omega0401

Living in Los Angeles, we've had a missionary from Mongolia! What a surprise that was and what a special missionary he was. Very polite and he loved being here and serving the Lord. Wish we had him longer.

The best way to know the truth of the Book of Mormon is found in Moroni 10:4-5 which says... 4. And when ye shall receive these things, I would exhort you that ye would ask God, the Eternal Father, in the name of Christ, if these things are not true; and if ye shall ask with a sincere heart, with real intent, having faith in Christ, he will manifest the truth of it unto you by the power of the Holy Ghost. 5. And by the power of the Holy Ghost ye may know the truth of all things. There is no greater evidence than that which comes from the power of the Holy Ghost. That’s really the only evidence one needs. It’s faith that we need to exercise not archeological discoveries or other kinds of evidences. Some people read and pray about it once and that's it. When that happens the Lord will sometimes try your faith. If you pray about it each time you read it, you will start to feel the spirit. And in prayer ask if the words you are reading truly come from a Prophet of God.

Rekhyt, I do hope your faith and testimony of the restored gospel is much more stronger than whether to wear a cross or not. This restored gospel is true despite how others may unfairly treat you. First, I personally am not offended by others who wear a cross. I just don't think it is necessary to wear a cross to show that you believe in Christ. We know we believe in Christ, that we are Christians without the need to wear a cross. It's possible that some people wear a cross to shout it from the roof tops that they are Christian. I believe it's not what you show or wear on the outside that counts it's what's on the inside, in your heart, and how you live your life. Do you love and follow the teachings of Jesus Christ? Do you love one another? Do you ask forgiveness and give to others your forgiveness and love them anyway? Sometimes we forget that last part. Do we repent when we've done something wrong and desire to not repeat it again and if we do we are not afraid to repent once more and try over again. To wear a cross does none of those for me. I think it's what we do with the knowledge of the gospel we are given and how we live our lives. Those I feel are much more important than wearing a cross. But others should not judge you because you do. They should love you intead and they probably do and don't show it or know how to show it.

Anytime you read a story like this one...(Presbyterians drop the Gay Ban), it makes you realized how important it is to have a Prophet of God upon the earth. Once a Prophet speaks in the name of the Lord the questions are over and the wheat and the tares separate. The Presbyterians will be fighting each other again. Update: Since posting this story I read another one in the newspaper about how the Methodist ministers in California are trying to marry homosexuals in their church.

Bytor, your link did not work for me. See if this one works. Quetzalcoatl, the Maya Maize God, and Jesus Christ

Interesting thought. There may very well be a link between preparation in our pre-mortal life and what our outcome is in this life. You might have something there Traveler. Thanks. Another thought might be that what we learn in this life, that we could not learn in our pre-mortal life and may have affected us so deeply, may even make us a better more Christ-like person than we were in our pre-mortal life. The time will come when we will know the answer. Having that vale across our minds so we cannot remember our pre-mortal life and to learn through faith is such a huge key to the Plan of Salvation and our eternal progress. Our Heavenly Father is so very wise.

A great source of information for the Book of Mormon not only for members but for investigators too. Thanks Hemi.

Papi, I understand what you're saying and I agree. I'm not entirely sure if that's what Traveller is saying. We won't know unless he posts back and gives us more details or some examples.

I agree with you about His love. His love is infinite, enduring, powerful, far more than what a mortal person can possibly comprehend. However, should that be the only thing we should seek, desire, talk about, or hope for? We cannot hope for all those blessings that God desires to give us? God offers us the gift of eternal life through the grace of His son if we are worthy of it by forgiveness through repentance and obedience. Even though we should recognize and appreciate the tremendous love our Heavenly Father has for all of His children, we still need to do as Paul taught to the Philippians that individuals are called upon to “work out their own salvation with fear and trembling” (Philip. 2:12) I do not look at it that way. Do we not all seek for salvation and eternal life? When we seek for something that is righteous, why then do you say it is selfish? The Apostle Paul wrote to the Saints at Corinth and said, “Know ye not that they which run in a race run all, but one receiveth the prize? So run, that ye may obtain.” (1 Cor. 9:24.) Does that make Paul selfish because he wanted to obtain eternal life and taught the Saints at Corinth to do the same? If we do not prepare ourselves in our race, or hope to earn our exaltation then we are just procrastinating and that will cause us to lose our exaltation. President Gordon B. Hinckley in the Ensign, May 2004 said: Even President Hinckley is grateful for the blessings of salvation and of exaltation. To not seek for such a gift would not make a person unselfish. Instead it would make him ungrateful of Christ's atoning sacrifice and suffering for us all. To want more than what you are worthy of receiving, to me that is being selfish and very greedy. All through the scriptures our Father in Heaven teaches us about the blessings He has for us if we are worthy. It is not to make us selfish but to give us encouragement, hope, a goal, and to prepare ourselves and to remind us to live the laws which those blessings are predicated upon. He wants all of His children to return to Him and wants us to be like Him. That is why I finished my post with the "hope" of maybe being worthy enough to be blessed with such a gift. The question as to who will be exalted must be left to the Lord in His mercy. Going through life is hard and difficult enough without any blessings and I am grateful that He has promised us great blessings to give us hope if we are worthy of them. There really is a bright future that He wants us to look forward to and I think He wants us to be happy about that. The progress of becoming exalted includes serving not only God but serving our brothers and sisters. To do unto other what we would have them do to us. In our Book of Mormon we are taught by a great Nephite leader, King Benjamin. He gave his people a wonderful discourse and said that when we are in the service of our fellow man we are in the service of God. I believe we are and sometimes that takes a lot of sacrifice on our part. But service is just one of the many attributes towards exaltation. Our progress to exaltation also includes loving others and it includes sacrifice and unselfishness. Keeping all of the Lord's commandments and covenants should come from our desires to love God, to honor him, and follow him not because of the blessing He gives us. But it's wonderful to know that those blessing are there for us if we are worthy because our Heavenly Father wants to bless us and we need to prepare ourselves to be worthy of them. God has promised us blessings to hope for, to prepare for and I am thankful for that. We need hope in this life.

It is not surprising that our church has taken this stand. Seems like this is another time where we need a Captain Moroni but instead of a banner of liberty it is a banner for marriage and we all should rally behind it. Marriage, as God has defined it, is sacred and should not be treated as anything else. I remember a saying that goes, "A man with God is always in the majority."

I am grateful for a church that teaches that He, God, wants us to be like him. Isn’t that what Christ meant when he said, “Be ye therefore perfect even as your Father which is in Heaven is perfect.” (Matt. 5:48) Who is Christ telling us to be like? Who does Christ want us to become? Is there anything greater than perfect? At another time, Christ taught his people, “Is it not written in your law, I said, Ye are gods?” (John 10:34) Who does he say said that? It was Christ. He was referring to what was taught to the Jews in the old testament in Psalm 82:6. From Christ’s own lips He is teaching us that we have the potential to be like God and that is exaltation. From The Infinite Atonement by Tad Callister we can learn this... Perfection doesn’t occur in this life. There is only one who is perfect in this life and that is Christ. But He commands us to become perfect and he wouldn’t give us a commandment if we could not achieve it. But it is an on going process that we will work at even well beyond the grave. It is a constant process of sincere repentance and trying again to live the way He has taught us to live. But Christ gives us that hope that we can become perfect even as the Father. I hope our Christian friends will realize what it is the Savior is trying to teach us. That He loves us and wants us to become like our Father in heaven. Our Christian friends are very fond of C.S. Lewis because of the Christian principles he taught. I hope they take these words of his to heart... What a great and tremendous hope we have to look forward to.

I'm from Los Angeles and right now we are having a big heat wave. 106 Fahrenheit. Needless to say I miss rain!!!! When I visited my relatives in Cambuslang we attended the Cathcart branch. Is that in the Glasgow Stake?

Hi Lost One, Welcome. I was born in Scotland (Glasgow) but in live in California. I still have family over there. You could bring us some rain. Okay, lots of rain we need it. :) What part of Scotland are you from?

Thank you for reading the article.My post was simply to point out the problems that legalizing same-sex marriage would cause. I saw another article that talked about the legal problems it would cause between states that I didn’t share. That sounded like a real mess. No one is out to stop any and all sorts of sins. Everyone has their free agency and they will have to bear the responsibility that comes with it. This is about how other people’s choices are forced upon others by governments and minorities and I’ll give you a recent example other than what was discussed in the article. There are seven judges that overturned the voice of the people in California and allowed same-sex marriages. Who gave seven people the responsibility to redefine marriage for the millions of people living in that state when that was already voted on in 2000? I will call that a branch of the government forcing homosexuality into the sacred grounds of marriage even after there were many who opposed that in 2000. And I don’t think it will end there. I can go on answering each of your points but the way in which you wrote, it makes me feel you would rather argue the point as though you were angry at someone or something. I won’t participate in that. You know my views and I know yours and in some points they are totally opposite. But it was interesting. Thank you.

What is so nice about a forum like this is that it brings together members of the church from all over the world. I read about members and their experiences and knowledge in the church and their testimonies who live in Europe, Africa, South America, Indonesia, etc. With more members outside of American than there is in America we truly are a world wide church and we can learn so much from people in other cultures.

Well GoodK, from your reply you seem to enjoy belittling people and I could easily do the same with what you wrote but it’s beneath me to do that. It’s abusive. But I’ll respond to what you wrote. That’s not what the articled is about. Did you read the article? I’ll quote part of it, “Once governments assert that same-sex unions are the equivalent of marriage, those governments must defend and enforce a whole host of other social changes. Unfortunately, these government-enforced changes conflict with a wide array of ordinary liberties, including religious freedom and ordinary private property rights.”

(Edited to change the link to go directly to the full story) The following link is to a very interesting story about Same-Sex Marriage and the Persecution of Civil Society. It brings up some very interesting points about the direction our society is heading. Same-Sex Marriage and the Persecution of Civil Society Some of my thoughts on the article...Have we now lost part of our freedom? To allow others their free agency to commit sin is one thing but to force us to contribute in their sin – doesn't that take away our free agency not to be apart of someone else's sin? Just when did we allow our government to force us to partake of something we view as morally and religiously wrong and which we do not want to partake of? How are we contributing in their sin? Will all churches be force to marry gays? Will all teachers in all church owned schools be forced to teach that gay relationships are not a sin but acceptable? Will all doctors be forced to perform an artificial insemination on lesbian couples? Will a photographer be forced to participate in a Gay marriage by taking photographs of the event or be sued for discrimination? Will all these be forced on us regardless of our moral or religious beliefs? Have state governments started rewriting God's commandments? I fear this is just the beginning. We are living in the last days, but still, let's pray that the Marriage Amendment in California passes! I live in California and my family and I are voting for it. If it fails, I believe it will affect the whole country.

Hi Mike and welcome to the LDS site. Nothing bad about being an LDSaholic. I think you will find that we all love the Lord's church here. Great that you served a mission! You are always a missionary.

Welcome back to church sister and to this site. There's lots to read, learn, and contribute to and just plain have fun. :)

I like your interest list. It is right on. We need each and every one of those in our lives. I haven’t heard of Kingsley’s book but I assume he’s LDS too. Your comment about not having to AGREE with it was an interesting comment. It leaves me wondering what part I might not agree with or maybe all of it. How does this book compare to the one we both have read, The Infinite Atonement? Which book gave you the most meaning? I know it’s sometimes it’s hard to compare books or even remember details from a book you may not have read in some time.

Hi Tom, I’ve been waiting for a while to see if more people will make comments about Following Christ but it looks like you’re the only one who’s read it. Thank you for replying back. I like Brother Robinson’s style of writing with good analogies. I like to read about faith and works so I think I’ll get the book and read it. I think it will come in handy when I meet anyone who may be born again. I read your book list. One book that we share is The Infinite Atonement. I enjoyed it immensely. It is the best book I’ve read about the Atonement but then I haven’t read them all but I can't imagine anyone else writing a better book on such a sacred topic. I haven’t read The Peacegiver which I also heard was a very good book. Another book I’d recommend is a book called Fire in the Bones. It’s about William Tynsdale and how the bible got translated into English. It gives one a great appreciate for all that they had to endure and not just torture but losing their own lives. I would even say he was preordained to the do this work. You can almost feel the hand of the Lord in getting this work done and in preparing for the restoration. Ah, so many books, too little time. Thanks for your post.

Rachelle, here is a more specific link straight to the church's missionary couple web site. You can click on the button for full time or part time missionary opportunities and it has a listing of what the expenses are throughout the world. My wife and I plan to serve a mission when we retire and we are looking forward to it. It also happens to be a great example to set for your grandchildren too when they see their grandparents serving a mission. Mission and Service Opportunities for Senior Adults and Recommended Young Adults

Hemi, if you can get the book through their library then look on page 101. That's where the Parable of the Weightlifter is located.

Deseret Book Co. is the publisher and here is the link on Amazon for more comments and information. There are both hard bound and soft bound versions. Believing Christ the Parable of the Bicycle and Other Good News

Hi Hemi, I don’t mind posting the parable but I don’t want to infringe on any copyrighted material. Notice that the quotes I did make in my post are not complete for the same reason. But I think anyone who reads the book will gain much information from it. If you already have the book or can borrow one, I can post the page number where the parable can be found. I don’t have the book with me right now to do that. Brother Robinson doesn’t give it a name but The Parable of the Weightlifter is what I like to call it.