I submit the Pride Matrix

[mikbone]

18 minutes ago, zil2 said:

Yes, all 5 of the rest of us are now aware.   Methinks you're gonna need another platform if you want to reach a few more of us...

Oh I teach my family too.  And anyone that might listen. 

Don’t we have a duty to correct when we know better.  

Imagine what would happen if everyone did the same.

 

Elder Boyd K. Packer and M Russell Ballard tried to get the members to stop using the Mormon moniker back in 2011.

https://www.churchofjesuschrist.org/study/general-conference/2011/10/the-importance-of-a-name?lang=eng

Were they wrong to do so?  No one really made a change until President Nelson made the same recommendation in 2018.

[zil2]

@mikbone, I'm just bemoaning the dwindling participation here.  I've been mentally planning a post about it, but haven't made one.  There will be no point unless @pam can fix the mobile template for the site to include the user menu (or have someone do it).  It's lacking the user menu.  I guess I should make another post about that.

[mikbone]

22 minutes ago, zil2 said:

@mikbone, I'm just bemoaning the dwindling participation here.  I've been mentally planning a post about it, but haven't made one.  There will be no point unless @pam can fix the mobile template for the site to include the user menu (or have someone do it).  It's lacking the user menu.  I guess I should make another post about that.

Yup, I’ve noticed the decline.  I’m OK with a small group.  This is the only social media I do besides family chat.  

It’s cozy.  I’d probably get death threats if I posted on something like Facebook.

And sometimes I use y’all as a sounding board for my thoughts / presentation.

D&C 18:15 And if it so be that you should labor all your days in crying repentance unto this people, and bring, save it be one soul unto me, how great shall be your joy with him in the kingdom of my Father!

I have always interpreted the above one soul as ones self.  

Even if the only person that I have reached is myself, I have accomplished something.

And perhaps,

16 And now, if your joy will be great with one soul that you have brought unto me into the kingdom of my Father, how great will be your joy if you should bring many souls unto me!

Believe it or not, but this site has helped my personal scripture study.

Edited September 16, 2024 by mikbone

[zil2]

When you and I are the only two users left, I'm pretty sure MGF will shut it down and save their money.  I'd like us to try encouraging folk to come and stay (we've had poor luck at that), but first, the mobile version has to have full functionality because the vast majority of the world are crazy enough that that's the only way they'll use the site.

[mikbone]

29 minutes ago, zil2 said:

When you and I are the only two users left, I'm pretty sure MGF will shut it down and save their money.  I'd like us to try encouraging folk to come and stay (we've had poor luck at that), but first, the mobile version has to have full functionality because the vast majority of the world are crazy enough that that's the only way they'll use the site.

Nah, I’ll finally learn how to use a fountain pen and we will become pen pals.

[NeuroTypical]

Oh, I'll still be here Zil!  I'm good at being the last person out the door.  

The bottom has sort of fallen out of the discussion forum market in the last several years.  Not just this board, or even LDS boards.  But social media in general has taken a lot from forums like this.

[zil2]

1 hour ago, NeuroTypical said:

Oh, I'll still be here Zil!  I'm good at being the last person out the door.  

The bottom has sort of fallen out of the discussion forum market in the last several years.  Not just this board, or even LDS boards.  But social media in general has taken a lot from forums like this.

Sorry, three of us are not enough.  I'm well aware that forums are less popular - likely because parents buy their kids cell phones and the kids think everything worth doing has an app.  Probably something to do with crappy American education, too, but... 28 "guests" have been here in the past 3 minutes.  83 in the past 10 minutes.  Sure, some are bots, some are just viewing search results, but I have to believe there's some percentage of those who might sign up and stay if:

• The mobile template had the user menu so that folks could sign in, sign up, manage user stuff like notifications, etc.
• If we weren't so quick to call people trolls / or so brutal when folks post something we don't like

When a newbie signs up for a fountain pen forum, or the reddit sub, and introduces themselves, they basically get love-bombed.  It sucks that members of Christ's Church are being out-Christianed by a bunch of fountain pen users (especially the ones on reddit).

[JohnsonJones]

14 hours ago, zil2 said:

Sorry, three of us are not enough.  I'm well aware that forums are less popular - likely because parents buy their kids cell phones and the kids think everything worth doing has an app.  Probably something to do with crappy American education, too, but... 28 "guests" have been here in the past 3 minutes.  83 in the past 10 minutes.  Sure, some are bots, some are just viewing search results, but I have to believe there's some percentage of those who might sign up and stay if:

• The mobile template had the user menu so that folks could sign in, sign up, manage user stuff like notifications, etc.
• If we weren't so quick to call people trolls / or so brutal when folks post something we don't like

When a newbie signs up for a fountain pen forum, or the reddit sub, and introduces themselves, they basically get love-bombed.  It sucks that members of Christ's Church are being out-Christianed by a bunch of fountain pen users (especially the ones on reddit).

I need to be a better person. 

[zil2]

3 hours ago, JohnsonJones said:

I need to be a better person. 

We all do.

[zil2]

3 hours ago, JohnsonJones said:

I need to be a better person. 

PS: If it helps any, yesterday the reddit FP folk showed their viciousness and intolerance as much as possible when someone brought the religion of the owners of a popular online FP shop into the discussion.  So, they only out-Christian us when religion and politics are not part of the discussion (a fact I was already well aware of).

[mikbone]

3 hours ago, zil2 said:

PS: If it helps any, yesterday the reddit FP folk showed their viciousness and intolerance as much as possible when someone brought the religion of the owners of a popular online FP shop into the discussion.  So, they only out-Christian us when religion and politics are not part of the discussion (a fact I was already well aware of).

Yup, I was in a telescope forum awhile back. Everyone was super helpful.

But don’t talk about politics or religion!

Edited September 17, 2024 by mikbone

[HaggisShuu]

On 9/16/2024 at 1:41 AM, mikbone said:

I hate the concept of a prosperity theology

From Wikipedia - Prosperity theology (sometimes referred to as the prosperity gospel, the health and wealth gospel, the gospel of success, seed-faith gospel, Faith movement, or Word-Faith movement) is a religious belief among some Charismatic Christians that financial blessing and physical well-being are always the will of God for them, and that faith, positive scriptural confession, and giving to charitable and religious causes will increase one's material wealth. Material and especially financial success is seen as a sign of divine grace or favor.

The Pride matrix is a better way of visualizing reality.  

Yes Righteousness does tend to make people industrious and blessed, and usually people will improve their situation and become better off spiritually and temporally.  But not necessarily.  Good people get trials like cancer and financial compromise.  Bad people can also become very rich and appear spiritually and temporally blessed.  Be careful sitting in judgment.  

I don't believe the church teaches prosperity gospel - it promises temporal and spiritual blessings for obedience, but also promises hardship, pain and that the agency of others can and will negatively impact you. 
 

My patriarchal blessing says I will always be able to provide for my family, but doesn't go any further than that by saying I'll be prosperous or abundant in wealth. 

[laronius]

Came across this in this week's BofM reading, concerning the economic status of the people in the years following Christ's appearance to the Nephites:

4 Nephi 1:23 ...they had become exceedingly rich, because of their prosperity in Christ.

This is definitely an example of the promise of the faithful being blessed in all things both temporal and spiritual, but that phrase "prosperity in Christ" caught my attention. This verse is not equating becoming rich with prosperity in Christ but rather pointing out that riches are a potential blessing or byproduct emanating from fully living His gospel. And prosperity in Christ certainly has other and greater forms of prosperity than earthly riches. 

But the immediate verses following state:

"...there began to be among them those who were lifted up in pride, such as the wearing of costly apparel, and all manner of fine pearls, and of the fine things of the world. 25 And from that time forth they did have their goods and their substance no more common among them. 26 And they began to be divided into classes; and they began to build up churches unto themselves to get gain, and began to deny the true church of Christ."

Clearly the people started to overvalue the earthly riches of being prosperous in Christ and undervalue the eternal riches.

Edited October 25, 2024 by laronius

[JohnsonJones]

On 10/25/2024 at 8:55 AM, laronius said:

Came across this in this week's BofM reading, concerning the economic status of the people in the years following Christ's appearance to the Nephites:

4 Nephi 1:23 ...they had become exceedingly rich, because of their prosperity in Christ.

This is definitely an example of the promise of the faithful being blessed in all things both temporal and spiritual, but that phrase "prosperity in Christ" caught my attention. This verse is not equating becoming rich with prosperity in Christ but rather pointing out that riches are a potential blessing or byproduct emanating from fully living His gospel. And prosperity in Christ certainly has other and greater forms of prosperity than earthly riches. 

But the immediate verses following state:

"...there began to be among them those who were lifted up in pride, such as the wearing of costly apparel, and all manner of fine pearls, and of the fine things of the world. 25 And from that time forth they did have their goods and their substance no more common among them. 26 And they began to be divided into classes; and they began to build up churches unto themselves to get gain, and began to deny the true church of Christ."

Clearly the people started to overvalue the earthly riches of being prosperous in Christ and undervalue the eternal riches.

What is of extreme interest is what I highlighted...

 I try to point out to people what it means to have everything in common among a people.  Many on these forums do not like this idea. 

[laronius]

2 hours ago, JohnsonJones said:

What is of extreme interest is what I highlighted...

 I try to point out to people what it means to have everything in common among a people.  Many on these forums do not like this idea. 

The law of consecration is really a rather significant manifestation of a person's/people's commitment to both the first and second great commandments: a grateful recognition that everything good comes from God and is ultimately still His and loving your neighbor as yourself. It is also a significant manifestation of a people being of one heart and one mind, the definition of Zion. Even if the law of consecration wasn't a formal commandment, it would be the natural byproduct of our attempts to live these great teachings.

[askandanswer]

The thing that bothers me the most about the concept of the pride cycle is that it suggests that God repeatedly blessed the people with that which made the biggest contribution to the start of the next pride cycle. The concept suggests that the people were blessed by God with prosperity and that the prosperity led to pride which then led to destruction. Surely God noticed this and once He did, He may have realised that it was not such a wise idea to bless people with something that fuelled their destruction. I like to think that God makes better decisions than that. I think that there are many other things that He could have blessed them with that would not have contributed to their destruction. I'm more comfortable with the idea of attributing the prosperity that often followed periods of warfare and destruction to the natural economic cycles related to peace and stability, the increased demand for all manner of goods and services to replace that which was lost during the period of war, and the flow of income and investment to productive and profitable activities rather than the wasteful and destructive expenditure associated with warfare.   

Edited November 3, 2024 by askandanswer

[Ironhold]

8 hours ago, askandanswer said:

The thing that bothers me the most about the concept of the pride cycle is that it suggests that God repeatedly blessed the people with that which made the biggest contribution to the start of the next pride cycle. The concept suggests that the people were blessed by God with prosperity and that the prosperity led to pride which then led to destruction. Surely God noticed this and once He did, He may have realised that it was not such a wise idea to bless people with something that fuelled their destruction. I like to think that God makes better decisions than that. I think that there are many other things that He could have blessed them with that would not have contributed to their destruction. I'm more comfortable with the idea of attributing the prosperity that often followed periods of warfare and destruction to the natural economic cycles related to peace and stability, the increased demand for all manner of goods and services to replace that which was lost during the period of war, and the flow of income and investment to productive and profitable activities rather than the wasteful and destructive expenditure associated with warfare.   

"Hard times make hard men. Hard men make soft times. Soft times make soft men. Soft men make hard times."

How it works is that whenever things go sideways, there will generally arise a group of people, if not a key part of that generation, who stand up, get things done, deal with the drama of the day, and then bequeath to their posterity a relative amount of peace and prosperity. 

Problem is, the longer a society experiences peace and prosperity, the more likely they are to take it for granted and the less willing the members of that society are to do what they need to in order to protect what they have. That's when things go pear-shaped and the hardship comes back to smack everyone. 

Real life example of this - 

It's Fall 2019. I have a strong feeling that I need to go to Amazon and stock up on surplus military rations. 2020 rolls around and we lock down. We take comfort in the fact that we have the rations in case my parents and I need them for food storage. 

The 2020 lockdown is lifted and grocery stores eventually restock. My parents decide that we no longer need the rations, that the cases are just cluttering the house, and so off they go to a storage unit we're renting along with everything else they decided we don't need in the house. 

We're in Texas. 

February 2021. We get the blizzard that shuts down the state's electrical grid. For 72 hours, we have no electricity. We're fortunate to have water, but no power. 

The rations are still inside the storage unit because mom and dad didn't think to pull them back out in time and my car isn't safe to drive in severe weather of the kind that preceded the blizzard. 

US military rations of the kind I got have an included flameless ration heater that makes use of an exothermic reaction to boil food in the bag. So we could have had hot food at our leisure. Instead, dad had to go out onto the back porch and boil large pots of water using our gas grill (which has since gone to grill heaven), then bring those pots inside the house whereupon mom dumped whatever shelf-stable items we had into those pots to try and boil something. 

Once it was safe to travel they went to the storage unit to get those rations, their way of admitting that I'd been right the entire time and we suffered needlessly. 

[laronius]

13 hours ago, askandanswer said:

The thing that bothers me the most about the concept of the pride cycle is that it suggests that God repeatedly blessed the people with that which made the biggest contribution to the start of the next pride cycle. The concept suggests that the people were blessed by God with prosperity and that the prosperity led to pride which then led to destruction. Surely God noticed this and once He did, He may have realised that it was not such a wise idea to bless people with something that fuelled their destruction. I like to think that God makes better decisions than that. I think that there are many other things that He could have blessed them with that would not have contributed to their destruction. I'm more comfortable with the idea of attributing the prosperity that often followed periods of warfare and destruction to the natural economic cycles related to peace and stability, the increased demand for all manner of goods and services to replace that which was lost during the period of war, and the flow of income and investment to productive and profitable activities rather than the wasteful and destructive expenditure associated with warfare.   

Financial prosperity as a blessing (beyond simply being self-sufficient) is largely intended to allow us to more fully bless others. In other words seeking riches with the intent to do good. If we cannot be trusted with earthly riches we cannot be trusted with eternal ones either. It's a rather significant test of this life and indicator of future opportunities. Life is meant to reveal our true character, not conceal or avoid exposing it.