Truth

I was struck by a very brief talk today. Her daughter, a returned missionary, spoke before her and took most of the time, so I was prepared for the meeting to go late, but the mom got up, gave a profound talk and sat down two minutes before the end of the meeting. I was impressed by this alone, but in the talk she shared an experience where her daughter had come across a podcast that criticized the church, tearing apart its doctrine and history. Her mom wisely asked her, “How do you feel when you listen to it?”

Her daughter shared, “Angry, hurt, frustrated.”

And her mom then asked her, “What do you think the purpose of the podcast is?”

Her daughter, without thinking, said, “To destroy faith.” Her mom explained that the second she said that, it made her realize that it had an agenda and it was succeeding.

She further explained that the podcast had confused her daughter so much because it had taken some truths and interwoven them with lies. This reminded me of so many scriptures.

Genesis 3:1-7

4 And the serpent said unto the woman, Ye shall not surely die:

5 For God doth know that in the day ye eat thereof, then your eyes shall be opened, and ye shall be as gods, knowing good and evil.

Satan, the ultimate deceiver told her a truth, that they could be like Gods, knowing good and evil, but he left out the consequences of the sin. Lies, woven behind the face of truth. This is Satan’s greatest tool. It can be as simple as the change of a single word. Take this example when Zeezrom was contending with Amulek.

36 Now Amulek saith again unto him: Behold thou hast lied, for thou sayest that I spake as though I had authority to command God because I said he shall not save his people in their sins.

37 And I say unto you again that he cannot save them in their sins; for I cannot deny his word, and he hath said that no unclean thing can inherit the kingdom of heaven; therefore, how can ye be saved, except ye inherit the kingdom of heaven? Therefore, ye cannot be saved in your sins.

One word. From vs in. Christ can save us from our sins, but he will not save us in our sins.

I recently saw an instagram post from a traveling UK influencer. He comes to the US often and shares his love for America: its nature, the people, and more. He recently explained that he thinks that the reason so many Americans feel so unsatisfied with such a great nation is because of the media. He explained, “It is dividing wonderful people and plotting them against each other.” The media is just another example of how perspective and intent can show an entirely different truth. I may have shared this in earlier blogs, but I used to struggle (and sometimes still do) to believe that people can love me. I don’t know why I’ve struggled with this pretty much my entire life, but during my husband’s residency I had hit rock bottom for various reasons, but as I clawed my way out of that hole, I realized that one of the things that had put me in there in the first place was believing in a skewed reality. I believed I was unloveable. I would seek for and support my belief in the way people talked to me; it got so bad, that when I’d received, “I love you, Elise,” from my husband, my brain would tell me, “He’s only saying that because he feels guilty about something.” If someone was kind to me, they wanted something from me. I am being incredibly vulnerable here, and broadcasting it across the World Wide Web, so please be kind, but I am sharing this because I want to show how powerful our brains can be. We can find evidence for faith or we can find evidence against it. But what is our intent? What are we seeking? In the Book of Mormon, one of the most common scriptures you’ll hear a missionary share is Moroni 10:3-5, but there is a reason it is so widely shared. It is packed with truth.

3 Behold, I would exhort you that when ye shall read these things, if it be wisdom in God that ye should read them, that ye would remember how merciful the Lord hath been unto the children of men, from the creation of Adam even down until the time that ye shall receive these things, and ponder it in your hearts.

4 And when ye shall receive these things, I would exhort you that ye would ask God, the Eternal Father, in the name of Christ, if these things are not true; and if ye shall ask with a sincere heart, with real intent, having faith in Christ, he will manifest the truth of it unto you, by the power of the Holy Ghost.

5 And by the power of the Holy Ghost ye may know the truth of all things.

The most important part of this scripture, to me, is that we have real intent. If we pray to know that the church is true, or if Joseph Smith was a prophet, or if the Book of Mormon is the word of God with the intent to support anti-claims or support our desire to not have to live a higher law, then we are not promised the manifestation of truth. We have to have real intent. Intent that we will act on the truth we are given. Sometimes we may feel we are in a valley of darkness, that we haven’t felt the spirit in a while, but maybe it is because we aren’t willing to make the changes necessary to get back to the peak, but it also might be that we are like Adam and Eve and know no different because we always live in that light, but I do know we can know with an assurance to what is truth: Through the fruits of the spirit which we can see in the consequences of our choices and the feelings in our heart. No one can falsify the feelings of peace.

Ok, now that I have shared that part of my heart, let me share what I’ve been up to the past few weeks… I’ll try and catch you up, but I’m going to do it in the next post to keep the topics separate.