- This topic is empty.
-
Posts
-
nibbler wrote:
Where I feel we need help is with the belief that being more obedient will earn us our desired blessing. Should the blessing not come, the default position becomes, “we must not have been obedient enough.” I hear a variant of this most Sundays.
I think this stems from D&C 130: 20-21 … “There is a law, irrevocably decreed in heaven before the foundations of this world, upon which all blessings are predicated— And when we obtain any blessing from God, it is by obedience to that law upon which it is predicated.”
That scripture gets referenced back to a lot. There is an old talk by RMN titled A Study in Obedience where he references that scripture and elaborates: “In other words, whenever a blessing is received, it’s because a law has been obeyed. And that means it will always work—not just most of the time, not just some of the time, but every single time without exception.”
I think the scripture above gives believers the illusion of control. For example, if I want to be blessed with peace or a spouse or a new job or a family or health or a stronger testimony, etc, etc all I need to do is obey the correct commandment and, according to the law that has been irrevocably decreed in heaven, I will (must) receive my desired blessing.
mfree6464 wrote:
nibbler wrote:
Where I feel we need help is with the belief that being more obedient will earn us our desired blessing. Should the blessing not come, the default position becomes, “we must not have been obedient enough.” I hear a variant of this most Sundays.
I think this stems from D&C 130: 20-21 … “There is a law, irrevocably decreed in heaven before the foundations of this world, upon which all blessings are predicated— And when we obtain any blessing from God, it is by obedience to that law upon which it is predicated.”
That scripture gets referenced back to a lot. There is an old talk by RMN titled A Study in Obedience where he references that scripture and elaborates: “In other words, whenever a blessing is received, it’s because a law has been obeyed. And that means it will always work—not just most of the time, not just some of the time, but every single time without exception.”
I think the scripture above gives believers the illusion of control. For example, if I want to be blessed with peace or a spouse or a new job or a family or health or a stronger testimony, etc, etc all I need to do is obey the correct commandment and, according to the law that has been irrevocably decreed in heaven, I will (must) receive my desired blessing.
I remember that RMN talk. I think it came during my FC when I was not a huge fan of the leadership to begin with, although in those days I was ambivalent about RMN himself. So I also remember what I thought during that time (essentially smoke was coming from you-know-where). But having matured in my faith (and/or rebuilt my faith) I see that scripture, and blessings in general, differently now. It could well be we get blessings for obeying specific commandments, but few of them have specific blessings tied to specific commandments. The WoW is an exception and I doubt those blessings (at 59 and in relatively good health, I do get weary when I run – but maybe that’s because I eat meat in summer and at times other than famine, or maybe it’s because I seldom run, but I digress). So, I didn’t murder anyone today (or ever) what am I blessed with because of that? I haven’t stolen anything in many years, how am I being blessed for that? Part of my issue is that I’m not really sure what blessings are and part of it is that everybody I associate with doesn’t murder or steal so we’re all blessed (and if we’re all blessed, is it a blessing? ). The biggest part of the issue I have is pointing out how I (or anyone else) am blessed for specific commandments I have kept. And that all rolls back to what you said: the belief that we are in control and all we have to do to get x is keep commandment y. Except we don’t know what y and x are. And taking that point of view is the plainest part of the prosperity gospel (doing y gets you blessing x, paying tithing – y- means you will never have financial difficulty – x). The other part of the problem here is that for some people doing y does seem to bring about x.
:wtf: If we see all our blessings as being in physical form, we become materialists. I wonder how this goes down in poor countries. SamBee wrote:
If we see all our blessings as being in physical form, we become materialists. I wonder how this goes down in poor countries.
Great point. If there really are blessings, I’m not sure they’re physical/temporal most of the time (if ever).
SamBee wrote:
If we see all our blessings as being in physical form, we become materialists. I wonder how this goes down in poor countries.
Poor countries tend to be far more religious than rich countries. It certainly helps “keep them in their place”. Promising spiritual blessings, or blessings in the next life, is a very easy thing to do. Which is probably why so many groups can get away with saying “Plant your seed of faith (in the form of money/subservience) now, and you will reap a thousand fold in the world to come”. “Blessed are the poor in spirit: for theirs is the kingdom of heaven… Blessed are the meek, for they shall inherit the earth.” Wonderful promises for keeping a destitute population in check.
Spiritual blessings are all that really can be offered, in part because they are so ambiguously defined and can never be disproven. You can try to make physical promised blessings and prophecies, but unless rooted in basic “cause and effect” or common sense, they’re going to be wildly inconsistent.
Prosperity gospel is bad for poor countries because they look at the rich countries and see how depraved and irreligious they are. The richest people in the world often don’t live gospel. There are rich people who are openly anti-Christian as well. “Wonderful promises for keeping a destitute population in check.”
And also for saying that the rich are evil! It’s certainly true that some poor people are happier than some rich people, so quality of life can be a strange thing.
The modern secular version of this in the West is the lie that anyone can become rich, which is not true. Yet many people believe it, and it shuts them up because they think they aren’t rich because they’re not working hard enough or maintaining a positive attitude.
All three of these positions contain subversive seeds. As I said, one can make the rich look evil, another makes evil look good, and the secular one produces long term resentment when it doesn’t deliver.
SamBee wrote:
It’s certainly true that some poor people are happier than some rich people….
That’s another thing the “rich” are happy to point out. On the one hand, the poor, needy, and destitute deserve their fate. But on the other hand, being rich is hard, and full of responsibility and its own problems… so you best leave being rich to us, and learn to appreciate what you have.
In fairness, not all rich people are bad, or approach the less-fortunate this way. Fixing poverty is hard, and the science is complicated. I have no doubt the Church would throw as much money at poverty as it could, if that would fix the problem (they would get a nice ROI). But that’s off topic. I think the heart of the problem is, much of the doctrine and teachings of the LDS Church, among others, resolves around this central thesis:
1. A being with knowledge and capabilities beyond human comprehension created everything and planned everything from the beginning.
2. This being has every individual member of humanity’s best interest at heart.
3. Therefore everyone’s life is catered to what they need most
4. Therefore everything happens for a reason
5. Therefore, there is no such thing as “luck”.
6. Therefore life makes sense and has inherent fairness
While there might be some goodness coming from some people believing these things, it naturally leads to the “prosperity gospel”, as well as passing judgement on the less fortunate, including ourselves, when things go “wrong”. We’re also less likely to try and “fix” things. We try to make sense of why bad things happen, or why good things happen, when a lot of the time, it boils down to luck. While I’m all for believing we can take steps to put the odds more in our favor, there are too many factors outside of our control… and to be blunt, outside of any reason comprehensible to humans.
I agree with you Dande:
dande48 wrote:
much of the doctrine and teachings of the LDS Church, among others, resolves around this central thesis:
I find it somewhat helpful to realize that this is not the only school of thought on the matter in the LDS church. Unfortunately, I say that it is only somewhat helpful because many people at church act as though that is the true and official doctrine and that to disagree is due to lack of faith or lack of loyalty to leadership or both. I currently take more of a deist view that God sets up the basic parameters of life in that each of us will do our best with whatever we find here. Perhaps a more couplet way to explain my belief is that “God does not give us what we can handle, He helps us to handle what we are given.”
Quote:Therefore everyone’s life is catered to what they need most
I also have discovered that some people that have lived very challenging lives take great comfort from the idea that their challenges and sorrows have been personalized, individually tailored, and master designed to maximize their glory and exaltation. IOW, other people might struggle with wealth and the associated trappings but it is not for us to complain, as our HF (who knows us better than we know ourselves) has made the decisions on who to place where based on where each individual will receive the most growth.I can certainly understand the appeal. In reading about and trying to understand people who have gone through terrible tragedy, it certainly can help if there might be some need, purpose, or meaning to it in a “larger plan”.
I found the following quote from my signature line in a book by LDS author Lowell Binnion:
Quote:“It is not so much the pain and suffering of life which crushes the individual as it is its meaninglessness and hopelessness.” C. A. Elwood
It can be tricky to give validation and equal footing to other possible schools of thought on this topic without reducing the standing or authority of this “central thesis” that some people have based their life meaning and hope for the future upon. Those people may feel personally attacked and get quite defensive. Tricky, tricky, indeed.Quote:That’s another thing the “rich” are happy to point out. On the one hand, the poor, needy, and destitute deserve their fate. But on the other hand, being rich is hard, and full of responsibility and its own problems… so you best leave being rich to us, and learn to appreciate what you have.
I don’t see it that way at all. It just proves that money makes you *comfortable* not happy. Physical comfort and happiness are two different things. Look at how many rich kids commit suicide or get into drugs…
There is no glamor in poverty, but I have known plenty of poor people who were better adjusted than their rich colleagues. The trouble with money is that you can never get enough of it. Many super rich people want to be richer still. It’s the trap of all gamblers, when they win, they want more and end up losing.
I’m not saying any of this in an attempt to excuse the inequality in society… Only that things don’t work out the way we’d expect. Besides there is no way in hell that millions of us can live how billionnaires do, for a variety of reasons.
There was a time in my life that I felt like I had been doing all the right things in church, (paying tithing, going to the temple, fasting, reading scriptures, praying. etc) but none of the blessings seemed to be coming. In fact everything had gotten worse. My kids were in trouble and my husband did not get his raise, the car and washer broke down, and now he left the church. Where we all the blasted blessings they kept preaching about from the pulpit. Then I came across some anti-Mormon stuff from the Tanners that quoted out of church history and Journal of Discourses. For the first time I thought that my church might be false. This 7th Day Adventist pastor handed me a little book called “The 5 Day Plan to Know God.” As I was reading, it talked about how the Jews were waiting for their Messiah to come save them from all their trials. When he came and told them he came to save them from their sins, not their problems, they were ticked off. A light bulb went off in me and I realized I was like those early Jews; waiting for God to save me from all my problems. Suddenly I realized I had been living the gospel for the wrong reasons. I knew immediately that the only thing I should be concerned about is being saved from my sins and that is why Jesus died for me. A real paradigm change for me.
I also read that Mother Theresa had her doubts in God at times. She knew God had called her to serve the least of these in India but later felt that God had abandoned her because she no longer felt God’s presence or help. Years later God spoke to her and said that the reason He had left her to her own was because he wanted her to understand what the people she was serving felt like (abandoned).
bridget_night wrote:
There was a time in my life that I felt like I had been doing all the right things in church, (paying tithing, going to the temple, fasting, reading scriptures, praying. etc) but none of the blessings seemed to be coming. In fact everything had gotten worse. My kids were in trouble and my husband did not get his raise, the car and washer broke down, and now he left the church. Where we all the blasted blessings they kept preaching about from the pulpit. Then I came across some anti-Mormon stuff from the Tanners that quoted out of church history and Journal of Discourses. For the first time I thought that my church might be false.This 7th Day Adventist pastor handed me a little book called “The 5 Day Plan to Know God.” As I was reading, it talked about how the Jews were waiting for their Messiah to come save them from all their trials. When he came and told them he came to save them from their sins, not their problems, they were ticked off. A light bulb went off in me and I realized I was like those early Jews; waiting for God to save me from all my problems. Suddenly I realized I had been living the gospel for the wrong reasons. I knew immediately that the only thing I should be concerned about is being saved from my sins and that is why Jesus died for me. A real paradigm change for me.
Thank you for this Bridget. There are blessings in Christianity, but they are not always the ones people think.
I remember Carl Jung was once asked if he cured any of his patients of their troubles, and he replied, “No, but I helped them
cope better“. Coping better is something the Gospel can give us. It can’t stop our bosses underpaying us or your children misbehaving… But it can help us cope better, which means we cause others less suffering, and it can make us feel happier sometimes.
- You must be logged in to reply to this topic.