Seven of Everything

According to Elder Bruce R. McConkie: “Eternal life is not a name that has reference only to the unending duration of a future life; immortality is to live forever in the resurrected state, and by the grace of God all men will gain this unending continuance of life. But only those who obey the fulness of the gospel law will inherit eternal life. ( D&C 29:43-44 ) It is ‘the greatest of all the gifts of God' ( D&C 14:7 ), for it is the kind, status, type, and quality of life that God himself enjoys. Thus those who gain eternal life receive exaltation; they are sons of God, joint-heirs with Christ, members of the Church of the Firstborn; they overcome all things, have all power, and receive the fulness of the Father” (Mormon Doctrine, 2nd ed. [1966], 237). The first thing I want to say is that this quote, from the book Mormon Doctrine, was the opinion of its author Bruce R. McConkie. It was never agreed upon or declared as doctrine by the leaders of The Church of Jesus Chri...

"We are in the telestial kingdom" was a phrase stated at this last general conference which I would like to elaborate on. There are 9 verses in scripture using the word telestial and one Joseph Smith Translation (D&C 76 , 88 and JST 1 Cor 15:40 ). There are an additional 33 making reference to that kingdom in these three chapters; there may be more I did not catch. There is another verse in D&C 88:25 stating, "the earth abideth the law of a celestial kingdom." Out of all 44 of these verses, there is not one that makes any reference to us currently living in the telestial kingdom. So where did this idea come from, is it true, and what does it mean? This idea that we live in the telestial kingdom comes from the temple. It is a true principle but has been and continues to be largely misunderstood. It implies the world that we live in right now is the telestial kingdom. The incorrect interpretation for this is as follows: The world we live in is a fallen ...

This was a talk given to my brother-in-law at his baptism on the gift of the Holy Ghost. I am modifying it for the blog setting. Some of the things I put in brackets are things I didn't say because it is more than I would expound upon to either an eight-year-old or a new convert. Congratulations! I want to start by reiterating a little bit of what [your brother] said. You just went into the water. Now back in the day, eight years ago, before you were born, you were immersed in water and you had your spirit come into your body. Then you were born, right? You were born to your dad and your mom and they were already in the kingdom of God, so you were blessed, and you grew up in the church. You were taught about the gospel, you go to primary, and now you're eight, and when you're eight, just like [your brother] talked about, that's the time when you are ready to choose, right? You're ready to make that choice. Its like being brought to the front door of the kingdom o...

I find it interesting how different the same intro can lead only four months apart. In November, I wrote the blog post " Master, What Shall I Do To Be Saved? (Luke 10:25) ." Here I duplicated the first two paragraphs and it naturally took a different direction. Eternal life and salvation, or being saved, are synonymous terms. You cannot have one without the other and you cannot loose one without loosing the other. Another term also synonymous with these is inheriting or entering the kingdom of God. Some people believe that to be saved the only thing that must be done is "confess with thy mouth the Lord Jesus, and ... believe in thine heart that God hath raised him from the dead" ( Romans 10:9 ); that is enough, it is as good as done, the final judgement of salvation has been declared upon their soul, they are saved. However, this is not what Jesus taught. In fact this scripture, which is true and written in future tense, cannot be taken out of the context of ev...

Partaking of the sacrament is clearly without question to renew our baptismal covenants. This is repeated over and over in General Conference. But is it limited to that? There are many quotes where Prophets and Apostles state that with the sacrament we renew our covenants, without reference to baptismal covenants specifically. Also, there are a few quotes that directly refer to temple covenants being included as we partake of the sacrament to renew our covenants. Here are three links that I found that refer to the sacrament as having a purpose of renewing all our covenants not just baptismal covenants: I have a question? As Now We Take The Sacrament? Understanding Our Covenants with God? The first one uses quotes that can be interpreted both ways (baptismal covenants only or all covenants). It also uses quotes from sources that are not printed by the church as doctrine. The second one has the most obvious and original quote which is from Delbert L. Stapley (in Conference Report...

This is an email that I sent to my elders quorum president in Georgia in the middle of 2016. For context this ward was very recently reorganized and consisted of sections of three or four wards previous to the boundary change and leadership reorganization. I had just been called as the secretary: Hello [EQP], After last night’s meeting I have had several thoughts I want to share with you. One is about home teaching assignments and the other I’ll call cleansing the inner vessel. I remember once while I was on my mission we went to the mission office and while there we were given a tour or a walk around the office. In the mission president’s office, I remember seeing a board with pictures of all the missionaries in their location assignments and in companionships. This is the one thing I still remember, the mission president explained the process he went through to assign companions and locations. He said each transfer period he would go through all the missionaries, each missiona...

It has been said that there are at least six different meanings for the use of saved and salvation among Latter-day Saints . While this is true, it is not scripturally accurate. This blog post will focus on the scriptural use of the words save, saved, saveth, and saving in understanding salvation. Future blog posts may study the use of other words such as salvation, kingdom of God, eternal life and so forth. Scripturally, there are three uses of the words save, saved, saveth, or saving. One is in reference to salvation, another is in reference to different kinds of temporal or physical saving, and the last is a different use of the words save and saving meaning except. This last meaning is very easy to decipher. The total number of instances of the words save, saved, saveth, and saving in all scripture are 740 (in 708 verses). Of these, 288 instances (in 279 verses) use the word to mean 'except.' The remaining 452 instances (in 436 verses) refer to either eternal salvatio...