I Ask a Mormon about the Church
@mythociate (21432)
Oklahoma City, Oklahoma
March 11, 2015 3:38pm CST
I ask "What are the goals of the LDS Church (Church of Jesus Christ of the Latter-Day Saints)?"
An elder responds "To enable us to receive eternal life."
I'm inspired to respond "Talk to Our Father. Say this, "I believe. I will (as you would yourself). I take eternal life. I have eternal life. I thank you for it. And I forgive any who would take it from me." ... or something to that effect (the Six I's)"
he asks "What is this meant to accomplish?"
I reply "Can you have eternal life if you will not believe, will, take, 'have' (keep), appreciate & use it?"
He tells me, "Yes, we need to accept Christ and His teachings and believe in Him to have eternal life."
I then asked "By which fruits do you know that you so-accept and so-believe?"
"Christ said, 'If ye love me, keep my commandments.' By living our lives in a way that's in line with His will we show our faith in Him."
"And what is His will?"
"God always reveals His will to us through his servants the prophets that teach us more about Christ and how we can follow HIm" ... so His goal is not to get anywhere, but just to keep going. Kind of another non-reply to the complaint of my patron-saint Saint Jude: "How can we follow you if we don't know where you are going?"
This is another reason why I like Buddhism ... Oh, I FOLLOW Christ; but with the understanding that Christ is now a 'buddha' (an enlightened-one who was once a bodhisattva and is now at peace).
With Buddhism, you're alright ... things'll make you go kinda crazy (compared to the times when things aren't so crazy), but you'll be alright with whatever happens (because you KNOW ... you know why things got the way they got, you know if it'll be worth surviving, and if not then ... okay 
)
This all comes to mind because--as I was walking to dinner-&-shopping yesterday--I was met by a couple Latter-Day-Saints missionaries. One of them handed me a Book-of-Mormon with a bookmark marking the chapter in which Jesus Christ appeared to the early Native Americans.
I hope my little exchange with the LDS shows you something---something like 'we're all just creatures of habit, doing what we have always done because it's what we hope we'll always keep on doing.' Is that what it shows you?
)
This all comes to mind because--as I was walking to dinner-&-shopping yesterday--I was met by a couple Latter-Day-Saints missionaries. One of them handed me a Book-of-Mormon with a bookmark marking the chapter in which Jesus Christ appeared to the early Native Americans.
I hope my little exchange with the LDS shows you something---something like 'we're all just creatures of habit, doing what we have always done because it's what we hope we'll always keep on doing.' Is that what it shows you?
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1 response
@Hopefull90 (921)
• United States
12 Mar 15
The problem I have with the Mormon's is that any part of the Bible they don't want to follow they just say it was written wrong. There are suppose to be 400 errors in the Bible so they pretty much preach from the book of Mormon. I do have good Mormon neighbors and they have tried to convince me that their church is the one to belong to. I have to give them credit for that. They aren't afraid to try and convert you to their church and they strongly believe in their prophets.
@mythociate (21432)
• Oklahoma City, Oklahoma
15 Mar 15
The problem I have with Bible-believers is that they see THE WHOLE THING as "written by the same guy-in-the-sky." I 'liked' a Facebook-page/-group entitled "The Bible Is BS"---not because I do-or-don't believe any, some or all of it, but because it's up to us children-of-God to make sure the Bible holds true with The Living Word of Our Father God.
@mythociate (21432)
• Oklahoma City, Oklahoma
19 Mar 15
@Hopefull90 If 'whether I believe or don't believe in something' affects 'whether that thing is true or not,' then it fails to hold faith for me. God is faithful, his people (no matter how much 'God breathes through/on/at them'---root of the word "inspire") are faithful to themselves.
That's how far I believe their writings: those people write to serve themselves & God first & second. True, some serve God first and some themselves first; the point is, God's KINGDOM falls pathetically behind those two.
Jesus said to 'love your neighbor as yourself.' And those writers DO THAT, I think; by writing of the extraordinary wonders of majesty that await us, they make us (and themselves) contented to lock-step behind the grindstone, lean-in a shoulder and SHOVE-AND-SHOVE relatively aimlessly until they take a break the next Sabbath to hear the fairy-tales of 'whither we are pushing that big huge rock.'
I guess I'm just 'keeping it One-Hundred' http://www.washingtonpost.com/news/morning-mix/wp/2015/01/20/larry-wilmores-nightly-show-debuts-aiming-to-keep-it-100/ - 100% 'scientific' truth (that means 'provable and DISprovable,' not necessarily "said by a scientist.")
If we wake up in a heretofore imaginary place called Heaven, it will NOT be by the grace of God; it'll be by OUR hard work that BUILDS the Kingdom of Heaven (RULED by our God, whose gift-of-grace GIVES US the ability to build & maintain Heaven!)
