faith – Page 2 – What Do Mormons Believe?

The Standard of God

I have often found in this wide world, that many people don’t understand the Mormon way of living. This is evident based just on the question, “what can’t Mormons do?” as if restrictions on behavior is something strange. Well, first off, it isn’t to me. Not very much. It isn’t strange to me that I don’t smoke, drink, gamble, cheat, or steal and that I do go to church, pay tithing, read scriptures, stay chaste and so forth. That is the standard by which I live. Everybody has a standard, or guidelines by which they make their decisions. So then, why did I choose my standard? Let me explain it to you.

First and foremost, God has a standard. He has a way of living that He wants for us. He has revealed, and continues to reveal, that way of living to prophets throughout the ages. Through Moses, He instructed the children of Israel to obey a strict set of laws. Jesus Christ instructed the Jews a different (and better) way of living that relied more on developing a good heart that dictates good actions. I don’t doubt that that same Being inspired Buddha, Mohammad or Confucius to teach their respective peoples a better way of living.

Here’s the important part: God does this so that His own children might be happy. That’s right; God gives rules for you to be happy. If He can persuade His children to lift their way of living to a higher level, even on just a single point, it brings Him joy because they are living up to a standard that is naturally better. It isn’t so much that God will punish those who break commandments; the commandments are there to prevent actions that cause damage. If I do action “A” then “B” will be a result. If “B” is good, then God wishes us to do “A,” otherwise He must forbid it.

There are several problems people see with this standard. First, they don’t see beneficial results from supposedly good actions, nor do they see bad results from bad actions. Then they wonder why the standards are there in the first place. Patience. That’s why we believe in personal revelation. We can ask our Heavenly Father if such a thing is for us. After receiving an answer, we trust in that answer and believe that someday, somehow, that trust will be for our good.

Second, many people find themselves not living in harmony with their beliefs. That is, everybody eventually finds themselves where their actions don’t line up with what they know they should be doing. They then have a choice. They could change their actions, or change their beliefs. Either will relieve the situation and not doing either will always result in misery. You would be the most wretched person if you constantly wish to be unchaste while acting in celibacy. Or you could be miserable believing that you ought not to drink alcohol while sitting at the bar getting drunk. The key is to alter the action that is keeping us from God instead giving up His standard.

Third, when we make a poor decision, we naturally are loathe to accept the consequences for that action. We would like to get the benefit of something we didn’t do and avoid the penalty for something we did do. It is true that Christ’s atonement allows us to repent and avoid the dire consequences of our actions, most especially being separated from God, but it is definitely easier to prevent making a mess of our lives than to work through the repentance process. The time spent destroying spirituality could be spent building it up instead. God’s standard helps us reap blessings with the time we have and not to spend it in trials and pain.

So in light of all this, it is imperative that each of us keep to the standard of God and stick to it. The Atonement of Jesus Christ is there for us in our moments of weakness and to pick us up at our worst moments, if we are just willing to accept help. It will be uncomfortable, there is no doubt there, but growth means growing pains. The path of least resistance is quite comfortable, but doesn’t lead to the desired end. We desire a better end, a more excellent way and one that brings a life of real joy and satisfaction. That is why we do the things we do and try our best to live according to God’s standard.

How do we ‘know’?

Today at church we had a testimony meeting. This is a somewhat unique sermon style where the bishop invites the people in the congregation to come to the microphone and share their testimonies or personal witness stories. They simply go up to the front if they feel like they should, and it is usually very uplifting and enlightening. You can learn how the gospel impacts a person directly.

You’ll often hear phrases like, “I know that God lives,” and “I know Jesus died for my sins,” and “I know that Joseph Smith was a prophet of God.” Sometimes visitors come away from these meetings non-plussed by our uber-confident ‘knowledge’ of things. It got me thinking.

Whenever someone says they know something, they are saying they have high confidence that their belief coincides with objective truth. We do this all the time. You say, “I just know the dentist is going to lecture me on flossing” because 1) he’s done it before and 2) you still haven’t been flossing. Your previous experience and the evidence of your behavior lead you to this prediction. There are many ways we gather knowledge; I’ll list a few here for illustration:

Personal experience (five physical senses, sense of balance, pain, hunger, etc.)
Emotion and intuition (love, fear, instinct, etc.)
Experiences of others (advice, anecdotes, biographies, etc.)
Logical and mathematical proofs (a priori)
Found evidence (archeology, historical documents, paleontology, forensics, etc.)
Robust scientific experimentation that controls for all variables (physics, chemistry, etc.)
Scientific experimentation/observation that controls for variables where possible (sociology, political science, economics, etc.)

We all tend to have some level of confidence in these methods, some more than others, depending on many factors, but each of these can lead a person to say “I know…” if the learning method is compelling enough. Even so, many would argue that none of the methods I listed above are capable of producing reliable knowledge of things as transcendent as God. Archeological digs might lend credence to a religious belief, but surely not firm knowledge. These critics have a point, so I would add one more item to the list:

Revelation from God

God speaks to His children in various ways. He gave Joseph prophetic dreams that came true; He spoke to Moses from a burning bush (and also face-to-face). He sent an angel to Mary to announce the birth of Jesus. Joseph Smith saw and listened to the Father and the Son in a grove of trees.

To Joseph of Egypt, Moses, Mary, Smith and many others, those experiences were indisputable. They had every right to declare, “I know” instead of “I believe,” and they did.

For most of us, though, the glorious visions and visitations of heavenly beings haven’t yet happened. For us, God has promised another form of revelation: a personal witness of spiritual truths through the power of the Holy Spirit. He is available to bear witness of the Father and the Son. “By the power of the Holy Ghost, ye may know the truth of all things” (Moroni 10:5). This witness may be less dramatic or conspicuous than an angelic visitor, but its convincing power may be even more sure than a vision (see Joseph Fielding Smith, Answers to Gospel Questions, 2:151; 1 Nephi 17:45-46). Because of His subtlety, it may take many prompts for you to hear the Holy Ghost and again many more before you trust them enough to say “I know.” But it can happen. This is how I know God lives and that Jesus is the Christ.

You can know, too. Like other modes of learning, it won’t necessarily come in an afternoon of mild curiosity, but it will with dedicated seeking, knocking, and asking over the course of weeks and months and years. Begin now and you will taste the deliciousness that is the knowledge of God.

Does God still speak to us today?

First Vision

While preparing for a class, I came across this talk given by Hugh B. Brown, a member of the First Presidency of our church, who passed away some years ago. It details a conversation that he had with a member of the British House of Commons and a former justice of the supreme court of Britain regarding our belief in the reality of modern-day prophets.

I will never understand why people reject the doctrine of God still being able to call prophets. He has always done so and will continue to do so. I firmly declare that Joseph Smith was a prophet of God and that there is a prophet today who speaks for God. Prophets are essential to us knowing who God and Jesus Christ are—their characters and their teachings that will bring salvation. You too can know of this truth if you will sincerely ask God in prayer with faith to act.

“[This man] called me on the phone one day and asked if I would meet him at his office and explain some phases of my faith. He said, “There is going to be a war [World War II], and you will have to return to America, and we may not meet again.”

When I went to his office, he said he had been intrigued by some things I had told about my church. He asked me if I would prepare a brief on Mormonism and discuss it with him as I would discuss a legal problem. He said, “You have told me that you believe that Joseph Smith was a prophet and that you believe that God the Father and Jesus of Nazareth appeared to him in vision.

“I cannot understand,” he said, “how a barrister and solicitor from Canada, a man trained in logic and evidence and unemotional cold fact, could accept such absurd statements. What you tell me about Joseph Smith seems fantastic, but I wish you would take three days at least to prepare a brief and permit me to examine it and question you on it.”

I suggested that, as I had been working on such a brief for more than 50 years, we proceed at once to have an examination for discovery, which is briefly a meeting of the opposing sides in a lawsuit where the plaintiff and defendant, with their attorneys, meet to examine each other’s claims and see whether they can find some area of agreement and thus save the time of the court later on.

I began by asking, “May I proceed, sir, on the assumption that you are a Christian?”

“I am.”

“I assume that you believe in the Bible—the Old and New Testaments?”

“I do!”

“Do you believe in prayer?”

“I do!”

“You say that my belief that God spoke to a man in this age is fantastic and absurd?”

“To me it is.”

“Do you believe that God ever did speak to anyone?”

“Certainly, all through the Bible we have evidence of that.”

“Did he speak to Adam?”

“Yes.”

“To Enoch, Noah, Abraham, Moses, Jacob, and to others of the prophets?”

“I believe he spoke to each of them.”

“Do you believe that contact between God and man ceased when Jesus appeared on the earth?”

“Certainly not. Such communication reached its climax, its apex at that time.”

“Do you believe that Jesus of Nazareth was the Son of God?”

“He was.”

“Do you believe, sir, that after the resurrection of Christ, God ever spoke to any man?”

He thought for a moment and then said, “I remember one Saul of Tarsus who was going down to Damascus to persecute the saints and who had a vision, was stricken blind, in fact, and heard a voice.”

“Whose voice did he hear?”

“Well,” he said, “the voice said `I am Jesus whom thou persecutest: it is hard for thee to kick against the pricks.'”

“Do you believe that actually took place?”

“I do.”

“Then, my Lord”—that is the way we address judges in the British commonwealth—”my Lord, I am submitting to you in all seriousness that it was standard procedure in Bible times for God to talk to men.”

“I think I will admit that, but it stopped shortly after the first century of the Christian era.”

“Why do you think it stopped?”

“I can’t say.”

“You think that God hasn’t spoken since then?”

“Not to my knowledge.”

“May I suggest some possible reasons why he has not spoken. Perhaps it is because he cannot. He has lost the power.”

He said, “Of course that would be blasphemous.”

“Well, then, if you don’t accept that, perhaps he doesn’t speak to men because he doesn’t love us anymore. He is no longer interested in the affairs of men.”

“No,” he said, “God loves all men, and he is no respecter of persons.”

“Well, then, if you don’t accept that he loves us, then the only other possible answer as I see it is that we don’t need him. We have made such rapid strides in education and science that we don’t need God any more.”

And then he said, and his voice trembled as he thought of impending war, “Mr. Brown, there never was a time in the history of the world when the voice of God was needed as it is needed now. Perhaps you can tell me why he doesn’t speak.”

My answer was, “He does speak, he has spoken; but men need faith to hear him.”

(President Hugh B. Brown, Conference Report, October 1967, Third Day—Morning Meeting 118.)

Choose Your Own Adventure: Experimenting on the Word

summer-peaches The other day I was visiting a friend and she had the most beautiful peach tree in the backyard. It grew enormous, sweet peaches—I ate three of them after we had lunch. I asked her which nursery she had bought the tree from and she said that she actually grew it herself—from a peach pit! She offered me one of the discarded pits from lunch and told me that if I wanted to grow a tree too, she would tell me what to do and help me whenever I needed it. I gladly accepted, anticipating an abundant supply of those divine peaches.

Her instructions were to take the peach pit home and bury it in a small pot. Give it plenty of water and sunlight. When the seedling gets to be about 6 inches high, plant it in a bigger pot. When it reaches 2 feet, transplant it outside where it will receive lots of sunlight and water. It seems like a lot more work and a lot more time than I originally counted on. I decide to…

the pit A.   Throw the seed out the car window as I am driving home and resolve to just come by her house occasionally and ask for a bushel of peaches. (Go to {A})
B.   Take it home and plant it outside in the spot where I am eventually going to put it in the yard and save myself a few steps. (Go to {B})
C.   Take it home and plant it in the small pot and water it faithfully for a few days. At least, as long as it’s still interesting to me. (Go to {C})
D.   Take it home and do exactly as she says. (Go to {D})

{A} As I throw the seed out of my window, I think—how would I know if this particular peach pit was even going to germinate? I’m pretty sure it was faulty. If she asks, I’ll just say it never came up, so would she mind just sharing her peaches once in a while? I just saved myself a lot of trouble. Unfortunately, my friend moves away the following year and my peach supply ends. (Matthew 13: 4, 19).

{B} I take the seed home and wonder if it is even a viable peach pit—will it germinate? Or did she just get lucky with her peach pit? Maybe she wasn’t even telling me the truth about growing her pit into a tree! I talk to a lot of my friends about it, we look stuff up on Wikipedia about peaches and what the likelihood is of them germinating. I go to cherry growers websites, too (they are also stone fruits), to see if they have hints or facts about growing peaches. I discuss it with people in the supermarket line. I’m getting a lot of good information about peaches and I think I’m almost an expert on them. I guess the time is right for me to have my own.

I decide just to plant it in the yard and see if it comes up. I’m not going to bother with all the fussy details. I plant it and, mercifully, the rain and sun cooperate. One day as I’m out playing with my toddler in the yard, I notice a little seedling unfolding in the sun–the peach tree! The only problem is that it is surrounded by thick Texas grass and weeds. I check on it occasionally, but after a few weeks, the grass and weeds have won the battle for water and sun and the seedling is gone. Hmm, I guess I should have just planted it inside like she said. Turns out it was a good pit. Unfortunately, my friend moved away before peach season came again and I didn’t get another chance to try it. (Matthew 13: 7, 22)

{C} As I leave her house, I am so excited and empowered by the idea that I could seedling grow my very own peach tree! I’m going to start a blog about it! I’m going to take pictures every day to show the progress! And maybe I will be able to find a little ruler that I can plant right along with the pit and then I can tell how much it is growing every day. What should I name it? Tabitha. Definitely Tabitha. Full of adrenaline, I rush right in and find a small pot (my first attempt at ceramics in 9th grade), fill it with potting soil and plant the seed. I faithfully water it for a week. Then less faithfully the next week. Then we go on vacation for three days. When I get home, I have kind of forgotten about it and it never really gets to be part of my daily schedule, besides, now I am too busy teaching myself Tae Kwon Do from YouTube tutorials. Two months later, as I do the dishes, I look up and see it there. Brown and lying in the dirt. The sun and drought has fried it. Poor Tabitha. I just got really busy. (Matthew 13: 5, 20-21; Alma 32: 38-40)

{D} As I leave her house, I am excited about the possibility of having my own peach tree, growing right out my back door. I already have a pot on my window sill with some dirt in it from another plant that didn’t survive the winter. Maybe this tree will be luckier. I decide to empty the old dirt out and put in some fresh, moist potting soil. The kind with MiracleGro right in it. This little pit needs all the help it can get. Then I put it back up on the windowsill and remind myself that every time I make dinner, I will give it a little drink. As soon as it is part of my schedule, it is easy to take care of. My kids and I watch the little sprout grow and grow with fascination.

After a few months, we put it in a bigger pot and it continues to grow. It only takes a year and a half to be hardy enough to plant outside. A year and a half! And now we’ll have fresh peaches each summer for the rest of our lives, if I continue to care for it. I’d say it was a solid investment of time. Good thing I did, too, because my friend moves away the next year and her peach tree is razed when the new owners take over the house. We still talk about gardening stuff on the phone though. It’s so great to have that in common. As soon as my tree starts producing, I plan to send her a peach pit so she can grow her own again. This particular variety is sweeter than any other I’ve tasted. (Matthew 13: 8,23; Alma 32: 28-37).
Our own peach tree

If you are wondering what in the world I am talking about, read Alma 32: 28-43 and Matthew 13. A gospel-centered life is a lot sweeter than peaches. I know that it is viable and will germinate if you give it a sincere chance with diligent effort. You can know the restored Gospel of Jesus Christ is true fairly quickly (a sprout), but to be able to stand on your own testimony takes a little time (say, a year and a half of dedicated effort) and finally receiving the fruit (a life changed through Jesus Christ) can take even longer, though I promise that it is worth the effort.

“And because of your diligence and your faith and your patience with the word in nourishing it, that it may take root in you, behold, by and by ye shall pluck the fruit thereof, which is most precious, which is sweet above all that is sweet, and which is white above all that is white, yea, and pure above all that is pure; and ye shall feast upon this fruit even until ye are filled, that ye hunger not, neither shall ye thirst. Then, my friends, ye shall reap the rewards of your faith and your diligence, and patience, and long-suffering, waiting for the tree to bring forth fruit unto you.” (Alma 32: 42-43)

Faith Precedes the Miracle

“Faith precedes the miracle. It has ever been so and shall ever be. It was not raining when Noah was commanded to build an ark. There was no visible ram in the thicket when Abraham prepared to sacrifice his son Isaac. Two heavenly personages were not yet seen when Joseph knelt and prayed. First came the test of faith–and then the miracle. Remember that faith and doubt cannot exist in the same mind at the same time, for one will dispel the other. Cast out doubt. Cultivate faith.”

President Thomas S. Monson, The Call to Serve