Upward Thought

 Andrew Tiner posted this a few days ago ( video ): "Now that I know Jesus for real, I will never go back to doing church, doing worship, doing the ceremonies that they do in church to try to prove to the world that they are a church and that they are Christians. The churches here in America are apostate. They have fallen away from God or maybe they never were with God. They advocate for all kinds of sin. They teach people that you will always be a sinner, that you never truly repent. They accept all kinds of perverted things. They keep people out of the kingdom of God and they themselves are not entering the kingdom of God. If we want to come into a genuine relationship with Jesus Christ, we have to sever ourselves from the world and from false religion. Do you love Jesus Christ? Do you want to hear His voice? Do you want to be led by Him? Or are you content with the lies in church? May the grace of Jesus be with you."

I've been describing an idea I label "impulses and echoes" for quite some time. Here's an example. I listened to this interview from Jordan Peterson and noticed he's figured it out as well. Take a watch.

 This guy gets it. Here's just one of his videos. Check out the others, too. You might find his messages particularly forwardable to others.

Here is a talk by Marc M. that I thoroughly enjoyed listening to: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=75DnTJpoF54 I find it to be excellent. He succinctly addresses many important ideas regarding governance and the past, present, and future disposition of Zion for those who believe that Joseph Smith was a prophet of God. Marc said he wrote and read this speech from the LDS pulpit by invitation, and I think it stands as a wonderful example of how the Lord is using people to teach what he has taught them in a way that is accessible to those who might not otherwise access those ideas. I've made several videos on teaching that address a bit of what I'm referring to here . I happen to know that Marc has a lot  going on in his life. He faces many demands on his time and attention, and many of those things are out of his hands. And he still found the time to work with the Lord to write, deliver, and record this talk. If he can do it, so can you. So many precious blessings God offers are l

I received the following email yesterday: <begin quote> Could you stop referring to us...as doofuses...and idiots? ....It's just many of us do often feel like doofuses and idiots (I guess we all are compared to God) and we want to feel like we have a bit of a chance as well. It may sound funny to you, but when you said a while back in a video that no doofuses would make it to heaven it really discouraged me. Because I am one in many ways, and probably in the way that you meant, more than I would normally care to admit. If I knew how to easily overcome this condition I would have already because I've put a substantial effort into not being one. I know God can't look upon sin with the least degree of allowance, but I was hoping he'd have some mercy on idiots. I wouldn't want you to lose any sleep over this. You haven't offended me, it was just a bit discouraging for a little while is all. Then I decided that I may as well keep trying because the alternative

Someone wrote me the following: "Is part of getting into the presence of God, that a person overcome a big physical test? Was there one significant test you passed that cracked the heavens for you?" One good place to look for this is "The Glory of God is Intelligence."  Here is a snippet from page 41: <begin quote>  Law, glory, light, and truth are all intimately tied together. Any time you have one, you have all the others, and any time you lack one, you lack all the others. Reconciliation to the law of the level of truth you possess sanctifies you, or makes you able to receive the glory pertaining to that kingdom, or all the blessings reaped as a natural consequence of living the truths at that level: “that which is governed by law is also preserved by law and perfected and sanctified by the same.” (D&C 88:34) There is a range of light and truth corresponding to a given kingdom. There is a minimum and a maximum. Everyone who possesses the minimum amount

There are many articles on the internet that counsel people not to pray to know whether the Book of Mormon is true. You should check them out and add your voice to the conversation of articles that allow them. In this article, the author makes what I believe is a solid argument for why putative truth can't be evaluated by one's feelings about it. He uses scriptures to support the idea that one must use their minds and reason about putative truth. Then he takes a huge turn into a less supported conclusion: "In summary, then, we should never be tempted to accept the Mormon challenge to pray about the Book of Mormon. Rather, we should use our minds to investigate its origin, examine its teachings, and compare it with Scripture. In so doing, we remain consistent with Scripture and subject a book that claims to be the Word of God to a factual and realistic assessment." I am writing this post because I think this is a great specific example of what I've referred to as

A viewer wrote: "To be honest, one of the ways I deviate from God is by not saying what The Lord would in my place.  Many times, I’m silent when I should be verbally standing apart from the crowd.  This has come to my attention with greater clarity because of your videos.  How do you go from a, How To Win Friends and Influence People, kind of approach to life to being a verbal warrior for Christ?  My whole life I’ve been agreeable....I’ve spent my life finding common ground and avoiding conflict.   How do you get to the point where you speak the truth regardless of how offended the other party will take it?  I don’t believe The Lord ever worried about that.  I’m so amazed at how blunt and offensive he was at times and how kind and loving he was to others.  He had the ability to deliver exactly what the individual needed because he had the spiritual gift of being able to “see” their hearts.  I don’t have that now.  I assume that gift comes as you do it, otherwise you are shooting i

Q: "What would you say to your wife if she asked you, 'don’t you believe in the temple anymore and the covenants you made there, don’t you believe in eternal marriage?'  This is how I responded saying, 'yes, I believe in those promises we made, and we can be married forever, but that depends on how we live, that ordinance in the temple was an invitation, God is the one that seals in the Heavens what is sealed on earth.'  So bottom line, is that true?  Is there still a sliver of truth in the LDS temple rites?  Would God recognize that marriage performed in the temple if we live righteously?" A - what: There is nothing done in LDS temples today that confers anything beyond whatever true information is contained in what is done or spoken. The blessings available to anyone who has been married in an LDS temple are available to all people under the same conditions, which have everything to do with how they treat each other and how diligently they learn from and act

In reply to a video I published on how to respond to those who claim to have had supernatural experiences in LDS temples , someone wrote: "Insightful video.  Do you still believe the BoM is inspired after knowing it was translated by automatic writing using a well known method of occultic divination?  The early restoration folks also became violently possessed as did Mohammad, Siddhartha Buddah, etc..upon their encounters.  I investigated Mormonism for a few years exhaustively and it just couldn't stand any scrutiny whatsoever. I'd be interested to hear any epistemic reasons there are for that belief." Here is my reply: To someone who believes the Bible: The means of translation The commenter above referred to the purported means of translation of the Book of Mormon. While he used strange phrasing, it seems he doesn't dispute that Joseph Smith dictated the Book of Mormon. He refers to the process as a potential problem. Do you also have a problem with Joseph of Eg

I recently published a video where I encouraged everyone to go preach the gospel online by searching for and engaging with people who have questions. Here is an example of this. It's not the best example of a sincere question, but it is as important to leave people without excuse as it is to bring people into the fold, and you can't always tell ahead of time which way it will go (see Alma 12-13, where a bitter opponent of God fully repents in response to intense arguments provided by believers). This was on the comments of a YouTube video someone I don't know made about how God increases the intensity of suffering when we need to learn something. Go find people who ask questions that you have the answer to. But sanctify the Lord God in your hearts: and be ready always to give an answer to every man that asketh you a reason of the hope that is in you with meekness and fear: (1 Peter 3:15) And if you don't have the answer, seek God for it yourself. If any of you lack wis

I couldn't agree more. The system originally set up in the United States and later innovated upon in the writings of Jefferson (one of its principle architects) was designed to mitigate the inability of the average person to know what is good or right through hierarchical selections of people. O how marvelous are the works of the Lord, and how long doth he suffer with his people; yea, and how blind and impenetrable are the understandings of the children of men; for they will not seek wisdom, neither do they desire that she should rule over them! (Mosiah 8:20) The system Jefferson later proposed is closer to the system set up by king Mosiah in the Book of Mormon than it is the system initially adopted by the United States. Unfortunately, very few read the Book of Mormon, and very few who do understand what it says. One example of this ignorance is that no one I know of has actually described the judge system there, even though it is written in a way to make this a not-too-difficult

Someone wrote me with the following information, which I've stripped into bullets in order to protect anonymity while keeping them in first-person phrasing. - I have studied the gospel my whole life. - I have come to realize that I don't know nearly as much about God as I thought. - Who is God? Is he one, or two, or three beings? - I've watched and read some of your things. - I keep asking God about this, and I hate asking someone else, but I feel God has told me to ask you. This is a topic I've heard many questions about, typically including a lot more about the Holy Ghost specifically, and there are lessons for many in the response I wrote to her. I share it here for whoever it might benefit: It seems to make sense to me that if you wanted to know more about someone after getting to know everything you can from books about them, you would ask someone who knew them personally. Everything we know about God began through the eye witness of Adam and Eve, and at all times

On YouTube, I wrote "We all ought to live up to the full stature of Christ in the choices we make." This was in reference to: 4 There is one body, and one Spirit, even as ye are called in one hope of your calling; 5 One Lord, one faith, one baptism, 6 One God and Father of all, who is above all, and through all, and in you all. 7 But unto every one of us is given grace according to the measure of the gift of Christ. 8 Wherefore he saith, When he ascended up on high, he led captivity captive, and gave gifts unto men. 9 (Now that he ascended, what is it but that he also descended first into the lower parts of the earth? 10 He that descended is the same also that ascended up far above all heavens, that he might fill all things.) 11 And he gave some, apostles; and some, prophets; and some, evangelists; and some, pastors and teachers; 12 For the perfecting of the saints, for the work of the ministry, for the edifying of the body of Christ: 13 Till we all come in the unity of the f

Someone emailed me this: "Thanks for continually doing videos along the way of writing your books. I'm always reluctant to email too much and take up your time but I know many of my questions may be of benefit to others hearing your responses to them." Here is my reply: Never hesitate to ask. Questions can be beneficial or not. Withholding questions when the answer would benefit impedes the good God would otherwise flow out to the world. The benefit of a question depends on the heed and diligence of the asker. When those with requisite heed and diligence ask a question, they pay the price so that others who do not have that faith can hear the answer. While most will not understand, those on the margin of faith will learn more than they otherwise would, and God is glorified more than he would otherwise be. You obviously take the time one should to consider the things you have access to, squeezing out and cherishing every drop of what you can get from God directly before as

Thank you for those few who have taken the time to write up their thoughts on the books I've written using Amazon's review feature. There is a tendency of people to only write reviews when they really hate a book, and it can significantly skew the perspective of those who might otherwise read the book, especially when there are only a few reviews. One such score-skewer is the self-styled "Seeker of Truth" who has left another single star review for one of my books ("Repentance") on Amazon. Because his doctrinal viewpoint aligns very much with the common Christian status quo, it's perhaps worth taking a moment to address. The argument of the reviewer is essentially that God can magically change you against your will, while my claim is that God has given us the power of choice and provides us the information necessary to show us what we ought to choose, both at great price to himself and his servants, and that we need to make that choice in order to receiv

At least several people I know are experiencing desires to establish places to which people can come. Their reasons for this are various, but in the cases I know of, seem to be sincere and good. I can't at this time share with you an adequate portion of what God has taught me on the subject. The only reason is that there is too much to convey briefly, it is too interdependent to share chunks of it, and there are many other things that are much more important right now to which I must dedicate my limited time. This is the best I can do for now. I want to clearly indicate to you the importance, opportunities, complexity, and dangers of gathering, but I can't call upon the details of what I know for the aforementioned reasons. So here is analogy: You are a caveman, and you've just found a giant barrel of gasoline and box of matches outside your cave. There are some scenarios where this could end in your benefit, and all of them would be massively better than anything you have

A friend shared with me the idea of preparing a place where anyone who needed a place to live could go. He intended it to be a place in the United States, differentiating it from a developing world opportunity to rise to greater temporal capacity. He intended it to be a working farm, differentiating it from the welfare programs practiced in the wealthy nations. He intended it to be a place that is self-supporting, but extremely frugal and simple, meaning people would not have any money, but they would have simple clothing, sufficient calories from simple food they were able to grow themselves, and simple dorms to live in. The place would run by the principles of heaven, which would include freedom from compulsion of beliefs. As time goes by, I encounter more and more people who would prefer to live in such a place than the system that presently pervades the world. But it is clear to me that very few people would show up to such a place as this. The religious would probably be the last

On 7/8/19, I wrote: A week ago I had the following dream: I was in my house looking out the back window, first thing in the morning. Overnight, someone had cut windy roads into the grass all over the yard and close to the house. There were workmen everywhere. Then people started crowding into my house by my sides. I said, "who are you? Get out of my house!" They said they were there to watch the work. The workers were converging on a house maybe 700 feet behind mine and up a hill (there is no house there in reality). The chief worker was right outside my window, so I opened and asked him what they were doing. He said they just discovered they could turn houses on their foundations, and that they were going to turn that house. I said "isn't that dangerous?" He said, "absolutely not. It's completely safe." Then they started rotating the house. Almost immediately, the foundation crumbled, and the house came sliding down the hill towards mine. The peop

This is a revision of some ideas I originally published in July of 2019. I was asking the Lord about a vision he recently gave me, and he explained to me that people today have incredibly little awareness of the benefits of the cultural foundations put in place by people better than them. He said we do not appreciate the sacrifice it cost for them to do what they did or the benefit we receive from it.  One reason we fail to appreciate the contributions that make modern life possible is that we believe the false idea that the good of an idea or work cannot be evaluated absent everything else about its author.  We insist that in order for a person to do good, they must first be perfect. We insist that it is ok for a judge to hold others to standards they do not keep themselves.  There is no end to the culling of culture when we insist that every source be perfectly pure from our current lens. MLK was a serial adulterer and Ghandi was a voracious racist. Does this invalidate their princip

Question: A friend emailed me this question, which I have anonymized while keeping the essence: I know there are issues in my church, but I believe that by remaining in my church, I can reach more people and do more good than if I left. With everyone I interact with there, I try to help them see and believe the next increment of light from where they stand. It seems like if I said more, they wouldn't listen anyway, and I can't see what good I'd do as an estranged hermit. Am I doing everything I could? I feel like I'm not necessarily calling things as I see them, but I also feel like if I did, I would be giving them more than they could handle. Do you have any insights on this? Response: Here is a rough cut answer from some thoughts I've been working on for some time on teaching. It could definitely be extrapolated on, written more clearly, and organized better, but I hope there is something here that helps you now. If you really want to do the greatest good, you mus

 A YouTube visitor wrote: "LDS and Protestants have a different view of Christ. LDS he’s just one son of God of many generations of gods who is the spirit brother of Satan. Protestants believe in the trinity that Christ is Creator who is the triune God who is the first and last and only God." I responded: Thanks for replying. Your argument is one of many that seem to promote the holiness of God, but actually do the opposite by persuading people not to follow him. Jesus was crucified for the charge of blasphemy (to make God seem less holy than he is) because he claimed that man could become like him.  27 My sheep hear my voice, and I know them, and they follow me: 28 And I give unto them eternal life; and they shall never perish, neither shall any man pluck them out of my hand. 29 My Father, which gave them me, is greater than all; and no man is able to pluck them out of my Father’s hand. 30 I and my Father are one. 31 Then the Jews took up stones again to stone him. 32 Jesus