{"id":673,"date":"2021-01-20T16:00:00","date_gmt":"2021-01-20T23:00:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/restorationarchives.com\/blog\/?p=673"},"modified":"2023-03-14T09:54:11","modified_gmt":"2023-03-14T15:54:11","slug":"personal-revelation","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/restorationarchives.com\/blog\/index.php\/2021\/01\/20\/personal-revelation\/","title":{"rendered":"Personal Revelation"},"content":{"rendered":"<div class=\"powerpress_player\" id=\"powerpress_player_5470\"><!--[if lt IE 9]><script>document.createElement('audio');<\/script><![endif]-->\n<audio class=\"wp-audio-shortcode\" id=\"audio-673-1\" preload=\"none\" style=\"width: 100%;\" controls=\"controls\"><source type=\"audio\/mpeg\" src=\"https:\/\/media.blubrry.com\/lightandtruth\/www.denversnuffer.net\/podcast\/episodes\/2008.08.16_LT071_Personal_Revelation.mp3?_=1\" \/><a href=\"https:\/\/media.blubrry.com\/lightandtruth\/www.denversnuffer.net\/podcast\/episodes\/2008.08.16_LT071_Personal_Revelation.mp3\">https:\/\/media.blubrry.com\/lightandtruth\/www.denversnuffer.net\/podcast\/episodes\/2008.08.16_LT071_Personal_Revelation.mp3<\/a><\/audio><\/div><p class=\"powerpress_links powerpress_links_mp3\" style=\"margin-bottom: 1px !important;\">Podcast: <a href=\"https:\/\/media.blubrry.com\/lightandtruth\/www.denversnuffer.net\/podcast\/episodes\/2008.08.16_LT071_Personal_Revelation.mp3\" class=\"powerpress_link_pinw\" target=\"_blank\" title=\"Play in new window\" onclick=\"return powerpress_pinw('https:\/\/restorationarchives.com\/blog\/?powerpress_pinw=673-podcast');\" rel=\"nofollow\">Play in new window<\/a> | <a href=\"https:\/\/media.blubrry.com\/lightandtruth\/www.denversnuffer.net\/podcast\/episodes\/2008.08.16_LT071_Personal_Revelation.mp3\" class=\"powerpress_link_d\" title=\"Download\" rel=\"nofollow\" download=\"2008.08.16_LT071_Personal_Revelation.mp3\">Download<\/a> (Duration: 1:56:15 &#8212; 133.9MB)<\/p><p class=\"powerpress_links powerpress_subscribe_links\">Subscribe: <a href=\"https:\/\/podcasts.apple.com\/us\/podcast\/light-and-truth-podcast\/id1474389927?mt=2&amp;ls=1\" class=\"powerpress_link_subscribe powerpress_link_subscribe_itunes\" target=\"_blank\" title=\"Subscribe on Apple Podcasts\" rel=\"nofollow\">Apple Podcasts<\/a> | <a href=\"https:\/\/restorationarchives.com\/blog\/index.php\/feed\/podcast\/\" class=\"powerpress_link_subscribe powerpress_link_subscribe_rss\" target=\"_blank\" title=\"Subscribe via RSS\" rel=\"nofollow\">RSS<\/a><\/p>\n<p>The following talk by Denver, discussing personal revelation, was originally given on August 16th 2008, in Sandy, Utah.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<!--more-->\n\n\n\n<p>\u2026And since no one\u2019s paying me\u2026&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>You know, the other problem is this: in the Doctrine and Covenants there\u2019s a mandatory statement. It\u2019s much ignored, but it\u2019s a mandatory statement. It says\u2026&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>So, I have to talk loud? Do Bob Dylan? Bob\u2019s always swallowing the mic. Can you turn it up?<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Talk normal. Can you hear me? Is it\u2026? Can you hear me back there? Alright.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>The other problem with treating you as if you were a jury is the mandatory statement in the Doctrine and Covenants\u2014much ignored by us but nevertheless the case\u2014which says&nbsp;<em>if ye receive not the Spirit ye shall not teach&nbsp;<\/em>(D&amp;C 42:14). I view that as mandatory.&nbsp;<em>If ye receive not the Spirit&nbsp;<strong>ye shall not<\/strong><\/em>\u2026 is one of the prohibitions on what we ought to be doing. I\u2019m always amazed at those who are&nbsp;<strong>eager<\/strong>&nbsp;to do this kind of thing. I am a&nbsp;<strong>reluctant<\/strong>&nbsp;draftee. I don\u2019t want to do this. I don\u2019t think I will ever do this again. Doug&nbsp;<strong>nags<\/strong>&nbsp;me to these things. And so, I\u2019m telling you that if he tells you I\u2019m coming again, don\u2019t believe him, because I view this as a terrible responsibility. Anytime you\u2019re going to take up the subject of truth and you\u2019re going to speak, I think you have an obligation to do so by the spirit, and if you don\u2019t, then the requirement is: shut up; just don\u2019t do it.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>We have this erroneous reading of the description given in section 138 about those that were called to be rulers. There\u2019s a parallel drawn between the statement in section 138 and&nbsp;<s>the section<\/s>&nbsp;the description given by Abraham in the pre-existence about how Abraham, you were chosen, you were one of them, you were one of the rulers that were chosen before the world began to be a ruler. And we equate&nbsp;<em>ruler<\/em>\u2026&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Well, in the Book of Mormon, the equation between&nbsp;<em>ruler&nbsp;<\/em>is<em>&nbsp;<\/em><strong>teacher<\/strong>. It has nothing to do with position or rank or authority. It has everything to do with whether or not you teach. And so, in the Book of Mormon what Nephi says is that my brothers are always angry at me because I\u2019m going to be a teacher and a ruler over them. Teacher and ruler are an equivalent.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Abraham presided over a family, but Abraham learned great truths, and he taught great truths, and he is distinguished as a consequence of the things which he learned and he taught. You can occupy a position of authority and never say one thing worth anyone remembering, and therefore, you are not (by definition, using the Book of Mormon) a&nbsp;<em>ruler<\/em>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>On the other hand, you can be one of the least of the Lord\u2019s. I have heard\u2026 In fact, the most memorable statements I have heard in church meetings came from a stake president bearing testimony while talking about the David and Goliath incident in the Old Testament, came from an elderly woman, widowed and in ill health, bearing testimony in a Fast and Testimony Meeting. When I think about those talks that have affected me, that have enlightened me, that have enlivened me, it is the rule that they come from&nbsp;<strong>odd<\/strong>&nbsp;places. And it is the exception when I hear something like Hugh B. Brown\u2019s \u201cProfile of a Prophet\u201d that still resonates with me. There are talks, the greatness of which will endure forever. Paul (on Mars Hill) talking is still resonating in the world.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>(Ya know, I don\u2019t know how you\u2019re gonna get that up here. But if you got it here, I\u2019d use it.)<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>(It has a wide base? Just turn it into a mosh pit and bring it\/hand over to the front.)&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>In any event, so we\u2019ve got this a\u2026&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>(Well, I\u2019ll be quiet while we move the chalkboard. I surrender to the chaos of\u2026 There it is. Just out of curiosity, do we have a marker and an eraser? \u2018Cuz it\u2019s a lot of trouble to go to. Oh, we do. We do. OK, I\u2019m gonna be wary of the microphone and try and stay close to it, but I can still reach part of this.)<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>So, the obligation becomes\u2014if you read section 42, and you read what the Scriptures generally have to say about the subject\u2014the obligation becomes: if you\u2019re going to say something, to say it by the spirit. And so, I\u2019m hoping that the trip to and from the airport, the soccer game that I\u2019ve had to go to, and the fact that when I leave here I am in a hurry to get my daughter and get her to the pet store to buy the frozen pinky mice for her pet snake, and then get her to her babysitting appointment at 6 o\u2019clock will all come together somehow happily, and that I can forget about that while I\u2019m here. (It\u2019s a corn snake. Have you seen her corn snake? It\u2019s this pink, light-colored\u2026 It\u2019s a pretty snake, as snakes go.) But&#8230;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>In one of the latest offerings in the\u2026 By the way, all of this bears on a subject that we\u2019ll get to, but you have to triangulate in if you\u2019re really gonna\u2026 If you\u2019re gonna say something meaningful.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>One of the latest offerings about our greatest controversy, we now have&nbsp;<em>Massacre at Mountain Meadows<\/em>&nbsp;in publication. We have listed\u2026 I mean, everyone refers to this as \u201cTurley\u2019s book\u201d when it was coming out, but listed (in order of priority) the authors are:&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\">\n<li>Ronald Walker, who\u2019s an independent historian and writer of Latter-day Saint history;&nbsp;<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li>Richard Turley is listed second, he\u2019s an Assistant Church Historian for the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints;<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li>and then Glen Leonard is listed as the third author, as the former director of the LDS Museum of Church History and Art.&nbsp;<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n\n\n\n<p>It was published (or it&nbsp;<strong>is<\/strong>&nbsp;published) by Oxford University, carried by Deseret Book. And it was the intention that it be published by&nbsp;<s>Deseret Book<\/s>&nbsp;in order for the book to bear\u2014or excuse me, published by Oxford Press\u2014to bear the imprimatur of independent scholarly approval on the book and not be something that is simply an apology.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>But when you go back to the acknowledgements portion of the book, and you look at who all was involved in getting this into print, he references:<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Colleagues in the Family and Church History Department and other departments of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints and Brigham Young University traveled to many librar[y], archives, and other historical institutions\u2026&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>&#8230;and they list all of them that they went to, and it is formidable. And they give special thanks to all of those from those various church institutional sources who participated in this information gathering and give credit to them.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Then they thank \u201cthe professionalism of several editors,\u201d and they list the editors, many of them inside the Church or Deseret Book, but then they also thank an editor from Oxford Press. They thank:<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Others at church headquarters or Brigham Young University who gave countless hours of assistance with their various skills and knowledge includ[ing]\u2026&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>&#8230;and they give a page-and-a-half list of names. These are&nbsp;<strong>names<\/strong>&nbsp;that are involved in doing the review, and included among them is Dean C. Jessee, who is working on&nbsp;<em>The<\/em>&nbsp;<em>Joseph Smith Papers<\/em>.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>And then they also thank \u201cthe skills and knowledge of archivists, librarians, historians\u201d and others, some of whom reviewed and provided information or critiqued the manuscript. And included among them are some very interesting names like:<\/p>\n\n\n\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\">\n<li>Lavina Fielding Anderson&nbsp;<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li>Richard L. Anderson<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li>Sharon Avery<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li>Lowell Bennion<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li>Ed Firmage<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li>John Groberg<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li>Steve Robison<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li>John Welch<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n\n\n\n<p>(He\u2019s ubiquitous, ok? You can\u2019t get anything into print without John Welch\u2019s name appearing somewhere.) And then there is thanks given to doctors who helped them and to others who are scholars that looked into it and pages of names.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\">\n<li>Richard Bushman\u2019s name appears.&nbsp;<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li>John Carmack\u2019s name<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li>Sheri Dew<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li>Ronald Esplin<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li>Armaud Mauss<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li>Cory Maxwell (well, Cory and Karen Maxwell; my suspicion is Karen did more than Cory did, but that\u2019s just my suspicion)<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li>Jan Shipps.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n\n\n\n<p>And then they end all this\u2014and this is pages; this is pages, and it\u2019s \u201cWho\u2019s Who,\u201d OK? They end all this with:<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>We also express appreciation for the support and feedback of Russell M. Nelson and Dallin Oaks, advisors to the Family and Church History Department, and of Marlin K. Jensen, Church Historian.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>So, I assume, therefore, that this is a very deliberate book. This is a very calculated and intentional book. And that the words that appear in this have been weighed carefully in the balance and chosen in order to have an effect. OK, let\u2019s accept that as a given for a moment. Go read the Acknowledgments if you would like to check that and reach your own conclusion.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>There are precious few things which appear in this book,&nbsp;<em>Massacre at Mountain Meadows<\/em>, which touch upon the subject of revelation or visitations. I think I can read all of them to you. (I may have missed some because I just finished the book a few hours ago and may not have been as deliberate as I went through it as they were in preparing it, but I think these are the quotes.)<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>This is talking about the primary villain responsible\u2014ultimately, the only one that will be executed for the crime of murder of over a hundred and twenty people at Mountain Meadows. This is Brother Lee:<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>During missionary tours to Illinois, Kentucky, and Tennessee, Lee said he beheld heavenly visions, contested with evil spirits, and defeated other Christian ministers with strong, inspired words. Although at first timid and inexperienced before a congregation, he soon believed he was transformed by a higher power. \u201cMy tongue was like the pen of a ready writer. I scarcely knew what I was saying,\u201d he reflected, after speaking to a congregation for an hour and a half.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>\u201cI grew in grace from day to day,\u201d he said\u2026<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>So, \u201cbeheld heavenly visions, contested with evil spirits, &#8230;defeated other Christian ministers with strong, inspired words.\u201d That\u2019s from page 60.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Beginning on page 65, there\u2019s another source they quote at some length, speaking also about John D. Lee on the subject of inspiration and the spirit:<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Thomas D. Brown\u2026wrote an extended passage in his diary that accused Lee of having an \u201cabundance of dreams, visions and revelations\u201d that he used for his own purposes. Brown believed the actual source of Lee\u2019s information was more ordinary. \u201cHe listened behind a fence to Bros. P[eter] Shirts and W[illia]m Young who are talking of his immeasurable selfishness, and he repeated it next meeting as having read it from a sheet let down from\u2026[heaven] before his eyes,\u201d Brown claimed.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Then there was the incident in which Lee, thinking he was temporarily out of favor with Brigham Young (his adopted father), was troubled over whether he would get the appointment to be the U.S. Indian farmer, which was a governmental position, and Brigham Young was at the time the governor. And so, as the governor and as his adopted father, he could make an official appointment. And Lee was sweating over that \u2018cuz it meant an income for him. And Brigham Young, sure enough,&nbsp;<strong>did<\/strong>&nbsp;make the appointment, which gratified him because&nbsp;<s>he<\/s>&nbsp;now he knew he was not out of sync with his adopted father. And again, this is from page 66:<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>When Lee learned of his appointment, he wept\u2014not because it satisfied his ambition, he said, but because it allowed him to continue to serve. He&nbsp;<strong>later<\/strong>&nbsp;said that several days before Young\u2019s letter arrived, \u201can angel of the Lord\u2026.stood by [his] bedside and talked\u2026.about these and many other things.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Now, are you picking up a pattern yet about how spiritual phenomena are being dealt with? Since we\u2019re confining it exclusively to Lee in this account (and since Lee will ultimately turn out to be filled with all manner of wickedness and chicanery)\u2026&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Well, after he had led the early abortive attack and personally become involved in the surrounding of the emigrant wagon (when they were dug in), in the fracas that ensued and the bullet fire that was going on, he got hit several times in his clothing, but he did not get injured. Then, a couple of Mormon communication bearers, Willden and Clewes, arrived; the incident occurs (and this is set out on page 172) in this way. (And this account, by the way, will\u2026 You\u2019ll want, in your own mind, to juxtapose this account with Willard Richards\u2019 statement about why he escaped&nbsp;<s>Liberty<\/s>&nbsp;[Carthage] Jail without any injury and what some people believe that possession of the temple rites do for you\u2014but that\u2019s not mentioned, but keep that in mind.) So, reading now on page 172:<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>At one point\u2014perhaps after getting bullet holes in his clothing\u2014&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Well, undoubtedly, because that\u2019s the point. I mean, he has the bullet holes, but this is between dashes. So, it\u2019s just to remind you that we\u2019ve got that background.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>At one point\u2014perhaps after getting bullet holes in his clothing\u2014Lee had told the Paiutes \u201cthat the bullets of the emigrants would not hurt the \u2018Mormons\u2019 the same as the Indians.\u201d Seeing Willden and Clewes, the Paiutes decided to test Lee\u2019s claim[s]. They \u201cdemanded that Willden and Clewes should put on Indian attire and run unarmed past the emigrant train within easy range of the rifles, to a neighboring point about a hundred yards distan[ce].\u201d It may have been the same route Jackson\u2019s brother took when he was shot. The two white men concluded that they would have to \u201ctake their chances\u201d in doing what the Indians demanded \u201cor risk being killed by them. So they ran, amid a shower of bullets from the emigrant camp and reached the opposite point in safety.\u201d The men then returned to the Paiute camp, where they \u201cwere heartily cheered for their bravery after their perilous run. Soon,\u201d said Clewes, \u201cwe were hailed from a ridge on our left; we looked around and there stood John D. Lee.\u201d Lee told the Indians to return to their camp\u2014\u201dpacif[ying] their feelings by making explanations to them\u201d\u2014then sat down and talked to [them].<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Well, we get that. And in the context of this book and this treatment, and given the fact that the focus of the tale is upon what\u2019s the worst crime committed in the history of the Church, this is the first words. This is the Preface:<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>On September 11, 1857, Mormon settlers in southern Utah used a false flag of truce to lull a group of California-bound emigrants from their circled wagons and then slaughter[ed] them. When the killing was over, more than one hundred butchered bodies lay strewn across half a mile stretch of an upland meadow. Most of the victims were women and children. The perpetrators were members of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints aided by Indians.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>It makes no apology for the Church\u2019s involvement. It exposes it. It limits the damage to those who were locally involved in perpetrating it and doesn\u2019t gloss it over. It\u2019s a very raw, candid description (including of the killings themselves). And I\u2019ve read to you from this book (deliberately prepared), those statements that exist in it with respect to the subject of visions, revelations, and visitations.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>And so, if you are going to form an opinion about how we regard the subject of visitations, and this is the latest statement from all of the gathered, well, \u201cpowers that be,\u201d blue-bloods, insiders, credentialed folk\u2014all the good people that we rely upon\u2014if that\u2019s what they had to say about it, you would have a hard time reconciling that with what our nineteen-year- old missionaries do.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>The nineteen-year-old missionaries go out, they hand people the Book of Mormon, and they say, \u201cLook, look! Here in Moroni 10:4, it says,&nbsp;<em>Ask God<\/em>, and He\u2019s gonna tell you. And oh, by the way, this whole thing started\/this whole thing began when Joseph Smith read in Scripture,&nbsp;<em>Ask God<\/em>. And Joseph read that&nbsp;<em>God\u2026giveth to all men liberally and upbraideth not<\/em>. And Moroni says if you&nbsp;<em>ask with a sincere heart<\/em>, God\u2019s going to answer you.\u201d And so, our missionaries go about saying to everyone, \u201cYou go get revelation.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>And then we encounter the Church Historian and the director of the\u2026well, the Assistant Church Historian, reviewed by the Church Historian, Marlin Jensen (who I knew when he was still practicing law), and no one seems to have said, \u201cWait a minute, for a church whose bedrock remains\u2014indispensably remains\u2014the presence of the spirit, and for a church who, in order to expands, requires those that would like to join to go ask of God and get an answer to prayer, ought we not to do something more with the passing mention of revelation then to simply confine it to the guy who gets executed for the crime\/the guy who led the charge that created the problem\/the guy who shot someone (and we had to now cover it up because white men were involved in this incident, and if the emigrants got out, the emigrants were going to spread the word of that), ought we not put revelation in the hands of someone else and in some other context?<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Well, there is a little bit more, and to be fair I probably ought to read that, \u2018cuz the sisters were involved. \u201cAt 2:00 that afternoon\u2026\u201d This is after the group had set off from Cedar City\u2014the militia had set off\u2014to finish the deed and to kill \u2018em, under the direction of the stake president.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>At 2:00 that afternoon, leaders of the Cedar City Female Benevolent Society held their regular meeting. \u201cSister Haight\u201d reported that she had been visiting some of the Cedar women and \u201ctaught them the necessity of being obedient to their husbands\u201d and not to be fearful in these \u201ctroublesome\u201d and \u201csqually times.\u201d \u2026They had advised the women they visited \u201cto attend strictly to secret prayer in behalf of the brethren that are out acting in our defence.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>So,&nbsp;<strong>prayer<\/strong>&nbsp;creeps in here, too. And then, there\u2019s this comment in the\u2026umm&#8230;as they got ready for the final killings (in the chapter, \u201cDecoyed Out and Destroyed\u201d)\u2014I\u2019m reading on page 187:<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>The men sat in a circle off by themselves and began by praying for \u201cDivine guidance,\u201d a sacrilege that only the passions of the time could explain.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>So, we do have prayer. We do have prayer in the book, too.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Now, I find this troublesome. I find it more than troublesome. I find it troubling enough that it\u2019s worth commenting on as we get into the subject of revelation. Because there is a competition afoot. It is a competition that if history should inform us of anything, it should inform us of this tension. This is&nbsp;<strong>always<\/strong>&nbsp;the case. There is&nbsp;<strong>always<\/strong>&nbsp;an effort to turn the gospel of Christ into religion and to turn religion into something that is very different. And you have to be on your guard, and the church has to be on its guard. And every one of us have to wage war against this process, because this process is foreseeable\/predictable\/ knowable. If you want to know how it happened in the past, all you have to do is study the past. I was surprised in reading\u2026&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>(I watched the soccer game, okay? I did. But there were timeouts. There were\u2026 I don\u2019t know&nbsp;<strong>what<\/strong>&nbsp;they did to bring that little girl into that crumpled ball off the\u2026 I mean, it didn\u2019t look like that, but the girl that kicked her&nbsp;<strong>was<\/strong>&nbsp;rather big. And then we had halftime, and so there long periods when I was reading this just a few hours ago.)<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Yeah. In any event\u2026&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>This is the book I\u2019m waging into at the moment. It\u2019s the latest in the Hugh Nibley Collected Works,&nbsp;<em>Eloquent Witness: Nibley on Himself, Others, and the Temple<\/em>. And some of&nbsp;<strong>this<\/strong>&nbsp;stuff struck me.&nbsp;<strong>This<\/strong>\u2014a publication of \u201cThe Neal A. Maxwell Institute for Religious Scholarship, Hugh Nibley and Associates, LLC\u201d (see, there didn\u2019t used to be a Hugh Nibley and Associates\u2014yeah, Tom, the next generation, LLC\u2019d up)\u2014and printed by Deseret Book Company. So, there\u2019s hope! I mean, there\u2019s happy news.&nbsp;<strong>This<\/strong>&nbsp;squeaked through. Let me read you\u2026 I mean, these two books came out at virtually the same time. They were hot on the shelves when I walked in and took them off a few days ago.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>This is Nibley in an interview that they\u2019ve published, and so, here we go:<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>And the two marks of the Church I see are and have been for a long time these: a reverence for wealth and a contempt for the scriptures. Naturally, the two go hand in hand. We should call attention to the fact that these things we are doing are against the work of the Lord. There is one saying of Joseph Smith I think of quite often. If the heavens seem silent at a time when we desperately need revelation, [it\u2019s] because of covetousness in the Church. \u201cGod had often sealed up the heavens because of covetousness in the Church.\u201d And now the Church isn\u2019t just shot through with covetousness, it is&nbsp;<strong>saturated<\/strong>&nbsp;with covetousness. And so the heavens are going to be closed. We\u2019re told we don\u2019t get revelation if we put our trust in money in the bank.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Well, okay, what do you do? Well, that\u2019s answered a little later in the same book: if you&nbsp;&nbsp;seal the heavens up because you\u2019re covetous, then\u2026&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>This<\/strong>&nbsp;is a description of what happened in the Christian church, k?\u2014the history of Christianity and the church fathers. We\u2019re now a couple of hundred years post-Christ and into the era when the apostles are gone, and we\u2019ve got a limit on ongoing revelation. So, here, I\u2019m reading from page 127, here:<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>When the Church lost revelation it had to turn to another source for guidance and so it threw itself into the arms of the established schools of learning. The schoolmen, as one of them expresses it, took over the office and function once belonging to the prophets and once in power guarded their authority with jealous care, quickly and violently suppressing any suggestion of a recurrent inspiration.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Oh, I shouldn\u2019t read this, but this is a great comment:<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>\u2026 I was forced to admit that the Berkeley institution is if anything less anti-religious than BYU, where religion is under more conscious and deliberate attack. But I do not for that reason hold my BYU colleagues culpable\u2014they cannot help themselves. By its very nature the university is the rival of the Church; its historic mission has been to supply the guiding light which passed away with a loss of revelation, and it can make no concessions to its absolute authority without forfeiting that authority.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Yeah. Huh. Here\u2019s another quote a couple of pages later:<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>The celebrations of the learned men and&nbsp;<strong>not<\/strong>&nbsp;the utterances of the prophets comprise the gospel [according to the university]. This has been the credo of the Christian schoolmen since the days of Clement of Alexandria: the universities\u2014Christian, Moslem, Jewish, or pagan\u2014has its own religion, and the basic tenet of that religion is the denial of revelation.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>(And then he quotes from C.S. Lewis; I\u2019m not gonna read that, but in any event\u2026) So, there\u2019s hope because this is&nbsp;<s>the<\/s>some of the same folks\u2026 I\u2019m sure (I didn\u2019t look), but I\u2019m sure Jack [John] Welch\u2019s name\u2019s in here somewhere, too. You can\u2019t\u2026 Yeah, you can\u2019t get it out into print without him appearing here as he does in the other. So, there&nbsp;<strong>is<\/strong>&nbsp;hope\u2014there\u2019s perhaps some schizophrenia\u2014but hope nonetheless, in the way that it all unfolds.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>So, what of it all? You know, there was a time when\u2026 Our language is still permeated by words of usage and descriptors which presumed a whole different world than the one we live in now, words like \u201cenvision\u201d or \u201clight.\u201d I mean, we accept the idea of anything that is not in front of your face being described and using the word \u201cenvision\u201d as the manner\/the proper word to use when you\u2019re talking about it. Can you envision what Utah will look like in 2050? Can you envision what the new temple in Draper will look like when it is completed? Can you envision this or that? It\u2019s a holdover from another period of time in which the visionary experience was so commonplace that it leaked into the vocabulary,&nbsp;permeated the vocabulary, and we all thought it perfectly appropriate. \u201cCan you give me further light on that subject?\u201d \u201cCan you shed some light on that?\u201d \u201cAre we enlightened on the subject yet?\u201d&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>And you can be talking about anything from General Motors to solving the problem of sabermetrics (a subject that is worthy of devotion). If anyone here wants to devote themselves to a Ph.D. effort, that\u2019s the study of mathematics and baseball and figuring out what really wins games. I think Billy\u2026 We owe a lot to Billy Beane, I\u2019m telling ya\u2014the Oakland A\u2019s. If you have a resistance to reading obscenities in print, then you ought not get it. But if you\u2019d really like to know what baseball is all about, that book,&nbsp;<em>Moneyball,<\/em>&nbsp;&nbsp;is just\u2026 It\u2019s&nbsp;&nbsp;full of light and truth (and a number of obscenities at the same time).<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>So, then we get, we encounter\u2026 Joseph defies categorization. Joseph brought a flood of light, literally a flood of light. And\u2026&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>I appreciate the efforts of the scholars. I applaud the work that they do, but they don\u2019t give us the answers. You have to find a revelator if you would like to get the answers. And the preeminent one for our time was and is Joseph Smith. He covered the turf. What we\u2019re trying to do is catch up with him and to figure out what it was that he was talking about. Joseph repeatedly said, \u201cHey, I can\u2019t go any further than this. The Lord forbid me from saying anymore. And many more things did he reveal unto me, which I cannot at this time put into write. But great and marvelous were the things which the Lord showed unto me, and the mysteries of his kingdom which surpass all understanding, which we were commanded we should not write while we were yet in the Spirit\u201d (see D&amp;C 76:114-115).<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>I mean, the account of the First Vision, the account that we find in section 76, repeatedly in the Book of Mormon, we get right up to the precipice, and then we draw the curtain. And the Scriptures say, \u201cNaw, we\u2019re not gonna go there.\u201d And why aren\u2019t we gonna go there? We\u2019re not gonna go there because, well, we would profane it. We would take and we desecrate it if we put it on public view.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Well, doesn\u2019t the Lord want us to know this stuff? Well, of course He does! Of course He does! In the proper setting, with the proper person, in the proper light, so that you know that it will not be profaned or desecrated, the Lord will show anything to anyone that anyone would like to see. He\u2019s told us that. Joseph said that repeatedly: \u201cHe didn\u2019t show me,\u201d this is Joseph speaking, \u201c&#8230;anything that he won\u2019t show unto the least of you.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>(Hey, Benjamin, can you come here? Make sure you lock it when you come back. But in the middle, I left the&nbsp;<em>Teachings of the Prophet Joseph Smith<\/em>. It\u2019s a small, leather-bound copy, and it\u2019s right in-between the seats. Yeah. We need Joseph\u2026in more ways than one.)<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>See, Joseph was way, way out ahead; we still haven\u2019t caught up, and we display the&nbsp;<strong>least<\/strong>&nbsp;amount of curiosity about the things which are&nbsp;<strong>most<\/strong>&nbsp;enticing. He throws out a statement, and he just dangles it, and then&#8230;no more. And what was the reaction of Nephi to the dangling statements versus the reaction of Laman and Lemuel to the dangling statements? We know what Laman and Lemuel said. They said, \u201cThe Lord maketh no such thing known unto us.\u201d&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>And what did Nephi say? He said, \u201cHey, have ye inquired of Him? Have you asked? Have you asked? Have you asked?\u201d&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>\u201cNo, we haven\u2019t asked; the Lord maketh no such thing known unto us.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Well, I\u2019ve got this, and then I\u2019ve got this. Now, you be careful; you be very careful. In the&nbsp;<em>Encyclopedia of Mormonism<\/em>&nbsp;on the subject of \u201cRevelation,\u201d one of the great precautionary statements there is the devil\u2014the devil\u2019s gonna crop up and mislead you.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>I noticed that on the\u2026 It was the 20th anniversary, I think (it may have been the 25th anniversary because that\u2026 I mean, that was in the intro; I didn\u2019t keep that in mind), to a news article on KSL this last week. We had a\u2026 (Hey, thanks.) We had a repetition of the woman who threw her children off of the 11th floor and killed them, and then she jumped off and killed&nbsp;<s>them<\/s>&nbsp;[herself], and then the brother-in-law to the woman (the uncle to the children) giving his explanation of how the husband\u2014his brother\/her husband\u2014was Jesus Christ and was God the Father and that because he had died, that the family had committed mass suicide to be with him again, and \u201cCan you imagine&#8230;the faith that [that] took?\u201d&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>And that incident, again, is another cautionary tale: Be careful. Be afraid; be very, very afraid. Revelation: You could be John D. Lee! Revelation: You could throw people off a balcony! Be very afraid.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>These are not just random happenstances. This is the era in which we find ourselves. This is the times in which we live.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Well, this is from the&nbsp;<em>Teachings of the Prophet Joseph Smith<\/em>, a comment that Joseph made. (And again, there\u2019s so much of this that I would canonize in the teachings if I were given discretion to ask you to sustain things in adding to Scripture. We\u2019d have a bigger quad; we\u2019d all look like high priests.) So, this is from page 51:<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>We consider that God has created man with a mind capable of instruction, and a faculty which may be enlarged in proportion to the heed and diligence given to the light communicated from heaven to the intellect; and that the nearer man approaches perfection, the clearer are his views, and the greater his enjoyments\u2026.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>So, he\u2019s\u2026 I mean, this is Joseph Smith using, really, prose to describe the process, because for Joseph it was prosaic; it was poetry; it was a thing of beauty. \u201cLight communicated from heaven to the intellect.\u201d \u201cA mind capable of instruction\u2026.a faculty [that] may be enlarged in proportion to the heed and diligence [it\u2019s] given.\u201d These aren\u2019t just idle words. These are Joseph trying to put into the English language a description of a process. And the process works.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Well, a couple of other Scriptures before we start on to something. This is from Doctrine and Covenants section 93, one of Joseph\u2019s most&nbsp;<strong>profound<\/strong>&nbsp;revelations. In section 93, he says, beginning in verse 27:<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><em>No man receive[s] a fulness until he keepeth his commandments. He that keepeth his commandments receiveth truth and light, until he is glorified in truth and knoweth all things.<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Well, that\u2019s interesting: keeping commandments, receiving truth and light, glorified in truth, knows all things. Then he adds,<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><em>Man was also in the beginning with God. Intelligence, or the light of truth, was not created or made, neither indeed can be. All truth is independent in that sphere in which God has placed it, to act for itself, as all intelligence also; otherwise there is no existence. The glory of God is intelligence, or, in other words, light and truth. Light and truth forsake that evil one&#8230;.that wicked one cometh and taketh away light and truth, through disobedience, from the children of men, and because of the tradition of their fathers.<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Huh, yeah, well, we\u2019re fetching up on that, aren\u2019t we?&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>So, we\u2019ve got these interesting statements. And there\u2019s this notion that there is some relationship between keeping commandments, on the one hand, and receiving truth and light, on the other hand. And then, there is this statement about \u201cintelligence, or the light of truth, [wasn\u2019t] created or made\u201d\u2014intelligence wasn\u2019t created or made. Intelligence or \u201cthe light of truth\u201d and \u201cthe glory of God,\u201d then\u2026 It\u2019s redefined \u201cglory of God,\u201d \u201cintelligence,\u201d \u201clight of truth.\u201d K? In two separate statements, in verse 36 and 29, it\u2019s reiterated for us twice that intelligence (that which can\u2019t be created or destroyed\u2014and&nbsp;<strong>can\u2019t<\/strong>&nbsp;be created or destroyed\u2014intelligence)&nbsp;<strong>is<\/strong>&nbsp;light and truth. Light and truth, co-equal with God.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Now, that\u2019s an interesting statement because here we have the word \u201cintelligence,\u201d and it appears here in the&nbsp;<strong>singular<\/strong>. When you go back to Abraham chapter 3, beginning in verse 22, it says,&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><em>Now the Lord had shown unto me, Abraham, the&nbsp;<strong>intelligenc<u>es<\/u><\/strong>&nbsp;that were organized<\/em>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Now we\u2019ve encountered something that has a&nbsp;<strong>plural<\/strong>&nbsp;to it. And in Abraham chapter 3, when it talks about the plural form of this,<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><em>&#8230;the intelligences that were organized before the world was; &#8230;among all these there were many of the noble and great ones; \u2026he stood among those that were\u2026.<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>From what then were your spirits organized? Light and truth. Okay\u2026 At your core, at your nub, at the very essence of what it is that constitutes you to be you, what is it that constitutes you to be you? Light and truth.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>There\u2019s another place where a description is given of the Lord\u2014Christ\u2014in the pre-existence:&nbsp;<em>In the beginning was the Word<\/em>. Now, that\u2019s an interesting thought, that word. So, what you have at your core is light and truth or intelligence, which is&#8230;what? The glory of God\u2014God the Father; you\u2019re derivative from Him. He is the Creator or the Organizer. But what He created or organized you from is light and truth.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Okay. Now, this ought to become increasingly obvious to you as you look at what we were reading in section 93. Why, why is it necessary, therefore, for you to keep his commandments in order for you to receive truth and light? Why? Why is that the way it works? Why must you keep the commandments if you want to get more of this?&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>[audience comment]<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Exactly! We\u2019re trying to harmonize ourselves with Him. We\u2019re trying to get back to Him. We\u2019re trying to get ourselves aligned correctly so that when we resonate in the same way that He resonates, we can pick up on things that are not pick-up-able in the absence of that resonance. We\u2019re trying to get in harmony with God.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>So, what are the commandments? What use are they? Well, He\u2019s giving us a blueprint. And some portions of the blueprint may appear altogether ridiculous. We\u2019re supposed to do them anyway. And why are we supposed to do the things that may seem even ridiculous anyway? Because at your very core, you&nbsp;<strong>know<\/strong>\u2026 You know if it comes from Him. And you know when you\u2019re getting light and truth from Him. There is never a futile act. You know when you pay tithing that you\u2019re doing something&nbsp;<strong>He<\/strong>&nbsp;asked&nbsp;<strong>you<\/strong>&nbsp;to do. And you know what? If it involves a sacrifice, you know all the more&nbsp;<strong>by<\/strong>&nbsp;that sacrifice.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>This is what Joseph was trying to get across in the Lectures on Faith. Would you like to know God? Then go inconvenience yourself by following what He asks of you, and you will unlock inside yourself resonance with the light and truth of God. And it\u2019s an unfolding process.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>It grows\u2026 (Oh, you gotta go back to 50 for that). It grows\u2026 Let me find that, which is really also borrowed from the&nbsp;<s>Psalms<\/s>&nbsp;or the Proverbs, rather:<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><em>That which is of God is light, and he that receiveth light, and continueth in God, receiveth more light; and that light groweth brighter and brighter until the perfect day.<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Proverbs 4:18 is a similar thought. But it\u2019s a dynamic process. It involves your (again, you know, we\u2019re victims of our time), your interface with God. (Another 500 years and the gospel will be perverted by computer terminology, but&#8230;) The way you link up to God (see? There it goes again) is by this mechanism of obeying the commandments that He\u2019s given you. And it\u2019s never futile, and it\u2019s never superfluous. It\u2019s how you, as a being at your core made of light and truth,&nbsp;<strong>know<\/strong>that you\u2019re pleasing God.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>In the Lectures on Faith, Joseph said you had to know that the sacrifice that you are making was pleasing to God. How can you&nbsp;<strong>know<\/strong>&nbsp;that? You can know that because in your core you have light and truth, that\u2019s why I read the quote a few minutes ago. The nearer you come to God and the more obedient you are\u2014the more \u201cheed and diligence\u201d were the words he used in that statement\u2014the more heed and diligence that you give, the more correct your understanding will be. Well, why is&nbsp;<strong>that<\/strong>&nbsp;the case? Because you are enlightened, because you are enlivened, because you are drawing closer to Him.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>One of the great descriptions of how Christ did what He did\u2014in addition to 93\u2014is in section 20 of the Doctrine and Covenants, beginning at verse 21:<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><em>Wherefore, the Almighty God\u2026&nbsp;<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>And by the way, since we\u2019re not in church, you can actually get your Scriptures out and read along. I talk in a ward tomorrow as the High Council representative, and it&nbsp;<em>es<\/em>&nbsp;<em>prohibito<\/em>&nbsp;tomorrow, but today you can get your Scriptures out. This is D&amp;C section 20, beginning at verse 21.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>(Can you hear that annoying rustling of the pages? Because these things aren\u2019t made of paper. They\u2019re made of fabric; that\u2019s cotton you\u2019re hearing. And it\u2019s just annoying. It grieves the spirit and withdraws itself.)<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>[ audience comment]<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Yeah, some of mine won\u2019t. Okay, so, we\u2019re reading, beginning in verse 21:<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><em>Wherefore, the Almighty God\u2026&nbsp;<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>And by the way, if we can\u2019t laugh at ourselves, there\u2019s something really, really wrong with us. I mean, if we take ourselves so seriously that we can\u2019t look at and say the most comedic thing on Earth is a Mormon trying to live his religion, then you missed the point.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>I mean, we do&nbsp;<strong>not<\/strong>&nbsp;attain to perfection in this life. The visions that we read in Scripture all have a constant theme. And the constant theme is a&nbsp;<strong>wretch<\/strong>&nbsp;managed to make it into the presence of God, and then&nbsp;<strong>God<\/strong>&nbsp;fixes the wretch. What was the very first thing\u2014not in our current version of the First Vision, but it is in the earlier versions that Joseph wrote\u2014what is the very first thing God does when Joseph\u2019s in His presence? He forgives his sins; He cleans the mess up. \u201cJoseph, you know you\u2019re a wretch; let\u2019s fix that. Okay, now, now you can endure My presence.\u201d Isaiah, in the temple:<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><em>Woe is me! &#8230;I am undone; &#8230;I am a man of unclean lips, &#8230;I dwell [among] a people of unclean lips.<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Fetch the coal; fix the guy. Coals from the altar, touched to the lips\u2014there; purged; you\u2019re okay.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>You do\u2026 Look, we really are comedic. Our religion promises the fantastic, it promises the perfection of us frail, messed up, insecure human souls. We get hungry; we get thirsty; we get tired. We\u2019re vulnerable; we\u2019re subject to pain; we\u2019re gonna ultimately die, every one of us. We have infirmities, and they progress over time. What about us can possibly be perfected? And you look at it and say, I can\u2019t detect a thing. Oh, wait there&nbsp;<strong>is<\/strong>&nbsp;one thing. You&nbsp;<strong>can<\/strong>&nbsp;be perfect in your desire. You&nbsp;<strong>can<\/strong>&nbsp;hope for it. And for God that\u2019s enough. As long as you make the kind of sacrifice that He would like to have you make preliminarily. And we\u2019re talking about that at this point. And we\u2019re reading from verse 21 of D&amp;C section 20, where it says:<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><em>Wherefore, the Almighty God gave his Only Begotten Son, as it is written in those scriptures which have been given of him. He suffered temptations but&nbsp;<strong>gave no heed unto them<\/strong>. He was crucified, died, and rose again the third day; And ascended into heaven\u2026.<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>See, \u201c<strong>He<\/strong>&nbsp;suffered temptations but gave no&nbsp;<strong>heed<\/strong>&nbsp;unto them.\u201d Turn back to D&amp;C section 130. Verse 19 in section 130 says,<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><em>If a person gains more knowledge and intelligence in this life through his diligence and obedience than another, he will have so much the advantage in the world to come.<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>That\u2019s what Christ did. Christ gave&nbsp;<strong>no heed<\/strong>&nbsp;to the things that were pulling him in the one direction, and He gave&nbsp;<strong>strict<\/strong>heed to the things that were enticing Him to the other direction. And He obtained (as section 93 explains) a fullness of that. So, if there is an increasing flow of light\/an increasing flow of truth that comes to someone by their heed and diligence in following the commandments, then that seems like a fairly simple formula for someone to follow if they\u2019re interested in obtaining further light and knowledge.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>There was a time when all of these words crept into our language, and their usage in our common vernacular became popular when everyone simply&nbsp;<strong>assumed<\/strong>&nbsp;that we all were in contact with the mystic, with the mythic, with the forces that were around you. Everyone simply&nbsp;<strong>assumed<\/strong>&nbsp;that was the case. There was a way of describing the phenomenon. And the way that the idea was reduced to words was by using the concept of a third eye. Well, why that? It was because physically your eyes are the source that light gets into you. You perceive light through your eyes. So, if you\u2019re gonna collect light from somewhere else, two things are essential. The first thing is you have to realize that it\u2019s there, and then you have to be willing to see it. Well, it was a fairly common thing because people weren\u2019t as well educated as they are now. They weren\u2019t&#8230;yeah. They weren\u2019t schooled in naturalism and the philosophies of men, which we have so successfully commingled with Scripture that we have essentially supplanted, in all of Christendom, the gospel of Christ and replaced it with the doctrines of men and the precepts of men and the creeds of men. And we\u2019re beginning to develop our own set of creeds.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>You see, it\u2019s hard. It\u2019s hard to keep the commandments. It involves inconvenience and sacrifice. It\u2019s hard. And for some folks, in a trial and error kind of way, it\u2019s like riding a bicycle. And when you start riding a bicycle you get bloodied elbows and bloodied knees, and you make mistakes, and it\u2019s unhappy. But you know what? You can write a Ph.D. thesis on riding a bicycle without ever getting&nbsp;<strong>on<\/strong>&nbsp;a bike or ever suffering an injury. Well, isn\u2019t that interesting? Because that\u2019s essentially the trade-off that we\u2019ve made. That\u2019s the trade-off that Christendom made, and that\u2019s the trade-off that is rapidly, rapidly advancing right now\u2026&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>I\u2026 Why would Satan ever change his agenda? Why would he ever invent a new tool if the old one works perfectly well? If I can use the sexual appetite of men to destroy a David, well, why not just bust that thing out all the time and aim it at whoever happens to promiscuously get in front of me? (In that context, the word means \u201crandomly,\u201d and it was a pun.) In any event, why invent a new way of corrupting the truth when the old way has been so entirely serviceable?<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>When the Jews returned from the discipline of Babylon, they learned the wrong lesson. And they became sophisticates in the Babylonian system of thought\u2014which, as Lehi would tell us, was necessary because they were the only people that would kill their God, and they had to be in the right frame of mind (which is to say, \u201cscrewed up\u201d) in order to be willing to kill their God, because no one else would do it.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>It takes a lot of learning to really be in hell, because the gospel of Christ beckons people to become childlike and to become simple. That\u2019s not to say the gospel is simplistic, because it comprehends all truth, and it involves light, and it involves everything that is\u2014everything that was, everything that is, and everything that will be. And there are enormous surprises along the way. The gospel of Christ ought to be a delightful process of discovering new things all the time.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Well, at a time when people understood this idea that you could take in light, that it was possible to tune in and to receive information\u2026 And by the way, this information was so readily available that you just had to be sensitized to the awareness of its existence and the willingness to look into the matter for you to begin receiving it, whether you were Lutheran or Calvinist or involved in folk magic. In fact, folk magic largely grew out of the idea that you&nbsp;<strong>can<\/strong>&nbsp;tune into these things.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>This has been a war that has been waged (and waged successfully), and&#8230;it\u2019s my own people that did it. I\u2019m just\u2026 The Scottish Enlightenment, my ancestors, they\u2019re\u2026 They just\u2014you know, David Hume and the gang\u2014they won. And whether&nbsp;<strong>you<\/strong>&nbsp;know it or not,&nbsp;<strong>your minds are full of that crap<\/strong>. And Joseph Smith brought\u2026 He was carefully selected at the time that he came at the end of one epoch And the American Revolution was a war against some of that stuff; we wanted to preserve an island\/a place where you could still be in touch with the deity and be free to accept and receive things from the deity. There were more things in play at the time of the American Revolution than simply a new form of representative government. It was trying to preserve an ideal\u2014an ideal that was rapidly fading\u2014and allow an environment in which people could continue to be in touch with God, however you envisioned your God to be, because there were things available that, if you would let them in, would speak to you (if you were willing to see them).<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Why does a mother suddenly know that her child is in danger at the edge of the camp, with her back turned, and drops everything and runs and catches her child before he or she falls in the creek? Well, we\u2019ve all read stories about that. Oooh, ummmm,&nbsp;<s>tuition<\/s>&nbsp;or intuition or PMS? Somehow it\u2019s ovarian. I\u2026 See, we tend to reduce that to the biological function now. But there was a time when everyone accepted the fact that that was&nbsp;<strong>sight<\/strong>, that was vision, that was light. She&nbsp;<strong>saw<\/strong>&nbsp;it. She envisioned it.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>You know, you do fall down, and you do scuff your elbows and your knees when you learn to ride a bike. But when you finally master it, it\u2019s the closest thing you will do to flight other than flying. And I don\u2019t even think an airplane feels like flight as much as riding a bicycle does. (I\u2019m so converted to the principle that I own four Harleys, and I fly about on them. Yeah, it\u2019s cost me a few tickets, that flight.)&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>But you can\u2019t\u2026 You can talk about bicycles; you can build them; you can repair them; you can have discourses on them without ever having experienced the bike. And what the school men are trying to do is change the subject. The subject&nbsp;<strong>ceases<\/strong>&nbsp;to be that sensation\/that wonderment\/that childlike experience of getting in the seat and running down the road and leaning as you propel yourself under your own strength into something that nearly replicates flight itself\u2014and changes that into something that can be controlled and bona fide, and we can credential it, and we can give you a Bachelors of Bicycle-dom, and we can give you a Masters of Derailleurs. Now we\u2019re getting even more specialized, because it\u2019s not simply the bicycle as one component. At the Masters level, we\u2019re talking derailleurs. And if you would like to go on to and graduate to axles, well, that\u2019s a Ph.D.&nbsp;&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>And so, we never encounter the&nbsp;<strong>vision<\/strong>. We can fill libraries up with crap&nbsp;<strong>talking<\/strong>&nbsp;about it and never&nbsp;<strong>do<\/strong>&nbsp;it. And the gospel that Christ delivered and the thing that Joseph was trying to describe for us was the&nbsp;<strong>doing<\/strong>&nbsp;of it.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>There was another analogy, and I like it a lot, too. It\u2019s an analogy I borrow from Jon Larsen, and it\u2019s not original with me. He likens it to the launch pad that\u2019s built down at Cape Canaveral, where we have this enormous infrastructure, and it\u2019s all kept and preserved and polished and\u2026 But if you never fly anything out of it, then all you\u2019ve got is a launch pad. The gospel of Christ was designed to be a launch pad. One of the unfortunate things about launching is you melt a bunch of stuff, and you make a mess. I mean, anytime you fire one off, it gets kind of ugly for a while.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>And of all things we Mormons would like to be, it\u2019s orderly and punctual and uniform. We would hate to have the mess, the chaos, the disaster of\u2026&nbsp;&nbsp;I mean, we all remember&nbsp;<s>John<\/s>&nbsp;[Hiram] Page, right? And we got a section in the Doctrine and Covenants about Page. And he\u2019s the guy with the peep stone\/the seer stone that got rebuked for having visions because it came from the wrong place.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Well, you know,&nbsp;<strong>we learned the wrong lesson from that!<\/strong>&nbsp;The lesson from that is not that&nbsp;<s>John<\/s>&nbsp;[Hiram] Page got misled and had a false revelation using a peep stone that gave him bad information. The message from that is spirits were afoot. Now, let\u2019s get\u2026 Let\u2019s weed them out, let\u2019s figure out which ones are bad and which ones are good, but let\u2019s stay in touch with them. Let\u2019s keep the dialogue going. Take that stone, and take a hammer to it. Go find some others, because as far as I know,&nbsp;<s>John<\/s>&nbsp;[Hiram] Page is the only one (other than Joseph) in this dispensation who claimed to have contemporaneous revelation using a seer stone. Although I\u2019m sure there were others, they aren\u2019t published. Well, yeah. I mean, the whole idea\u2026 The idea of the crystal ball gazing, the Urim and Thummim\u2014these things\u2026 They\u2019re traditions, they\u2019re echoes; they\u2019re found everywhere, and they\u2019re based upon the truth.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Well, look. Ether chapter 4, verse 11 (I\u2019m going to the last sentence of it\u2014Ether 4, verse 11):<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><em>For because of my Spirit he shall know that these things are true; for it persuadeth men to do good. And whatsoever thing persuadeth men to do good is of me; for good cometh of none save it be of me. I am the same that leadeth men to all good; he that will not believe my words will not believe me\u2014that I am.<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>See, \u201che that will not believe my words will not believe me.\u201d It\u2019s a real simple test. Did the words you heard originate from God? You should be able to tell that. You should be able to say, sitting and listening, \u201cI hear God in that.\u201d And then whoever it is that is speaking, it doesn\u2019t matter if she\u2019s an elderly widow. It doesn\u2019t matter. It doesn\u2019t matter if he\u2019s the stake president\u2014it doesn\u2019t matter. You have to hear&nbsp;<strong>Him&nbsp;<\/strong>in the words that come. And then, it ceases to be the woman or the man who is standing in front of you, and it becomes the Lord. And the person is simply\u2026 I mean, good for them; they resonated with Him, and they caught on to something.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Turn back to Moroni chapter 7; it\u2019s the same thing. Moroni chapter 7, verse 16:&nbsp;<em>For behold, the Spirit of Christ is given to every man<\/em>. Wow, now there\u2019s another thought. The Spirit of Christ given to everyone. You have a link to Christ. By virtue of the fact that you\u2019re here, you have a link to Christ. K?<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><em>The Spirit of Christ is given to every man<\/em>&nbsp;[and in this sense, \u201cman\u201d means mankind; it\u2019s not sexist]<em>, that he may know good from evil; wherefore, I show unto you the way to judge; for every thing which inviteth to do good, and to persuade to believe in Christ, is sent forth by the power and gift of Christ; wherefore ye may know with a perfect knowledge it is of God. But whatsoever thing persuadeth men to do evil, and believe not in Christ, and deny him, and serve not God, then ye may know with a perfect knowledge it is of the devil; for after this manner doth the devil work, for he persuadeth no man to do good, no, not one; neither do his angels; neither do they who subject themselves unto him.<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Satan is so committed to doing evil that he\u2019s treacherous even to those that\u2019ll follow him. He won\u2019t support those who say, \u201cI\u2019ll follow you, Satan, if you\u2019ll do something for me.\u201d And Satan\u2019ll say, \u201cI\u2019ll do it. Come, follow me.\u201d And you come follow him, and he doesn\u2019t support you, and you say, \u201cWait a minute. You said you\u2019d make that bargain!\u201d And he says, \u201cI\u2019m a liar from the beginning. I\u2019ll always tell you what you what to hear, because I\u2019m a liar.\u201d&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>[audience comment]<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Yeah, he is unreliable. He doesn\u2019t even support those who follow him, as the Book of Mormon makes the point (repeatedly) with those who, after having followed him and succeeded in bringing others to apostatize, are not sustained by him.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Well, the thing to fear is not the existence of Satan or the fact that you may be deceived. That\u2019s a given. Turn on your TV. Uh, I don\u2019t know&#8230;do Toyota trucks really get that mileage? I mean, you\u2019re being deceived every time Wall Street has your attention. The glitter, the glitz, the garbage they\u2019re trying to sell you. If you love your family, you\u2019ll buy some wretched piece of trinkery from someone somewhere because they know you like families. If you love your wife, you\u2019ll do some hopelessly pathetic physical acquisition and make an offering to the goddess, and then she\u2019ll be pleased. And it doesn\u2019t work that way! Because if you come bearing rings and trinkets and you\u2019re a jerk, she\u2019s gonna see right through the rings and the trinket to the jerk. It\u2019s just\u2026 They\u2019re not fooled! Hollywood says, \u201cHey! Trick them this way, and you know, we\u2019ve got Viagra for the elderly. It could work out.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>It\u2019s not difficult (as Moroni points out, both in his interlude in Ether and again in chapter 7 of Moroni), it\u2019s not difficult to tell the difference. It\u2019s really not. \u201cSatan deceived me!\u201d Well, why did he deceive me? \u201cWell, he deceived me primarily because I wanted to be deceived. I knew it was a crappy deal. I knew what I was up to was no good. I had this nagging feeling at my core, because I am, after all, made of light and truth, that something was wrong with this. But I did it anyway.\u201d I mean, how many times do those who are caught\u2014the primary antagonists of the Book of Mormon, when they\u2019re caught, and they\u2019re not supported by Satan, and they collapse at the last day\u2014how many times do they confess, \u201cYeah, I knew all along I was deceived. I knew all along it was wrong, but I did it, I taught it, I preached it, I participated in it, I urged it. I knew it was a lie, but I nearly believed it myself because I had success at it. It looked good; it felt good. It was fun.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>There is nothing more fun, however, than gathering light and truth. We\u2019re sent down here on a journey in which we are supposed to be getting \u201cadded upon.\u201d Those are the words. That was the goal. We\u2019re gonna send people down to the second estate, and what\u2019s the goal? The goal is to be added upon. But what are we adding? What are you&nbsp;<strong>adding<\/strong>&nbsp;to yourself that you didn\u2019t have before? You\u2019re adding light and truth. You came with a certain amount of it. You\u2019re supposed to leave with a greater&nbsp;<strong>quantity<\/strong>&nbsp;of it.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>The description given in section 93 of Christ:<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><em>I, John, bear record that I beheld his glory<\/em>&nbsp;[this is verse 11 of section 93,&nbsp;<em>his glory<\/em>]<em>, as the glory of the Only Begotten of the Father.<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>You know, you\u2019re just gonna have to do your best with this. We\u2019ve got this idea that God the Father and his unnamed Consort (Mrs. God the Father) had a Son (and we know Him as Jesus or Jehovah) and then had another son or sons and some others, and then we got a Lucifer. And then some others and what have you. And then this group, these are called \u201csons of morning.\u201d And then there\u2019s this birth order, and eventually, we get down to the rabble that we were among. And that that picture is this linear development of the family of God.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>If you read very carefully what we find in section 93, there\u2019s another picture. And that picture is that you have this group of\u2026 Imagine all of these being little stick figures because I don\u2019t have the time to draw them. You have them all, and\u2026&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Oh, I think I can read you something on this. Yeah:<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><em>This is the manner after which they were ordained\u2014being called and prepared from the foundation of the world according to the foreknowledge of God, on account of their exceeding faith and good works; in the first place being left to choose good or evil; therefore they having chosen good, and exercis[ed exceeding] great faith, are called with a holy calling\u2026Or in fine,&nbsp;<strong>in the first place<\/strong>&nbsp;they were on the same standing with their brethren.<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>K? This is chapter 13 of Alma. So, let\u2019s change that picture, and let\u2019s say that instead of this [referencing the original picture Denver drew], everyone was on the same\u2026 \u201cIn the first place\u2026\u201d In the first place everyone was just alike. Everyone had the same potential. Everyone had the same light and truth. Everyone was made of that. Everyone was just like one another.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>Where did the birth order come from? Where did Christ come from?<\/strong>&nbsp;93, beginning at verse 11, this is John (and I\u2019m starting at verse 11, but we\u2019ll back up in a minute):<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><em>And I, John, bear record that I beheld his glory, as the glory of the Only Begotten of the Father,&nbsp;<strong>full<\/strong>&nbsp;of grace and truth, even the Spirit of truth, which came and dwelt in the flesh, and dwelt among us\u2026&nbsp;&nbsp;<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>K? This is Him; He came, and He dwelt here. \u201c[But] I\u2026\u201d I\u2019m talking about the pre-existence\u2026&nbsp;&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>&#8230;<em>I<\/em>&nbsp;<em>saw that he received not&#8230;the fulness at first&nbsp;<\/em>[He received not the fulness at first]<em>, but continued from grace to grace, until he received a fulness; &#8230;thus he was called the Son of God, because he received not&#8230;the fulness at the first.<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>What did He do? One of this group\/one of this family\/one of this assortment of people\/one of them went from grace to grace until He received a fullness.&nbsp;<strong>He proved<\/strong>&nbsp;it could be done.&nbsp;<strong>He showed<\/strong>&nbsp;the way.&nbsp;<strong>He<\/strong>&nbsp;was&nbsp;<strong>called<\/strong>&nbsp;the Only Begotten of the Father. He was called that because&nbsp;<strong>He<\/strong>&nbsp;embodied the word of God. Would you like to know what God the Father\u2019s word was? Look at Him. Look at the Only Begotten. Did you make it without Him? No, you didn\u2019t. You didn\u2019t make it&nbsp;<strong>here<\/strong>&nbsp;without Him.&nbsp;<strong>Christ proved the word of the Father by the things which He did<\/strong><em>.<\/em>&nbsp;As a consequence of Christ doing it, some few others, in turn, were also able to rise up. And they became \u201csons of the morning.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>You see, the picture that we get in D&amp;C section 93 (coupled with Alma chapter 13) is different than the picture that you sometimes pick out or get described for you. Look at verse 30 of section 93:<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><em>All truth is independent in that sphere in which God has placed it, to act for itself, as all intelligence also; otherwise there is no existence.<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Did Christ exist? If Christ existed, He had to be free to choose for Himself. This had to be a&nbsp;<strong>voluntary<\/strong>&nbsp;act on His part. He had to be willing to receive the light and truth.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Believe it or not, we\u2019re all just talking about the same thing. This is just about personal revelation. All of it is. And it\u2019s about how&nbsp;<strong>you<\/strong>&nbsp;receive light and truth. Because we\u2019re acting out again here what we acted out once before, and the process is the same here as the process was there\u2014although here it\u2019s coupled with a lot of illusions that are guaranteed to make you progress whether you want to or not\u2014it\u2019s coming.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>So, when you look at the&nbsp;<strong>word of God<\/strong>, what you\u2019re seeing in Christ is the embodiment or the fulfillment of what the Father&nbsp;<strong>said<\/strong>. When Christ defines Himself in 3rd Nephi chapter 11, and He tells you who He is, He can\u2019t tell you who He is without referring to the Father three times in a very brief introduction:&nbsp;<em>I&#8230;suffered the will of the Father in all things from the beginning<\/em>, He tells us. He is the word of the Father. He is the embodiment of the things that the Father would like to have for us. So, why do we obey the commandments? Why do we follow the process? Why do&nbsp;<strong>we<\/strong>&nbsp;want to go from grace to grace, and&nbsp;<strong>how<\/strong>&nbsp;do we open the third eye to be able to resonate with and receive light and truth into ourselves from the Being who is defined as light and truth?<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Well, I read another book just a few days ago. (I\u2019ve heard that he\u2019s written a good book. I was challenged to read this one, and I was challenged&nbsp;<strong>by<\/strong>&nbsp;reading it.) You just\u2026 You can\u2019t pick up that title without\u2026 Well, maybe&nbsp;<strong>you<\/strong>&nbsp;can:&nbsp;<em>Odds Are, You\u2019re Going to Be Exalted<\/em>. Well, he\u2019s got a \u201cMaster\u2019s degree in theology and a Ph.D. in biblical studies.\u201d So, he has credentials: Alonzo Gaskill\u2014actually, I was gonna leave him alone, but I heard him on the radio a couple of days ago, and it was that\u2026 It was the tone in his voice\u2014it was the absolute, resolute, bitter, hostile conviction that \u201cGod wouldn\u2019t do that!\u201d on the radio that just struck me, convinced me I don\u2019t want to talk to the man. But in any event, here\u2019s a quote from his book:<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>The thought that God would promote something that would ensure that the vast majority of His children would never again be able to dwell in His presence is&nbsp;<strong>incomprehensible<\/strong>. And the assumption that our mother in heaven would idly sit back and allow such a guaranteed flop to eternally strip her of any interaction with her spirit offspring is equally unfathomable. Such could not\u2014and did not\u2014happen!<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>I couldn\u2019t contain myself, and I wrote,&nbsp;<strong>Why?<\/strong>&nbsp;You see, nature tells us that of all the male turtles that are born, precious few of them are ever going to survive long enough to reproduce. And of all the bull elk that are born, precious few of them are gonna survive long enough to ever reproduce.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>And he\u2019s made the cataclysmic leap of presuming that all children who die under the age of eight are promised something other than the Celestial kingdom (which is what the Scriptures say that they\u2019re promised\u2014they inherit the Celestial kingdom); he\u2019s leapt to \u201cexaltation,\u201d which is a different kind of life within the Celestial kingdom. And he does some math calculations based upon the Millennium, based upon the number of children infant mortality tells us will die before the age of eight, and the city of Enoch, and people who are unaccountable because they\u2019re mentally impaired\u2014which I presume would include most of the faculty of many of our learned universities\u2014equals, in his computation, that the odds are you\u2019re gonna be exalted.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>The problem is none of us fit in the category about which he\u2019s exalting. You\u2019ve lived beyond the age of eight (except the kids that aren\u2019t listening). And you\u2019re\u2026 Well, I was gonna say you\u2019re not retarded\u2014I need to at least hesitate on that point\u2014I don\u2019t think you\u2019re mentally impaired, although some of us are. And you don\u2019t live during the Millennium, and you weren\u2019t in the city of Enoch, and you\u2019re not part of the Nephite centuries and the post- visitation by Christ. I mean, the audience\u2026 You know, odds are you\u2019re gonna be exalted\u2026 Peddle that to children under eight, peddle it during the Millennium, maybe you got an audience. But the audience to which this is directed is&nbsp;<strong>you<\/strong>. And he\u2019s trying to tell you that this isn\u2019t hard, when everything that the Savior said implies very strongly that this&nbsp;<strong>is<\/strong>&nbsp;hard, and that \u201cfew there be that make it,\u201d and that it\u2019s designed (just like nature is designed) to start with a lot and to end up with a few.&nbsp;&nbsp;And the lessons of nature tell us that you will start with a lot, and you will end up with a few. Just like this overly generous outpouring of priesthood ordination to anyone who is twelve years old or older who happens to be baptized in the Church results in just the most promiscuous series of priesthood certificates of any dispensation ever. But then we read,<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><em>Behold, there&nbsp;<strong>are<\/strong>&nbsp;many called, but&nbsp;<strong>few<\/strong>&nbsp;are [then] chosen. And why are they not chosen? Because their hearts are [so set] upon the things of this world, [they] aspire to the honors of men, &#8230;they [don\u2019t] learn this one lesson\u2014That the rights of the priesthood are inseparably connected with the powers of heaven, and&#8230;the powers of heaven cannot be controlled nor handled only upon the principles of righteousness. That they may be conferred upon us, [it\u2019s] true; but when we undertake to cover our sins, or&#8230;gratify our pride, our vain ambition, or to exercise control or dominion or compulsion upon the souls of the children of men, in any degree of unrighteousness, behold, the heavens withdraw themselves; the Spirit of the Lord is grieved; and when [it\u2019s] withdrawn, Amen to the priesthood or the authority of that man.<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>See, odds are you are going to be\u2026a priest? Well, \u201cthat they may be conferred upon us, [it\u2019s] true.\u201d But I just read a bunch of limitations.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Odds are you\u2019re gonna be exalted? Well, you can go to the temple and fetch an ordinance, but unless it\u2019s sealed upon you by the Holy Spirit of Promise, you know, all those things are conditional. And so, it\u2019s not\u2026 The call is to&nbsp;<strong>do<\/strong>&nbsp;this. The call is to come down here and be a gatherer of light. And it doesn\u2019t matter if the process seems so ephemeral; it seems gossamer. It seems like the web of a spider and so delicate that the blowing of the wind can tear it apart. That\u2019s exactly how it\u2019s supposed to be. Because you\u2019re trying to get in harmony with God. And you\u2019re trying to gather a substance that proves your existence by your free will choice to accept light and truth. When you do, Joseph said you could&nbsp;<strong>taste<\/strong>&nbsp;the truth. When you do, you can&nbsp;<strong>feel<\/strong>&nbsp;the truth. You can sense its presence; you can let it in to you; you can resonate with it. The&#8230;umm\u2026&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>(Boy, we\u2019re not going to have the time to get through this stuff. And I have to go buy frozen pinky mice. Yeah.)<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>When you go back to the account that\u2019s given in section 93 and you go back to the description that\u2019s given in Abraham chapter 3, you learn in Abraham chapter 3 that the Father shows (Christ shows, acting in the role as the Father) all of the organized intelligences that existed before the world was; and among this all there were a subset called \u201cmany\u201d that were noble and great (if you can read that scratch).<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><em>&#8230;saw many that were noble and great. And God saw&nbsp;<strong>these souls<\/strong>&nbsp;that they were good&#8230;&nbsp;<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>These<\/strong>&nbsp;souls, that they were good,<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><em>&#8230;and he stood in the midst of them, and he said: These I will make my rulers.<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>These are the people that are gonna teach truth and light. These are the ones that are gonna come down and bring to you revelation. These are the ones that are gonna shed forth light and truth. They\u2019re not administrators.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><em>These [will I] make my rulers; for he stood among those that were spirits, &#8230;he saw&#8230;they were good; and he said unto me: Abraham\u2026&nbsp;<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>So, we know that one of them is like the Son of God, but another one is Abraham.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><em>Abraham, thou art one of them; thou wast chosen before thou wast born. &#8230;there stood one among them that was like unto God\u2026&nbsp;&nbsp;<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>And that\u2019s Christ. Christ stood among them, k? He (Christ),<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><em>&#8230;he said [to] those [that] were with him:&nbsp;<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>K? Christ talking to \u201cnoble and great,\u201d He says to them,&nbsp;&nbsp;\u201cWe, we will go down.\u201d&nbsp;<strong>This<\/strong>&nbsp;group\u2026&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><em>We will go down, for there is space there, &#8230;we will take of these materials, &#8230;we will make an earth whereon these may dwell; And&nbsp;<strong>we<\/strong>&nbsp;will prove&nbsp;<strong>them<\/strong>\u2026to see if&nbsp;<strong>they<\/strong>&nbsp;will do all things whatsoever the Lord their God shall command them; And they who keep their first estate\u2026&nbsp;<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>&#8230;and so on. Well\u2026&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>This is from the&nbsp;<em>Teachings of the Prophet Joseph Smith<\/em>, from page 375:<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>\u201cNow,\u201d says God, when He visited Moses in the bush, (Moses was a stammering sort of a boy like me) God said, \u201cThou shalt be a God unto the children of Israel.\u201d God said, \u201cThou shalt be a God unto Aaron, and he shall be thy spokesman.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>I [this is Joseph, I] believe those Gods that God reveals as Gods to&nbsp;<strong>be<\/strong>&nbsp;sons of God, and all can cry, \u201cAbba, Father!\u201d Sons of God who exalt themselves to&nbsp;<strong>be<\/strong>&nbsp;Gods, even from before the foundation of the world, and are the only Gods I have a reverence for.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>This is Joseph, just in the middle of a talk, saying that there is a group who exalted themselves to&nbsp;<strong>be<\/strong>&nbsp;gods even before they were born, and all of them can cry, \u201cAbba, Father!\u201d&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Well, Abraham served as the prophet-leader of a little, tiny family. We read about him now and think him \u201cbig cheese,\u201d but at the time, he led a badly-fractured family and presided over a small group. His apparent one public ministry in Jerusalem resulted in him getting run out of town. From then on, he ministered only inside his own family. Abraham (while he had a fairly interesting career in a varied climate and managed to get to sit on Pharaoh\u2019s throne because he taught some things about the heavens and ingratiated himself to Pharaoh\u2014not the least of reason was his wife and her beauty) went on to lead a relatively private life in a&nbsp;<strong>family<\/strong>\u2014in a family. And we all call him the father of the righteous.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Christ\u2019s largest audience was, in all likelihood, the group He spoke to at the temple in Bountiful&nbsp;<strong>after<\/strong>&nbsp;His resurrection. During His mortal ministry, in all probability, even in the temple He didn\u2019t have as big an audience as He did at the temple in Bountiful. Perhaps as He hung on the cross, as the crowds were gathering to attend the festivities at the Passover in Jerusalem, more people passed by Him and wagged their tongue at Him in His final state of making the sacrifice, but we don\u2019t know that.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>The folks who the Scriptures identify as being most clearly \u201cnoble and great\u201d are people that really didn\u2019t have much more responsibility in life than every one of you have inside your own family. You know, we get filled with covetousness because celebrity-dom has come to Zion. And I mean this in all sincerity: I do not intend to be a celebrity, and it\u2019s one of the reasons why I don\u2019t like talking at these things. Because I think to the extent that you attract attention for yourself, you\u2019re missing the mark. The best of us are horribly flawed, the&nbsp;<strong>best<\/strong>&nbsp;of us are. Anyone that would attract light or distract people for themselves and take it off of the perfect example that you find in Christ is a fool. They practice the wrong sort of religion.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>We\u2019re down here to gather light. Whether you recognize it or not,&nbsp;<strong>you&nbsp;<\/strong>are a son or a daughter of light. That\u2019s what you are. You\u2019re down here to gather more of it. And the place where you\u2019re primarily responsible for presiding and conducting is inside the confines of your own family. That\u2019s why Abraham is remembered. That\u2019s why Lehi is remembered. For the most part, the public ministry of ancient prophets was met with almost universal failure. Noah saved his own family. You rarely find a prophet or prophet<strong>ess<\/strong>&nbsp;(and they are in Scripture, as well) who succeeds in their own lifetime.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Christ got it right when He was saying the only words of the prophets that you really respect are the dead ones. And why do you respect the dead ones? Well, because then the professors of religion can take over, and they can package them and parse them and explain them\u2014or explain them away. Without the living oracle there to be able to say, \u201cNot so fast!\u201d you can take the words of any of them and parlay them into whatever you want them to become. Hence, Joseph\u2019s insistence that every one of us become a prophet and prophetess, every one of us get in touch with the things of the spirit, every one of us receive what is out there in the way of light and welcome it into yourself. Vessels of light\u2014that\u2019s what you\u2019re supposed to be.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>You know, it\u2019s very basic, and I think it\u2019s (in all likelihood) the case that the first principles and ordinances of the gospel are not the&nbsp;<strong>first<\/strong>&nbsp;principles (meaning the beginning), but they are the first principles meaning the primary\/the essentials\/the ones that&nbsp;<strong>must<\/strong>&nbsp;be kept\/the ones that are always in front of you:&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\">\n<li><em>Faith<\/em>\u2014you have to have faith in the existence of that light and that truth.&nbsp;<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li><em>Repentance<\/em>\u2014why? Because you\u2019re made of light and truth, and if you won\u2019t reconcile and resonate with it, you won\u2019t welcome it in. You create a barrier to it; it can\u2019t be shed into you.&nbsp;<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li>Faith. Repentance.&nbsp;<em>Baptism<\/em>\u2014you\u2019re supposed to be doing that every week when you partake of the sacrament (that ordinance that Christ celebrated repeatedly with the Nephites over and over). He\u2019s taking the time to do the sacrament, and we\u2019re supposed to be taking the time to doing that.<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li>And then after you have had faith, and after you\u2019ve repented, and after you\u2019ve partaken of the sacrament or received baptism, then what happens? Yeah, you&nbsp;<em>receive the<\/em>&nbsp;<em>Holy Ghost<\/em>.&nbsp;<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n\n\n\n<p>You receive the Holy Ghost. D&amp;C section 130, \u201cThe Father\u2026\u201d This is verse 22:&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><em>The Father has a body of flesh and bones as tangible as man\u2019s; the Son also; but the Holy Ghost has not a body of flesh and bones, but is a personage of Spirit. Were it not so, the Holy Ghost could not&nbsp;<strong>dwell in us<\/strong>.<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Receive the Holy Ghost, and let it&nbsp;<strong>dwell<\/strong>&nbsp;in you.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Well, you know, it\u2019s\u2026 I don\u2019t know if the odds are you\u2019re gonna be exalted or not, but I can tell you that the way in which that will happen, if it does happen, is going to be through\u2014unlike the way revelation is portrayed in this, the latest offering by the powers that be, as something perverse and something that only the nutcases engage in\u2014it will be by your connection with the spirit.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Moroni chapter 7 is a dissertation on all of those things of the spirit, and it says, \u201cHey, if these things have ceased, then there is no faith, and no one\u2019s being saved.\u201d And it\u2019s just that simple. If it doesn\u2019t happen, no one\u2019s being saved. You\u2019re a child of light; you\u2019re a son or a daughter of light. You proceed from the glory of God or the intelligence of God, which is light and truth. At your core, what is there is light and truth. But it has been made independent. It gets to choose for itself. Otherwise, there is no existence.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>And you\u2014each of you\u2014need to receive the Holy Ghost\u2014each of you\u2014and to permit it to dwell in you. You know, there are a lot of symbols that get employed in the Scriptures. One of the words that gets employed to describe the Holy Ghost (which should dwell in&nbsp;<strong>you<\/strong>), is \u201cthe third member of the godhead.\u201d Would you like to be like your Father in Heaven? Well, then, receive ye the Holy Ghost. He is as close, He is as intimate, He is as in connection with you as the very substance out of which you were originally organized. If you would like to be in touch with Him, keep His commandments.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Follow Him. You\u2019re not\u2026 Even if you do your best, you\u2019re not gonna do a very good job. But the Scriptures talk in terms of your sincerity: those who keep all His commandments or&nbsp;<strong>seek earnestly to do so<\/strong>. Even the best of us are doing things wrong that we don\u2019t even know are wrong yet, because we haven\u2019t&nbsp;<strong>got<\/strong>&nbsp;that much light and truth&nbsp;<strong>yet<\/strong>. And so, we proceed to blunder around in the china shop, breaking the furniture and damaging all of the things that we ought to be holding sacred, and we do it with reckless abandon. And God doesn\u2019t care about that, because He hasn\u2019t brought us that far up the ladder yet to respect the furniture. He\u2019s just trying to get us to stop messing our pants and stop putting graffiti on the walls\u2014if we\u2019ll just settle down enough to do that.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>The atonement of Christ is a work in progress. He\u2019s trying to fix us, and He does that by giving us a little light, and a little more light, and a little more yet. Until finally you look back upon yourself from two decades earlier, and you say, \u201cWhat a wretch was I!\u201d Well, it\u2019s a progression in light and truth. You\u2019re still a wretch, you\u2019re just 20 years away from recognizing it still.&nbsp;<strong>Start obeying further<\/strong>&nbsp;and getting more light and truth, and you\u2019ll be astonished at what it is you\u2019re going to become.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Well, let me end by bearing testimony to you that, in my view, the Church is exactly what it ought to be, staffed exactly as it should be, filled with all you good people, with all of the things that you bring with you to the party. And that this is a perfect environment in which each one of you get the opportunity to work out your own salvation with fear and trembling before the Lord. And you ought to be afraid. You ought to be fearful, because the things that you hold onto in your secret sins are the very things that you ought to be abandoning. And the fact that you\u2019re holding on to them means you have not yet chosen the light and the truth. You ought to be abandoning that junk, whatever it is.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>We all have our shortcomings. We all have our temptations. We all have our failings.:<\/p>\n\n\n\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\">\n<li><strong>Despite<\/strong>&nbsp;the bundle of insecurities (and there were&nbsp;<strong>many<\/strong>&nbsp;in the prophet Joseph Smith), the prophet Joseph Smith met the Lord.&nbsp;<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li>Despite the fact that&nbsp;<s>Abraham<\/s>&nbsp;[Isaiah] was a self-confessed man of unclean lips in the presence of the Lord didn\u2019t stop him from entering into the presence of the Lord.&nbsp;<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li>The fact that Peter is\u2026 Peter is not even a personality; he\u2019s a syndrome. OK? He\u2019s got pathologies. This\u2026 Peter: the chief apostle, the rock, the one that the Lord relied upon, the one that He put first and preeminent.&nbsp;<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li>And Paul? Well, look\u2026 You have to trust Paul to someone with far more\u2026 They have to have prescription authority to deal with him. You can\u2019t\u2026 A psychologist is insufficient.&nbsp;<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>These people met with the Lord<\/strong>.&nbsp;&nbsp;It is not a distant mountain. It is not an insurmountable problem.&nbsp;&nbsp;Have faith, repent, go and partake of the sacrament\u2014do so (and I use the word advisedly), do so&nbsp;<strong>worthily<\/strong>.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>By the way, do you know how to determine if you\u2019re worthy or not? You ask the Lord. You don\u2019t do as brother Gaskill suggests and simply presume it. You do as Joseph said: And after thinking about his native cheery temperament and his inclination towards irreverence, he decided to inquire of the Lord to find out what his standing was. It had been four years since the First Vision, and Joseph wanted to know. Joseph didn\u2019t presume. In fact, if he were presuming, he would have presumed to the contrary that he was worthy. \u201cHow am I doing, Lord?\u201d And the Lord answered, in the form of the angel Moroni.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>You know, don\u2019t settle for a book about riding the bike. Don\u2019t settle for polishing up the launch pad. It was designed to be set in motion. It was designed to engage you. You\u2019re supposed to be part of this. The prophetic history of all that we read needs to come down to and be embodied in you and your life.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>You have whole generations of people that went before you and you have people that are coming after whose faith, just like our faith in the pre-existence, was stimulated by the word of God embodied in the life of Christ. You have people looking upon you and having faith as a consequence of what you\u2019re doing. You\u2019re called \u201csaviors on Mount Zion\u201d not simply because you trek to the temple, and you fall asleep during the endowment. You\u2019re called that because all of those that went before and all who come after have an investment in your life.&nbsp;<strong>You<\/strong>!&nbsp;<strong>You<\/strong>&nbsp;are the source of faith.&nbsp;<strong>You<\/strong>&nbsp;are the source of light for many.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Live your life as if you\u2019re on stage because, believe me, you are. There are people who are being redeemed as a consequence of the investment that they have in you. A failing, flagging, despondent ancestor is being buoyed up by the example you set. You have no private moments, and you have no private sins, so stop holding on to them. For goodness sake, they\u2019re not only being shouted on the rooftops in the day of judgment, they\u2019re being shouted on the rooftops right now. This is only the illusion of privacy. Everything you do is on display, which is why it is so important that you be one who gathers light and truth.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>You be one who is open to receiving these things, which&nbsp;<strong>God offers liberally<\/strong>\u2014liberally, however perverse that may be in political terms in Utah, that\u2019s a descriptor of God. He spends money like a Democrat with the federal budget when it comes to giving you light and truth. God giveth liberally. Deficit spending doesn\u2019t matter. He gives liberally, so where\u2019s the impediment?&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>The impediment is that we lack the faith to bring ourselves into harmony with perfect perpendicularity to the Earth\u2014because as long as you\u2019re in sympathy with the Earth, you\u2019re out of sync with heaven. You have to get perpendicular to it. You have to draw a line between you and it. And when you draw a line\u2026 That\u2019s one of the reasons why we have gravity. That\u2019s one of the symbols that God gave us in this life. If you can walk, you\u2019re walking around teaching a lesson about \u201cgetting in harmony with God\u201d to yourself. All things testify of Christ. They all do.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>And I bear testimony of Him in His name, Amen.\u00a0<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/restorationarchives.net\/pdf\/2008.08.16_Personal-Revelation_transcript.pdf\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">TRANSCRIPT<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>The following talk by Denver, discussing personal revelation, was originally given on August 16th 2008, in Sandy, Utah.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[8],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-673","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-podcast"],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v26.4 - 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