Portable Packets, Quotable Quotes, Succinct Snippets

In this age when frantic, frenetic flitting from one internet image to the next renders linear thought an endangered species, a mile-long treatise on one particular part of the gospel may not be adapted to current expectations. It is possible to spur faith and repentance with a few simple words. This entry still long, but it is composed of segments, sound bites in no particular order. It is a collection of random, disjointed, non-linear, distinct ideas that may be quotable, or at least easier to swallow because they are bite-sized.

• Spiritual rebirth might be summed up in one sentence: We give our hearts to Jesus Christ, and He gives His heart (His nature) to us. The more of our hearts we give to Him, the more of His heart, His tendencies, He installs in us.
  
  
• We strive to take the name and identity of Christ upon ourselves. Why? Not just because it is good to try and imitate Him, but because we are borrowing His privileges connected to His identity. Jesus overcame the world, and merited exaltation for Himself. When we present ourselves at Judgment Day, we will be presented as if we were a miniature Jesus Christ if we are to enter heaven. We will enter heaven because He has earned the privilege of taking us with Him wherever He goes, and we are bound to Him forever.
  
  
• We demonstrate our willingness to take the name of Jesus onto ourselves each Sunday when we partake of the sacrament. If we have His identity, that means we receive one of the blessing He qualified for: the constant companionship of the Spirit. What is not commonly mentioned is that Jesus took our names, our identities, upon Himself when He suffered in Gethsemane and on the cross. He took all the consequences and disadvantages that come from being who we are, including our culpability for our sins and the loss of the Spirit.
  
  
• “Opposition” is commonly defined as the stuff that gets in our way, inconveniences and trials and pains. The phrase “opposition in all things” means that as the bad gets worse in the world, so the good must necessarily be getting better. In D&C 88, Jesus gives a parable about His impending arrival on the face of this earth, and then says: “...I leave these sayings with you to ponder in your hearts, with this commandment...that ye shall call upon me while I am near—Draw near unto me, and I will draw near unto you...Whatsoever ye ask the Father in my name it shall be given unto you...” (verses 62, 63, 65). There must necessarily be increasing compensatory blessings to counter the increasing wickedness now raging. We will catch the shower of manna falling from heaven today if only we keep our bowls facing upward.
  
  
• Jesus prophesied that Peter would deny Him three times before the rooster crowed. Immediately after that sad prediction, Jesus tells Peter, “Let not your heart be troubled...” Again, “Let not your heart be troubled, neither let it be afraid” (John 14:1, 27). “In the world ye shall have tribulation: but be of good cheer; I have overcome the world” (John 16:33). Let’s say Peter, or any of us, stumble as we give our 100%. Jesus gave His all, and it was enough to overcome all. We give our all, and fail anyway. If we are in all sorts of trouble for failing, why should HIS victory cheer us and defray our fears and worries? Because if we belong to Him, we inherit His victory, His rewards. We just need to give our 100%, and succeed or fail, if it really is our all, He will accept it, and “he shall divide the spoil with the strong...” (Isaiah 53:12). We make too much of performance; we already blew it by being imperfect.
  
  
• What is hell? Jesus explains it: “But if they would not repent they must suffer even as I...therefore I command you...confess your sins, lest you suffer these punishments...which...in the least degree you have tasted at the time I withdrew my Spirit” (D&C 19:17, 20). To have that light, radiation, power, whatever it is emanating from God, withdrawn, THAT is hell. That is why hell is described literally as “outer darkness;” fire and brimstone are figurative. The celestial kingdom is described as “dwelling in everlasting burnings,” receiving the fullness of that light. Why are we all miserable on earth? The scarcity of the Spirit. The Spirit is a foretaste of the joy, the earnest money, of heaven (see D&C 11:13). The withdrawal of the Spirit when we sin is a foretaste of hell, too. The little we get and keep here will be amplified in the eternities beyond our current ability to comprehend, if and when we are exalted. It is discouraging and frightening to see how casually members of the Church take the privilege of the Gift of the Holy Ghost, how eager and willing we are to dim our receptivity through “mildly” ungodly entertainment and talk. It is more than a warm blanket to keep us from being miserable; it is a lifeline to God, a portion of His presence. Why discard it? What risky business to do so.
  
  
• The command to offer the Lord “a broken heart and a contrite spirit” is fairly vague. We get the gist of sorrow for sin and admitting our nothingness, our complete dependence on God. The fuller meaning of the phrase gets illustrated for us in vivid clarity and by formal covenants in the endowment.
  
  
• Repentance is not just for “the very vilest of sinners.” Any progress can be characterized as repentance. Since we have all been commanded to be perfect as God, no one is off the hook. Jesus arrives among the Nephites, and His opening lines include the following: “...I bear record that the Father commandeth all men, everywhere, to repent and believe in me” (3Ne. 11:32). And as Nephi says, when the Lord gives a commandment, He also prepares a way to keep it.
  
  
• 1Ne. 3:7 is oft-quoted, but is it oft-applied? Do we think of it as a scripture about the Law of Chastity? Or tithing? Or fasting? Nephi’s statement gives us a picture of humility acceptable to the Lord. “I will go and do the things which the Lord hath commanded...” Nephi announces his willingness to obey, to do things the Lord’s way. “...for I know the Lord giveth no commandments unto the children of men, save he shall prepare a way for them that they may accomplish the thing which he commandeth them.” Nephi acknowledges his nothingness, his total dependence on God, and his intense trust, too. These are two indispensable threads we must braid into the wick of genuine humility. Notice this definition of humility is proactive and hopeful, instead of the drooping defeatism we often associate with being humble.
  
  
• What are the “Sunday School Answers?” Pray, read scriptures, attend church meetings, attend the temple, fast, do service, pay tithes and offerings, etc. Why are these presented as the generic solution to all our problems? Why are they so prominent and ubiquitous in General Conference talks? These activities have one main thing in common—they each invite the Spirit to be with us, with us powerfully. The Spirit delivers the power of the Atonement to our hearts, minds, and lives, and THAT is what gives them such broad application, what makes the Sunday School Answers such profound solutions to our problems.
  
  
• Our job is not to manage our bad desires; it is to let the Savior surgically remove them from our hearts, and replace them with His desires. Not only is this possible, it is mandatory, at least for all those who would enter heaven. No one is exempt, however socially acceptable or innocent a person may appear.
  
  
• Among the first sentences that opened this dispensation in the Sacred Grove, the Savior states the following: “all their creeds were an abomination in his sight; that those professors were all corrupt; that: ‘they draw near to me with their lips, but their hearts are far from me, they teach for doctrines the commandments of men, having a form of godliness, but they deny the power thereof’” (Joseph Smith—History 1:19). Jesus tells Joseph in the Sacred Grove that all these pious Christian teachers deny the power of Jesus to make a bad man into a good one. A few years later, Joseph Smith gets the gold plates, and translates the Book of Mormon from them. It is practically a manual about how to access the Atonement, to have “the Spirit of the Lord omnipotent [work] a mighty change in us...that we [might] have no more disposition to do evil, but to do good continually” (Mosiah 5:2). It contains the solution to the big problem defined by the Lord for Joseph Smith in the First Vision.
  
  
• The “mighty change” is not something we practice; it is a gift from God. If a person awoke one morning craving broccoli intensely and feeling indifferent toward chocolate ice cream and cake, this person would not say, “Wow! All that hard work and practice is finally paying off.” There might be celebration of good luck, but more likely a visit to the hospital for a brain scan to figure out if wires had crossed. We are not expecting a change of attitude through our willpower; we are expecting a fundamental change of nature through the Atonement. How do we experience it? Read the Book of Mormon—it is a Master’s thesis on the subject. All our efforts and good works do not in themselves secure this mighty change; rather, they qualify us to receive it from God.
  
  
• One of the most profound things I ever heard from a devotional speaker was the idea that we do not forgive others because forgiveness implies the damage they did was inconsequential; we forgive others because we expect Jesus to make it right one day, to pay the debt our enemy owes to us. Would scourging and suffering repair a broken stained glass window? No. Those who injure us are usually powerless to repair or repay. Jesus will fix the damage and repay the debt the offending person owes to us instead. How ironic that the speaker who forwarded this idea was among that despised and vilified class of professionals, a lawyer. His training and career primed him to learn a gospel truth I never heard before. A third party is paying for, and repairing, the mess I caused in someone else’s life, and the messes others caused in mine. I am free to relinquish my demands on them, and rely on the Savior instead.
  
  
• Where is love in the temple endowment? If love is the driving force behind God’s actions, why all the legalism and semantics and mechanisms of justice, mercy, Atonement, forgiveness, ordinances, covenants, and so on? Imagine an operating room in a hospital. Tubes and machines by the dozen are hooked to the body of a sick child. Surgeons and nurses crowd around, cutting and stitching. The physicians are dressed in colorless gowns, masked and unsmiling. Everything is mechanical, by the book, procedures and technical jargon. Where is the love in this picture? The love is all around, if we understand what is going on. All these tools and machines and trained medical professionals are there to infuse life into a broken body, to restore damaged tissue and extend the child’s life to the fullest extent of their ability. A lullaby and other common trappings of love just won’t suffice here. Platitudes and cuddly sentiment will not get us out of our predicament either. We are sinners who hope to inherit exaltation and eternal life. What awesome measures and efforts must it take to get us from our present miserable point A to our hoped-for, perfect point B? Think about that the next time you feel perplexed by the endowment. It’s all here to help us.
  
  
• I walk the face of the earth, free as can be, and yet I keep to familiar paths for the most part. The Lord always knows right where I am, and often I run right into people or things or ideas at just the right moment, as though it had been planned. Is agency real? Jonah had two choices: Go to Nineveh, or be dragged to Nineveh. So he went there. God has agency too, and he said, “The works, and the designs, and the purposes of God cannot be frustrated, neither can they come to naught...therefore his paths are straight, and his course is one eternal round. Remember, remember that it is not the work of God that is frustrated, but the work of men...” (D&C 3:1-3). Satan thought he was destroying God’s plan, but giving the fruit to Adam and Eve only furthered it. Perhaps agency is less about what we do, and more about what we choose in our minds. We often long for things that don’t exist, but we are told we will answer for these longings and desires as part of the final judgment.
  
  
• When Jesus beckoned to Peter to jump out of the boat and walk on the water to Him, Peter did not say, “One moment—let me strap on my water skis.” When we attempt to accomplish the Lord’s work by trusting in our own understanding, day planners, schedules, salesmanship, psychology, science, medication, charisma, charm, etc., we are doing what Nephi called “making flesh” our “arm.” Could water skis have sustained Peter? Poorly at best. Even when Peter floundered and began to sink, because he was failing while doing things the Lord’s way Jesus was there to bring him back up to the surface. He relied on the Lord in the boat, on the water, while sinking, and when Jesus pulled him up and escorted him back to the boat. Perhaps the Lord uses the weak and simple things of the earth as His instruments is because they are not sophisticated or savvy enough to make the mistake of looking to some source of power besides the Lord. The strong things of the earth have ways, means, procedures, and gadgets; the weak and simple have nothing to rely on but the power of the Atonement.
  
  
• There are only five scriptures that have anything bad to say about money: The Old Testament, the New Testament, the Book of Mormon, the Doctrine and Covenants, and the Pearl of Great Price. Why the bias against money in scripture? Perhaps the Lord is offended when we take His creations, which each have intrinsic value, and reduce their status by equating them with a thing that has no intrinsic value, the essence of ephemeral. The value of money compared to other things is a human contrivance. One good test to see whether or not a thing is eternal might be: can it be bought with money? Putting a price tag on everything obscures its intrinsic, eternal worth from our view.
  
  
• I once saw what was supposed to be a comprehensive list of addictions in a magazine. Missing from the list was the appetite for money. There is nothing addicts will do in the attempt to get their fix that greedy people have not perpetrated in the attempt to get money. Dishonesty, destroyed families, selling sex, killing, stealing—all these have been suffered in the attempt to get money. Does that put it in the same category as so many other deleterious substances addicts abuse?
  
  
• Money can be used for good or ill, but so few things have its limitless ability to corrupt an otherwise kind, righteous person. All of God's creations have limits; sex has physical limits, the desire for food has limits. Even land is a limited commodity. But because of the imaginary nature of money, the appetite for it can grow without limit. Because the portfolio can expand without limits, it can become a red herring Satan can use to throw us off the trail—if only I get a little more wealth, THEN I'll be happy. Those who subscribe to this philosophy learn by experience that wealth cannot shield us from pain or sadness or emptiness. The poor people of the world are notoriously happy and generous. They don't need psychotherapists because they cannot afford them.

The Three Witnesses

The Book of Mormon was translated from gold plates, but Joseph Smith was told not to show them to anyone, at least at first. He was overjoyed when the Lord told him the time had come to show the gold plates to witnesses who could publicly back up his testimony. We can learn principles from the lives of these three men.

These three men were not simply to gander at the gold plates and report that Joseph had them. Metal plates might be accounted for through human means. They were assigned to have a heavenly manifestation—to see the angel Moroni bring the plates down from heaven for them to handle, and hear the voice of God testify to them that the Book of Mormon is true. They were to bear witness to this event on peril of their souls if they should deny what they had seen.

Many people have expressed a desire for this kind of experience. But the three men who had it—Oliver Cowdery, David Whitmer, and Martin Harris, each eventually forsook Joseph Smith and the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, even while averring that what they originally testified of was true. They never retracted their collective statement; their witness is recorded at the beginning of every copy of the Book of Mormon.

In the Book of Mormon itself, there are instructions to the translator about the necessity of showing the plates to witnesses: “And now I, Moroni, have written the words which were commanded me, according to my memory....And behold, ye may be privileged that ye may show the plates unto those who shall assist to bring forth this work; And unto three shall they be shown by the power of God; wherefore they shall know of a surety that these things are true. And in the mouth of three witnesses shall these things be established; and the testimony of three, and this work, in the which shall be shown forth the power of God and also his word, of which the Father, and the Son, and the Holy Ghost bear record—and all this shall stand as a testimony at the last day” (Ether 5:1-4).

Joseph Smith also received a revelation giving instructions to the Three Witnesses before they saw the plates: “And after that you have obtained faith, and have seen them with your eyes, you shall testify of them, by the power of God; And this you shall do that my servant Joseph Smith, Jun., may not be destroyed, that I may bring about my righteous purposes unto the children of men in this work” (D&C 17:3-4). To Martin Harris: “...I will grant unto him a view of the things which he desires to see. And then he shall say unto the people of this generation: Behold, I have seen the things which the Lord hath shown unto Joseph Smith, Jun., and I know of a surety that they are true, for I have seen them, for they have been shown unto me by the power of God and not of man” (D&C 5:24-25).

God knows the future. Why did He choose men who would eventually apostatize to be the Three Witnesses for the Book of Mormon?

The idea of angels and revelations strains credulity; getting people to take it seriously requires evidence. If Joseph’s story was true, it would make sense that more people than he would learn by experience that it was true. Having multiple witnesses confirm his story bolsters it, makes it easier for others to accept.

Liars lie because they want to be believed. Fabrications are meant to fool people by seeming plausible, usually to get something from others. Their individual apostasies and disaffection show that whatever they were motivated by in the beginning was absent at some later time. If they were lying, they would have exposed that lie when they each apostatized and became disaffected from the Church and Joseph Smith. The weakest position would be for them to deny their original testimony. A stronger position than that would have been for them to maintain their full fellowship with Joseph and the Church, and never deny. But the strongest position of all is the one they eventually took—hating and criticizing Joseph Smith, leaving the Church, yet never denying their collective witness. If they hated the Church and Joseph enough to leave it, why continue claiming the Book of Mormon is true unless they actually experienced a divine manifestation and feared divine retribution? If the work was a fraud, why not expose it in a moment of anger or disloyalty? They were angry; they left the Church, but never wavered in their claims about what they had seen.

“Another parable spake he unto them; The kingdom of heaven is like unto leaven, which a woman took, and hid in three measures of meal, till the whole was leavened” (Matt. 13:33). Joseph Smith interpreted this parable to be a reference to the Three Witnesses of the Book of Mormon. Leaven, when it is put into bread dough, it causes the unbaked loaves of bread to rise by forming gas bubbles. Leaven is fungus; fungus is a corruptible. The Lord knew the flaws of the men chosen to bear witness. Their apostasy, combined with their unwillingness to retract their statements, made their testimonies stronger than if they had been angelic men with no flaws who remained perfectly faithful throughout their lives. Fungus makes loaves rise; the corruptible parts of the witnesses’ characters ultimately helped the Church to rise.

The Lord can use anything, even our flaws, to get His work done: “Remember, remember that it is not the work of God that is frustrated, but the work of men...” (D&C 3:3). “...the devil has sought to lay a cunning plan, that he may destroy this work...I will not suffer that they shall destroy my work; yea, I will show unto them that my wisdom is greater than the cunning of the devil” (D&C 10:12, 43). Like a sailing ship that can tack in the opposite direction the wind blows, the Lord can incorporate anything, even our sins and flaws and rebellion, into His work. (The Fall was another such instance.)

While this is all true, I would much rather be aware of God's plans and cooperate with them than be a helpless, oblivious cog participating in them anyway.

Seeing great miracles or manifestations does not convert people. Each of these witnesses left the Church; Oliver Cowdery and Martin Harris returned, while David Whitmer never rejoined the Church. Faithfulness needs more than knowledge; it requires great trust, courage, and can require a high pain threshold.

The fact that witnesses were called to testify of the divine origins and authenticity of the book also shows that it is meant to be taken seriously, to challenge those who come in contact with it. The Book of Mormon is not a work of fiction; it is meant to be believed. Many people approach the Bible like a fish, taking what they prefer and leaving what they consider to be the bones. Unlike the Bible, the Book of Mormon has been presented to the world in such a way that it cannot be approached like a buffet; it must be completely accepted or rejected. Either it is all true, or it is all false. The more ignorance people possess, the more easily they can dismiss the Book of Mormon. But the more knowledge they bring to bear on the question of its authenticity, the more resilient the book becomes. As Hugh Nibley said, it is like a football—you may kick it, throw it, bounce it, but it will wear you out before you wear it out.

Even when something is proven through evidence or logic, that is not always enough to change behavior, let alone to sanctify a person. Seeing an angel and hearing the voice of God was not enough to keep these men faithful in their behavior, though they were terrified of denying what they saw. My witness is that the Book of Mormon is true, and I have it through the simple power of the Holy Ghost. The Bible is the Old Testament—the book of rules, and a never-ending list of how people break them, and the New Testament, the story of how Jesus paid for those sins through His Atonement. The Book of Mormon teaches better than any other book how to access the power of the Atonement, not only to be forgiven for our sins, but to receive its transforming effect in our lives, minds, and hearts.