When a friend of mine decided to clear out all her Mormon stuff from her home she gave a lot of her accumulated papers to me. One of them was a photocopied page that contained a “Statement by President David O. McKay given in June, 1965 in President McKay’s Hotel Utah apartment to a group of brethren in the Physical Facilities Department of the Church.” According to this, Mr. McKay said,
“Let me assure you, Brethren, that some day you will have a personal Priesthood interview with the Savior, Himself. If you are interested, I will tell you the order in which He will ask you to account for your earthly responsibilities.
“First, He will request an accountability report about your relationship with your wife…
“Second, He will…request information about your relationship to each and every child.
“Third, he will want to know what you have personally done with the talents you were given in the pre-existence.
“Fourth, He will want a summary of your activity in your Church assignments…
“Fifth,…if you were honest in all your dealings.
“Sixth, He will ask for an accountability on what you have done to contribute in a positive manner to your community, state, country and the world.”
All of these are good questions about how one lives life, good things to think about. Yet as I read this, I thought about the biblical accounts we have of Jesus interacting with His people. I can’t seem to recall any “Priesthood interviews” that Jesus conducted while He was walking among us, but there are many examples of Jesus asking His followers personal and probing questions.
Interestingly, virtually every personal question that I found in the books of Matthew and John asked by Jesus (excluding questions found in parables or asked rhetorically of a crowd) loosely fall into 3 categories:
- Questions about personal faith
- Questions about understanding/accepting Jesus’ teachings
- Questions about loving and trusting Jesus Himself
These are some examples:
When the disciples were frightened by the storm that was tossing their boat to and fro Jesus asked, “Why are you afraid, O you of little faith?” (Matthew 8:26). Jesus asked a similar question of Peter as he tried to walk on water: “O you of little faith, why did you doubt?” (Matthew 14:31. See also John 1:49-50, 5:6-9, 16:29-33, 20:28-29).
When Jesus met with Nicodemus in private, Jesus explained that one must be born again to enter the kingdom of God. Addressing Nicodemus’ confusion, Jesus asked, “Are you the teacher of Israel and yet you do not understand these things?… If I have told you earthly things and you do not believe, how can you believe if I tell you heavenly things?” (John 3:10, 12). After Jesus washed the disciples’ feet He asked, “Do you understand what I have done to you?” (John 13:12. See also John 6:60-69, 14:8-9).
When two blind men begged Jesus to restore their sight, Jesus asked, “Do you believe that I am able to do this?” (Matthew 9:28). When Martha was grieving over he brother’s death, Jesus said to her, “I am the resurrection and the life. Whoever believes in me, though he die, yet shall he live, and everyone who lives and believes in me shall never die. Do you believe this?” (John 11:25-26. See also John 9:35-38, 14:10, 20:14-16).
Probably the most well known probing questions Jesus asked in the New Testament are these:
- “But who do you say that I am?” in Matthew 16:15; and
- “Do you love me?” in John 21:15, 16 and 17
Jesus’ personal questions to His followers dovetail perfectly with His teachings. When Jesus was asked to single out the greatest commandment He said, “You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind” (Matthew 22:37). On another occasion Jesus was asked, “What must we do to be doing the works of God?” He answered, “This is the work of God, that you believe in him whom he has sent” (John 6:28-29).
While God calls us to serve each other, and honorably serve Him in caring for the responsibilities He’s given us, Jesus’ main concern was–and is–how we respond to Him. Do we have faith in Him (“Why are you afraid”)? Do we seek to understand and accept His teachings (“Do you understand what I have done”)? Do we love and trust Him (“Do you love me”)? This is the personal interview with the Savior we all have ahead of us. May our answers be pleasing in His sight (Hebrews 13:20-21).
———————-
Comments within the parameters of 1 Peter 3:15 are invited.
———————-
This David O. McKay´s statement is famous, it´s been the theme of some Stake Conferences around here.
In those conferences i noticed an elevated emotional response to the message. The speakers would get tear-eyed as they spoke about their families and how much sacrifice they had done to fulfill their duty to God, and how much they still had to do to face Jesus in that interview. At the same time i heard the same old stuff repeated every time the church wants to urge their members to actually do some work, asking if they had been doing all they could to not be ashamed when that day came. After all was said and done, that emotional message faded away pretty fast and no one on leadership actually followed up on it. It was nothing more than a good motivational speech and had the same effectiveness as well.
The saddest part of it all is that those things are important, especially on these days that it´s so easy to neglect your wife/children, and that´s the reason of most of the terrible social problems we face today. Another sad part of it was that while they get all emotional about families, the family is the FIRST thing to be neglected when the Church calls on them to do their callings. Bunch of hipocrites. If you work on a Stake level you can only go with your family to church once a month! Imagine that – you can´t even go to church with your family! The Mormons who are truly engaged in a leadership position will hardly spend weekends home with their families, and, then, when their families have "worthiness" problems they ask themselves what happened…
I would think their prophet, seer and revelator that can´t stop talking about pornography would actually take action to allow the leadership to actually take the care of their families the way the church requires of them. Maybe they could actually have a paid clergy – that would help an awful lot. Of course, we know that won´t ever happen because that doesn´t go along with the goals of furthering God´s earthly kingdom, and "His" theocracy under an utopian world government.
"“Fifth,…if you were honest in all your dealings."
More hypocrisy. Maybe the "prophet" and the "apostles" could take the lead and give the example by making available all historic documents the church has and revealing it´s true history to let their membership actually have a way to honestly decide if they want to be part of it based on it´s real history and intentions and not by deception.
DOM's comments regarding an interview with Jesus are pretty typical of a works-righteousness paradigm, legalistic form of religion. It's all based on performance and "doing". Mormons, for some reason, are into "doing" as a way of proving that they are a faithful and true believers in the Mormon church. What this attitude and expectations model really is, is a form of slavery to the Mormon religion. It's a set-up to get the individual to perform like a trained monkey for the religious organization. It's well disguised as personal responsibility but it all comes down to "how ya doing".
The fact of the matter is, that while Mormonism talks a good game about duty to spouse and kids, the institution keeps people so busy performing monkey tricks, that the families often suffer. Just read the accounts of former Mormons and you can see how the Mormon religious system ran them right into the ground. Of course this is all under the guise of personal worthiness. A man isn't going to get to become a god because he refused a church calling because he needed to spend more time with his family. After all, he's going to have all of eternity to see to their needs in the Celestial Kingdom, right?
Last night I was meditating, as I frequently do, about the transformational life; from living in the flesh to living in the Spirit. As always I come to the same conclusions.
1. We humans take to sin naturally. In-other-words, it's our nature to sin because we have a sin nature.
2. God's performance standards are high. They are sinless perfection.
3. Through faith in Christ we are born again to a new reality and are indwelt by God's Holy Spirit.
4. The blood of Christ covers us and God no longer sees us as sinners, but as perfect. Our position changes.
5. We are still stuck in our natural bodies with our natural inclination to want to sin but fighting with the spiritual new reality of total perfection.
Here's my conclusion:
The only "formula" for closing the gap between our actual self and our reborn self (in performance) is to get closer to God. Legalistic formulas and performance standards imposed by a religious system may have some effect if enough pressure and guilt is placed on a person, but they rob the believer of the fruit of the Spirit. We become as much of a hopeless slave to the "law" as we do to our sinful nature.
God tells us in Jeremiah 31:31 that he will make a new covenant with his people, which he did. He would not write laws on tablets of stone, but He would write them on our hearts and though our sins are as scarlet, he will make them as white as wool. And our sins and our lawless deeds He will remember no more.
God wants changed hearts not just changes in behavior. Changes in behavior should come about with a change of heart. Our hearts change as we draw closer to God and are transformed by the love of Jesus and through the power of the Holy Spirit.
I came out of a religious legalistic system and I can testify that all it did was steal my joy and eventually turn me away from God.
Praise God that He drew me back and showed me a better way.
" What this attitude and expectations model really is, is a form of slavery to the Mormon religion. It's a set-up to get the individual to perform like a trained monkey for the religious organization."
That sums it up pretty well!
Also one thing i was wondering was, if those are the questions Jesus will ask of each of us, why aren´t they taught and emphasized in the Temples? Why are those not the covenants made in there, instead of covenants in which you sell your soul to the organization?
If that´s contained within the other covenants, then why pick those ones out of the bunch as the items that Jesus will specifically ask about? None of that is emphasized by "Alma" in what some people call a personal worthiness interview that is found in Alma 5?
Can the Mormon leaders and scriptures please agree on what specific works a person will be judged by?
terrific article Sharon!
I can imagine that "callings" in the Mormon system are really great for people who don't want to deal with their families. It's like some guys actually like being on the road because they get away from their wife and kids and have peace and quiet and freedom from all of the stuff that has to be done to keep a family going. And what a great built in excuse for a Mormon man, for example, he's off serving God and getting the "family" to the Celestial Kingdom where he'll be god. I would also think it would be a great opportunity for a man and a woman not married to one another, to commit emotional adultery as they share in the service to the Mormon god. I'm wondering if men will sacrifice their families for the organization, who's to say that he'll be around once they all make the fictitious journey to the Celestial Kingdom? He'll probably have lots to do besides procreating spirit babies. You know endless meetings with his up line gods discussing the problems they're having ruling their various worlds and such.
The theme of the interview with Jesus is, "Are you worthy?" So I must ask the question, "Worthy for what?" That leads to the answer which is, "To become a god." Which leads us to the Mormon belief that there are many gods, all of whom were once sinful men who progressed through the Mormon system. So in Mormonism it always comes back to the heretical, blasphemous views on the nature of God and man.
And how much does a Mormon have to do before the Mormon Jesus will cover the short fall of the man's efforts so he can become a god? If you've filled up a quarter of a tank will the Mormon Jesus fill-up the remainder three-quarters? Or does a Mormon man have to get at least to fifty percent before he can qualify for the rest?
"The theme of the interview with Jesus is, "Are you worthy?" So I must ask the question, "Worthy for what?" That leads to the answer which is, "To become a god."
Falcon, do you have an idea what kind of problem that raises to a "worthy" mormon man? Some leaders like to emphasize the importance of obeying the laws of the celestial kingdom when talking about the temple. The source of that is found in D&C 88:22 "For he who is not able to abide the law of a celestial kingdom cannot abide a celestial glory."
What does the law of the celestial kingdom consist of? Among other things the law of polygamy and the law of consecration, both of them not practiced by anyone in the mormon church at the moment. Even though you covenant to live the law of consecration in the temple that law is not practiced in real life because nobody dedicates everything they have, whether it be time, money, property, talents, etc. to the church and they are not required to by the leadership, so it´s not the same thing as what was tried by JS in the beginning of the church.
What remains is the emptiness and insignificance of such "laws" that are there just so people can feel special for having such "truths" revealed to them nobody else has.
I really enjoyed this article, Sharon!
I'm really glad you pointed us to John 6:28-29. I have seen and read through so many verses in response to Mormon theology, but this one seems to hit home the most. The biggest thing with Mormonism is that it teaches that one must obey Jesus's commandments. In addition to the two greatest commandments given in the Bible, Mormons have a whole slew of other ones. But John 6:28-29 really turns that idea upside down. ALL that matters is a belief in Jesus Christ as Lord and Savior and the only begotten Son of God.
The Mormon restoration of the gospel doesn't make sense to anyone outside of Mormonism because it doesn't exist. How can someone say that Mormonism recovers Jesus's commandments, the ones that were lost? When Jesus says himself that his words will not fade away? How can someone see the Bible, the words there, the original words on the Dead Sea Scrolls, repeated over and over again on ancient documents, and give them less credence than text that has no source?
My Mormon friend argued that the Bible is malleable because of all of its sources, that it has been changed and ruptured and interpreted, and that it is her faith that makes her believe the BoM without seeing proof. She says she doesn't need proof because she knows it's from God. It makes me head hurt thinking about it sometimes, when the logic is so warped and twisted. Jesus tells us to beware of a wolf in sheep's clothing, someone who brings a gospel that parallels but isn't the Gospel. I know that Jesus says the time will come when people are led astray and will harden their hearts. I think it's incredible and yet utterly terrifying that we see this in evidence and so real with the Mormon Church.
"she doesn't need proof because she knows it's from God"
How does she knows it is from God? I don´t remember who said it, but if 13 million people joined the mormon church because they prayed about it, imagine how many people actually prayed about it and received a negative answer and refused to join the mormon church! So, let´s say, out of 10 people 1 gets a positive answer – does that mean that the other 9 didn´t receive an answer from God, did it mean they weren´t sincere, how would you know that?
Hey, wasn´t Bill Mckeever who said that?
If your friend say that to you again ask her about all the people that did the same thing and received a negative answer, and she´ll probably go down that road of "they weren´t sincere enough", etc. then ask her a follow up question along those lines… watch how her pride shows its ugly head.
Here's a passage from a book I'd like to share as I think it has pertinence to this topic.
"I was not prepared for the look on the unfamiliar woman's face as she came forward for prayer at the end of a church service. She was teary-eyed, anxious. But most of all, I saw fear. What's more, as she began to speak, it became apparent what she was afraid of-me!…..I realized that she wasn't afraid of me personally-it was what I represented. I was a pastor, a figure of authority. And not just any authority-a spiritual authority, a 'representative of God.' She was terrified of that, and coming to me for prayer was one of the hardest, bravest things she'd ever done.
Later, as I pondered the encounter, I realized that she exhibited the characteristics of an abuse victim…..Her abuse was spiritual.
In the context of her Christian home and her evangelical church, this woman had been shamed, manipulated and weighed down by a distortion of the gospel. Though Jesus came with 'good news' to set us all free, she had been pressed by other Christians to work harder at being 'a good Christian.' When she had failed in her honest attempts, she was judged as undisciplined and unwilling-perhaps even unsaved. She tried harder and harder to do all that was prescribed: more Bible reading , more prayer, more financial sacrifice. Finally exhausted, she had come seeking help. By then she was so sure I, too, was going to judge her that she nearly could not ask for help from one more 'spiritual authority'.The good news had become bad news; the message of life had been distorted until it nearly crushed out her inner life."
One of the key concepts here is the distortion of the gospel. Now in the case of Mormonism, there is no distortion of the Christian gospel because Mormonism bears no relationship to Christianity. However, Mormonism does distort Christ in such a way that we know it's not Jesus that (Mormonism) is representing. However Jesus is used, not as a loving Savior, but as an authority figure to manipulate Mormons into doing what the Mormon church demands; absolute obedience to the church and unquestioned loyalty.
I’m not sure how 1 Peter 3:15 even relates to the article you posted. I can say this, if ALL Christians were to live by Peter’s advice (specifically the part about responding with gentleness and respect), the world would be a better place. [Sentences removed for violating blog policy] This site and its entire ministry is the later. I find it offensive that you would call yourselves Christians when the things you say do nothing to unify the people. Do you think that is what Christ would do? Not likely.
I would guess that there are a number of Mormons who feel that Mormonism's claims to the truth have been confirmed by their own personal spiritual experiences. This could be anything from an answered prayer to the sense that God is close to them, providing them with intimate feelings of the Almighty. Evidence of Mormonism's fictitious character and past abuses or practices are troublesome for some Mormons, but it's difficult to square the facts with their own personal experiences.
The idea that Jesus will/may engage them in a personal evaluation as to their behavior and progress towards the goal of becoming a god must, at the very least, be intimidating. The whole idea of this happening fits in well with the Mormon narrative on religious achievement and present Mormon practices (personal interview with the bishop).
So where would a Mormon go or what would they do if things start unraveling and don't make sense and yet they've had "spiritual" experiences. Well the words of DOM in the above article don't match the reality of what's revealed in God's Word the Bible. DOM may be very sincere in what he says and may believe it himself, and while what he says may be consistent with Mormonism, it isn't with Christianity.
The truth starts with knowing who God is and what His expectations for us are. God is not a libertine who provides us with grace so that we may engaged in licentiousness and all out debauchery. But God tells us plainly in His Word that His top priority for us is that we know Him, love Him and serve Him. In doing so, our character will conform to that of Jesus Christ.
I don't know of any Christian who believes that it isn't important to lead a transformational life based on their faith in Jesus. This is one of the great errors of Mormonism, and I think it's important to the narrative of the religion, that Christians think that since they are saved by faith, they are now free to sin with impunity. That's a charge of Mormonism against Christianity that helps serve the needs of Mormonism to justify its legalistic religious system and to slam Christianity.
A person can read through any of the NT material and see the delicate balance that is laid out between faith in Jesus as a means of salvation and how we are to live our lives as a result of that faith. First John 1:5-10 is a good example of this. It reads:
"And this is the message we have heard from Him and announce to you, that God is light, and in Him there is no darkness at all. If we say that we have fellowship with Him and yet walk in the darkness, we lie and do not practice the truth; but if we walk in the light as He himself is in the light, we have fellowship with one another, and the blood of Jesus His Son cleanses us from all sin. If we say that we have no sin, we are deceiving ourselves and the truth is not in us. If we confess our sins, He is faithful and righteous to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness. If we say that we have not sinned, we make Him a liar, and His word is not in us."
John points out an interesting dichotomy here. We walk in the light, hopefully, and yet we sin. How can that be? There's a difference between habitual sin that we won't give up, and tripping and falling. One is a life pattern of doing wrong, the other is an event. There is a difference.
For the Christian, we have received the gift of eternal life based on our faith in Jesus. As we draw closer to Him our sin life is exposed. The light of Christ exposes this darkness in us. The Good News is that God continually cleanses us from our unrighteousness through the blood of Jesus.
That's what peace with God is all about. In DOM's scenario of the interview with Jesus, there is no being set-free in Christ. There is no peace with God. There is only guilt, shame and condemnation. The Mormon can never get good enough to please the Mormon religious system. But the system is set-up to make the Mormon a slave to the organization. The "interview with Jesus" scenario is just one more tactic in keeping the Mormon under the thumb of the organization.
Mormons are slaves to the Mormon organization. Christians are slaves to Christ in that we recognize that it's all about Jesus and what He did for us on the cross. While the religious organization condemns, Christ forgives. Jesus wouldn't have any time for this nonsense of the interview. He would be interested only if we loved Him and if that love was then extended to those we touched in life.
Mormonism is a false gospel, with a false god, a false Jesus, and a false plan of salvation.
"I find it offensive that you would call yourselves Christians when the things you say do nothing to unify the people"
Unify the people under what God? Mormonism´s God? No, thanks.
You sound like a bitter mormon to me, that being the case it would be your wish that the world would be unified under the mormon prophet. No, thanks, i´d rather shoot myself.
"Do you think that is what Christ would do?"
You want to know what Christ would say to mormons leaders today?
Matthew 23:27 "Woe unto you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! for ye are like unto whited sepulchres, which indeed appear beautiful outward, but are within full of dead men’s bones, and of all uncleanness."
Can you believe Jesus actually said stuff like that ?!? You probably wouldn´t call Jesus Christian.
I find this kind of funny. Here we have an example of do what I say rather than what I do. A call for unity, gentleness and respect in a post that gets sentences removed for violating blog policy?
I'm wondering how Christians and Mormons are supposed to join together in unity? What's the basis between the two in order to be unified?
And what would Jesus do? Well he warned us about false prophets and the like so I'm thinking he'd be just fine with what we're doing here, warning people about the false prophets of Mormonism that are leading their followers to their spiritual destruction.
Anyway, if you post again, I hope you have something constructive to say regarding the topic at hand without playing the Mormon persecution card.
A specific work a person will be judged by? Probably all of them But don't worry if you are heading in the right direction-have Jesus in your life- and doing what Jesus would do and chuckling at Calvin and Hobbes you should not have any problems.
Gentleness and respect. Christians have one book of scripture. Mormons have four. Christians have one God. Mormons have many. Christians take one wife. Mormons took many. Christians generally have smalllish families compared to Mormon generally large families. Christians have education. Mormons have intelligence carries over into the next life. Christians have an existence. Mormons have pre-existence plus this existence. I do not smoke, or drink. My neighbor does not smoke, drink, or drink coffee, tea, soda, herbal tea, etc. My church has a women's bible study. My neighbor has the women's relief society. Christians have dead prophets and Jesus as our living prophet and king. Mormons have dead prophets, Jesus and living prophets. Their dog is bigger. Their dad makes more money. We can never, ever win. Christians might be decent but Mormons are more decent. We might love our families but Mormon families are more sacred. I go to church on Sundays but Mormons keep the Sabbath. I cook. My Mormon friend has food storage, prepared frozen foods, organic, homemade, low-sugar, fresh. My dad is an only child without a competitive bone in his body. I wasn't made to compete but in Mormonism, there is nothing but competition. They love God more. They win. But they missed the point of the bible. God won for us. God has no favorites. He remembers our sins no more.
"Probably all of them"
I agree – but that should worry mormons an awful lot, because they have such a long list, in my experience i haven´t met a mormon who is able to keep up with 1/10th of it, and that´s because they have a family to feed and the time they have in the weekend is dedicated to serving in their callings doing stuff that is not even in the scriptures…
"and doing what Jesus would do"
You say it as if it was so easy…
"chuckling at Calvin and Hobbes"
lol! I loved that one!
This article points out an important aspect of spiritually abusive systems and that is to beat people down and make them think that they are the problem. On the surface, DOM's little presentation on an interview with Jesus may appear quite innocent and even viewed as a means of challenging people to live better lives. The fact of the matter, however, is that it has the effect of setting a high bar and then showing people how short they are falling from meeting expectations. They then must try harder and strive to meet the standards not of Jesus, but of the Mormon religion. Putting the stamp of Jesus on it, however, gives the religious organization the authority they covet in managing the lives of the members.
What's interesting is that some people seem to "thrive" in this sort of system. I knew a woman once who was the happiest when it appeared that the pastor was "scolding" the people. I'm sure she wasn't applying any of it to herself, but imagined that she was doing the scolding and straightening people out.
We could cite three main factors that set the stage for abusive systems and there victims: mindset, motive and method. When we examine mindset, we are talking about how people see themselves and also how they view Scripture. The mindset of the people is that they don't have the ability or capacity to understand Scripture themselves. They need a leader who speaks for God. In his fictitious "interview with Jesus", what DOM is doing is advocating that people perform right so that God will bless them. Spirituality becomes manipulation. What DOM is really advocating is doing more of the approved behavior to look good, rather than an inner transformation into being like Jesus in character. It's all about outward performance and appearances. In short, the followers need the leaders to tell them how to perform and the followers are insecure enough to buy into that mindset. Having an independent thought based on a thoughtful reading of the Word of God will not fly.
The motive in these types of system is that the people's religious performance meets the needs of the leaders. This performance orientation of the leaders reinforces the idea that they (leaders) are right! So the people get burned out performing and it leads to a distorted perception of who God is and what His expectations are. God's image thus becomes a reflection of the leaders.
Finally the method that is employed is to use Scripture to prove and support the agenda of the leadership. Thus we have the interview with Jesus. Jesus becomes the front man for the leadership as they twist and distort the Word of God to their own purposes. This method stretches or ignores the original issue which the Scripture was addressing and totally violates any context within which it was written.
In Mormonism the church holds all of the trump cards. That's why the Mormon testimony pushes the Mormon church front and center and makes it the conduit through which a member must pass in order to become a god. Mormonism gives lip-service to Jesus, but the reality is, it's the Mormon system that's going to be the way a Mormon reaches the highest level of Mormon reward.
Once people see the falseness of this system and that the leaders are not much more than Wizard of Oz figures behind the curtain, the jig is up, control ends, fear recedes, and the people are free.
Here is a learning story to think about. There was a man who wanted to be the greatest martial artist. So he went to the greatest teacher and ask him how long it would take. The teacher said 10 years. The man said he would practice hard day and night. The teacher said 20 years but if you let me teach you my way it may take less. The man let the teacher teach him and learned in three years.
You said 'I haven't met a mormon who is able to keep up with 1/10th of it" We are observer and sometimes what we see does not match what is actually going on.
Jesus is a mormon. If He were not, He would have to sit in the lobby if his mormon friends or family were married in the temple. Jesus in the lobby. Can you imagine? No. I think Jesus would let the non-mormon mother-in-laws or mothers be present at the ceremony. Maybe even Mary, His mother, the Mother of God, because she was technically not a mormon, would have to wait in the lobby too. Not very respectful or gentle to leave the Mother of God in the lobby of the temple.
One of the problems of abusive systems is that people are led to believe that the organization is without error. An often heard phrase in Mormonism is that the "church" is perfect but people aren't. Thus, there is to be no criticism of the organization, the system, the "church". If there's a problem, it's with you and not the perfect "church" .
Along with this is the "no talk" rule. The unwritten but clearly understood "no talk" rule keeps members in a constant state of denial and guilt if they notice that maybe this perfect organization isn't really as perfect as advertised. There is a resulting loss of integrity for the individual because he/she must deny what's clearly in front of them and shoulder personal responsibility for noticing that something is wrong; you're wrong and you should feel guilt and shame for even entertaining a thought that the "church" might not be perfect.
People in these systems don't talk straight but engage in a lot of evasive language and double talk. There's a lot of veiled or hidden language. People are told that they aren't quite up to standard if they don't "get it" or see things in a manner that the leadership does. A person might get the "right" answer to a question, but not the "real" answer.
But it's the inability or fear of the person noticing that something isn't quite right that keeps them enslaved to the organization. As long as the cult can convince the person of their own unworthiness, the status quo will never be threatened.
Jesus' intention is not to make us feel unworthy, it's to make us feel loved and forgiven. That's the difference between slavish obedience and loyalty to an organization and a personal relationship with Jesus Christ. The former brings condemnation, the latter acceptance. Jesus came that we might be set free from the emcumbrance of religion. There is no religious system that can provide for its adherents, eternal life. It's a one-on-one proposition without the shackles of a legalistic religious system. Blind loyalty to the organization and the endless, mindless repetition of meaningless rituals will not save or keep a person in God's good graces. It is faith in Christ and Him alone that satisfies the Father's requirements to enter into His rest.
Cute Karate Kid-ish story.
"We are observer and sometimes what we see does not match what is actually going on"
Only God knows a person´s heart, but honestly, all i see in mormonism are people that are not very much concerned with what God says besides "knowing" that the Book of Mormon is the word of god, the church is true and there´s a living prophet – all they do is to follow the church guidelines and the specific rules required to enter the Temple. Other than that the scriptures are just there as salad dressing for heart-touching talks that everybody forgets a second later(just notice what happens at the moment of the last prayer´s "amen" in a Conference).
I wasn´t only an observer – i´ve lived it myself and so i can speak from such experiences. Also i´ve observed that for almost my entire life – if it was supposed to be different i would have had plenty of opportunities to have observed that and didn´t – from the various wards from here(Brasil) and the U.S. which i attended all i saw was the exact same thing. Nothing changes even though we are talking about two completely different cultures. The mentality is the same with rare exceptions.
Yes – it was Bill McKeever – here: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0TrnfAymZd0
and they get upset when people call their ceremonies "secret" instead of "sacred". The reason they don´t let people in like that is because they´d all freak out by the weirdness of it all. New members are only allowed to enter the temple after a full year of membership(except to do baptisms for the dead, but that´s ok because they don´t get to see the endowments part, just regular baptism stuff). That time allows people to get used to the mormon way of thinking little by little, then they take temple preparation classes that set them up to expect the most heavenly of heavenly experiences. Then they are mentally and maybe psychologically ready to swallow up all the creepy weird stuff that goes on in there as "sacred".
The things that happen there would shock anyone that went without any previous brainwas… errr…. preparation.
Oh. And I forgot. Stone plates. . . golden plates. ..
Violet- I love your perspective! You hit the nail on the head. I was raised a 7 generation mormon and married and had 4 kids and spent 33 years in the Mormon race. Thank the good Lord above, I have been given eyes to see and ears to hear. I have been a Christian for just about 2 and a half years. I write a blog as well about Mormonism and Christianity. Please drop us a line and leave more beautiful comments like these. =)
http://www.welovemormons.blogspot.com
After reading this post, it appears to me that "Mormonism Research Ministry" is just a cover to try to justify making disparaging remarks about Mormons that are out of context and out of the spirit that they are written in. This is more of a "Mormon Bashing" site. Are we not all brothers and sisters as we belong to the Christ who bought us all with his blood through his atoning sacrifice. There are certainly more things that can unite us than divide us if we are truly followers of Christ. As a comment about some of your statements, Christ and the early apostles taught us in James Chapter 2: 14What profit is it, my brethren, for a man to say he hath faith, and hath not works? can faith save him?
15Yea, a man may say, I will show thee I have faith without works; but I say, Show me thy faith without works, and I will show thee my faith by my works.
16For if a brother or sister be naked and destitute, and one of you say, Depart in peace, be warmed and filled; notwithstanding he give not those things which are needful to the body; what profit is your faith unto such?
17Even so faith, if it have not works is dead, being alone.
18Therefore wilt thou know, O vain man, that faith without works is dead and cannot save you?
19Thou believest there is one God; thou doest well; the devils also believe, and tremble; thou hast made thyself like unto them, not being justified.
20Was not Abraham our father justified by works, when he had offered Isaac his son upon the altar?
21Seest thou how works wrought with his faith, and by works was faith made perfect?