Some months
ago I noticed the comments of a critic of the Church posted on a (highly
critical) chat-site forum. This person wanted to engage with me in a discussion
(debate) about Church history and doctrine in hopes of causing doubt or loss of
faith. His opening catch-phrase was clever. Something like: “I assume he is a
truth-seeker” (meaning me). This was meant to sound innocent; after all, for
goodness sake, shouldn’t we all be truth-seekers?; especially Latter-day
Saints?
At first
glance I knew sophistry was in play. I realized that this question “are you/is
he a truth-seeker,” was a wolf-question in sheep-question disguise. It was a
way to ensnare, to set a trap. Something like “beware
of the evil behind the smiling eyes.”
But it also
gave me further occasion to ponder whether or not I am a truth-seeker, and if
so, what kind of truth-seeker I am, and this caused me to engage in some
introspection. Sometimes the deceptions of the enemy (Satan’s mortal servants
and spokespeople who often don’t know they are) can prod thoughtful people into
adjusting or refining their thinking and views, and such was the case for me.
While I made no direct response to the subtle crafty critic then, I now offer
some broader thoughts on the subject.
I have
decided I am not really much of a truth-seeker as the world would define the
term (and where they would expect me to seek it). In this larger sense, I am already
a truth-founder. I know God lives and that He has revealed Himself today to
prophets. I have no need to go to science or scholarship or other religions
(although I have seen some of what each of these has to offer) to find God or
His plan of salvation. Because I became and remained faithful to Elohim and
Jehovah to some degree in the pre-mortal existence, I was born into a family of
faith that already possessed the truth, and I was eventually intelligent and
spiritually attuned enough to realize that fact and rejoice in it. Since then,
there have been numerous powerful revelations of truth and confirmation that
have granted certainty.
I am
decidedly an obsessive truth-seeker in the sense of looking for truth where it
is most likely to be found. This to me is the great difference and definition
issue brought up by the critic. He wanted me to look for truth in counterfeit
places; in suspect scholarship and theoretical science. He figured that if he
could convince me that these allegedly reliable sources had truth in them, his
chances of causing doubt in the Restored Church of Jesus Christ rose. What he
didn’t realize was that, at least in my case, pitting God’s revelations of
truth to me against the insufficient learning of men was a silly no-brainer
that has always backfired. How can evolving and sometimes contradicting scholarship
compete with the power of the Holy Spirit of God? Faulty scholarship and weak
critical arguments are helpless against revelation. “Confirmation bias!” shout
critics who have never known or felt the power of God; makes them look foolish.
So I
continue looking for truth in the scriptures (the standard works) and in the
teachings of modern prophets and apostles, and I keep finding it; I keep being
rewarded in my search for truth. I do not go to some critic’s YouTube videos,
where he pontificates some current theory on horse bones or Egyptian manuscript
translations. These poor fellows are doing nothing but ignorantly creating
smoke-screens that will be obliterated either in this life or the next. I just
noticed this brief but telling anecdote recently shared (on another
fine website) by Elder Tad Callister:
I
have a friend . . . who joined the Church. . . . He was an extremely bright
young man. He then got caught up in the criticisms on the internet. . . . He
decided he couldn’t intellectually accept the Book of Mormon.
I
remember talking to him and saying, “If you leave this Church it will ruin you
for any other church because you know too much. What other church is going to
teach you about the premortal existence? What other church is going to teach
you about the spirit world, or baptism for the dead, or the three degrees of
glory, or exaltation, or eternal marriage, or apostles being necessary today?
It will totally ruin you for any other church. You’ll either be a church on
your own or go down the road of atheism.”
Well,
he looked for another church. He searched and searched and searched, and could
not find one. He knew too much. So he finally decided he would re-investigate
the Church.
He
told me, “I was kneeling in prayer one day asking if the Book of Mormon were
true, and a spiritual witness came to me that it was. And I realized that all
the time I was looking for archaeological or linguistic or geographic evidence
of the Book of Mormon. But all the time I should have been looking for Jesus
Christ and His teachings, and how it affects me.” He rejoined the Church. . . .
Meanwhile, the
critics, as emissaries of Satan, are engaging in an infinitely serious and
consequential quest: trying to destroy a person’s chances of gaining eternal
life.
It’s not a
big deal, but I believe that some members have interpreted Alma’s comment about
murder in Alma 39:6 wrong. Because verse 5 talks about “the shedding of
innocent blood” some have thought that the reference to murder in verse 6 meant
the same thing. At least I have heard that view argued and taught. However, I personally
believe Alma was speaking of his own early experience with leading away members
of the church when he said, “whosoever murdereth against the light and
knowledge of God, it is not easy for him to obtain forgiveness; yea, I say unto
you, my son, that it is not easy for him to obtain a forgiveness.” If anyone
ever had an exquisitely hard time obtaining forgiveness for their sins (including
causing others to apostatize), it was Alma; he knew from his own personal
experience. He metaphorically murdered others’ souls when he purposely used his
talents of persuasion to convince people to leave the Nephite church; to cause
them to forsake the gospel and their sacred covenants. This is the same thing
critics/anti-Mormons are striving to do today, working hard to murder “against
the light and knowledge of God.” And someone wants to do that to me? I know
exactly who they are working for even if they might not.
One ray of
hope for misled people that I know of, is found in D&C 50:7 “there are
hypocrites among you, who have deceived some, which has given the adversary
power; but behold such shall be reclaimed.” I don’t know how broad and
far this promise goes, but at least it gives hope for those who are led astray
by anti-Mormons, many of whom once had testimonies—the “light and knowledge of
God.” Their fate?: “the hypocrites shall be detected and shall be cut off,
either in life or in death, even as I will; and wo unto them who are cut off
from my church, for the same are overcome of the world.” Some of these people
are detected and excommunicated in this life, but others won’t be until the
next, after their death, “even as” God wills; “wo unto them”!
Another ray
of hope comes from D&C 138, where statements like this might eventually
have some sort of application to the deceived and rebellious: “Thus was the
gospel preached to those . . . in transgression, having rejected the prophets”
(v. 32, and also see 37, 58-59). As President
Oaks taught in the recent General Conference, there is repentance for some,
to some degree, in the spirit world. Whatever the case may be, above all other
things, I do not want to be “overcome of the world” or having the Lord talking
about me saying “wo unto them.”
President
Russell M. Nelson has warned: “Those same threats are among us today. The
somber reality is that there are ‘servants of Satan’ embedded throughout
society. So be very careful about whose counsel you follow.” The Prophet
doesn’t go to YouTube or Reddit or one of the iffy, liberal/progressive blogs
for truth; he is thankfully not a “truth-seeker” in that sense. As he has said,
he goes to the revelations of God (the scriptures), and directly to God Himself,
and to His Brethren of the First Presidency and the Twelve to obtain spiritual
truth; He is most definitely that kind of truth-seeker. He has explained that even
in seeking truth in science, he used spiritual law (along with the scientific
method) to discover scientific truth.
Thanks, Dennis!!!!!
ReplyDelete