Upward Thought

I was looking for something in my notes and my eyes scanned the following reflection on Isaiah 55:2, and my heart valued it so highly that I could not withhold sharing it: Why do you exchange your silver for what cannot nourish you and consume your toil on outcomes that are less than their cost? Listen to me carefully: eat what makes you grow the best, believe what is most useful, do what conforms to your conscience, desire what you believe is best, and admire what is beautiful, and your soul will increase as what is contrary to the best God can presently give you is consumed to ashes, making the way to see, obtain, and rejoice in increase everlasting.  This is the desire of the Lord's heart for you and for me, and as you live it, you will feel him smile upon you. What could possibly be greater than increasing the Lord's joy? I know of nothing. My footnote to the word "silver" read: Not just money, but also your strength, e.g. the good that you could do. Silver shines...

I was introduced to a new song yesterday which I am continuing to listen to through today to extract all the things the Lord is tying it to in my mind and heart.  The lyrics start with this passage: It started out as a feeling Which then grew into a hope Which then turned into a quiet thought Which then turned into a quiet word And then that word grew louder and louder 'Til it was a battle cry I'll come back When you call me No need to say goodbye Just because everything's changing Doesn't mean it's never been this way before All you can do is try to know who your friends are As you head off to the war Just because everything's changing Doesn't mean it's never been this way before All you can do is try to know who your friends are As you head off to the war ... You'll come back When they call you No need to say goodbye As with so many ideas from God, this passage can be experienced in a multiplex[1] of meaning.  Here's a variation of those words ...

This morning I was blasted by the Lord with a stream of love for a certain friend. I emailed him a note, part of which I will paste here to the strengthen the others it also applies to: You do so much for your family and those who are willing to receive you as a friend. Your love does not go unnoticed to our Father. I hope you can feel his love for you. I thank God that he put you here at this time and in this place. God has given you the courage of a lion. Turn the full fire of God toward your own heart,[1] and be consumed in his love, and after refining you,[3] he will pour a stream out of your overflowing heart into all the world.[4] As you face temptation, learn to go out and serve someone. Make the devil check under his bed for you. Make him regret every time he comes knocking.  Your home defense shotgun is the heart of God within your own, and you fire it by placing your love on full display for all to see, as if you were loving the Lord himself,[5] no matter who tramples it....

A viewer asked: "Please tell us about your avatar change (or did I miss it on one of your recent videos?)" The new icon is going to be on the new website, so I put it on the YouTube channel in preparation for that. When the new site goes live, this blog will end with a message that says "go there instead." I may still cross publish new content on YouTube, but maybe not. The former YouTube icon was a picture I quite liked, but it was very poorly suited to the low resolution way it is displayed, appearing simply as a gray blob. I tend to be resentful of all the dumb little things people require to click on things, but it is good to make a reasonable effort to remove barriers for people to access what will help them. The former blog icon was a lighbulb, which used to be a lightbulb on a ramp until I decided my graphic artist skills were too horrific to make that look sufficiently good. The former blog has the tagline "Explaining the prophecies and the scriptures t...

A viewer asked the following tranche of questions, which I will address inline. Q: "Please teach us why you do not capitalize Him/His when referring to God?" A: I understand the reasons people have for capitalizing them. The experiences I have with him have caused me to find some things much more important to him than I thought, and others to be much less important to him than I thought. There are some cases where he cares about the outward show of reverence, and there are many where they are so pretentious that those who see them so cannot exercise them without mocking God. In at least some things, God would like us to place less emphasis on the outward to as to take away the temptation people incline toward of assuming that by filling their lives with outward shows of piety, they can excuse themselves for the lack of inward obeisance to him. If we capitalized him in our hearts, we would not find the need to do so in our writing. I don't know anyone who uses capitals who...

Part of the email: I sincerely want to do what is best. When I’m given greater light, I want to increase my speed, sensitivity and intensity in reacting appropriately to the greater light, but I’m struggling to practically apply your advice with women. I appreciate what you said about crowns, thorns, unmerited suffering for the benefit of others, etc. but when it comes to ladies, how do I balance this with having basic standards? For women, you say they should receive the best man who will have them. For men…find the woman with the greatest growth potential who is also willing to adopt your purpose as her own? My response: We teach in terms of the ideal, but we must live in terms of the practical. Even when we make every sacrifice we know of to aim for the ideal, we will feel that we are living very far from it in our experience--even if we are on the exact path to it, and certainly if we have not yet truly found it. The truth is that the ideal is very hard to find, and that is not suc...

The comment: A viewer responded to my video called  Hierarchy of Awareness  by saying:  Wow, I had to rewind and listen to some parts again.  I don’t believe in depression or anxiety like Western medicine defines it i.e. a broken brain or diminished quantity of some neurotransmitter and suspect the real treatment for these thought disorders has something to do with increasing awareness. Wonder what your thoughts on this are?  It seems that individuals with higher levels of awareness just don’t suffer from these pseudo-psychiatric conditions but as our world continues to degenerate, we will see more and more people suffer from this because of lack of awareness or constricted awareness or something to that effect.  Thanks for teaching these things that we just weren’t aware of before. My response to him: I agree with what you've said and can make a strong case for it. You've put my thoughts into brief terms better than I could. I am going to say a lot about t...

From time to time, people will accuse me of trying to start a cult. If that were my aim, I am going about it the worst possible way. - Don’t believe anything I say. Only believe what you have your own reasons to believe. Only believe what you are persuaded of so thoroughly that if it proved to be utterly false, only you would be at fault. - Don’t value anything I say or do that you do not believe  - I only ever share what I see, believe, value, and do myself. - I am the least charismatic person in history. I dependably tell you the thing you would least like to hear. - I do not hide anything. I am not giving one message in public and one message in private. Whenever there is anything I know that I do not say, it is only because I have not yet said everything else that I’m supposed to say before that, or because I’m still working on better words to express it.  - I don’t have a secret inner circle. There are a few people who deserve a medal for how diligently they have repeated...

The email: Something I’ve been trying to work out that’s affecting me in the immediate: when Christ descended below all things, did he draw on the grace of the Father to do so?  The first thought that comes to mind is his cry on the cross, “why hast thou forsaken me?” Yet, he can do nothing but what he sees his Father do.  I ask because, as our exemplar, it has to say something for the nature of the suffering and course we follow. Is Christ’s suffering unique because he had no example in time, or because he had to draw on his own infinite nature to bind all creation to him?  If it’s the former, then we draw on the grace and power that flows out his atonement. If it’s the latter, then we follow his example in learning to draw on our own infinite nature (because there is no other way than the one he showed). This feels a bit more new-agey, but ultimately our own “infinite nature” isn’t of ourselves, but our connection to an Eternal God. …Which bring me back to square one. W...

A friend of mine named Chris has started a YouTube channel where he is focusing on sharing stories of his experiences helping those in need. Chris has a lot of love in his heart, and I think you'll find his videos are clear and uplifting. You might want to check them out.

This is one of many posts where I write out a longer explanation of something that I will reuse to save time, forwarding a link instead of rewriting the same idea again and again. Frequently, I will include information from correspondence with or observation of specific individuals in the materials I publish. Sometimes my response treats one specific case. Often, I amalgamate more than one person or experience to respond to several people all at once or to attempt to make the message more generally applicable. Though I probably do it very poorly, I freely weave together chunks specific to specific people, as well as chunks derived for groups of people and chunks intended for everyone. There may be a better way, but doing this achieves several objectives: 1) It gives you the opportunity to practice the art of honestly scanning for information that may be helpful to you among information that may not be. It's good to keep that active and sharp. 2) It gives me the ability to increase ...

"All aboard! ....ha ha ha ha..." (Ozzy Osbourne, Crazy Train ) Risk is the composite of opportunity and danger. Where one component exists, there is also the other in equal and opposite abundance. All disciples of Christ will necessarily embrace more of both. The gospel is not just a vehicle for providing what is better, but also the tools to protect us from the increase in danger that always attends the same. It is always with great grief that I perceive that a what appeared to be a fellow sojourner in the path turned aside to obvious falsehoods. It is good to get away from the idea that all people and things must be all good or all bad. Goodness and badness is a question of motive, not material, and when we force something or someone into a binary state, we lose the benefit of taking the good wherever it can be found. It's wonderful to be able to recognize value in some aspects of a person, thing, or situation without being bound to what you see as less than the best yo...

It is not possible to give one message to all people while saying the best that could be said to each. The ancient preacher Jacob said it very well: 1 The words which Jacob, the brother of Nephi, spake unto the people of Nephi, after the death of Nephi: 2 Now, my beloved brethren, I, Jacob, according to the responsibility which I am under to God, to magnify mine office with soberness, and that I might rid my garments of your sins, I come up into the temple this day that I might declare unto you the word of God. 3 And ye yourselves know that I have hitherto been diligent in the office of my calling; but I this day am weighed down with much more desire and anxiety for the welfare of your souls than I have hitherto been. 4 For behold, as yet, ye have been obedient unto the word of the Lord, which I have given unto you. 5 But behold, hearken ye unto me, and know that by the help of the all-powerful Creator of heaven and earth I can tell you concerning your thoughts, how that ye are beginni...

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