This story has been in the news recently, about man in Las Vegas that has made calendars with returned missionaries in somewhat provocative poses with their shirts off.  You can decide the level of appropriateness or not here.

According to the Associated Press and on the KSL website, the calendar creator, Chad Hardy, has now been excommunicated.  Mr. Hardy also thought it was the correct decision.  According to the article, Mr. Hardy was facing three issues at the disciplinary council.  He made the calendar, and had not been keeping his covenants.  The exact nature of the covenants not kept has not been reported and The Church will not say anything about any of the reasons.  Mr. Hardy would have to reveal them.

According to the article, Mr. Hardy has been inactive for the last six years and has not paid tithing for a long time either.

Hardy said he considered resigning his membership to avoid the hearing, but decided against it out of respect for his family. Hardy is a sixth-generation Mormon. His parents live in Utah.

“I really feel sorry for my family,” said Hardy. “They are going to be so sad. But I feel empowered and free and I feel like I no longer have to apologize for anything.”

This is not really freedom or empowerment.  If anything, being excommunicated helps people to be under less condemnation because they have less covenants they are violating (assuming the behavior at issue has not stopped).

It is the type of Freedom that Satan wants us to have which is really an illusion.  We think we are free because we can disobey the commandment when it is the commandments and obedience to them that truly make us free.

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Faith is an interesting thing. It is how we believe in things that we can’t see yet, but we know must be on their way. Testing this belief or faith is also important.

Alma 32:41-43 says:

But if ye will nourish the word, yea, nourish the tree as it beginneth to grow, by your faith with great diligence, and with patience, looking forward to the fruit thereof, it shall take root; and behold it shall be a tree springing up unto everlasting life.

And because of your diligence and your faith and your patience with the word in nourishing it, that it may take root in you, behold, by and by ye shall pluck the fruit thereof, which is most precious, which is sweet above all that is sweet, and which is white above all that is white, yea, and pure above all that is pure; and ye shall feast upon this fruit even until ye are filled, that ye hunger not, neither shall ye thirst.

Then, my brethren, ye shall reap the rewards of your faith, and your diligence, and patience, and long-suffering, waiting for the tree to bring forth fruit unto you.

The part I have emphasized is the diligence, patience, long-suffering and waiting for the blessings. That can be very hard to do, to wait. It is not as if by exercising even more faith, you can force the blessings to come faster. You have to continue to believe, act on that belief, and wait for the promised blessings, with faith.

What this means is that in your mind and heart you have to believe that the blessings are coming and that is what will hopefully inspire you to act. You can be faithful and act correctly or be unfaithful and act correctly. Laman and Lemuel did not believe they would be successful at getting the brass plates, but they went and did it anyway, even if their part was to wait outside the walls until Nephi got back. They complained and acted in accordance with the commandment reluctantly. Sort of like when Nephi had to build the boat and Laman and Lemuel eventually went along. To act with faith is to go forward happily and to do what the Lord wants you to do. It is tough to do.

From Ether 12:6 ” I would show unto the world that faith is things which are hoped for and not seen; wherefore, dispute not because ye see not, for ye receive no witness until after the trial of your faith“. Acting even when you do not see the end result is part of the trial of faith.

The Lord determines what the trial is and how long it will take. It will often take longer than you think it will because that is part of the test. The secret is to keep going forward, believing that it will work out in the end, work out well and probably better than you expected.

I have been going forward with faith in a direction that has not yet borne the fruit that I know will come. It is very difficult for me but I have persevered. I know that the blessings will come and they will come on time. I have read that the Lord doesn’t always come when we think He should, but He is never late.

I know that the Lord will come when the time is right, and that I will be blessed for my faithfulness.  From Doctrine and Covenants 130:20-21 “There is a law, irrevocably decreed in heaven before the foundations of this world, upon which all blessings are predicated— And when we obtain any blessing from God, it is by  obedience to that law upon which it is predicated”.  Faithfulness brings blessings, as well as paying a full tithe, generous fast offerings, and listening to the still small voice.

I’ll follow up this post later.

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The First Presidency Message for the Month of June 2008 is very interesting.

In General Conference, we were told numerous times to listen to the prophets, specifically the new President of the Church, Thomas S. Monson.  This is good and sound advice.

The First Presidency Message this month is called “Safety in Counsel”.  It also drives home the importance of following the counsel of living prophets, especially when the counsel is repeated by several prophets.

We do live in troubled and difficult times, but there is a way to avoid much of the trouble of this world and this is acknowledged in the first part of the message.

There seems to be no end to the Savior’s desire to lead us to safety, and there is constancy in the way He shows us the path. He calls by more than one means so that it will reach those willing to accept it. Those means always include sending the message by the mouths of His prophets whenever people have qualified to have the prophets of God among them. Those authorized servants are always charged with warning the people, telling them the way to safety.

President Eyring then tells of the story of Haun’s Mill Massacre and specifically how the Prophet Joseph Smith warned the people to leave the area and move to Far West, Missouri,

“. . . but Mr. Haun did not deliver the message”.  Later, the Prophet Joseph recorded in his history: “Up to this day God had given me wisdom to save the people who took counsel. None had ever been killed who abode by my counsel.”  Then the Prophet recorded the sad truth that innocent lives could have been saved at Haun’s Mill had his counsel been received and followed.

It is important that we follow the counsel of the Prophets and obey them.  It will lead us to safety and security.  President Eyring then repeats some of the counsel given to us today by President Kimball, President Bensen, and President Hinckley.  This counsel is to provide us safety from “sin and sorrow”.  Of course, we won’t be protected from every little thing and sorrow is part of life, but following the counsel of Prophets will protect us from more of the sin and sorrow than we would have otherwise encountered.

So what is this important counsel?  It is about “the importance of a mother in the home“.  Too often people are taught that a woman cannot be complete if they are just a stay at home mom, or that it is demeaning or somehow oppressive for women to be at home with their children.  Nothing could be further from the truth.  It is a difficult job that only a mother can handle, really.  It is true that having a mother in the home will do great things for families and will protect them from sin and sorrow.

How can you tell how strong your faith is?  President Eyring gives us a practical test to follow if we are true to ourselves and can handle the self-evaluation.  It is based on how we respond to the counsel given us via prophets which really comes from God.

Looking for the path to safety in the counsel of prophets makes sense to those with strong faith. When a prophet speaks, those with little faith may think that they hear only a wise man giving good advice. Then if his counsel seems comfortable and reasonable, squaring with what they want to do, they take it. If it does not, they either consider it faulty advice or they see their circumstances as justifying their being an exception to the counsel. Those without faith may think that they hear only men seeking to exert influence for some selfish motive. They may mock and deride, as did a man named Korihor . . .

Emphasis added.  How we respond to the instructions and counsel from prophets is a great way to measure our faith.  I have never really thought to quantify it in that way, but it definitely makes sense.  If we believe in Jesus Christ and that he has prophets on the earth then we will obey those prophets because they speak the words of Christ.  Makes perfect sense, really.

So what about people seek to not listen to prophets and decide that they want to try to go their own way without undue influence from a higher power?  They are sadly mistaken about what influences them.  Nephi was taught by an angel that there are two churches only in 1Nephi 14:10

Behold there are save two churches only; the one is the church of the Lamb of God, and the other is the church of the devil; wherefore, whoso belongeth not to the church of the Lamb of God belongeth to that great church, which is the mother of abominations; and she is the whore of all the earth.

Emphasis added.  President Eyring also teaches this but with a slightly different emphasis and he teaches this point masterfully.

Korihor was arguing, as men and women have falsely argued from the beginning of time, that to take counsel from the servants of God is to surrender God-given rights of independence. But the argument is false because it misrepresents reality. When we reject the counsel that comes from God, we do not choose to be independent of outside influence. We choose another influence. We reject the protection of a perfectly loving, all-powerful, all-knowing Father in Heaven, whose whole purpose, as that of His Beloved Son, is to give us eternal life, to give us all that He has, and to bring us home again in families to the arms of His love. In rejecting His counsel, we choose the influence of another power, whose purpose is to make us miserable and whose motive is hatred. We have moral agency as a gift of God. Rather than the right to choose to be free of influence, it is the inalienable right to submit ourselves to whichever of those powers we choose.

We will never be independent in this life, we will simply choose to submit to God or the Devil.  This does not even allow for any middle ground.  We need to choose which side were are on.  It really does matter.

Further, it is easier to follow the counsel of prophets when the counsel is first given rather than waiting.  President Eyring wrote: “The best time to have decided to help Noah build the ark was the first time he asked. Each time he asked after that, each failure to respond would have lessened sensitivity to the Spirit. And so each time his request would have seemed more foolish, until the rain came. And then it was too late.“  Emphasis added.  If we don’t obey, the counsel seems silly or foolish and then when we see that the counsel really was inspired because of other outside evidence it will be too late.

The other prophetic counsel besides the importance of mothers in the home is to reach out to new members and to help them along.  We need to be doing more, even if the counsel does not seem to apply to us.  Pres. Eyring wrote:

Sometimes we will receive counsel that we cannot understand or that seems not to apply to us, even after careful prayer and thought. Don’t discard the counsel, but hold it close. If someone you trusted handed you what appeared to be nothing more than sand with the promise that it contained gold, you might wisely hold it in your hand awhile, shaking it gently. Every time I have done that with counsel from a prophet, after a time the gold flakes have begun to appear, and I have been grateful.

We need to consider and ponder prophetic counsel even when it does not seem to apply to us.  We need to do our best to obey and Pres. Eyring’s message is definitely one of warning.  He relates stories and teaches that we need to obey before it is too late.

I agree wholeheartedly and need to do better.

Comments Welcome

I just can’t leave The First Presidency Message from August 2005 alone, I guess.

President Hinckley wrote this about the Book of Mormon: “it is as current as the morning newspaper and much more definitive, inspired, and inspiring concerning the solutions of those problems”.

So then I saw this story in the morning paper today, “Drug lords to Mexican officers: Join us or die“.  The Drug cartels have been threatening the lives of many honorable policemen in Mexico and it is becoming more difficult to establish order in Mexico.  What is different is that the drug lords are actually assassinating many police captains and officials and causing several more to quit the force.

It does not help that the police and military are now resorting to very heavy handed tactics in effort to stomp out crime in some parts of Mexico.  It is hard for the civilians to have any confidence in the government when many of the officials are already considered corrupt and part of the problem.

The drug cartels are also recruiting Mexican military officials and soldiers to help them in their efforts to take over the control and order of many areas.

Here is another story about the drug cartels essentially going to war against the police.

This is similar to a story in the Book of Mormon, where the leader of the Gadianton Robbers told the free people to surrender or he would destroy them.

From Third Nephi, Chapter 3, verses 1-9:

1 And now it came to pass that in the sixteenth year from the coming of Christ, Lachoneus, the governor of the land, received an epistle from the leader and the governor of this band of robbers; and these were the words which were written, saying:
2 Lachoneus, most noble and chief governor of the land, behold, I write this epistle unto you, and do give unto you exceedingly great praise because of your firmness, and also the firmness of your people, in maintaining that which ye suppose to be your right and liberty; yea, ye do stand well, as if ye were supported by the hand of a god, in the defence of your liberty, and your property, and your country, or that which ye do call so.
3 And it seemeth a pity unto me, most noble Lachoneus, that ye should be so foolish and vain as to suppose that ye can stand against so many brave men who are at my command, who do now at this time stand in their arms, and do await with great anxiety for the word—Go down upon the Nephites and destroy them.
4 And I, knowing of their unconquerable spirit, having proved them in the field of battle, and knowing of their everlasting hatred towards you because of the many wrongs which ye have done unto them, therefore if they should come down against you they would visit you with utter destruction.
5 Therefore I have written this epistle, sealing it with mine own hand, feeling for your welfare, because of your firmness in that which ye believe to be right, and your noble spirit in the field of battle.
6 Therefore I write unto you, desiring that ye would yield up unto this my people, your cities, your lands, and your possessions, rather than that they should visit you with the sword and that destruction should come upon you.
7 Or in other words, yield yourselves up unto us, and unite with us and become acquainted with our secret works, and become our brethren that ye may be like unto us—not our slaves, but our brethren and partners of all our substance.
8 And behold, I swear unto you, if ye will do this, with an oath, ye shall not be destroyed; but if ye will not do this, I swear unto you with an oath, that on the morrow month I will command that my armies shall come down against you, and they shall not stay their hand and shall spare not, but shall slay you, and shall let fall the sword upon you even until ye shall become extinct.
9 And behold, I am Giddianhi; and I am the governor of this the secret society of Gadianton; which society and the works thereof I know to be good; and they are of ancient date and they have been handed down unto us.

This is similar to how the drug cartels in Mexico are threatening the police and national police officers of Mexico.  The military and police forces in Mexico are responding with more and more draconian measures to crack down on the people.  It really is sad.  How did Lachoneus respond to Giddianhi?

12 Now behold, this Lachoneus, the governor, was a just man, and could not be frightened by the demands and the threatenings of a robber; therefore he did not hearken to the epistle of Giddianhi, the governor of the robbers, but he did cause that his people should cry unto the Lord for strength against the time that the robbers should come down against them.
13 Yea, he sent a proclamation among all the people, that they should gather together their women, and their children, their flocks and their herds, and all their substance, save it were their land, unto one place.
14 And he caused that fortifications should be built round about them, and the strength thereof should be exceedingly great. And he caused that armies, both of the Nephites and of the Lamanites, or of all them who were numbered among the Nephites, should be placed as guards round about to watch them, and to guard them from the robbers day and night.
15 Yea, he said unto them: As the Lord liveth, except ye repent of all your iniquities, and cry unto the Lord, ye will in nowise be delivered out of the hands of those Gadianton robbers.
16 And so great and marvelous were the words and prophecies of Lachoneus that they did cause fear to come upon all the people; and they did exert themselves in their might to do according to the words of Lachoneus.

Instead of merely relying on their own strength, they repented, turned to God, and got ready for battle.  They eventually hid in a fortress and had enough provisions to starve the Gadianton robbers out and the innocent people made it through.

We really need to turn to God in these times.  Pres. Hinckley was right about the Book of Mormon being as current as today’s paper.

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I am not so sure myself.

You Are Fairly Skeptical

You’re not the type of person who will fall for anything… But you do keep your mind open to all sorts of possibilities. You figure that anything could be true. After all, the world is a strange place. However, you’re going to need some convincing before you can believe in aliens or reincarnation!

This quiz does not agree though.

There’s Not a Violent Bone in Your Body

You’re cool and collected, even when someone really gets under your skin. And while you don’t blow up when you’re angry, you know how to express your anger calmly. You don’t bottle emotions up or let them get out of control. For you, violence would never be an option.