to some, as I've used it here many times.  But I don't know a better way to put it).  We're all fools when it comes to God and the Spirit, I figure, so we're all going to make mistakes when dealing with the Spirit and it's influence.  I used to attribute the Spirit's influence in my life with telling me what's true, most often.  I'm not sure that's our best bet anymore, even if in some cases it can surely be a great tool in getting us to true stuff. But as the years have gone on and as I've been able to work with that influence that I call the Spirit, I've learned that He helps me identify what's good and what works for me, more so than what's true.  So I've kind of morphed from saying things like "the Church is true" (a phrase that feels meaningless to me now) to saying the Church has many good and helpful aspects.  The Spirit's influence and direction is individual and subjective.  One can be influenced by the Spirit and be Muslim or Buddhist, just as well, and perhaps in many cases better than one can be LDS and have the Spirit's influence.  That may sound anathema to some, or some might say, "well sure other's can feel the Spirit but given that LDS are given the gift of the Holy Ghost we get precedence as it is an extra blessing to us.  So we know more truth and have better access to God".  I doubt that's true.  The Spirit's great influence, I'd suggest, is to guide us into loving others and God.  This is difficult though.  We all love other people.  We may feel we're better at it than others, but I don't know how we gauge such things.  It's unfair of us to try.  We simply can't see enough. 

Recall with me, Elder Holland's story about following the spirit.  He and his son were driving down some dirt road, heading home.  On their way they came upon a fork in the road that they didn't expect which didn't look familiar.  They each prayed and felt like they should go down the one way which turned out to be wrong.  Elder Holland says that God wanted them to know they were going to be going down the right road when they did get going on the right road.  Something about the fastest way to know they were going the right way.  Cute story, it's been shared all over the place, as you can see a video was made about it with touching music setting a mood.  But what does it tell us?

God can direct any one of us in any direction so we can head down the wrong road for a while until we learn it to be wrong.  So we can be headed down the road that is the Church's path and learn at some point it is the wrong way.  We could have gotten married having felt so influenced by the Spirit in our decision to do so, only to see years later it was the wrong road and our kids might have to deal with the effects of our bad choice. 

Where I'm getting to is this.  If we pray and head down the road, learn its bad and try to correct it, then the Spirit has directed us so we can learn that it's was bad.  If we don't pray and head down a road learning it is good, what does that say about praying, The Spirit and us? 

We will never know if the Spirit's influence is getting us where we need to go, unless at some point he leads us in the wrong direction so we can learn for ourselves that it was wrong?  Does that idea work? 

Interested in thoughts on this very important topic. 

The influence and direction involved are individual and subjective, and work both ways as a dynamic between the Spirit and the communing spirit.

The Gift of the Holy Ghost is the right to His constant companionship if we remain eligible, and not the power of witness that anyone can get. The light of Christ leads us to either.

Regarding Elder Holland’s story, “His father replied that with the sun going down, that was undoubtedly the quickest way for the Lord to give them information—in this case, which one was the wrong road. Now, though the other road might not be familiar and could be difficult in places, they could proceed confidently, knowing it was the right one.” https://www.lds.org/prophets-and-apostles/what-are-prophets/bio/jeffrey-r-holland?lang=eng

One application of this story seems to be, with time running out for someone to commit to the path to the tree of life, the Lord will inspire him to wander off or fall away until he hits a dead end so he can return to the path. But that is not how the vision goes. The wanderers were not praying, trusting, or believing in what they had commenced traveling and in some cases partaken of; there is no dead end (but a gulf); and, there is no alternate route to the tree of life.

The account shows how the Lord provides expedient information in the most immediately assimilated manner for our temporal salvation. It is not about revealing or witnessing truth to address an immediate temporal problem. When navigating the difficulties of life, “…God expects us to pray, trust, and be believing and then not give up, panic, or "jump ship" when something doesn't seem to be going right.” In other words, we use our faith and other spiritual principles to address and govern life’s immediate needs. Facts and truth are two different things. The event was about interpreting the facts God reveals; the metaphorical application is about what to do about the truths He reveals (again, two different things).

Facts are only as we know them for the time being and they can change. Thus, we apply them to our temporal benefit. On the other hand, truth pertains to our past, present and future (eternal) well-being and we apply it for that purpose. Spiritual influence and direction involved in either facts or truths are inevitably individual and subjective, and work both ways, between the Spirit and our communing spirit.

[stemelbow]

Just now, bluebell said:

Like this example you provided-

We could have gotten married having felt so influenced by the Spirit in our decision to do so, only to see years later it was the wrong road and our kids might have to deal with the effects of our bad choice. 

The story doesn't tell us that 1) the spirit will allow you to go years on the wrong path and 2) you and others will suffer negative consequences because of being led to that wrong path.

In the story, they traveled on the wrong road for a very short period of time (around 500 yards), very quickly knew it was wrong, and suffered no negative effects because of it.

 

So you are saying a person could not be influenced by the Spirit to go down the wrong road for more than 3 minutes, for such a person to learn what God wants him/her to learn?  How short of a time do we allow here?  Is one year in a person's life, relatively short?  What about 30 years in a person's existence? 

How do you know a person couldn't be led by God to get into a marriage that turned out really bad, negatively affecting other people?  I ask that because I've known many people who have had their marriages end, only to tell me that they were certain the Spirit had directed them in getting into the marriage. 

[Rain]

5 minutes ago, bsjkki said:

I tend to use that story to illustrate the importance of respecting people's agency. We all have our own path to follow and sometimes your loved ones may head down the wrong path but that is the only way they may learn which path is correct. A lot of people must learn through making mistakes. A friend of mine is devastated one of their children has left the church and is attending other churches. I reminded her how she gained her strong testimony of the gospel. She attended many churches and because of her experiences with other churches, she knew which church she should join. I have found often, the spirit only tells me things one step at a time. Sometimes the next step is disastrous but it ends up getting me to the proper place. Without the disastrous step, the better outcome would not have been possible. 

I agree with this idea except for the "must" learn.  Rather I have to go with "sometimes" we learn. I don't think you are saying that some people always have to learn from mistakes. I just think that we always have to have the opportunity to learn before making mistakes or agency doesn't work. 

 

[CV75]

1 minute ago, stemelbow said:

So you are saying a person could not be influenced by the Spirit to go down the wrong road for more than 3 minutes, for such a person to learn what God wants him/her to learn?  How short of a time do we allow here?  Is one year in a person's life, relatively short?  What about 30 years in a person's existence? 

How do you know a person couldn't be led by God to get into a marriage that turned out really bad, negatively affecting other people?  I ask that because I've known many people who have had their marriages end, only to tell me that they were certain the Spirit had directed them in getting into the marriage. 

This is a good example of facts vs. truth. The Spirit told someone the person they wanted to marry is a good choice. It was (fact). Then after partaking of the covenant, one or both looked around and became distracted from the truth that would have anchored them against and endure the distractions, and that fact thus changed. Or it didn't, but the truth was rejected.

[stemelbow]

3 minutes ago, CV75 said:

The influence and direction involved are individual and subjective, and work both ways as a dynamic between the Spirit and the communing spirit.

 

The Gift of the Holy Ghost is the right to His constant companionship if we remain eligible, and not the power of witness that anyone can get. The light of Christ leads us to either.

 

Regarding Elder Holland’s story, “His father replied that with the sun going down, that was undoubtedly the quickest way for the Lord to give them information—in this case, which one was the wrong road. Now, though the other road might not be familiar and could be difficult in places, they could proceed confidently, knowing it was the right one.” https://www.lds.org/prophets-and-apostles/what-are-prophets/bio/jeffrey-r-holland?lang=eng

WEll, if God sent them on the right road and they travelled along they would have saved themselves the few minutes they took to go down the wrong road, and would have gotten home anyway.  This certainly wasn't a life or death situation, it seems.  The quickest way surely was to send them down the right road to begin with.  If they questioned it?  So?  They still would have gotten home at some point.  There was nothing dire to worry about. 

 

3 minutes ago, CV75 said:

One application of this story seems to be, with time running out for someone to commit to the path to the tree of life, the Lord will inspire him to wander off or fall away until he hits a dead end so he can return to the path. But that is not how the vision goes. The wanderers were not praying, trusting, or believing in what they had commenced traveling and in some cases partaken of; there is no dead end (but a gulf); and, there is no alternate route to the tree of life.

 

The account shows how the Lord provides expedient information in the most immediately assimilated manner for our temporal salvation.

huh?  I guess we have different ideas of what "expedient" and "temporal salvation" means. 

3 minutes ago, CV75 said:

It is not about revealing or witnessing truth to address an immediate temporal problem. When navigating the difficulties of life, “…God expects us to pray, trust, and be believing and then not give up, panic, or "jump ship" when something doesn't seem to be going right.” In other words, we use our faith and other spiritual principles to address and govern life’s immediate needs. Facts and truth are two different things. The event was about interpreting the facts God reveals; the metaphorical application is about what to do about the truths He reveals (again, two different things).

 

Facts are only as we know them for the time being and they can change. Thus, we apply them to our temporal benefit. On the other hand, truth pertains to our past, present and future (eternal) well-being and we apply it for that purpose. Spiritual influence and direction involved in either facts or truths are inevitably individual and subjective, and work both ways, between the Spirit and our communing spirit.

 

Sure.  I think there's stuff to agree with here.  This is interesting (quoting Holland, I presume) "God expects us to pray, trust, and be believing and then not give up, panic, or "jump ship" when something doesn't seem to be going right"  Is he trying to claim they would have jumped ship, panicked, or gave up if they were directed down the right road?  He's got some pretty screwy logic as it pertains to this story.

[stemelbow]

4 minutes ago, CV75 said:

This is a good example of facts vs. truth. The Spirit told someone the person they wanted to marry is a good choice. It was (fact). Then after partaking of the covenant, one or both looked around and became distracted from the truth that would have anchored them against and endure the distractions, and that fact thus changed. Or it didn't, but the truth was rejected.

The problem with this is, of course, we're all human and all of us get distracted in some way or another.  if the blame is not on getting directed in the first place but on us, then isn't it God who knows we'll get distracted that led us there so we can learn from our distraction and failure? 

[waveslider]

20 minutes ago, stemelbow said:

I'm not sure we're seeing eye to eye here.  But thanks for your contribution.

Yeah, I can agree to disagree as well, Thanks for the civility.

[bsjkki]

10 minutes ago, Rain said:

I agree with this idea except for the "must" learn.  Rather I have to go with "sometimes" we learn. I don't think you are saying that some people always have to learn from mistakes. I just think that we always have to have the opportunity to learn before making mistakes or agency doesn't work. 

 

I agree with you on this! I often have to edit absolutes out of my writing (in my head, what you wrote is what I meant but the word choice was poor.)

[bluebell]

2 minutes ago, stemelbow said:

So you are saying a person could not be influenced by the Spirit to go down the wrong road for more than 3 minutes, for such a person to learn what God wants him/her to learn?  How short of a time do we allow here?  Is one year in a person's life, relatively short?  What about 30 years in a person's existence? 

How do you know a person couldn't be led by God to get into a marriage that turned out really bad, negatively affecting other people?  I ask that because I've known many people who have had their marriages end, only to tell me that they were certain the Spirit had directed them in getting into the marriage. 

What I'm saying is that I don't think the story teaches everything that you've implied it teaches.  

You specifically said "Cute story, it's been shared all over the place, as you can see a video was made about it with touching music setting a mood.  But what does it tell us?"

I don't see where the story tells us that God will specifically direct us to wrong paths that lead to harm and heartache.  The questions you've asked are valid, but none of those answers can be found in the story.

[cinepro]

1 hour ago, bluebell said:

I think one of the key aspects to that story is that they learned very very quickly that they were on the wrong road.  That changes some of the things you said that story tells us.

If you look at the number of people who join the Church and then leave within the first year, it's quite possible to interpret that as God inspiring people to join the Church so they could quickly find out that it was the wrong Church and not have to worry about it again in the future.

But since Elder Holland didn't actually tell us how long God will lead us down the wrong path, there is no way to know how far we need to go before we can be sure we're on the right path.  So the principle of the story is still a little messed up.

But I guess if you have to choose between saying "Hey, it looks like we were wrong about what God was telling us" and "Hey, maybe sometimes God will lead us down the wrong road so we can be extra sure we'll head down the right road..", the latter sounds better if you don't think about it too much.

Edited April 28, 2017 by cinepro

[Duncan]

Just now, stemelbow said:

So you are saying a person could not be influenced by the Spirit to go down the wrong road for more than 3 minutes, for such a person to learn what God wants him/her to learn?  How short of a time do we allow here?  Is one year in a person's life, relatively short?  What about 30 years in a person's existence? 

How do you know a person couldn't be led by God to get into a marriage that turned out really bad, negatively affecting other people?  I ask that because I've known many people who have had their marriages end, only to tell me that they were certain the Spirit had directed them in getting into the marriage. 

That's been may experience. Long story very short, I felt SOOOOOOOOO much pressure to get married from leaders, people and I did it but wasn't in love at all and I people pleased all the way to a divorce. I often think what would my life had been like if I hadn't gotten married? and I can only speculate

[stemelbow]

7 minutes ago, bluebell said:

What I'm saying is that I don't think the story teaches everything that you've implied it teaches.  

You specifically said "Cute story, it's been shared all over the place, as you can see a video was made about it with touching music setting a mood.  But what does it tell us?"

I don't see where the story tells us that God will specifically direct us to wrong paths that lead to harm and heartache.  The questions you've asked are valid, but none of those answers can be found in the story.

Okily dokily.  So God will lead us down wrong paths, but only wrong paths that don't lead to harm or heartache.  Gotcha.

[stemelbow]

3 minutes ago, Duncan said:

That's been may experience. Long story very short, I felt SOOOOOOOOO much pressure to get married from leaders, people and I did it but wasn't in love at all and I people pleased all the way to a divorce. I often think what would my life had been like if I hadn't gotten married? and I can only speculate

I hope the whole experience wasn't so traumatic that you spend much time looking back and wondering what might have been.  There's far too much in front of you to do that.  We live and learn, and hopefully some of that learning helps. 

[bluebell]

10 minutes ago, cinepro said:

If you look at the number of people who join the Church and then leave within the first year, it's quite possible to interpret that as God inspiring people to join the Church so they could quickly find out that it was the wrong Church and not have to worry about it again in the future.

But since Elder Holland didn't actually tell us how long God will lead us down the wrong path, there is no way to know how far we need to go before we can be sure we're on the right path.  So the principle of the story is still a little messed up.

But I guess if you have to choose between saying "Hey, it looks like we were wrong about what God was telling us" and "Hey, maybe sometimes God will lead us down the wrong road so we can be extra sure we'll head down the right road..", the latter sounds better if you don't think about it too much.

I think that we, as humans, are generally uncomfortable with nuances.  We want things to either be always true or always false.  And we want our lessons to be exact and outlined for us as well.

Holland's story didn't need to point out all the specifics because telling us exactly how long and which way and what paths and percentage of times it will happen to you personally, etc. was not the purpose of the story.  The story teach "sometimes this can happen and this is why" and then we, with the spirit, are in charge of figuring everything else out and applying to each of our lives in the way the spirit directs.  For some of us it won't apply to our lives at all.

God can sometimes lead us down the wrong path to help keep us from making a bigger more costly mistake later on, and sometimes what we think is God's direction isn't actually God's direction.

You don't have to choose between those things; it's not either/or.

[Duncan]

Just now, stemelbow said:

I hope the whole experience wasn't so traumatic that you spend much time looking back and wondering what might have been.  There's far too much in front of you to do that.  We live and learn, and hopefully some of that learning helps. 

he he he he, yeah,  I wouldn't want to do that! hahahhhahha! I am moving forward, hopefully!!!

[bluebell]

14 minutes ago, stemelbow said:

Okily dokily.  So God will lead us down wrong paths, but only wrong paths that don't lead to harm or heartache.  Gotcha.

I'm pretty sure the story doesn't say that God will lead us down wrong paths.  Did i miss that in there somewhere?

Besides that though, if you disagree, you can share the parts of the story that you believe teach that God will lead us down the wrong path and cause harm and heartache so i can understand your point of view better.  

I'm not seeing them in there but if you are, I'd love for you to share them.