Islander
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Posts posted by Islander
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I am. I said it was subjective.. because for example.. you should not be able to say that I did not nourish the seed long enough, etc. It's a no-lose promise for Alma.. if it works he was obviously correct. If the experiment fails, however, the person doing the experiment must be the one who failed. That's not a 'real' experiment at all. That's my point.
great quote
You failed to see that it is ONLY an experiment for you. Many already have done their experiment so the process is well documented. If your outcome is different, it is obvious the flaw is in the process as far as you applied it.
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The problem with Socialism is that you eventually run out
of other people's money. Margaret Thatcher.
A government which robs Peter to pay Paul can always
depend on the support of Paul. George Bernard Shaw:rolleyes:
Amen
When the "Soviets" ran out of money, they broke away from the dead weight of the "republics" and left them to their own devices. They are now calling themselves "Russians"
By the way, not a peep about the economic disaster they created for 70 years and the millions that died of starvation.
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It is interesting that the proponents of socialism are always speaking of it in a vacuum. They are, invariable, either the political elite that arrogantly believe they know better, or the grossly uninformed about what such systems really entail. They should renounce their US citizenship and go live in Cuba or China like a regular citizen and see how much they like it
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Please bring the laugh button back!!! Pam!!!!
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Blur and erase those lines. Lines are for battle, and Gays and Latter Day Saints are not warriors... just people trying to come to a resolution that will make everyone happy.
One need not be so literal. It could refer to lines of thinking or reasoning. Even the argument.
I am not, by any stretch of the imagination, a pessimist. But I doubt those that advocate same sex marriage want a resolution that would make "very body" happy. If you study the history of their demands since the 60's it has become more radical and intolerant by leaps and bounds.
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Soninme said: "Or.........His word is complete. 2Timothy3:16 All Scripture is God-breathed and is useful for teaching, rebuking, correcting and training in righteousness, 17so that the man of God may be thoroughly equipped for every good work. Every means every, so what else do we need to know?
Therefore we have all we need and our commission is to take THAT message to all nations.
OK, but unless you are a Catholic Priest and a follower of the Universal Church, who was the first after the traditions and teachings of Peter, the Bishop of Rome and keeper of the keys of the Faith you are not authorized to teach or preach. For you are not ordained and schooled in the ancient languages and in the secrets of the sacrament of the Latin Rites.
Right? Not to deride but to point out that some make claims that would, on its face, invalidate your position.
You seem very keen to repeating what you have been taught rather than studying on your own and inquire as to our point of view. You are making the same mistake the Jewish people made when the Savior came. They had scripture from God, history and prophets. They thought they needed no more prophets, truth or God's direct instruction. But they did! Because after a while, people forget, they abandon the true doctrine and the commandments, they change the law, they corrupt the ordinance and they transgress the covenant. In fact, those that claim that they already know (scribes, pharisees and the like) are just too eager to showcase their greater intellect and insight to the point of rejecting the living prophets of God (see also 3 John 9-10). It happened then and it is happening now. That is why the word of God does not stop, it never has and the evidence rests in the fact that we have scripture that encompasses almost 5,000 years! I guess God could have said it was enough at some point since they had ALL they needed in their time!!!
Why would the Lord call another Apostle to the ministry some 30 years after the crucifixion? After all 12 Apostles had been called, many already killed and the work was underway. Because it is His Church and the work rests on His Living word thru prophets and Apostles that bring correct teaching and doctrine and not on the understanding, acquired knowledge or the belief of men.
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You can not be happy away from God, for it is HIM who defines happiness. We can seek euphoria and ecstasy thru thrills and intoxication with the ever growing need for more edgy and dangerous activities to achieve such emotional states. But we will never be happy involved in (whatever) activities away from, and at times, contrary to the will of God.
In the distant past, I walked thru very "promising" paths and what seemed, at the time, very worthy endeavors. Inspite of the public acceptance and accolade for my achievements I could not find happiness. It eluded me until I found and embraced the Gospel. Excluding medical conditions, depression is symptom with underlying causes varied and complex but always evidence of our distance from our Heavenly Father.
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My question partly stems from this.
When Christ was born as a spirit child, was He God?
Whenever that was in the eternities! Infinity plus or minus one = infinity!
He was the First, the ONLY Begotten of the Father and was with HIM from the beginning. He was is and forever will be God. You are NOT reading the scriptures. ALL things were made by Him.
One second after or a million years it makes no real different when infinity is involved.
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In LDS teaching, at what point did Jesus become "a" God? Was He God before He came to earth? At some point during His time on earth? At His resurrection? Thoughts?
Oh, that is a fairly easy one!
"In the beginning [of eternity] was the Word [Christ] , and the Word [Christ] was with God, and the Word [Christ] was God.
The same was in the beginning [of eternity] with God.
All things were made by him [the Word-Christ]; and without him [the Word-Christ] was not any thing made that was made.
In him [the Word-Christ] was alife; and the life was the light of men.
And the alight shineth in bdarkness; and the darkness comprehended it not."
John 1:1-6
English lacks the ability to express time in such magnitude. Christ was and is from eternity to eternity
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Your description and assertion that the creeds and councils held 300 years after Christ as "biblical" denotes your limited knowledge of the subject. Those traditions are no different from the rabbinic hedge and traditions the Jewish rabbis developed that the very Christ publicly rebuked and chastise. They were based on theo-sophical and historical interpretations rather than revelation and truth.
Nobody questions your devotion and faith. All we are saying is that by your very words based on your adherence to the the creeds, a Rabbi would declare you a polytheist since you claim that there is a Father-God, a Son-God and a Spirit-God. And that definition in itself was "decided" by men in a political compromise forced by a pagan-unbeliever despot-emperor. It may serve you well to research the facts surrounding these political events before you base your understanding and declaration of faith on who and what God is when HE has declare and shown HIS own nature, in fact and thru revelation.
Of course, your argument is not new and there are hundreds of threads on the very same subject here in the forum. But since you already made up your mind on the matter the exchange may have limited value.
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Hey, everyone. I really would appreciate advice.
Every now and then, I have thoughts of up and leaving my husband. I've even mentioned it a couple of times, but he finds ways to make it seem like everything's okay.
Here's the thing. Since marrying him 3 years ago, I've become LESS active in the church. I feel like every Sunday morning, it's a chore to get him to go to church. He's always full of excuses. Today, he told me going to Priesthood and Sunday School are not important, only Sacrament is important. However, every Sunday he drags slowly along, then goes, "Looks like we might miss Sacrament." There have been times I've just up and gone myself. He'd eventually join, but he'd pout.
He never suggests going to the temple. He has in the past, but of course, excuses come up when it's time. He's never mentioned reading the scriptures together. In fact, I have to be the one to bring up these subjects because he won't. I make the temple appointments. And I kid you not, we almost always get in a fight before attending the temple because he pouts like a child when his excuses don't make me change my mind. I end up praying and crying for comfort so that I can receive the spirit while in the temple; which I do, and our day always gets way better after we've been through a session.
I want him, and I've told him several times, to step it up as a priesthood holder. He works Monday-Friday 7:30am to 4:00pm. He says he just wants Sundays as his days off like his Saturdays. So when he misses church, he plays video games.
About a month ago, I asked him what I needed to do as a wife to help him WANT to go to church more. He told me to not be so pushy, but become sweet and loving. I tried that. Today, I was being very sweet with him, asking him if I could help him with anything, and what I could do for him. Of course, his answer was "nothing, I just don't want to go." Finally I just left because I didn't feel like babying him anymore.
I feel like I've tried everything with this guy. He was born and raised in the church, he's never abused me, he's never called me names, he's never raised his voice at me either. His parents are very active, and he's a good guy; I'm just getting extremely sick of his excuses when it comes to living up his priesthood. I've gone down the sweet nice wife route, and I regret I've been down the not-so-nice route.
One more thing, I apologize for this being long. He has a tendency to "punish" me. Like today. He came to church and attended his meetings, but afterwards, told me he was going to work the rest of the day. This is the one weekend out of the entire year his work MAY need him; he's a programmer, and the system he works for is being updated, so they have to move everything from the old to the new. This is every February. However, they don't need him unless they page him, which they didn't, yet he made it clear he was going to go anyway. He waited until I got home from church (we drove separately), before leaving, so I could watch him leave. Last night I was looking forward to playing a specific video game with him, but he, out of nowhere, began accusing me of pushing the "back" button on the controller, when I didn't, and out of anger, he turned off the game and said he didn't want to play with me. So, he went online and played with friends instead, leaving me sitting there by myself, clearly confused.
I just can't take this. I'm married to a 4 year old. He pouts, throws tantrums, and finds ways to punish me when he doesn't get his way. He knows how important the Gospel is to me, so sometimes he'll use it against me just to punish me. If he's mad or frustrated at me in any way, he'll purposely cancel a temple session or completely REFUSE to attend church; because he knows it would hurt me. And it does. Seriously, we need help before I walk out. I've mentioned counseling, but it's a joke when I bring it up to him.
What am I doing wrong?? I do everything for this man. I love him. I cook the meals, keep the place clean, give him a back rub every time he comes home from work; I let him spend his Saturdays and evenings playing video games. I hardly demand his attention. I let him come home and do whatever he wants. I try and make things fun for him. But the one time I ask anything out of him, I just can't have. And that's him stepping up his Priesthood. I'm exhausted.
My worst fear is someday when we have children; our sons will see his behavior and excuses, and mimic it. Or they'll see him pouting if he doesn't get his way, and they'll copy. Sigh. I'm almost done.
Much has been said, so I will be brief. A few suggestions may be worth considering
1. DO NOT HAVE CHILDREN (yet) until and unless the marriage has been on very solid ground and fully functional for at least 2 more years.
2. Seek some counseling for yourself, gain insight and dimension about your marriage-relationship, your history, his behavior and how that relates to your future.
3. GO to the Temple by yourself. Difficult as it may be to realize, your salvation IS NOT tied to his. Seek to gain a greater and closer relationship with your Heavenly Father so that the Spirit may reveal to you what you should do in order to deal with this difficult situation.
my prayers are with you
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Does the idea of worshiping a God who creates both billions of spirits and then creates a burning, tormenting, endless hell to put a majority of them in bother anyone else? Perhaps we ourselves may have been told we going to hell. Does it bother anyone that so many of us would be sent to burn in endless torment?
Has anyone stopped to wonder how sadistic it appears that God would send something he created to burn in hell fire for eternity. Should we worship a God with such sadistic tendencies, or are we better off seeking a new definition and understanding of God?
I think you misread the scriptures. The hellish-firepit-forever-terment condo is a perpetual lease for those that willfully and intentionally rebelled/defied God-the-Father and denied/rejected the Lamb. It is not a very large co-op so not many will be retired there.
In the other hand, if you kill, harm and do truly evil things in your neighborhood, you are sent to be fried in an electrified easy-chair. The nature of the punishment is directly proportional to the extent of the sin.
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Newcomer here! Great to see a forum for LDS.
I'm a 21 year old guy and was just baptized as a convert into the church, after two years of study and finally being certain this church is true. I firmly want nothing less than to be sealed in the temple with whoever I eventually marry.
However, I understand that at my age, LDS girls are encouraged to only date returned missionaries, and thus while I've been relatively alright with girls before, I'm now perhaps at the bottom of the pool in that regard, as a convert who unfortunately can't do this (and, who has a one year waiting period before I'm even eligible for a temple recommend). As a convert, how difficult of a time would I have meeting a good Mormon girl who will take me seriously, or is it more culturally appropriate for me to look for converts like me?
I want the non-sugar-coated truth here: I know every church has traditions, so if this is just the way things are I want to know so I don't go stumbling into a Singles Ward without knowing I actually belong elsewhere (or, that I need to distract the RMs with snacks/firecrackers first). Has anyone here ever dated/married a convert and this become an issue?
Thanks :)
(admin: if this is in the wrong spot, please feel free to move it. I'm slowly getting a feel for the board organization)
I would give up 20 years of my life to be you, right now and without hesitation. The story is simply too long but sufice to say that I agree with much of what has been posted above. Seek to understand the Lord, His doctrine, His plan and purpose for you and I know it will not be difficult for you to discern what you should do at this stage in your life. Discuss it with you Bishop and seek some guidance from him as well. It will help you significantly.
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Welcome back, Jody.
Like grandma' used to say: "The Lord is not so much concerned with who you were yesterday but who you can become in the eternities."
We are all glad ou are here today and willing to look ahead instead of behind you. Yes, welcome!
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Islander, are you sensing a spirit of argument in this thread?
M.
I do not mean to "argue" as in "disputation." Rather in the most basic sense of the word: they attempt to "bring clarity or explain" to me the errors of my ways.
I did not quoted any one in particular but some obviously thought Isaiah 43 proves "we" are mistaken in our claim to inheritance of celestial royalty, exaltation and divinity. So their logic leads to their circular reasoning that thus we are not who we claim to be. I just wanted to state my position, for clarity sake.
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We tend to spend a lot of time debating with those that ONLY seek to argue about what they think we stand for without the intent of actually learning. I know what I know with absolute and complete certainty and I do not expect others to comprehend. My commitment to the Gospel of Christ has very little room for theo-sophical arguments.
I will not flinch in the face of sacrifice, hesitate before the adversary, negotiate with whom has declared to be my enemy, or ponder at the pool of popularity. I will not give up, shut up or lay low until I have given my all for the cause and the work of Christ, the Lord. I will preach till all know, work till He stops me and go until He comes. And when He return for His own, I will bow to Him in humility but soaring in the happiness of my heart; for He will recognize me. My stand had always been clear.
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Faded,
I am no Hebrew scholar, in fact I won't claim to know a single Hebrew letter so I must rely on those who do. There are 16 different translations of Isaiah 43:10 here
Respectfully, what does this verse mean to you exactly?
You seem to have taken the "road well traveled" when you picked this passage to argue. I called this "verse shooting" and it is a very silly sport. Before you throw out a scripture text, you MUST consider the "context".
The scripture (context) is directed at Israel to stop worshiping false gods and idols. Since YHWH is eternal, all creation of every kind post date Him. and is subject to Him. So even other heavenly beings, for example, within the divine councils in heaven (gods?) (Ps 82:1 and 86:5-8) are subject to Him. It is clear from Revelation and Hebrews that we are heirs with Christ of eternal life and exaltation and partakers of all the Father has. But we will always be subject to Him. Absolutely nothing challenges the supremacy of YHWH, especially not His own creation.
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Islander you are black? I had NO idea.
Oh! Yeah, I know, you can barely tell.... Besides, you know I like to keep a low profile...:)
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What is truth, as determined by God, has been and will forever be truth. It should not be confused with man's understanding or awareness of it for many times we state a "fact" only to realize sometime ater that it was not so. Thus what "we believed" to be the truth was not so. Because it was NEVER so.
We can afford to err now and again. Except when we ignore that we are doing so and affirm our belief that we are in fact right.
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I actually get a kick at seeing people react when I tell them I am LDS:
"You are what???!!!"
Hehehe...I am black, you see? hehehehehe. To say they are shocked is an understatement...Few can utter anything else after that. It makes my day.
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I suggest that the Bishop would be well equipped to make a determination even when no specific "rule" exists on the matter. We go back to the doctrine of correct principles. If a young man will not serve a mission for no clear and justifiable reason, it is unlikely he is prepared to understand and receive his endowment. This is not a judgment of worthiness but of readiness, rather.
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Well.... Sometimes looks are an indication of how a person lives their life. But their are also issues with looks that have nothing to do with weather a person takes care of themselves.
Like if they are overweight because of a thyroid condition, or because they have started taking a certain medication (yes, some medications will cause weight gain). Even birth control causes it.
On the flip side, I know tons of people who are really vain; they spend an hour getting dressed up, and walk around all day looking like a million bucks--- but its just to cover up the fact that they are a disgusting, lazy slob in private!
In fact, our room mate's ex-girlfriend is like that! She has the face of an angel, bright blue eyes, natural platinum-blond hair, perfect slim (but well endowed) body, dresses like a model, goes to professional salons (her father is a doctor and spoils her)...
BUT, she parties in bars every night, cheats on every guy she dates, leaves cluttered messes and dishes with moldy food on them all over her apartment, can't cook to save her soul, buys new clothes instead of doing laundry, and she's had 5 abortions beacuse she HATES children! And to top it off, she bounces from job to job, and is the biggest shrew you could ever meet. Sure she's really sweet when you first meet her, and pretty much has everybody fooled. But when you really get to know her, you're like... DANG! Could a person be any more ugly on the inside??
So yeah, clean-cut attractive looks aren't always a sign of being responsible, or healthy in the heart / mind.
Yeah, and the devil wears Prada!!! What Ninjormon was referring to was a generality. What you describe are exceptions to the rule. Most overweight, unkept people have no thyroid or medication issues. And yes, we do make certain assumptions about people initially and time validates those. So your dirty, cheat, drunk but pretty ex-girl-friend will end up with a host of divorces and 3 kids by 4 different men. so don't worry about her.
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In his famous and lengthy refutation of gnostic doctrine, Irenaeus, bishop of Lyons, France, goes on to give a list of all the Bishops of Rome, from Linus at the time of the Apostles to Eleutherus (AD 173-188) in his own day. He does not mention Peter anywhere.
The issue has been debated for 2000 years and I suspect the RCC will stand its ground on the subject. But any objective student of history, with no theological agenda, looking at the pages of history will fail to conclude that Peter was the Bishop of Rome, but rather that the later claim of the bishops at the seat of the Empire was nothing but a geo-political claim. I arrived at such conclusion 10 years before I decided to join any church after living in an atheist country for most of my life.
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The US is a micro-cosm. It is a very small yet strident bugle that constantly trumpets to the wind the observations of very short term social experiments as if they were existential truths of some kind.
In just about any other society, social norms, values, traditions and training takes place with the explicit intent of preparing the individual to be a productive member of such society. In the US we have elevated the practice of being self-centered to a cult. What I think, feel, want and desired equates to truth that demands validation from the larger society. Nothing could be closer to an aberration as that position. We tend to ignore what GOD has said when it comes to who we are, what we ought to believe and do.
Yes, the Lord has opened heaven once more and poured upon a lost and slumbering world His light and truth once more. According to such, we agree of our own free will, to enter into a covenant to receive His Priesthood authority and power on account of absolute faithfulness, devotion and a vocation to service. We promise to care, protect, provide, serve, love and honor our wives after His example and before His eyes for time and all eternity. In order to do the previously mentioned, I must prepare and demonstrate my willingness to "walk the talk." Young men are asked to prepare and serve a mission, to serve His children, prepare spiritually and academically to effectively provide for a future family and keep themselves unspotted from the sins of the world as to be worthy to present their brides at the altar in the Temple. Is it too much to ask that she is ready and actually willing to do the same? Is her preparation to be a strong, effective and enduring companion, wife, mother and servant of the Lord less important?
Dealing with Infidelity
in Family
Posted
I am truly sorry you are going thru this challenge. I have read your post carefully. What I am about to say comes from many years of experience in these maters. Ultimately, you MUST gather as much information as you can about these issues, consult specialists and educate yourself thoroughly before you make a decision.
Since you have no family as of yet, you have time to determine what your next step will be. Pornography is a serious addiction. It deal with quite sophisticated and primal responses of the brain that are rooted deep in our developmental history. It is very likely that your husband has been struggling with this since he was a teen. So, there is nearly a decade of addiction, failed promises to himself, intervention and relapse. It is a well documented fact that pornography addiction can last decades and well until middle age. This has absolutely nothing to do with you and there is very little you can do, specifically, to curb his addiction. These are very intricate outlines of visual recall-ideation and arousal response that create a pattern of behavior that is extremely difficult to break.
It may sound like I am quite pessimistic. Well, I am just trying to be pragmatic and accurate. Difficult as it may be for you right now, a hard choice and a season of pain are always better than a life of misery and regrets. Your feelings can NOT cloud your intellect. So, this HAS to be a rational decision.
My prayers are with you.