Friday, March 14, 2008
Yes I am mormon
Okay so I 've recently told my husband and children that I would stop letting other people annoy me by trying to tell me what my beliefs are. According to other people, I dont believe in Jesus Christ, my husband has way more wives than me, I am affiliated with a cult and last but certainly not least I need you or someone like you to talk me out of my crazy ways and save my soul. I would like to assure you that none of this is true .However it won't do much good considering you already know everything there is to know about me. Even though I know people by name they only seem to know me by my faith. That I don't mind except that the only thing you know are what you have been told by others, read in the paper, heard on the television or learned from some other unreliable source. I make it a point to not critisize other religions. Why? Because I do not practice them. Nor do I study them. It is impossible to truly know everything about any religion that you are not a part of. Believe it or not you really don't know everything about a religion you practice. It is a learning process. So please all you people out there don't make me have to daily defend my beliefs , or hear another ignorant comment about what you think you know. I promise to allow you to believe in what you want. Please grant me that same respect.
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10 comments:
Michelle,
What would you say if said, "God told me to tell you that I must not join the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, for it is all wrong; and that all their creeds were an abomination in His sight; that those professors were all corrupt; that: they draw near to God with their lips, but their hearts are far from Him, they teach for doctrines the commandments of men, having a form of godliness, but they deny the power thereof."
Would you feel like I attacked your church? I mean you no ill-will, I'm just curious what your thought are about a statement like that.
Thanks for considering my question.
I would say the same thing many mormons would say. Have you read the book of mormon and prayed with a sincere intent to know the truth. I would also say that my heart is very close to God. I have daily talks with God he knows my heart just as he knows yours. It is not my place to judge you for only he knows the true intent of your heart.I also know that he has given us free agency to believe what we wish to believe and that it is not christian of me to condemn you so I won't. I also know that it is websites like yours that make people give me a questioning look when I tell them i am mormon. I dont understand why you feel such a strong desire to teach against us . I believe that the lord intends for us to live in harmony. I can also say that of the many denominations of churches i have attended that it is only in an lds setting that i have felt the spirit of the lord the strongest. When I was confirmed into the church I felt the spirit of the lord in ways that I know many never have. That is all the proof I need. It is okay that your beliefs are different from mine but do you really think God would want you to harrass us at our temples?
Just one more comment for keith. Please feel free to ask me any question you would like. i'm not easily offended. It is through open dialogue that people learn to accept one another and to help one another rather than try to change one another.
Michelle,
Thanks for your response and your invitation to keep talking. You too can ask me any question as I am not easily offended either. THERE! That is at least one thing that we have in common. ;-)
To answer your questions, yes I have read the BoM and have prayed about it and that is part of why I do what I do. But when you think about it, this really isn't a fair test for truth at all. You must assume that I was not sincere because I received a different answer than you did.
But back to the point. You never answered my question. Would a statement like my first make you feel like I attacked your Church?
As for harassment at LDS temples, I find that most Mormons have incredibly thin skin. We are not even there for the Mormons. We offer a paper to the general public that explains the differences between Mormonism and Christianity.
Since the Mormons refuse to explain to the public what it needs to know before considering LDS Church membership, we feel it is important to do that.
I wrote a letter to the San Antonio Temple President informing him that if they explained the law of eternal progression to the visitors, I would pack up and go home. He refused so we did it instead.
keith,
Please do not assume that i think you were not sincere in your prayers because you did not recieve the same answer i did. I would never think that of someone.And no your statment does not make me feel as though you have attacked our church. however some of the things on your web site disturb me. I do think you should know that membership into our church is not taken lightly, we do not just baptise people without believing that they are ready for it and without believeing they have a true testimony of the truthfulness of our church. my husband was recently baptized into the church and we have been together for 15 years. I met hiom when i was 16 years old and never even attempted to bring him into the church. I knew that was a decision he would have to make on his own with no interference from me. as I have told you before i would never attempt to convert anyone. That is the lords job.It is up to me to live the example that my heavenly father expects from all of us as humans. My husbands chose to speak to the missionaries and after some time he came to believe the gospel our church teaches. as a matter of fact i had been inactive for quite some time and it was my husband who brought me back to the church. When he was ready to be baptized as with all who join the church there is an interview process
(that i wasn't sure you were aware of)that takes place to insure you are ready and that you are sure of your decision before your baptism ever takes place.So I think every thing one needs to know before baptism takes place is explained to them. So you see we really don't need you to handle that for us. I would like to say to you however that even though we have differing opinions I believe that you are probably a very loving man who has a great love for the lord. I think you have good intentions but that you are misguided in your efforts. I think you would go much farther if you would just try to teach a love of the lord and love for your neighbor. if you could work with people such as myself instead of againt us i believe your ministry could be a wonderful thing. I hope to recieve more questions from you as well as answers to my questions. I think there is much to be learned on both sides.
Michelle,
Thanks again for your kind words. I must admit that I am shocked that you would not find such a statement offensive.
As for the LDS church teaching everything that someone must know before they join, that simply is not the case. I know numerous people who have left the LDS Church and were angry that they were not informed about certain doctrines.
We have talked to people who were going to join and explained the differences to them. Once they found out, they wanted to know why they were not told these things.
Does your husband know about the law of eternal progression? Does he know the idea that if he lives up to what is expected of him that he will become a God with you as his Goddess wife?
keith,
The answer to your question is yes my husband was told about eternal progression before he joined the church as was I. This post is going to be kinda long so just sit back and relax a while.
I have a question for you. Okay here goes. Im going to try to say everything without rambling so please be patient with me.:-)
My question is if our church is wrong(which I do not think it is I'm speaking hypotheticly) would our members be destined for hell? Growing up throughout my childhood we were always members of a local baptist church. And not always the same church but they taught pretty much the same thing. What they taught was that all you needed to do to go to heaven was be saved. They said sometimes you would "backslide" but you could ask for forgivness and everything would be okay. As a child I can remember several times asking different preachers what happened to the people who were never taught about God.People who never had the opportunity to accept christ, would they go to heaven? The answer was always no. Now to me that does'nt make sense.As a parent just think about how much you love your children. Now we are mere mortals so if we love our children more than words could ever say just think about how much our heavenly father loves us. His love for us is obvious by just looking at this beautiful world he has given us. So why would he send his children who have never had the opportunity to learn of him to such an awful place. Another thing with the baptist church I grew up in and with most churches there is one heaven and then there is hell. Now if you read from Genesis 2:1 in the king james bible(which is the bible us lds people use) it plainly states that the heavens and earth were finished and all the host of them. heavens being plural. Now i'm sure you already know that our church teaches that there is more than one degree of glory (Or heaven)that makes sense to me. being that you have some who dedicate their whole life to christ and give all glory to God, then you have those who believe but they don't try real hard to always do what the lord expects of us. Now the bible plainly tells us that our God is a just God, that being said it only makes sense that we would not all recieve the same level of glory upon death.We also know that God has created worlds without number that is apparent just by looking up at the night sky. Okay so even if we were to find out after death that none of this is true and that our church has interpreted everything all wrong none of this it seems to me would be so offensive to God that we would be destined for hell. This is really my point. In a baptist church (and i'm not picking on the baptist i'm just trying to compare a church that i have been a part of and understand)they believe that God, Jesus, and they Holy spirit are all one were as we belive that they are three distinct personages that is really the biggest difference in our belief system. However in our church we follow the ten commandments, We do not worship a false God nor do we worship Idols, We also follow the words of wisdom but hey if for some reason thats not true(which again im speaking hypotheticaly) then we are still healthy for it so it still benefits us and of course one other major difference we have a prophet. Many people mistakenly believe that we worship our prophet nothing could be farther from the truth. We believe our prophet is called of God to copunsel us and give us direction it is up to us to listen much as is is in any other church except they recieve councel from their pastor.So once again is there anything we are doing that would put our souls in jeapardy of hell? If there is I certainly can't find it. I would really love to know what your opinion is. And thanks for reading such a long post.
Michelle,
Thanks for your question. I'll answer it here in a second, but I wanted you to know that I have not been posting on Topix because I am having trouble with posting. For more info, please check out my blog which can be found by clicking on my picture.
Be sure to tell Larry I'm not dodging him, I just don't want to post again until I find out why 23 of my posts were never put on Topix.
Now to answer your question, Church membership has nothing to do with whether or not someone goes to hell. Those who go to hell are those who do not have their sins forgiven. Like I mentioned on Topix. I have never met a Mormon who knows their sins are forgiven.
keith,
i find it EXTREMELY interesating that you say you have never met a mormon who said they knew their sins were forgiven. now if that is true then i guess as they say there is a first time for everything because I know mine are. I am also aware that membership into a church does not have anything to do with wether or not a person goes to heaven or hell. It is not our belief that you must be a mormon to go to heaven. That would be absurd.Your still not fully answereing my question though, what about our beliefs would make us go to hell?I can't help but be interested as to what your take is on this.As far as us being forgiven I pray daily and ask the Lord to forgive my transgressions then I try my hardest not to repeat that same sin now of course some are harder not to repeat than others for example loving others as i love myself at times i think that one can be hard for anyone seeing that we are mere mortals with feelings that I know for me atleast can be easily hurt.(that has nothing to do with being mormon I was just born that way :) but i can however say that when i pray I go through a process of true repentance. as another example you'll never hear me say i'll forgive but i won't forget because that would not be true forgiveness. i feel like i'm rambling here so i hope you are catching the meaning of my words. anyway each sunday i was again ask forgiveness for my sins before going to partake of the sacrament which we feel renews our baptism covenents. our thoughts as we patrake of the sacrament are turned to Jesus Christ and the atoning sacrifice that he has made for us.anyway I would appreciate an answer to my question. thanks!
I have an idea for you. How about you start a new blog and tell me what it means to be forgiven from your perspective. I'll then ask some questions and try to get you to see things from my perspective.
If not, let me know and I'll just respond here. I just thought it would be an interesting enough conversation that deserved its own separate post. Just a suggestion though.
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