Amen my friend.
I’ve been a member of the LDS Church for 42 years, having joined the Church of Jesus Chrost of Latter-day Saints as a teenager when me and my fmily had been Southern Baptists.
There are certainly differences in interpretation and doctrine, there are certainly (as there are with any religion or group) those, even in ledership, who speak their mind and opinions which does not always represent the church’s official position.
I have been around and around on this with most of those here on FR who seek to deride the LDS Church endlessly and tell us what we believe and label us as a non-Christian cult.
I do not intend to revisit all of those or even contend, debate, or discuss it further here.
However, in an effort to give a counter balance to what is sure to be an onsluaght of attacks on my faith, I will, here, as a faithful LDS member... “card carrying” so to speak, and one who supported Palin, then Cain, then Sanorum and now Newt...here is my own witness for Jesus Christ, my Lord and Savior.
My Witness for Christ
http://www.jeffhead.com/jlhwitness.htm
...and in terms of day to day living, here’s my journal regarding my fight with malignant bone cancer, and who I depended on in getting through it to this point, which has also been much discussed here on FR and where hundreds here have prayed for me in the name of Jesus for my health, as have I and my family, relying on His will in the end, for His will is what is roght.
My Sacral Chordoma
http://www.jeffhead.com/chordoma.htm
This is how I, and those I know who are LDS live. Folks may read about it and judge accordingly...according, as the Savior said, by the fruit.
label us as a non-Christian cult.
>>There are certainly differences in interpretation and doctrine,
Uhuh. Got Blood Atonement?
“That truth is great and will prevail, errors ceasing to be dangerous when it is permitted freely to contradict them”.
How does the Mormon Cult, America’s Islam, traditionaly deal with those who contradict them within the context of their militaristic purview?
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mountain_Meadows_massacre
Is the con artistry/doctrine associated with Planet Kolob an “error”?
Etc etc etc.
FAIL.
>>This is how I, and those I know who are LDS live.
How’s Jimmy Lewis enjoying “living” in Federal Prison?
>>My Sacral Chordoma
Do you have a Reformed Egyptian version?
Jeff,
I am responding to your continual posting of your “personal testimony” in
the post above.
Telling a half truth is not the same thing as telling the truth.
It is a lie with consequences.
... When you tell a half-truth about God’s nature, you make God into an idol.
... When you tell a half-truth about the Gospel, the result is eternity away from God.
... When you tell a half-truth about man, you repeat the sin of Satan.
Sadly your personal testimony, which you continually post here (apparently) in order
to portray mormonism as Christianity and yourself as a misunderstood Christian with a
few minor differences, is full of half-truths in the three categories above - and frankly
others as well.
Only you know if you are emotionally deceived enough to rationalize
the careful way you craft your explanation to justify your own choices,
or if you knowingly and selectively choose your half-truths to make
mormonism appear Christian in order to proselytize FReepers and promote
Romney.
In the end, a half-truth remains a lie and is certainly contrary to the
image I used to have of you. I gave you multiple chances to come clean,
but in every response you obfuscated and continued your carefully crafted
sales pitch. You were unable to come right out and state what you believed.
In the end, I realized you did not want to tell the whole truth. I post this
to notify others on FR that you are posting half-truths about Christianity
and about mormonism. This is a common mormon tactic taught to their “missionaries”.
I feel for you... not just because of your physical challenges, but even
more importantly and of greater consequence, you spiritual challenges.
I pray for your physical and spiritual healing. In the meantime, I will continue
to point out the problems with your post here that distorts the simplicity of
the Gospel of Grace, the nature of our ONE GOD, and the unworthiness of man to
reach God through his own efforts.
best,
ampu
Why did you leave the Southern Baptist Church?
Did someone tell you there was something wrong with it?
Did someone tell you that the Southern Baptist Church was not a "True Church"?
Was their doctrine in error?
Were their creeds an "abomination"?
Did your current church accept your Southern Baptist Baptism as valid?
I’ve been an LDS member for over 25 years now, Jeff. I appreciate your witness of Jesus Christ which I share.
Boo hoo!
No, Ma'am; our chosen religious organization does NOT consider 49,998 more of us on your doorstep to be an onslaught.
After all; we are ONLY doing it for a year of so of our lives; 6 days a week.
So you were there when the 'church' was REALLY big on the following:
"You see some classes of the human family that are black, uncouth, uncomely, disagreeable and low in their habits, wild, and seemingly deprived of nearly all the blessings of the intelligence that is generally bestowed upon mankind.
The first man that committed the odious crime of killing one of his brethren will be cursed the longest of any one of the children of Adam. Cain slew his brother. Cain might have been killed, and that would have put a termination to that line of human beings.
This was not to be, and the Lord put a mark upon him, which is the flat nose and black skin. Trace mankind down to after the flood, and then another curse is pronounced upon the same race--that they should be the 'servant of servants', and they will be, until that curse is removed."
Brigham Young-President and second 'Prophet' of the Mormon Church, 1844-1877- Extract from Journal of Discourses.
Here are two examples from their 'other testament', the Book of Mormon.
2 Nephi 5: 21 'And he had caused the cursing to come upon them, yea, even a sore cursing, because of their iniquity. For behold, they had hardened their hearts against him, that they had become like unto a flint; wherefore, as they were white, and exceedingly fair and delightsome, that they might not be enticing unto my people, the Lord God did cause a skin of blackness to come upon them.'
Alma 3: 6 'And the skins of the Lamanites were dark, according to the mark which was set upon their fathers, which was a curse upon them because of their transgression and their rebellion against their brethren, who consisted of Nephi, Jacob and Joseph, and Sam, who were just and holy men.'
August 27, 1954 in an address at Brigham Young University (BYU), Mormon Elder, Mark E Peterson, in speaking to a convention of teachers of religion at the college level, said:
"The discussion on civil rights, especially over the last 20 years, has drawn some very sharp lines. It has blinded the thinking of some of our own people, I believe. They have allowed their political affiliations to color their thinking to some extent.I think I have read enough to give you an idea of what the Negro is after."
"He is not just seeking the opportunity of sitting down in a cafe where white people eat. He isn't just trying to ride on the same streetcar or the same Pullman car with white people. It isn't that he just desires to go to the same theater as the white people. From this, and other interviews I have read, it appears that the Negro seeks absorption with the white race. He will not be satisfied until he achieves it by intermarriage."
"That is his objective and we must face it. We must not allow our feelings to carry us away, nor must we feel so sorry for Negroes that we will open our arms and embrace them with everything we have. Remember the little statement that we used to say about sin, 'First we pity, then endure, then embrace'...."
(Rosa Parks would have probably told Petersen under which wheel of the bus he should go sit.)
1967, (then) Mormon President Ezra Taft Benson
said,
"The Communist program for revolution in America has been in progress for many years and is far advanced. First of all, we must not place the blame upon Negroes. They are merely the unfortunate group that has been selected by professional Communist agitators to be used as the primary source of cannon fodder."
We are told that on June 8, 1978, it was 'revealed' to the then president, Spencer Kimball, that people of color could now gain entry into the priesthood.
According to the church, Kimball spent many long hours petitioning God, begging him to give worthy black people the priesthood. God finally relented.
Sometime before the 'revelation' came to chief 'Prophet' Spencer Kimball in June 1978, General Authority, Bruce R McConkie had said:
"The Blacks are denied the Priesthood; under no circumstances can they hold this delegation of authority from the Almighty.
The Negroes are not equal with other races where the receipt of certain blessings are concerned, particularly the priesthood and the temple blessings that flow there from, but this inequality is not of man's origin, it is the Lord's doings."
(Mormon Doctrine, pp. 526-527).
When Mormon 'Apostle' Mark E Petersen spoke on 'Race Problems- As they affect the Church' at the BYU campus in 1954, the following was also said:
"...if the negro accepts the gospel with real, sincere faith, and is really converted, to give him the blessings of baptism and the gift of the Holy Ghost, he can and will enter the celestial kingdom. He will go there as a servant, but he will get celestial glory."
When Mormon 'Prophet' and second President of the Church, Brigham Young, spoke in 1863 the following was also said:
"Shall I tell you the law of God in regard to the African race? If the white man who belongs to the chosen seed mixes his blood with the seed of Cain, the penalty, under the law of God is death on the spot. This will always be so."
(Journal of Discourses, Vo. 10, p. 110)
Yeah; Native Americans are althroughout the Book of MORMON; too.
I saw a striking contrast in the progress of the Indian people today ... they are fast becoming a white and delightsome people.... For years they have been growing delightsome, and they are now becoming white and delightsome, as they were promised.... The children in the home placement program in Utah are often lighter than their brothers and sisters in the hogans on the reservation.
At one meeting a father and mother and their sixteen-year-old daughter were present, the little member girl-sixteen-sitting between the dark father and mother, and it was evident she was several shades lighter than her parentson the same reservation, in the same hogan, subject to the same sun and wind and weather.... These young members of the Church are changing to whiteness and to delightsomeness.
One white elder jokingly said that he and his companion were donating blood regularly to the hospital in the hope that the process might be accelerated.
(Improvement Era, December 1960, pp.922-23). (p. 209)
So; were you amoung the ones who kept praying to god to let the BLACKS have the priesthood?
Jeff; you KNOW we mainly re-post what you own CHOSEN religious organization has published; so why try to spin it?
We have no CLUE what you guys 'believe', so you are free to post whatever edited items you wish us to know.
We do, however, KNOW what your organization has taught, published and promulgated.
Jeff; you KNOW that it your own CHOSEN religious organization that ENDLESSLY derides the FUNDAMENTALIST Church of JESUS CHRIST of Latter-day Saints and labels them as a non-MORMON cult.
THEY are the ones who actually FOLLOW the scripture found in D&C 132; not you spineless weasels from that apostate organization from Salt Lake City!
*The following is a letter from Elder Lance B. Wickman, General Counsel of the Church to publishers of major newspapers, TV stations and magazines. It was sent out on Tuesday, June 24, 2008.
Recent events have focused the media spotlight on a polygamous sect near San Angelo, Texas, calling itself the Fundamentalist Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints. As you probably know, The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints has absolutely no affiliation with this polygamous sect. Decades ago, the founders of that sect rejected the doctrines of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, were excommunicated, and then started their own religion. To the best of our knowledge, no one at the Texas compound has ever been a member of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints.
Unfortunately, however, some of the media coverage of the recent events in Texas has caused members of the public to confuse the doctrines and members of that group and our church. We have received numerous inquiries from confused members of the public who, by listening to less than careful media reports, have come to a grave misunderstanding about our respective doctrines and faith. Based on these media reports many have erroneously concluded that there is some affiliation between the two or even worse, that they are one and the same.
Over the years, in a careful effort to distinguish itself, The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints has gone to significant lengths to protect its rights in the name of the church and related matters. Specifically, we have obtained registrations for the name The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, Mormon, Book of Mormon and related trade and service marks from the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office and corresponding agencies in a significant number of foreign countries.
We are confident that you are committed to avoiding misleading statements that cause unwarranted confusion and that may disparage or infringe the intellectual property rights discussed above. Accordingly, we respectfully request the following:
Stated simply, we would like to be known and recognized for whom we are and what we believe, and not be inaccurately associated with beliefs and practices that we condemn in the strongest terms. We would be grateful if you could circulate or copy this letter to your editorial staff and to your legal counsel.
We thank you for your consideration of these important matters.
Sincerely,
Lance B. Wickman
General Counsel