Category: Religion

It’s been a long time since I last wrote a religious post. I’ve been too focused on business and tech entries lately, perhaps because I’m prioritizing wrong. I thought that perhaps to get my priorities straight I would try to see if I can write on the current Sunday School lesson in church. For those non-Mormons that read my blog, the topic in our Sunday School classes currently is the New Testament, so I think everyone should be able to participate in this series for this year. I’ve bought the domain, “nopooramongthem” – if I get enough of these posts regularly I may start moving these things over there.

My lesson in Sunday School today was on 1 Corinthians 1-6, entitled “Ye Are the Temple of God”. I’ve had this lesson many times before, and for some reason each time the focus moves to “cliques” in the Church and how we shouldn’t have “cliques” among the members of the church. We should all be unified and friends with everyone.

What?

I see no where in 1 Corinthians to the extent of where the people of Corinth were separated into smaller groups of friends, all under the same leadership and prophet, following the same principles of the Gospel. In fact, I’m not quite sure that’s wrong! In fact, what really should be taught if we’re going to move into “cliques” is how one shouldn’t get offended if certain people are friends with other people in the church and don’t always remember to invite you to activities. We should teach that it’s your own responsibility to make sure you’re included in the church, loving and including everyone, but not necessarily hanging out with everyone at the same time as it seems gets preached way too often.

Okay, now that I’ve gotten that out of the way, let’s get to the real context of what 1 Corinthians is all about. 1 Corinthians is an Epistle from the Apostle Paul (yes, I had my cell phone out, searching the web for the real context of what we were supposed to be talking about during Sunday School – keeps me entertained and educated 🙂 ) to the people of Corinth at a time where those people were starting to stray outside of the bounds of the Gospel. Paul was concerned of what was happening in Corinth, and because of this wrote the Epistle. It should also be noted that this was around 50 or so A.D., many of those people were pure converts, having never seen or known Christ (Paul was probably just a kid I imagine when that happened), so the Church was very new to them. It was only 100 or so years later that we begin to see the early creeds of the Christian church written.

The saints of Corinth as I mentioned were beginning to stray. Some were claiming to be “of Paul”. Some were claiming to be “of Apollos”. Some were claiming to be “of Cephus (Peter)”, and some “of Christ”. There was no unity, and Paul decided it necessary to set them straight, so he wrote the Epistle now known as 1 Corinthians. Does this sound like “cliques” to you? To me, it sounds like the verge of apostasy – and that is the topic of today’s lesson.

The point of today’s lesson is how can we be “unified in Christ” and not contend with one another? How can we follow the Spirit to ensure we’re all on the same track towards following Christ? How can we be one “unified (termed ‘Catholic’ in those days), Apostolic church”? Paul stated to do so, you must “speak the same thing”, have “no divisions among you”, and “Be perfectly joined together in the same mind and the same judgement.” (1 Corinthians 1:10)

I know I can find applications for this in The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints. In our church we are taught to follow the priesthood of the church. Just as in the times of Paul there is a Priesthood hierarchy, led by God, that leads and guides the church and keeps it from straying. If we stick to that, follow the spirit and personal revelation, and follow the scriptures, those divisions cannot occur. There are many examples among small groups of new converts in the Church that would be very familiar with this story. I’ve heard several around Europe too during World War II where doctrines have strayed because there was no larger church to guide them.

The other place this can apply to is from Christian religion to Christian religion. For Christians to be unified, we must seek the truth. I think most Christians have some sort of belief in “Personal Revelation”. By turning to God first, he will “make foolish” the things of the world (1 Cor. 1:18-21). We have to seek out ways to work with each other, compliment our similar beliefs, and most of all, learn from the good things in our faiths. Contention is of the devil!

Anyways, I’ve strayed from my original point. Today’s lesson was on “apostasy”, how to avoid contention in the church as a whole, and how truth can be sought out and followed. It was not about what groups of friends in the church you should hang out with. What are some ways you think your own religions and other religions can seek unity and full truth in the Gospel?

I have been doing a lot of studying and pondering lately. I’ve decided I need to make sure I really believe what I believe, and what it is that I believe. I think every person in every religion should do this – faith, without some reasoning, in my opinion brings out a lot of weakness in religion. I think God should “make sense” and not just be someone people follow blindly. While blind faith may be a start for some people, I think people deserve to have some reasoning behind their faith. Yes, you can have reasoning with faith.

Joseph Smith said, “It is the first principle of the gospel to know for a certainty the character of God, and to know that we may converse with Him as one man converses with another, and that He was once a man like us; yea, that God himself, the Father of us all, dwelt on an earth, the same as Jesus Christ Himself did; and I will show it from the Bible.” I believe this is probably the phrase most criticized of Mormons – those against the Mormon Church love to use this to make us look weird and “non-Christian”. The thing is, I don’t really care what others think! Mormons should embrace this message! To me, this is the first principle of the Gospel, and Mormon or not, one must understand God most of all and that God must make sense.

I absolutely love Joseph Smith’s King Follet Discourse. Ironically, this link is from lighthouse ministries, I believe a Jehovas Witness site. Jehovas Witnesses and others, criticize away, but I don’t want anything else if what Joseph Smith says here isn’t true! I simply could not believe in God as a “mysterious being”. I want a God I can love, who will love me back, one I can talk to, will talk back, and who, Scientifically, just makes sense. The King Follet Discourse to me along with other LDS doctrine of the Godhead explain God in a way that actually supports science and can be explained “with reason”. No other religion I’m aware of has such a detailed view. Let me review a few things I’ve read about other religions’ belief in God. Please don’t take this as an attack against those religions – I respect your faith. I simply want to support the fact that Mormons do have a very detailed view of who God is, and why I simply couldn’t believe in a God if I didn’t believe in the Mormon view of God:

Catholics: “I pray to a God of mystery, a personal God, an approachable God, but a mysterious God nonetheless. Therefore, I have to bow my head and trust. God is not altogether unknowable, just not fully knowable, and never fully known this side of heaven.” (Reverend William J. Byron)

I think all other protestant religions share the Catholic belief above, as I can’t find a specific explanation of who God is out of the other religions. I would love to know if anyone can explain a difference. Here are searches for several under ‘(religion name) “character of god”‘ in Google: Baptist, Methodist, Jehovas Witness, 7th Day Adventist. I see many attempts, but no clear description like Joseph Smith. Ironically, the only clear descriptions in many of the search results are either in criticism of the LDS church, or quotes from LDS church members themselves. Have the Mormons been the only ones to actually try to explain the mysteries of God? Why is that a bad thing, especially if the attempt is through a belief in a Prophet who has talked to God?

Here is the Jewish belief, as I understand: “Although Jews have certainly considered the nature of God, man, the universe, life, and the afterlife at great length, there is no mandated, official, definitive belief on these subjects, outside of very general concepts such as the thirteen listed above.” (http://www.mechon-mamre.org/jewfaq/beliefs.htm)

And the Islamic belief: “Muslims hold to a monotheism which is closer to that of Judaism than Christianity, rejecting the Christian concept of a “Trinity.” Muslims believe that God, creator of all of existence, is just, omnipotent, and merciful. Muslims also reject the anthropomorphization of God which occurs in the theology of other monotheistic religions like Christianity or Judaism. For Muslims, God is completely “other” – God does not talk, does not walk and does not do anything like humans.” (http://atheism.about.com/library/FAQs/islam/blfaq_islam_basic.htm)

I love my God. He is a personal God. I can talk to him. He talks back. My God actually lives somewhere. Yes, I worship my God, and my God only, and I treat Him as my Creator. He sent His Son to redeem me. The thing is, my God makes sense! I don’t want any other God than the God I believe in. Other religions seem to miss the Character of God in their doctrines. They seem scared to approach it – I don’t get it, as I need something to back up my faith. If my God weren’t the God Joseph Smith explains, hey – Bhuddism looks kind of appealing… Who is your God and why do you believe in Him? Do you have a better God than the one Mormons believe in and can you explain it with reason? Or do we really believe in the same God, and you’re just missing some of the details? I’m very curious on other Christians’ thoughts about this.