Fether

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Posts posted by Fether

  1. On 7/22/2022 at 9:31 AM, Jamie123 said:

    has the Book of Mormon ever been translated into contemporary English?

    Something like this?

    https://www.amazon.com/dp/1544259158/_encoding=UTF8/ref=as_li_ss_tl?coliid=I3250QET6NOV2E&colid=N2P1EYGLVUWE&linkCode=sl1&tag=babblawid0e-20&linkId=bfddaa03e4cb35e02a2e1177a6dc86a0
     

     

    or https://www.bible.com/bible/76/JAS.1.HPB

    James 1:5-6

    5If one a you guys donno wat fo do, aks God fo help you, fo give you da smarts you need! He no goin give you guys hard time. He goin help you guys. God give plenny to erybody, you know. 6But if you goin aks him fo do someting, you gotta trus him. No ack jalike you no can make up yoa mind. Da guy dat no stay shua, he jalike one wave inside da ocean dat da wind stay blow all ova da place.”

  2. 1 hour ago, askandanswer said:

    behold, the bvoice of the Lord came unto him, saying:

    13 Lift up your head and be of good cheer; for behold, the time is at hand, and on this night shall the asign be given, and on the bmorrow come I into the world,

     

    Does 3rd Nephi 1: 12 – 13 provide support for any conclusions about when the spirit enters the body? In these two verses, we have the voice of the Lord speaking to Nephi on the day before He was born. Obviously this is not enough to establish any firm or reliable conclusions, but does it at least suggest that some possible conclusions are more likely than others? I suggest that speaking to Nephi was not the kind of thing the Lord would be doing if His spirit was already in His body and if He had already passed through the veil of forgetfulness.

    I understand that various church leaders have said we don't know enough to be able to say when the spirit enters the body, but these two verses might have a role in reducing our level of ignorance on this question. 

    This is also something I noticed. I imagine the exact time a spirit enters the body may be different and there isn’t any real metric we can look to to really know. Additionally, Christ may have had a little more freedom with this whole process.

    I understand this may not be where you are going with this, but it is worth pointing out. When the spirit enters the body should have little sway on our opinion of abortion.

  3. On 7/8/2022 at 4:25 AM, Jamie123 said:

    A few days ago my wife bought some little plastic containers which are supposed to use for portion control. There were 4 or 5 of them, and the tops have little blue plastic/rubber (whatever) "O-rings" on them to seal them. I washed up Sunday night and again last night, and the blue rubbery O-ring thingy of one of them has now gone missing. My wife went on and on and on and on and on......and on and on.....and on and on at me about this - about how she was "fed up" with things going missing and having to buy new ones. Blah, blah, blah...

    Now I know I'm not perfect. I know I left the cap off the car coolant reservoir so it overheated needed a new engine. Mea culpa. (I suppose I should be grateful she didn't give me a hard time about that, but she DID give me a hard time about losing the blue plastic O-ring.) I didn't lose it on purpose. I DID do the washing up and I did cook for her last night even though I was tired. But I still had to listen to her droning on and on about how "fed up" with me losing things. And it's not like she's perfect. She's lost plenty of stuff...including two cameras and our daughter's birth certificate. It's the pot calling the kettle black. But have you tried getting any woman to accept that she's the pot and you're the kettle? Oh now...she'll always find some way of making it your fault

    OK - rant over.

    P.S. I should count my blessings. I have a friend whose wife was so mad with him the other night she told him "not to come home till morning". He told me what it was about but I can't remember what it was. Certainly nothing very serious.

    Women, hey!

    My wife has a habit of thinking however things are going in any specific moment is how things have always been through all time.
     

    If we are having a good day, she will talk about how perfect of a marriage we have and how things are just so good all the time. 
     

    If things are going bad and I fail to meet her emotional and social needs, then she will talk about how how bad things are all the time and how she thinks we have been growing apart.

    She is aware of this so we have a good laugh (or fight) when this happens.

  4. 1 hour ago, byuguy14 said:

    what will the repercussions be for oral sex outside of marriage? my friend just slipped up and is trying to figure out if he can even still go on a mission.

    I have known many missionaries who had some sort of justification for not confessing to the bishop and went on their mission. Doing so are them alive until they finally confessed. Every second is mental and emotional torcher if your friend goes on a mission without confessing.

    Here are some exercises I have done to help my self chill out about confessing sins to the bishop.

    1) tell myself “repenting and coming clean is a requirement for exaltation. Serving a mission is not.”

    2) Ask myself “do I really believe there is a God? Do I really believe this is God’s church? If I really believe these things, going to my bishop is the obvious decision. If I don’t and I am only in it for the cheap schooling and social life, than who cares, I’ll just go on a mission without repenting”

    3) tell myself “this is a weakness I have. The only way to overcome it is through Christ. Christ has given clear guidelines on what someone ought to do to become clean of their sins. Do I become clean or do I stay hiding?”

    Maybe share those with your friend

  5. 2 hours ago, Carborendum said:

    I'm having trouble defining the Church of the Devil 

    It seems pretty clear that you're either on one side or the other. 

    We further read about the MANY churches.

    The fact that there are "many" in 2 Ne, but only two in 1 Ne, I interpret this to mean that 2 Ne is now using a more common definition of "church" that we're used to.  So, how does that relate to the definition in 1 Ne?

    It has been common to believe that there is only "TCOJCOLDS" and "everyone else".  But I think this idea is flawed.  I can't seem to find the quote.  But there was a quote (I believe it was George Q. Canon?) who said that we are not alone in our fight.  There is too much work for any one people to do.  So, we don't consider other churches to be adversaries, but allies.

    One way to weigh align all these ideas is that 1 Ne talking about "two churches only" was referring to the end times when the battle lines would be clearly drawn.  It could also mean that the battle lines are not drawn between Terrestrial and Celestial.  Perhaps, it is even drawn at O.D. and Telestial.  I don't know.  It's a theory.

    But what are we to think about these three ideas?

    I have always understood 1 Nephi 14:10 to refer to ideology and not necessarily organized church. Your beliefs and ideas are either in line with what god wants or against it. The “many churches” is referring to the many ideological movements there are in the world.

  6. 52 minutes ago, askandanswer said:

    Which do you think is the most merciful arrangement:

    a)       Complete and unconditional mercy for all;

    b)      Complete mercy for all who meet all the conditions on which it is offered, ie. You meet all the conditions so you get all the mercy you need;

    c)       Some mercy in proportion to which the condition have been complied with, ie, you only meet some of the conditions so you only get some of the mercy you need; 

    d)      All the mercy you need subject to you keeping a broad, flexible, maybe even negotiable, range of conditions; or

    e)      All the mercy you need subject to you making a considerable effort to meet a broad, flexible, maybe even negotiable range of conditions?

    A

     

    But pure, unadulterated mercy freely given to everyone goes contrary to God’s plan.
    Christ’s message is not one of “maximum mercy”, but rather perfection for those who wish for it and relative happiness for the rest.

    Read Alma 42 and it is clear that mercy and justice have their place

  7. 10 hours ago, Just_A_Guy said:

    That’s be nice.  I’m mildly surprised they even released the current iteration.  I imagine the potential liability issues cause the Church’s legal eagles many sleepless nights . . .

    Ya. One bad actor and we have ourselves another salt lake tribune article and a HULU docuseries about the horrors of gospel living titled “Gospel Grooming”

  8. On 7/4/2022 at 11:53 AM, Grunt said:

    Does anyone use this?  I have a list of issues I'm trying to resolve in communication, planning, etc.  It looks like the Circles tab would resolve much of this, but nobody uses it.  I suppose that might be because they have no reason to use it and this might provide one.

    Additionally, many youth don't have phones or tablets to use it on and it isn't web based at this time.

     

     

    It’s an incredible tool, but it isn’t being picked up by the church. I think if it became more popular, we may be able to see functions like custom circles and a web browser version of it for the youth that don’t have phones.

    it’s frustrating members don’t use it. It would solve so many problems

  9. 2 hours ago, romans8 said:

    Do you believe Adam and Eve had meaning and joy in their fellowship with each other and
    God (through worship) in the Garden before the Fall and with what God had initially tasked
    them with?  For the later, I refer to Genesis 1:26,28 and 2:15,18 

    As much meaning an joy as two toddler have living in a home together.

  10. 12 hours ago, LDSGator said:

    arming teachers (a shaky idea at best). 

    Arming teachers is not about having the cafeteria lady and pre-algebra teachers patrolling  the playground with M4s. It’s about school districts allowing, and maybe even paying for, concealed carry permits, classes, and regular trainings. It’s also not about saying the teachers are in charge of safety, but just having an extra precaution in case of a shooter situation.

    It’s not a solution, but rather another roadblock to prevent a bad situation becoming worst.

    The problem is mental health and having 1,000 kids, who are trying to figure out who they are, all trapped in a building together 8 hours a day half the year.

    The fix? Easy. Everyone is homeschooled by parents who are morally pure and have the ability to teach their kids. If a child shows signs of mental health struggles, they get to meet with a good therapist to help them…Actually… nvm… that isn’t simple, finding a good therapist is nearly impossible. This plan won’t work.

  11. 27 minutes ago, Jedi_Nephite said:

    I’m against all those points, including background checks.  “Shall not be infringed” was put there for an important reason.

    Is the gun violence / mass shooting issue not something worth addressing? Do you have better solutions?

  12. 8 hours ago, LineUponLine said:

    I found this in the Ensign from August 2002:

    Of the Savior’s words that no man knows the day or the hour of the coming of the Son of Man (see Matt. 24:36), the Prophet asked: “Did Christ speak this as a general principle throughout all generations? Oh, no, He spoke in the present tense. No man that was then living upon the footstool of God knew the day or the hour. But He did not say that there was no man throughout all generations that should not know the day or the hour. No, for this would be in flat contradiction with other scripture. For the prophet says that God will do nothing but what He will reveal unto His servants the prophets. Consequently, if it is not made known to the prophets, it will not come to pass.”12

     

    Thoughts? Is the prophet the only one that will have the date revealed to him? Or could it be more than that?

    I would argue that knowing the day it will come is of equal concern as knowing where Kolob is… which is zero.
     

    So why would anyone but the Prophet know? Signs of the end are not so we can know what day it will come. Signs of the end are there to remind us that there is an end and we ought not procrastinate the day of our repentance.

  13. 4 hours ago, Vort said:

    You might be surprised. Some years ago, I watched a documentary that exposed the wacky but heartwarming truth about witness protection among the Latter-day Saints. I believe it was called Mobsters and Mormons. Definitely eye-opening.

    I remember that. Can you imagine how terrifying it would have been to be in the chapel when that van blew up? Killing that monster family (can’t remember their names). So sad

  14. I’m hoping some of you google sheet nerds can help me become more of a google sheet nerd. 
     

    Is there a way to have a function with the variable X, where X = the number of cells to pull information from.

    for example. I am trying to calculate how much electricity someone has paid since they have lived in their home. I have their current electric bill as well as the annual % increase of said bill. I want to be able to ask the “how long have you lived in your home?” And they say “8 years”. Then I can enter “8” into a single cell and it tells me how much money they have paid for their electricity since they have lived on their home

  15. 1 hour ago, Jamie123 said:

    It reminds me of an episode of Frasier, where Frasier and Niles are unhappy to discover that a new club has opened in town, and they're not members of it. They don't even know what sort of club it is, but they are determined to join it. After a bit of wangling and string-pulling they manage to become members, and discover it's actually a health and fitness club. For a little while they are happy, until they discover that there's a door they're not allowed to go through because it leads to the "Gold Member" area, whereas they're only "Silver Members". So it's back to the wangling and string-pulling until they finally manage to become Gold Members. They're happy again for a while until they discover yet another mysterious door in the Gold area. Furious, Frasier believes that some deeper paradise is being withheld from him (Platinum membership maybe?) so he storms through the door and finds himself out in the alleyway amongst the trash bins. End of episode.

    What would you call that phenomenon Frasier experienced?

  16. 4 hours ago, jdf135 said:

    I am very frustrated by the way the English word "joy" gets used in gospel discussion and would maybe like to find a different word or just be clearer on what we mean when we say "joy."  To me "joy" is not a productive word because it makes lots of people feel they are failing when they are living the gospel teachings the best they know how but are still not feeling "joyful."

    I know there is a lot of discussion about the difference between "happiness" and "joy" - "joy" meaning more durable happiness -- but there seems to be an implication in the church that "joy" is an unending absence of sorrow or stream of contentment that comes from living the gospel to its fullest.  President Nelson's recent talk on joy gives some insight to a possible, better definition of the word saying, "If we focus on the joy that will come to us, or to those we love, what can we endure that presently seems overwhelming, painful, scary, unfair, or simply impossible?" (emphasis added).    In this case he is not really talking about "joy" in the sense of persisting, current contentment but  talking about how we should focus on the idea of potential  "joy" in the future which thought will give us the strength to endure this life.   In the body of his talk, he seems to suggest that joy is not a persistent feeling but a potential, temporary state amidst affliction. 

    I don't think Jesus was "joyful" at the very moment he was bleeding at every pore or having nails put in his hands.  I can believe he may have been anticipating great joy in the future and as a result was able to endure, but was he really feeling "persisting contentment" when he called out "why has thou forsaken me?"   Jesus, the most perfect of us all, is described by Isaiah as "a man of sorrows and acquainted with grief." Multitudes of prophets -- from Jeremiah to George Albert Smith -- seemingly had moments of immense anguish.  Did they still have "joy" even in their despair or did they just have a faith in future joy??? 

    Should we maybe stop using the word "joy" in gospel discussions and instead find words that better describe the satisfaction the gospel might bring? 

    There are numberless platitudes, one liners, phrases and words we use in the church that I feel we use in more situations than is called for this leads to ambiguous definitions. I can see “joy” being in that pile.

    To me, I understand joy just meaning peace in the direction are going. I am without a doubt happier playing video games than I am at the temple. But the peace and self assurance I get from the temple is essential for my life. Plato t video games does not give me peace or provide a sense  that what I am doing is good.

    I would not connect joy and happiness in anyway.

  17. 52 minutes ago, askandanswer said:

    Does anybody know what the purpose of, or reason for, the Tree of Life was or what its function was? I can't actually think of any good reasons why there was such a thing. I'm guessing that given that access to it was cut off after Adam ate from the other tree, if the Tree of Life did have a purpose, it must have fulfilled that purpose prior to access being cut off. 

    I had the exact same question after my temple visit last night. I understand it represents eternal life… but there is an assumption there that immortality is possible without going through life. Why would there be cherubim and a flaming sword placed to guard it

  18. 40 minutes ago, Traveler said:

    have pondered knowing verses faith and have come to the conclusion that there are two many unknowns.  I speculate that there is a third object in this discussion and that is belief.  It certainly seems to me that faith and belief are what we call in science - tightly coupled.  Knowledge is a very different problem.  I do not know how to distinguish between what we think we know and what truth we actually know.  I have the impression that in this mortal life we really do not know anything but rather we think we know stuff.  Very often I think I know something only to discover that what I thought I knew was not as accurate as I thought.

    I find that belief and knowledge are opposite ends of a spectrum where Faith is the application and internalization of those beliefs and knowledges in our own lives.

    For example:

    I know that eating too much unhealthy food is unhealthy for me and will cause me to gain weight. But I still choose to eat it despite my desire to be healthy. I have knowledge, but no faith.

    I believe that investing in NFTs and Crypto will result in mass wealth in the future… but I don’t do it. I have belief, but no faith.

    I know spending time on scriptures every day brings me peace and joy. I choose to spend that time in scriptures each day. But have knowledge and faith.

    I believe doing work for the dead is helping bring about Gods plan of salvation. I choose to spend some of my time doing work for the dead. I have belief and faith.

     

     

    We won’t be judged on what we believe and know, we will be judged on our faith. The examples above seem to go along nicely with that

  19. 13 hours ago, laronius said:

    But I don't think we are intended to be content with merely believing either. Alma 32 specifically instructs us on how to acquire knowledge. This knowledge comes by way of experience and we come to know pieces of the whole little by little, so that we can come to know some things and yet not have a perfect knowledge. But what exactly does it mean to know?

     In the Sacred Grove we say that Joseph came to know that God the Father and His Son are two distinct beings. But what if his encounter was really just with two members of a super advanced race of aliens pulling a joke on him? And yet Joseph came away from that experience knowing that was not the case. He KNEW who he saw. But how? Of course our sensory perceptions help us get along in life but those senses could not 100% reliably distinguish between God, aliens, or even a delusion. There had to be something more that granted him knowledge, qualifying him as a prophetic witness of God and His Son. I believe this is knowledge granted on a spiritual level, directly to our spirits, to our very beings. We are by definition intelligences after all. But at what point a person evolves from believing to knowing is tough to put a finger on. But with this in mind I have no problem with people saying they know the Church is true. I am curious to "know" does your argument and thought experiment disprove just knowledge of the Church's truthfulness or all knowledge altogether, a philosophical "How can we Know anything?" 

    I love and hate this topic. It is very interesting… but it always ends up becoming a “what does it mean to know” epistemology conversation which is such a bore.

    I think Alma, when is talking about gaining knowledge, is referring to knowledge on specific principles. Not things like whether there is a god or not, if this church is gods one true church, or if Joseph smith was a prophet. I think he is referring to commandment. I know, through experience, that the principles taught in the word of wisdom are true, that reading scriptures every day gives me peace and strength to overcome temptation. And so , and that obedience brings blessings.

    I do not, however, know that God is real or that this is gods one true church.
     

    This is what I think he means by having a perfect knowledge in That thing, but not a knowledge that is perfect (Alma 32:34-26). Hence why continued faith is necessary.