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wayfarer wrote:cwald wrote:
Sure. I want to give the guy the benefit of the doubt as well. I’m just a little bit jaded right now.
-sigh- The best i can do, with the benefit of doubt, is 2.8
Hmmm. I take it you won’t be attending a full-year course on the teachings of the 14 fundamentals and the guy who spoke them?😆 😆 Funny – our HPGL emailed us the lesson schedule for the year a few days ago and I am already planning which Sundays to skip.
Quote:our HPGL emailed us the lesson schedule for the year a few days ago and I am already planning which Sundays to skip.
I too, scanned the years offering, and wasn’t much impressed, except for Lesson #3, on Free Agency. I was reasonably impressed with the discussion. But what caught my eye was one reference to Obedience. I immediately emailed my HPGL and asked to teach that lesson. Those two principles taken together encompass some powerful concepts, for example
First of all Obedience and Free Agency are foundational concepts going back to the ore-existence:
Lucifer’s plan for forcing obedience was overtly rejected, even with it meaning 1/3 the host of heaven were lost forever
Christ’s alternative overtly gave us our free agency,to experiment and choose for ourselves. It also provided a way that Christ would pay
for our sins, providing we mend our ways, i.e. repent.
We have no need to be a puppet on a string, following every perceived command by our file leaders and/or God
Free agency means far more than political and economic freedom
We must make decisions every day that contribute to developing a Christ like character: Think compassion, altruism, generosity, loving
God and your fellow man, anger management, driving friendly, emotionally support your family, regardless of whether you approve,
etc. etc. etc
On the surface obedience and free agency are counter to one another, a paradox
Our task is to learn to want to choose good
But since every blessing is predicated upon the principle upon which it is predicated, that shouldn’t be terribly impossible.
Science and engineering have shown us how such obedience can give us such marvels as jet airplanes, the internet, medical science.
Likewise, I believe obedience to fundamental gospel principles brings us more joy, peace and comfort. I most cases we don’t have to
wait for the hereafter to realize some benefits. After all, man is that he might have joy.
wayfarer wrote:cwald wrote:Sure. I want to give the guy the benefit of the doubt as well. I’m just a little bit jaded right now.
-sigh- The best i can do, with the benefit of doubt, is 2.8
Hmmm. I take it you won’t be attending a full-year course on the teachings of the 14 fundamentals and the guy who spoke them?😆
[emoji6]I would love to hear that lesson, dash1730. Quote:Old-Timer » I would love to hear that lesson, dash1730.
I’ll be happy to share it when I get it put together. My biggest advantage is the lesson manual that focuses strongly on free agency and mentions obedience only in passing. My biggest challenge is to present it in a way that doesn’t offend.
dash1730 wrote:Quote:our HPGL emailed us the lesson schedule for the year a few days ago and I am already planning which Sundays to skip.
I too, scanned the years offering, and wasn’t much impressed, except for Lesson #3, on Free Agency. I was reasonably impressed with the discussion. But what caught my eye was one reference to Obedience. I immediately emailed my HPGL and asked to teach that lesson. Those two principles taken together encompass some powerful concepts, for example
First of all Obedience and Free Agency are foundational concepts going back to the ore-existence:
Lucifer’s plan for forcing obedience was overtly rejected, even with it meaning 1/3 the host of heaven were lost forever
Christ’s alternative overtly gave us our free agency,to experiment and choose for ourselves. It also provided a way that Christ would pay
for our sins, providing we mend our ways, i.e. repent.
We have no need to be a puppet on a string, following every perceived command by our file leaders and/or God
Free agency means far more than political and economic freedom
We must make decisions every day that contribute to developing a Christ like character: Think compassion, altruism, generosity, loving
God and your fellow man, anger management, driving friendly, emotionally support your family, regardless of whether you approve,
etc. etc. etc
On the surface obedience and free agency are counter to one another, a paradox
Our task is to learn to want to choose good
But since every blessing is predicated upon the principle upon which it is predicated, that shouldn’t be terribly impossible.
Science and engineering have shown us how such obedience can give us such marvels as jet airplanes, the internet, medical science.
Likewise, I believe obedience to fundamental gospel principles brings us more joy, peace and comfort. I most cases we don’t have to
wait for the hereafter to realize some benefits. After all, man is that he might have joy.
You do make a good point that teaching the lesson my way is an alternative to skipping. Just off hand and without looking at the manual, I’d probably volunteer to do 11 (Follow the Living Prophet) and 18 (Beware of Pride) rather than skip them. If 11 includes the 14 fundamentals I could easily leave them out, and I like Pres. Uchtdorf’s follow up to the Pride talk much better than Benson’s version – Pres. Uchtdorf is right when he says people were afraid to even speak the word pride after that talk (paraphrased).
DarkJedi.
Quote:If 11 includes the 14 fundamentals I could easily leave them out,
Indeed, it not only includes the 14 F’s, that is nearly the entire lesson. I am already dreading it. I need to learn to keep my mouth shut, but then I just feel irritated and uncomfortable. My mother is in my ward. If I skip class she always “worries” about me. I get the “I’m so glad you came” comment when I show up late. You would have no idea I am all grown up with kids and grand kids of my own. What is it about mothers and guilt??
:crazy: He was caught up in the Spirit but was not unconscious. “At this sacred moment, the natural world around him was excluded from his view, so that he could be open to the presentation of heavenly and spiritual things.” Orson Hyde(1842)
“My mind was taken away from the objects with which I was surrounded,” Wentworth Letter
I had forgotten about the Wentworth Letter as a description of the First Vision. The letter was reprinted in The Ensign of July 2002. https://www.lds.org/ensign/2002/07/the-wentworth-letter?lang=eng ” class=”bbcode_url”> https://www.lds.org/ensign/2002/07/the-wentworth-letter?lang=eng Quote:Believing the word of God, I had confidence in the declaration of James—“If any of you lack wisdom, let him ask of God, that giveth to all men liberally, and upbraideth not; and it shall be given him” [James 1:5]. I retired to a secret place in a grove and began to call upon the Lord. While fervently engaged in supplication, my mind was taken away from the objects with which I was surrounded, and
I was enwrapped in a heavenly visionand saw two glorious personages, who exactly resembled each other in features and likeness, surrounded with a brilliant light which eclipsed the sun at noonday. Quote:my mind was taken away from the objects with which I was surrounded, and I was enwrapped in a heavenly vision and saw two glorious personages, who exactly resembled each other in features and likeness, surrounded with a brilliant light which eclipsed the sun at noonday.
Oh how I love this.
:clap: I can believe and honor a persons vision. Visions are fantastic for inspiring, empowering, enlightening, and directing – and in this case freeing.Dark Jedi – You made my day. This needs to be in the quotes section.
mom3 wrote:Quote:my mind was taken away from the objects with which I was surrounded, and I was enwrapped in a heavenly vision and saw two glorious personages, who exactly resembled each other in features and likeness, surrounded with a brilliant light which eclipsed the sun at noonday.
Oh how I love this.
:clap: I can believe and honor a persons vision. Visions are fantastic for inspiring, empowering, enlightening, and directing – and in this case freeing.Dark Jedi – You made my day. This needs to be in the quotes section.
Whats also really cool about this is its totally biblical. The new testament has verses where this checks out. For example
“… and saw two glorious personages who exactly resembled each other in features and likeness”
Hebrews 1:2-3 “2. Hath in these last days spoken unto us by his Son, whom he hath appointed heir of all things, by who also he made the worlds; 3.Who being the brightness of his glory, and the express image of his person, and upholding all things by the word of his power, when he had by himself purged our sins, sat down on the right hand of the Majesty on high;”
Personally, I think that 1 and 2 can easily be melded together. They could have physically been there and or spiritually been there or even percentages of the two. Even 1 2 and 3 could be melded a little. I don’t think the immaterial nature of Spirit can be catagorized and defined by earthly means, I think we try, and thats why we have scripture in the first place. Visions and spiritual insights don’t follow ‘normal’ constructs. I’m sure we’ve all tried to write down in our journals some profound spiritual experience only to find that it pales to the actual experience of it. I’ve tried to capture it for future generations, and they won’t
getwhat Igot. In that sense, I give JS the benefit of the doubt regarding the differing accounts of the FV.I won’t say that 4 hasn’t crept into my mind and considered angles for it, even the whole conspiracy theory of Oliver and Sidney wanting to establish their own church and JS taking over. It just didn’t seem weighty to me.
So, long story short, I am in 1, 2, and 3.
Levi714 wrote:Whats also really cool about this is its totally biblical. The new testament has verses where this checks out. For example “… and saw two glorious personages who exactly resembled each other in features and likeness” Hebrews 1:2-3 “2. Hath in these last days spoken unto us by his Son, whom he hath appointed heir of all things, by who also he made the worlds; 3.Who being the brightness of his glory, and the express image of his person, and upholding all things by the word of his power, when he had by himself purged our sins, sat down on the right hand of the Majesty on high;”
I wonder if this couldn’t be interpreted symbolically or figuratively.
1) If Jesus looks exactly like God does that mean that Jesus didn’t inherit any of Mary’s genetic make-up?
2) I believe Isaiah foretells that Jesus wouldn’t be grand to look upon and the people from Nasereth did not seem to recall Jesus except as the son of the carpenter – would this mean that God is plain looking? (except for the brightness of his glory)
3) Does this mean that God has a beard?
Scoutmaster – I don’t have much of a problem with any of the versions. To me there is plausibility in all of them, especially given the human struggle to recall an event or to accurately portray it with words. Like you I have had deep spiritual experiences but words just kind of fall flat or I leave out something. Where my struggle comes is in the singular selection of one of the four being the cannon version. The unique variations are deeply powerful and deserve acknowledgement. I also struggle with the outgrowth that has been produced. Many read the “Vision” as a “Visitation” – and once that is stuck inside us, it is hard to separate. Our church stands by the idea that it was face to face, and that all churches are an abomination. Those are harsh words from a loving God.
As a person who believes in the more liberal God, I wish the church would throw open (the essay doesn’t count) all the first visions and build loving God narratives around them.
mom3 wrote:TScoutmaster – Many read the “Vision” as a “Visitation” – and once that is stuck inside us, it is hard to separate.
I agree once you have a paradigm of how things are and then you find out something that doesn’t fit into that box of how you imagined things to be it can be a hard thing to deal with and get past and is usually very uncomfortable for people.
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