An Insight I've had on Spiritual Manifestations

[CommanderSouth]

As a preface to this, I grew up Pentecostal.  So when I joined the church, and up until very recently, I struggled with the idea of "the only true and living church".  Mostly because I felt it pitted myself against my Mom.  She still believed as she did, and she still spoke in tongues, shouted (as in shouted and "flailed") on rare occasions (I've seen less than 10ish times in my life), and could fall out (slain in the spirit in the circles I was in).  I see people in churches she would watch and see the same, and I couldn't for the life of me reconcile it.

But in the last few months something has dawned on me, the principle of God speaking to people in their langauge.  When I combine this with the idea of the Book of Mormon being the "most correct of any book", something clicks.  We still need the Bible, we still love the Bible, and the Book of Mormon doesn't replace it.  Some people, ourselves included, need those words.  God still speaks to people with those words.  

Then it hit me, hard.  And I am SO grateful.

Worship, including manifestations, is so often just one yielding to the spirit and just expressing one's self to God.  So why wouldn't the Pentecostals speak in tongues?  I cry sometimes, and it's just me feeling so overwhelmed I can't express myself otherwise.  I am of the mind now that speaking in tongues (an unknown tongue, not the gift of tongues), is a way one can worship, and just because it's not something I do, doesn't mean it isn't valid.  We don't play guitar in church, but it doesn't mean it's not of God, and in similar manner, we don't speak in tongues like that, but that doesn't mean it's not of God (in the sense it isn't a pure action of worship vs a manifestation of Satan) and that he doesn't accept that offering.  Can someone fake it with malintent, sure.  But I've already believed that.  But now all these "moves of the spirit" I've seen don't have to be "us vs them".

I was listening to a podcast with a fairly "liberal" Mormon.  He is still a believer and isn't speaking against authority (and states that himself), even if he himself wonders if things being done are the best.  But John Dehlin was interviewing him, and trying to get him to discredit the experiences of Catholic nuns seeing Marian visions, and he wouldn't.  He refused, and said basically, "Who am I to say how God would speak to a Catholic?  He speaks to us in our language and to what we are able to accept" and then it hit me.  People aren't in the church because they don't believe God, they aren't in because A) they don't want it, or B) they aren't ready.  If we believe God will have 3 degrees of Glory, why not degrees of churches.  Give people what they can handle, and lead them.

God loves us all, and in the end, we'll all have access to truth, and we will get what we truly want.  He will give us EVERYTHING we can accept.  And it's a long game.  Don't quench the spirit, don't resist the promptings if you're being drawn, but beyond that, worship how you worship, don't do something you don't feel lead to, and leave the rest in God's hands.

And with that logic, I'm content.  My Mom loves God, and she speaks in tongues, it's how she manifests what's in her heart, and in my reading, it isn't unscriptural.  It just isn't something I do, and I am ok with that.

We are "the most correct" of any church, but that would be a dumb reason to throw out the rest, just like we wouldn't throw out the Bible.  Show people the truth, and if they want it, they will accept it, and if they don't, they won't.  And they may still later, and they may only ever accept a degree of it.  But isn't that the idea anyway, isn't that "the vision" of D&C 76?

Praise God!