ChaunceyRiddle

(Written in the 1950’s)

Democracy is a travesty without the responsible participation of an intelligent and informed electorate. No person can be intelligent and informed without an understanding of both sides of an issue. Russell Kirk’s work The Conservative Mind, provides an excellent opportunity for every citizen to become more responsible through reading a careful and thorough assessment of the historical and ideological facets of conservatism. The importance of this book is measured in large part by the fact that liberalism is ubiquitous in our society; it is unavoidable because it permeates education and communication, and has penetrated virtually every institution of our society. Liberalism is the legacy of Greek naturalism resurrected in Renaissance humanism and promulgated by the majority of the “intellectuals” of the modern society. Its proponents like to find it the cause and concomitant of everything good in Western Civilization.

Conservatism on the other hand is a position which has had few articulate and even fewer popular spokesmen. Most of the persons Kirk discusses will be either unknown or not previously known to be outstanding conservatives for most readers. But conservatism has not lacked for adherents. A conservative is anyone who tries to preserve something which is demonstrably good. The great mass of conservatives has been religious people who have sought to retain the tried and true aspects of their faith against the onslaught of excessive rationalism. Since the educated liberal rationalists have controlled most educational and communication opportunities in the modern world, conservatism has persisted mainly as a passive resistance to intellectual vagary, a somewhat inarticulate solid “common sense” of practical people.

Unfortunately for the conservative cause, the reactionism of vested material interests has frequently been aligned with conservatism in historical situations. In this unnatural but de facto association, the reactionary element has usually been more vocal and has pressed its leadership. This association has given the liberals an opportunity to smear conservatism with the moral irresponsibility that properly applies to most reactionism. In religion, the prophets have been the conservative leaders, trying to persuade the people to hold fast to the good word of God; the Pharisees have been the reactionaries, and the Sadducees have been the liberals. When the people have had no prophet, those of conservative bent have had to suffer somewhat silently under the oppression of self-styled leaders of the right or the left.

Political conservatism is in the main a rather recent possibility. The history of mankind has generally been one of bestial tyranny of man over man. In such cases of tyranny, the only good cause was liberal, to free men from despotic power. But any degree of freedom for the “common man” has usually been short-lived. One shining example to the contrary has been the experiment with constitutional republican government among Anglo-Saxon peoples. The crux of this movement has been voluntary submission to just law as a substitute for forced suppression under the will of the tyrant. British and American society have known during the last two hundred years a freedom for the common man virtually unparalleled in history. The attempt to conserve this freedom for the common man is the essence of political conservatism.

Conservatism in politics becomes a necessity because the maintenance of freedom is a precarious balance. The tyranny of the monarch must not be succeeded by the tyranny of the aristocracy, of the legislature, or of the majority. Perhaps the most obvious generalization of history is that men in power generally abuse that power. Checks and balances of power and decentralization of government provide the only hitherto proven basis for the protection of the freedom of the common man. Such a government appears to the rationalist to be an inefficient basis for economic maximization; the rationalist is presently engaged in attempting to buy the freedom of the common man from him by paying him with pottage. The choice is between a real and present freedom as opposed to a promised carnal security.

Though the able proponents of conscious political conservatism have been few, they have spoken and spoken well, though largely unheard thanks to the careful censorship and insidious ridicule of the liberal canopy. Kirk attempts to impress the reader with the logical clarity, the realism, the responsibleness of the few conservative statesmen who have risen above the reactionary politicians to proclaim the conservative case on the basis of principle rather than expediency. Those of a conservative bent will find Kirk’s book a satisfying witness that they are not alone and that conservatism is intellectually respectable. Those who are uncertain will find an opportunity to test their own hearts for conservative yearnings.

Kirk lists six basic canons of conservative political thought which provide the thread to unite thinkers from Burke to Santayana. These six ideas might be paraphrased as follows:

1. Belief in a divine power to which men are responsible, political problems being basically moral and religious problems.
2. Delight in the opportunity for the expression of individual differences as opposed to the leveling and equalitarianism enforced in most modern liberal schemes.
3. Recognition that men are not equal even though they should be considered morally equal under the law. Tyrants and unprincipled men should not be allowed to replace natural leaders of moral stature.
4. Belief that private property and freedom are inseparably connected.
5. Belief that man must subdue his appetites and passions to the rule of reason and knowledge. Mob action and anarchy must be checked by principle.
6. Recognition that change is not always progress.

Though these canons are neither exhaustive nor mutually exclusive, they do provide an excellent working basis for a conservative thinker to probe his own mind and to perfect the ideological basis of his own conservatism.

1 March 1979

The life mission of every member of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints is identical in its general features. Those features are that:

1. The whole of each person’s life is seen to be a mission in the cause of Jesus Christ from the time one receives the covenant of baptism until one releases that final breath. This means 24 hours a day, 7 days a week, at home or abroad, in sickness or in health, and in whatever marital state or Church calling one is found.
2. Each person’s daily assignment in that mission is to turn his assigned portion of evil to good. Seeing evil as that which is not as good as it could be and taking the Savior as the standard of good, the life of a Latter-day Saint is one continuous labor to uplift, to ennoble, to beautify, to instruct, to correct, to celestialize all around him, when, where, and how it is appropriate to his stewardship and as directed by the Holy Spirit.

A child forlorn, frightened, or sobbing is an evil of this world: it is the mission of a saint to hold that child, to administer comfort, security, and understanding as the manifestation of a pure and inspired love, thus turning an evil into something better. A ward choir which sings grudgingly, mechanically, egotistically is an evil; with skill, sensitivity and love an inspired director can lift every participant to praise God with voice and song, to bear witness and gratitude through the meaning of the lyrics, to sing to bless rather than for recognition or reward. A widow’s home is unpainted, with sagging doors, cracked panes and drafty casements; a small army of craftsmen who care descends upon that home and leaves function where there was fault, dignity in place of deterioration, warmth instead of wounded heart. The children of an Andean village have no opportunity for education; a low cost, locally administered self-help program is designed, embodied and delivered, giving those children access to the modern world. Even as a people languish in ignorance of their true spiritual heritage, their need is assuaged by the teaching of the Restored Gospel in their midst.

Thus every father, mother, builder, teacher, chemist, administrator, and repairman who is a covenant servant of Christ is striving each day to make the world a better place, to uplift, encourage and comfort not only fellow Latter-day Saints but ultimately all of the earth’s inhabitants. No one except the President of the Church carries the burden to worry about the whole world, for each turns to his own neighbors and stewardship for his field of labor. Each morning each faithful servant goes to his knees in prayer to discern his assigned quotient of evil to be turned into good for that day, knowing that the powers of heaven will assist his faithful labor and that therefore his day will be “sufficient unto the evil thereof.”

Compensation is the last thing the true servant is concerned about. He knows that he must perform honorable work and be compensated for it to provide for himself, his family and to have a modest surplus with which to bless others. He knows that his greatest personal opportunity is to turn evil into good for which he is not compensated; therefore he deliberately spreads his resources of wisdom, knowledge, skill and substance in many times and places where there cannot or should not be any return favor. And he always remembers that it is to the Savior that he is beholden for his health, strength, mentality, knowledge, wisdom and skill with which to bless, be it in compensated or non-compensated opportunities to do good.

Thus the mission of the Latter-day Saint is to waste and wear his mortal life out in searching the mind and will of the Savior to discern his formal and informal callings, then to turn evil into good in those callings. He thinks about poverty, ignorance, disease, inferior values, corruption in high and low places and strives to help. He may need to invent, to translate, to build, to tear down, to persuade, to expose, to correlate, to cooperate, but all with pure motive and under the direction of his master, the Lord Jesus Christ. Whatever preparation he needs to fulfill his task, he seeks, beginning with repentance from all sin, carrying through the acquisition of knowledge and skills, culminating in attaining power in the priesthood to do all good things. It is through the efforts of such servants of Jesus Christ that this earth will be first terrestrialized, then celestialized and delivered spotless and whole to its worthy creator.

Illinois Peoria Mission
1994

How is it possible to gain control of one’s mind to become a better missionary?

The first step is to be able to control our power of attention. We cannot control ourselves until we bring our power of attention under our own will. Then we can concentrate.

Control comes through exercising will power over what we think about.

Some Examples of Opportunities to Control Our Minds:

1. Focus intently on every word when another person is offering a public prayer. If you can support everything said, say a genuine “Amen”. Your attention and “Amen” lend great strength, all of your strength, to the prayer. So, don’t let your mind wander during prayers.
2. Focus on the words and messages of the hymns sung during church meetings. Hymns are a form of prayer, and to give full attention to every line of the hymn will greatly strengthen your power of attention and enhance the spirituality of your singing.
3. Focus when you read scriptures. Read slowly enough to let each verse sink fully into your consciousness. Ask questions when issues arise in your mind. Wrestle with difficult passages until you understand them. Practice until you can read a full half-hour at a time without mind-wandering.
4. Focus on your relationship with the Savior during the passing of the sacrament. Listen intently to the prayers of consecration, then ponder upon your feelings for the Savior and how well you are keeping the promises you are making by partaking. Let this time be some of the sacred moments of your week as you concentrate.
5. Focus on each talk you hear in church meetings. You can think twice as fast as another person can talk, so parallel what they say with what you would say if you were giving the talk. As you pay this close attention, the Holy Spirit will bring many ideas to your attention, things not said by the speaker nor hitherto understood by you. Then listening to every talk will be a spiritual feast.
6. Focus when any person who has priesthood authority over you speaks or writes to you. Remember that you must evaluate everything said to see how it should affect what you do. We are all bound by our covenants to support those who preside over us. If we make careful plans as to how to implement every instruction, we are showing true faith in Jesus Christ and the authority He has placed on earth. This will prepare you then to focus on the implementation of your instruction. Hearing without obeying is spiritual death, but we obey unto life eternal.
7. Focus when you are teaching a discussion, especially when you are not doing the teaching. Follow every comment of the person who is speaking, but observe carefully what the investigators are feeling and how they are reacting. Read the body language. Notice the emotional overtones of their comments and conversation. Be conscious of what your companion is saying and doing and fit into the discussion; support and bear testimony as is appropriate. Never let your mind wander. Your attention and loving contribution greatly strengthen the teaching situation.

You may find that you cannot focus attention for more than a few seconds at first. But if you pray for help and try hard in each of the above situations to gain control of your mind, you will get better and better at it until you have control. Control means that you can concentrate for 30 minutes or longer any time you desire.

If you do all of these focus exercises until you are able to do each of them without diversion of attention, you will have won the battle. Using such power of attention will lead you to be able to exercise great faith in our Savior. And that faith will lead you to every other good thing: like a firm mind in every form of godliness.

                   Elder Riddle (at the request of President Udall.)

A lecture was given by Dr. Melvin Morse, 28 October 2018 at the IANDS meeting in Salt Lake City. He is a pediatrician in Washington State who is studying near-death experiences in young children (10 and under). He is attempting to get the scientific world to recognize the validity (the reality) of what these children experience when they die and then come back and bring reports back of their experiences while dead. At issue is the question: What is real? What follows here are my answers to that question.

The scientific definition of reality is usually something like: Something is real if it is observable by more than one person, testified to by more than one person, can be reproduced at will by some procedure, and can be quantified (measured in some way). The purpose of these strictures originally was to separate false traditions and claims from things that really are so and do work. The germ theory of disease is a good example. Many people once thought that disease was a spiritual matter, caused by evil spirits. Since evil spirits are not observable nor measurable, that explanation was rejected in favor of the germ theory which postulates that disease is caused by microbes which are observable and measurable: the identifiable germs are present and observable in every instance of a given disease. So the germ theory is scientifically acceptable, and the evil spirit theory is rejected as unsubstantiated folklore. (The germ theory does falter a bit because sometimes the germs are present and the individual carrying them does not get sick.)

The problem that then arises, however, is that there are many things we want to think of as real that are not observable by more than one person and do not have a perceivable (materialistic) cause. The love of one person for another is such a matter. So shall we say that a specific love-bond is not real because it is personal and limited to one subject and perhaps to one object? Those who feel love for another person are often convinced it is very real, even more real than the material things on which scientists focus their attention.

To understand and clarify this question of reality we must explore human knowing.

We understand the following things about human knowing:

1.   To know something is to be assured by evidence that our ideas are correct. Sensory experience is one of those evidences.

2.   There are about 25 human senses which report evidence about the universe to our human minds.

3.   But we do not see in our eyes, hear in our ears, touch with our skin. Our human organs of eyes, ears and skin all report their sensations to the cerebral cortex in the back of the human brain.

4.   The cerebral cortex assembles all of the sensory evidence that comes to it from the 25 human senses and sorts and groups those sensations into an image of what might have caused those sensations. The brain thus forms a hypothesis as to what might have caused the sensations reported by the body. The brain then usually tests the hypothesis by asking questions such as:

• a.   Can I predict what sensations I will have next?
• b.   If I move my hand or foot to the object I think I perceive, can I predict what will happen?
• c.   Do repeated observations give me the same hypothesis as to what I am experiencing?

5.   The short version of this account of human knowing is that our consciousness of the universe we live in is all invented by us, an attempt of a sometimes rational mind to imagine the universe in which it finds itself.

Conclusion: This I have given is a very short account of an important, complex matter. But it must suffice for present purposes. Moving from that description, I now state the following conclusions about human knowing and “reality.”

1.   We do not really know anything about the universe (that which exists beyond our selves) we live in for sure. The fact that we are sure about some things about the universe is a measure of the strength of our belief in something. If I am really sure about something “out there,” that is simply to say that I really believe it. I believe that this mortal state was carefully designed by a loving Heavenly Father so that we would have to live our lives according to our beliefs, not knowledge. His purpose is to give us an opportunity to find out who we, ourselves, really are, by allowing us to construct a universe in our minds as to how we think the universe really is.

2.   The best we can do in imagining the universe is to be able to do something again and again. So you and I believe strongly that we understand the universe in relation to what we can accomplish. Rene Descartes, the French philosopher, took this tack by saying: “I think, therefore I exist.” The thing we are most sure about is our own existence, because we can think and plan and do things. Even here we sometimes are not successful, not being able to do something we have done before many times. What this teaches us is to be humble. We are not great “knowers.” But we are good believers, even convincing ourselves that we are so right that we can tell others what to believe. Some people believe what others tell them, but the more thoughtful people are, the less they tend to believe what others say.

3.   The purpose of human life, I believe, is for each of us to construct a universe in our minds, then to live in the universe to see if we can become happy persons. I love the Gospel of Jesus Christ because it is the plan of happiness, and those who live it fully are the happiest people I know. Those who reject it or who play around the edges of it, never fully embracing it, are less happy in my observation (my belief) than those who fully embrace and live it.

4.   One marvelous blessing the Christ brings to our lives is understanding. He gives us a set of beliefs that make sense as to who we are, where we came from, what we can and cannot do, and where we may likely find ourselves in the future. The Gospel message makes full “sense” to me. All of my life I have sought to make “sense” of this world and all that goes on in it. The Gospel, the scriptures, the revelations of the prophets of God fill in the blanks so beautifully that I am able to live my life in a very satisfying way. Obviously, what is true and real for me, that which I believe and live by, is not true and real for many others around me, including many in my own family. But, thankfully, what I believe and live by is true and real for some others also, including many in my own family.

5.   The bottom line is that each of us is constructing and living in a universe of our own choosing. I think God designed our existence to be this way so that we would be able to choose our own future out of a myriad of possibilities. I believe God will give us to live for the rest of eternity in just that universe we choose and want, and thus each of us will be as happy as he or she can possibly be. That happiness will be God’s gift to each of us, His children.

6.   Meanwhile, we get to live, act and believe according to our own choosing. I believe that there is a universe out there that is real. We interact with it all of the time. But we do not “know” it. We simulate what we think it is and act accordingly. Some of us are very successful in accomplishing what we desire to accomplish, I think because those who are successful have better beliefs and better discipline to do what they think should be done than those who are not so successful. But all of us are successful in building and living in a universe that suits our desires, and we each call that universe of our desires “reality.”

7.   No person can know what is “real” to another person unless it is revealed to them by God. The Holy Ghost is specifically sent to us to bear testimony of what is true and what is not true. The only way that you and I can know that Jesus is the Christ or that Joseph Smith is the head prophet of this dispensation is to have those truths revealed to us by the Holy Ghost. The only way we can know that the gospel taught in the Book of Mormon is the true doctrine of Christ is to have it revealed to us by the Holy Ghost. The only way I can know if someone who is telling me of their experiences is telling the truth is if the Holy Ghost reveals that to me. That is why the gift of the Holy Ghost is the Pearl of Great Price. Anyone who understands what that gift is and does and who has good sense would be willing to give all else he possessed to obtain that most precious gift.

So, are the experiences people have of near-death experiences real or not? They are very real to the persons who have them. But of course such experiences could also be “pretended,” conjured up by a vivid imagination, and possibly some are.

The answer is that one person cannot be the final judge of the experiences of any other person. Each of us is the master of what we ourselves believe and do, and none of us is or can be the master of what any other person believes and does.

Isn’t it comforting to believe that an omniscient, divine being, a loving Heavenly Father, will be our judge at the end of our mortal lives? He will see things as they really are, and because He is pure, will judge those things and reward each of us as the best we can be judged and rewarded. No partial, twisted view of us will be the basis of how we will be judged.

That is why I try with all my heart, might, mind and strength to serve that God whom I worship. I just wish I could fully deliver in that attempt.

1.   There are three important Gospel Covenants:

a.   The original covenant of Justice: Keep every commandment and inherit. Abraham 3:25 This is a covenant of justice.

b.   The New and Everlasting Covenant: Repent of all sinning and learn to keep every commandment and then inherit. This is a covenant of mercy, which mercy enables a sinner finally to keep the original covenant. Mercy cannot rob justice.

c.   The Covenant of Abraham: This is Abraham’s personal version of the New and Everlasting Covenant with four additions that pertain to time only:

• 1)   His posterity will be a great nation.
• 2)   His posterity will be charged to take the Gospel of Jesus Christ (The New and Everlasting Covenant) to all other nations.
• 3)   Everyone who accepts the Gospel of Jesus Christ (and partakes of the New and Everlasting Covenant) will be counted as Abraham’s posterity if they were not already literally so.
• 4)   God will bless all who bless Abraham, and curse all who curse him. (Abraham 2:9–11)

2.   The New and Everlasting Covenant is the means of obtaining forgiveness of sins so that we may then try to fulfill the original covenant. It gives us the supernatural powers necessary to fulfill the original covenant.

When the New and Everlasting Covenant is kept (and only when it is fully kept), it is:

• a.   A bestowal of knowledge and wisdom.
• b.   A bestowal of righteousness (a pure heart).
• c.   A bestowal of the promise of eternal increase.
• d.   A bestowal of an increase in priesthood power.

Only those who completely repent of all sinning while in their probation can fully inherit.

Anyone who wills not to repent completely is damned to the degree that they refuse to repent.

(The New and Everlasting Covenant makes it possible to repent of every and all sinning.)

3.   The most important sentence in all of scripture: “Thou shalt love the Lord, thy God, with all of thy heart, with all thy might, mind and strength: and in the name of Jesus Christ shalt thou serve him.” (D&C 59:5)

The second most important scripture: “Thou shalt do all that thou doest in the name of the Son, and thou shalt repent and call upon God in the name of the Son for evermore.” (Moses 5:8)

The keys to fulfilling the New and Everlasting Covenant.

Consciously do everything we do as a priesthood act, in the name of Jesus Christ, by:

• a.   Being obedient to Christ, even unto the ultimate sacrifice. (Heart)
• b.   Putting our full trust in Jesus Christ. (Mind)
• c.   Being chaste, uniting only with our husband or wife in the covenant. (Strength)
• d.   Use all we have and control to build Zion and establish His Righteousness. (Might)

4.   Conclusions:

• The centerpiece and jewel of the Gospel of Jesus Christ in any dispensation is the New and Everlasting Covenant.
• The endowment in the temple is the key to human fulfilling of the New and Everlasting Covenant.
• The most important covenant is the original covenant. The New and Everlasting Covenant is the bridge that makes it possible even to try to keep the original covenant.
• When we come to the point where we will no longer to sin, and do no longer sin, we will be fulfilling the New and Everlasting Covenant.
• If we then, no longer sinning, endure in faith in Christ unto the end of our probation, we will also fulfill the original covenant and can and will enter into exaltation.

I. What Human Beings Are

Human beings are spiritually and physically the children of the gods, and may become gods.

Each human being has a stewardship of mind, heart, strength, and might.

Mind is what and how one thinks and believes.

Heart is what and how one feels and chooses.

Strength is what and how one acts with one’s physical body.

Might is what and how one affects other beings.

Each human being who learns to love God with all of his heart, might, mind, and strength, can become as God is.

II. Human Learning: Epistemology

Each human being has two possible modes of learning.

1.   One can learn physically, from other human beings: horizontal learning.

• a.   One can learn from human beings who learn from God.
• b.   One can learn from human beings who know not God.

2.   One can learn spiritually from spiritual beings: vertical learning.

• a.   One can learn from God (personal revelation) about all things.
• b.   One can learn from Satan (personal revelation) about all things.

III. Human Beliefs: Metaphysics

What one believes about God, man and the universe sets the stage for all that one believes can happen in mortality.

What one believes can happen sets the limits as to what one can do.

IV. Human Actions: Ethics

Every person’s beliefs cause one to think there are better and worse ways of acting in this world.

How one acts is governed by one’s beliefs as to what acts are worthwhile.

V. Human Religion

The pattern of how a person learns, feels, chooses, acts, and influences others is his religion. (Everyone does something with his heart, might, mind and strength.) Habits=character=religion.

Churches are institutional forms of religion. Not everyone has a church, but everyone has a religion.

Everything one does is a demonstration of one’s religion.

VI. Skills

Skills are the learned patterns-of-action of a person.

One’s education or development is best gauged by the kind, number, and degree of refinement of one’s skill learning.

One’s religion is clearly exhibited in the skill applications one uses to meet the opportunities of daily life.

VII. What is art?

Art is both a process and a product.

Process: Every human skill is an art, a technology.

The arts which were practiced in the courts of Medieval Europe are now called “fine arts.” But there is no defensible line of demarcation between fine art and practical art.

Product: The products of fine art are called “art.”

The products of the practical arts are often called “artifacts.” Unfortunately, this historic division of art into two kinds has fostered a cultural and social schism. Some people feel superior because they deal with “fine art;” and most others are made to feel inferior because they deal only with “practical arts.” That division hides a very important truth: The work of every person’s hands can be honorable. Whether that work is honorable does not depend on whether it is fine art or practical art.

VIII. What is the connection between ethics and art?

A person’s art (process and product) is a clear and direct expression of his/her ethical commitments and metaphysical beliefs. In other words how and what a person does in the work of his/her life is a direct result of that person’s religion (not his church, but his personal religion).

If a person’s religion commits him/her to service to others, it leads that person to learn and practice skills which benefit others.

If a person’s religion is the worship of selfishness, he/she will do little for others but will pursue the consumption of wealth with great skill and perhaps with much learning.

IX. What is beauty?

The arguments as to what beauty is are thousands of years old and have made no identifiable progress in that time.

It seems likely that what most people call “beauty” is simply that name which they give to things that they like, want, or appreciate; beauty is thus a form of “good” for them. Is there a meaning for “beauty” which corresponds to “right?”

What a person calls beautiful or ugly is another clear index to his/her personal religion. Have you noticed that calloused hands are usually ugly to people who don’t like to work with their hands? And have you noticed that what is beautiful and desirable in clothing is almost always socially determined? A person’s religion takes a public bow whenever that person makes “value” statements such as what is and is not beautiful.

X. Which is more important in art, form or content?

This is a question which reflects a preoccupation with “fine art”; only there can art form be relished apart from content. Would a chair be beautiful if it collapsed and caused you serious injury? In practical art the content (function) is necessary, but the skill that produces good function also produces good form. In fine art some think they are being very (“upper”) classy by ignoring content and concentrating solely upon form or technique. However, they would be first to criticize a plumber who had masterful technique but who used newspapers for pipe in their home.

Rather than worry about form versus content, every artist would do well to concern himself first about what is the right thing to do, and then do that right thing with consummate skill. Then would the world be better off indeed.

XI. Is art communication or expression?

This is another question which arises out of the preoccupation with fine art. It can only be asked about art which is essentially useless.

All practical art must render service. It must communicate or translate need into satisfaction. Only in fine art can the artist be so contemptuous of others that he cares not a fig if he communicates with them. But note that such a one usually wants to be paid for “doing his own thing.”

Art which does not focus upon communication, upon translating need into satisfaction and appreciation, is art which reflects the religion of selfishness.

XII. Who can judge art?

We need to decide if we are talking about process or product to answer this question.

Judging the process, the skill of an artist, can only be done by one who is himself well-skilled or who has close and wide observation of the better practitioners of the art. There is something objective about skill, about what a person can and cannot do well.

Judging the product, the “good” of the artistic production, leaves everyone to himself, for this value is always personal, a function of present desire. It is the tendency of the world for those who are able to judge the process effectively and accurately to also place themselves as experts on product and to proceed to tell everyone else which artistic productions they should and should not esteem. Such easily turns to priestcraft.

Who can judge the “rightness” of art? Who could rightfully pronounce such judgment?

XIII. What is the place of art in civilization?

Observation of the art of a people, all of their arts of every skill, and concerning both process and product, gives an index to their civilization. The more moral their endeavors and the more skillful their execution, the higher, the better, the nobler, is their civilization.

Zion cannot be established in the absence of good artists and good art. When everyone in the society sees the need of producing good things, moral things, and doing it well, all for the welfare of one’s neighbors, then Zion is nigh.

To establish Zion, a people must believe that all work is equally honorable if it is a right thing to be doing. Doing well at any task is as noble as any other if it is what the individual is supposed to be doing to fulfill his stewardship.

One reason Zion is not yet upon the earth is because art, all art, has not yet found its proper place and function in the lives of those who call themselves Latter-day Saints.

XIV. What of Plato’s triad of “the good, the true, and the beautiful”?

Platonic thought makes the good, the true, and the beautiful all one thing, different names for single identity: The greatest idea. In the Platonic hierarchy of the Forms, the final idea or form is at the same time truth, beauty, and goodness.

In a world where men only approximate truth, where good is what they want, and where beauty is attributed to something because it pleases them, each individual person’s truth, beauty, and good, may indeed coalesce, but each person will have a truth, beauty, and good, different from every other person.

In a Restored Gospel frame where truth is the mind of God, where good is what is “right” in His eyes, and beauty is the holiness of the implementation of his right and truth, then indeed the three are one and they also become the same for everyone who lives the Restored Gospel.

A (non-exhaustive) Taxonomy of Human Arts (Skills)

An important index to the culture (civilization) of a group is which people (e.g., all or some) within the group master and employ such skills as the following.

Heart: Feeling Arts

Type	Description
Empathy/Sympathy/Compassion:	Ability to sense what others are feeling and then to feel the same way.
Pain tolerance:	Ability to allow pain to work its beneficence without seeking to mask it.
Self-motivation:	Ability to generate out of one’s own desires sufficient impetus to gain a goal.
Purity of heart:	Ability to discern the needs of others, with no admixture of selfishness.
Spirituality:	Ability to detect and identify both the Holy Spirit and the evil spirit unerringly.
Discipline/Control of appetites:	Ability to avoid interference of personal need or desire in learning and executing a regimen.
Judging/Evaluating:	Ability to establish “good” and/or “right” for any object of attention.

Might: Social Arts: (Based upon communication)

Type	Description
Motivating others:	Ability to turn the personal desires of others into an impetus to achieve a common goal.
Social graces/Manners:	Ability to follow a protocol to eliminate unpleasant surprises in social interaction.
Organizational management:	Ability to coordinate the activity of many persons in achieving a single goal.
Friendship/Enmity:	Ability to produce and maintain warm/cold personal relations.
Love/Hate:	Ability to sacrifice for/injure another person.
Priesthood/Priestcraft:	Dispensing truth and light to others with/without true authority and without/with remuneration.
Mentor/Master:	Guiding the skill development of another person with/without their consent.
Disciple/Slave:	Receiving a regimen from another person with/without one’s consent.
Business (buying, selling):	Exchange of goods for mutual benefit.
War/Assault:	Forcible attempt to deprive another group/person of some good thing they possess.
Diplomacy/Negotiation:	Verbal attempt to deprive another group/person of some good thing they possess.
Training:	Ability to change the reaction patterns of another person to what the trainer desires.

Mind: Intellectual Arts

Type	Description
Philosophy:	Asking questions which help to elicit understanding/comprehension.
Science:	Production of peer-acceptable descriptive assertions about the natural world.
Scholarship:	Creation of imaginative accounts of events of distant or past times out of record evidence.
Mathematics:	Creation of systems of order, pure and applied.
Engineering:	Ability to achieve specific goals using current technology and limited resources.
· Physical:	Creation of plans or physical objects and processes to achieve a physical goal.
· Social:	Creation of plans for social processes to achieve a social goal.
· Legal:	Creation of plans or pathways and legal barriers to assure legal attainment of client goal.
· Medical:	Creation of diagnosis and plans to attain a desired somatic state.
Thinking:
· Perceiving:	Identification of sensory phenomena.
· Comprehending:	Relating some idea to a matrix of relevant ideas.
· Systems:	Creating special relationships of ideas to achieve a personal or social goal.
· Deduction:	Deriving necessary conclusions from given premises in accordance with given rules.
· Induction:	Creating assertions about whole populations on the basis of evidence of samples.
· Adduction:	Creation of premises from which a given assertion may be validly deduced.

Strength: Physical Arts

Type	Description
Walking/Running:	Ability to change spatial deployment of one’s person as desired.
Carpentry:	Ability to deploy wood (plastic materials) to create larger structures.
Music:	Ability to create patterned noises.
Observation:	Ability to achieve extrapolable data from sensory perception.
Experimentation:	Observation of results of a change deliberately introduced into a controlled situation.

All: Arts which inherently involve heart, might, mind and strength simultaneously.

            (Every art involves heart, mind and strength.)

Type	Description
Learning:	Achieving desired changes in habits of one’s own heart, mind and body.
Communication/control:	Achieving desired actions in another person.
Righteousness:	Achieving the action patterns of a god through communication with God and becoming a disciple of God.

I. The problem.

1. The self is a doer, not an object of knowledge for itself.
2. We humans know objects (conocer) by a harmonic of comparisons between percepts and concepts. This we cannot do for the self because the self is never a percept.
3. Understanding knowledge (saber) is imagination reinforced by conocer knowledge.
   If the reinforcement is massive and immediate, the saber knowledge produced may be called physics. If the reinforcement is slight and distant, the saber knowledge may be called metaphysics.
4. Ideas about one’s self is saber, not conocer knowledge; is it metaphysics, not physics. It is usually myth, not truth.
5. If one looks for the self by introspection, one looks in vain. One sees memories, beliefs, desires, habits—but no phenomenal self.
6. If one looks for the self in asking others, one is given myths because to others we present no phenomenal self. We present to others only a body which acts.
7. So we must look to God for a true account of our self. Should He inform us, believing such would be faith, not knowledge. (But is it not true that most of our saber knowledge is faith, not knowledge?)

II. An account of the self as portrayed in the LDS scriptures.

1. The self is a will (chooser) embodied in flesh, blood and bone.
2. The will makes choices when confronted with alternatives.
3. The basic alternatives for human choice are good and evil. In every situation in life there may be an impulse to do a good thing and an opposing influence to do one or more evil things.
               Example: I am being introduced to someone; I can be either warm and friendly or cold and remote.
4. The self reveals itself to itself and to others by its choices between the good and evil alternatives available to it. But the revelation may not be believed because a particular mythology is preferred by the self or by another person (a choosing).
5. The difference between selves is found in the circumstances of life each enjoys and the choices each makes within the parameters of those life circumstances.
6. Each self grades itself by how long it takes them in what circumstances it may be in to stop choosing evil and to thereafter choose only good. For some this does not take place until after mortal death.
7. The day of judgment is the occasion when all of the circumstances/choices of the individual are reviewed in concentrated form.
8. If the self has chosen good, it will continue to choose good. If the self has chosen evil, then it must suffer further adverse circumstances until it turns to choosing only good.
9. Each self progressively creates itself by the choices it makes.

III. The effects of this account of the self on the theory of language use.

1. Meaning is always immediate. The self has no reference point to know what it meant at a past time or what it will mean at a future time. It can only “mean” something in the present.
               This means that all translation is approximate. One cannot be sure that one is translating one’s own previous meaning correctly and identically in two situations separated by a space of time.
2. There can be no private language because I cannot certify from moment to moment that I am using the same words with the same meanings. (Argument of Wittgenstein).
3. I can “mean” only in a particular circumstance. No two circumstances are ever identical (though we may sometimes find it practical to ignore the differences). Thus, no two meanings are ever the same.

Conclusion: I cannot fully know myself. I can act; I can mean; but what the “I” is I cannot fathom. But I do get clues as to what I am as I compare the acts I perform with the standards given by revelation. By my fruits I know myself as well as others. My witness as to my deeds may be good; but my witness of my self may not be reliable.

July 1999

Definition of Communication: Something communicates if it affects or relates to something else.

1.   To exist is to communicate. All existing things communicate with other things constantly.

2.   Affect can be considered both positively and negatively. What something does or doesn’t do.

3.   Affect can be considered both agentive and nonagentive; agent beings decide many affects.

4.   Agentive communication may be divided into messages. Each message has four defining variables:

• a.   Purpose: What the agent is trying to accomplish.
• b.   Main assertion: How the agent is trying to accomplish the purpose.
• c.   Support: The strength of the communication, internal (stated) and external (environmental).
• d.   Relevance: The importance (consequences) of the message.

5.   Agentive communication may also be internal (within oneself) or external (affecting others).

6.   Agentive communication may be non-verbal or verbal. The non-verbal is the basis of all verbal communication.

7.   Ordinary human agentive communications are a mixture of good and evil because we humans are both good and evil.

8.   Agentive power of attention gives one the ability to absorb some communications, reject others. We tend to become like the sources of communication we give our attention to.

9.   We agents shape ourselves by selecting the communications we receive and by meditating internally on those communications. We are also shaped by our environment. Some environments foster agency; others do not.

10. The purpose of the Restored Gospel is to give us the power to reshape ourselves into the kind of being God is, so that we can communicate with others only good, as God does. This can be done by communicating with God.

Conclusion: Our being (what we have been shaped to be and what we have shaped ourselves to be) is demonstrated by the communications we send to others. “By their fruits ye shall know them.” Matthew 7:20 “A good tree cannot bring forth evil fruit, neither can an evil tree bring forth good fruit.” Matthew 7:18

Application: Our most important communications are with God, spouse, children, other people, and nature, in that order.

Language

Definition: A language is a mutually stipulated set of signs by which humans stimulate thinking, feeling and action in one another. A normal language has signs to represent things, actions, modifiers and connectives.

1.   All human communication is invented. There are no natural words or natural grammars.

2.   There is no such thing as “The English Language” (or any other colloquial language) though there are standard “Englishes,” hundreds of them. In a sense, each individual has a personal language unlike any other.

3.   Language is what makes a being a human and gives a person the possibility of agency.

4.   A first language cannot be learned if one begins after puberty (limit of 50–100 words).

5.   Each human being has a private thought-world of concepts: a mind-set. Words represent concepts.

6.   Linguistic communication is a complicated process.

Person #1 [Mind set: Speaker’s beliefs, desires, hopes, fears, likes, dislikes] Concept set > Word pattern > Utterance > Physical transfer > Person #2 Reception > Word pattern > Concept set > Significance. [Significance: What a communication does to the receiver’s mind set.]

7.   Human language communication is never complete and is often not accurate. It does not transmit ideas. Meaning is always invented by the sender and by the receiver and is always context dependent.

8.   There are levels of language development (Pidgin, Creole, Full) and usage (Common, Erudite, Specialty).

9.   The unit of communication is the assertion (message): there are four basic kinds of assertions:

• a.   Disclosure: The person expresses feelings about something.
• b.   Description: The person tells how something looks or acts.
• c.   Directive: The person tells another person what to do.
• d.   Declaration: A person of authority makes a change by speaking.

10. The best way to improve language communication is to clarify concepts. Example: Repentance.

• a.   Base: LDS
• b.   Etymology: Latin re=again, pentir=to turn: thus, to turn again.
• c.   Dictionary definition: a turning of the heart and will to God. (LDS Bible Dictionary)
• d.   Example in base: “… if a man repent of his sins, he will confess and forsake them.” D&C 59:43
• e.   Related concepts:

•            1)   Genus: A necessary component of faith in Jesus Christ.
•            2)   Prerequisites: Understanding of right and wrong, desire to do what is right, hearing the Restored Gospel, etc.
•            3)   Opposite: Sinning Counterfeit: Paying money for an indulgence. Similar: Contrition, reformation

• f.    Levels:

•            1)   Celestial: After baptism, living by the Holy Spirit in all things.
•            2)   Terrestrial: Recognition, remorse, reformation, restitution.
•            3)   Telestial: Saying “I’m sorry.”
•            4)   Perdition: Being baptized and taking the sacrament with every intention to continue sinning.

• g.   New definition: Replacing all sinning with acts of righteousness through faith in Jesus Christ and the ordinances of the Restored Gospel. Every human act is either a sin or an act of faith in Jesus Christ.
• h.   Key Questions:

•            1)   Does repentance bring forgiveness of sins? Celestial repentance, yes.
•            2)   If one sins after forgiveness, what happens? The former sins return. D&C 82:7.
•            3)   Can one repent all at once, or is it a gradual process? For most people, it is a gradual process.
•            4)   When is repentance complete? When one has stopped obeying Satan and totally obeys God.

• i.    Conclusion: Language is the only way anyone can learn about the Restored Gospel of Jesus Christ. Through language one partakes of the ordinances, learns how to live as Christ did, and thus may enter into salvation.
• j.    Application: Learning how to repent and repenting should be the major daily activity of a Latter-day Saint.

Thinking

Definition: Arranging ideas in one’s mind. Principal theories as to what thinking is:

1.   Verbal: Arrangement and rearrangement of words in the mind.

2.   Behavioral: Sideshow of ideas which are an epiphenomenon on actions of the body. (No agency.)

3.   Concept: Development and rearrangement of concepts in the mind as preparation to act.

Basic kinds of concept thinking:

1.   Linear: Pursuing a problem to a conclusion. Usually follows a rut (habit).

2.   Lateral: Finding all of the possible ways to solve a problem. Additions to the rut.

3.   Systems thinking: Seeing the problem and possible solutions as part of a larger whole.

4.   Holistic thinking: Seeing the problem and possible solutions as part of the whole universe.

A problem is a disparity between one’s present situation and the desired situation. Ways of problem solving:

1.   Buddhist: Let desires go to zero and all problems are solved.

2.   Western: Gain power over all things and arrange them to suit desires.

3.   LDS: Give heart, might, mind and strength to God and work only on His problems.

Factors which affect thinking: Desires, knowledge, skills, effort, wiring, environment.

Tasks of thinking: Planning, memorizing, reciting, enjoying, analyzing, synthesizing, creating, etc.

Types of systems thinking: Analysis, synthesis, evaluation, operation

Example of systems analysis: Systems Analysis Format

Target system: The Atonement of Jesus Christ. Atonement: To enable all men to become one with Father.

1.   Static analysis: Fallen state of Man, the need for redemption.

System boundaries: The heavens and this earth.

System environment: All of God’s creations.

System parts: Father, Son, Holy Ghost, Satan; Adam, Eve and all of their children.

2.   Dynamic analysis: Problem: How to save men from the fall and not destroy their agency.

System function: God is just. He blesses obedience, but will not and cannot tolerate sinning in any degree.

System input: Men obey God sometimes, but also sin by obeying Satan.

System output: Father’s justice: Men become angels to Satan if they serve him. Only perfect obedience to God enables any human to receive all of Father’s blessings (exaltation). Father’s mercy: Sending His Son to reconcile men with himself.

System opposition: Satan opposes everything Christ does.

3.   Agent analysis: Agent: Christ.

Agent goal: To enable every child of Father to become exalted as Father and our Savior are; to bless each maximally (as much as each is able and willing to receive).

Agent resources: The knowledge and power of God plus the ability to sin and to die, plus the strength not to sin and to die for men.

Agent strategy: Obey Father in all things, suffer for the sins of all men, voluntarily die to seize the keys of death, teach all men how to repent and give them the power to do so, then to bless all men to the degree to which they have repented.

Agent tactics: Teach the Gospel, bestow the priesthood, organize the church, set all things in order. This so that every soul might have an opportunity to hear and accept the Gospel of Jesus Crist, repent, receive the true authority, unite with the church and receive the temple blessings, which is the means to full repentance to become as God is.

Agent work: Create the earth, enable the Fall, send angels to teach the Gospel, bestow the priesthood, organize the earth, suffer for the sins of all men, seize the keys of death from Satan by voluntarily dying, then to resurrect and continue to preside over the earth and the church, to give a final judgment to each person, exalting those who fully repented, blessing all others as much as they can receive.

Agent assessment: The Savior was (is) in constant contact with Father, taking instruction, working, reporting back.

Agent evaluation: The joy that passes understanding comes to the Savior as the children of men repent.

Key Factor: [Which system factor is most influential, the one which gives the operator of the system the greatest power and control: Christ: Total obedience to the commandments of the Father. Men: Total obedience to the commandments of the Savior.

Conclusion: Thinking is the exercise of agency, and is the basis for all human action. Systems thinking gives one a sense of the whole order of things, and is an approach to the holistic thinking of God. It gives humans an opportunity chance to appreciate the goodness of God in providing a way for the salvation of men.

Application: As a man thinketh in his heart, so is he. A man is saved no faster than he gains knowledge.

I. Religion is the most pervasive aspect of human life.

• Religion is the life-pattern of each human being.
• Whatever a human being says or does is a reflection of his personal religion.
• A person’s philosophy is his articulation of his religion.
• A person’s social relations are his exemplification of his religion and give rise to his political views.
• Every normal person has a religion.

II. Personal religion is the character (the habit patterns) of each individual.

People have strong character (religion) in two senses:

1. Strong in their influence on other people.
2. Strong in being internally rather than externally controlled.

To have strong internal control is the essence both of being free and of being religious.

A person is said to be “very religious” when he is strongly controlled internally and conforms to some institutional or culture standard of religion. But it is noteworthy that a person can be just as “religious” in maintaining a personal set of habits as in maintaining a set which has been culturally engendered.

III. There are four main factors in personal religion:

1. Habits of feeling: Optimism/pessimism, cheerfulness/dourness, self-centered/other centered, humble/haughty, courageous/fearful, exploratory/traditional, hunger for excellence/slovenliness, etc.
2. Habits of thinking: Beliefs about “reality,” what the universe is all about; battery of concepts (large or small battery, refined concepts or not); systems concepts; worldviews; beliefs about the past, the future, the possible, about the natural and the supernatural (if any); etc.
3. Habits of acting: The way one walks, talks, sleeps, eats, works, plays, worships, resolves confrontations, etc.
4. Habits of speaking: truthful/prevaricating; realistic/romantic; cynical/reverential; effusive/reserved; garrulous/laconic; poetic/imaginative; jargonistic/down to earth, etc.

IV. Change of personal religion (conversion) is change of habit patterns.

Habit patterns are changed only by choice. Choices consistently made become new habits. An individual changes his religion by making new habits.

It is usual to speak of an individual being “converted” when he changes how he speaks about his beliefs. But it is plain that all habits must change for a genuine conversion to take place. If a person’s expression of beliefs change, but his feelings, thoughts, actions, and other expressions do not, the conversion is apparent, not real.

The most important area that must change in conversion is the feelings, for the feelings are the independent variable in the human system.

The Restored Gospel name for change of religion is repentance. Only a long faithful series of correct choices will convert one’s heart, might, mind and strength into the image of the Savior. It is obvious why there is not such thing as death-bed repentance (even though there may be death-bed confession).

The key to Restored Gospel repentance is to be severe (unswerving) with ourselves in our own making of correct choices (this is discipline or discipleship) and at the same time to be completely forgiving of others (merciful), all because of our love for the true and living God, and all done in the name of Jesus Christ.

V. Institutional Religion is manifest in social organization as in a church or a culture.

Every culture is a religion, a set of habit patterns for meeting the contingencies of life.

Every culture has a philosophy, a political stance, an economic program, a system for settling disputes (a justice system), art forms, and an educational program.

VI. There are always at least three aspects to institutional religion:

1. Theology: The official or normal beliefs of a religion.
2. Moral code: The official or normal “dos and don’ts” of a religion.
3. Ritual: The typical means of initiation and intensification of the religion.

The moral code is the “heart” of every religion. Every institutional form of religion exists because some persons try to affect the actions of other people.

Theology is the “mind” of every religion. Theology exists to give support (rational and/or historical) to the moral code.

Ritual is the “strength” of every religion. Without ritual the young would not be acculturated nor the initiated reinforced in their feeling, thinking, acting and speaking.

Do institutional religions have “might?” If they are churches, the formal organization of the church usually has money, property, news media, etc., thus having “might.” Cultural religions usually do not have might apart from the individual might of the participants unless some of those participants band together to form a church or a nation (e.g., Israel).

Question: What are the counterparts in philosophy to theology, moral code, and ritual?

VII. Apostasy is conversion of individuals away from one religion to another.

Individuals apostatize from institutional religion by changing their personal religion: by making choices which do not accord with the institution which they are leaving.

Institutions never “apostatize.” The moral code, the theology, and the ritual of a church may change, but that is because individuals having power (leadership) in the church change their personal religion and take others with them.

When individuals change religion, either as individuals or as groups, the first thing they change is the moral code. Apostasy and conversion take place so that a different way of life may be maintained.

Theology follows change of moral code, to “justify” the change.

The element of religion most resistive to change is ritual. (That is why one can find elements of the Restored Gospel temple ceremony in cultures scattered over the whole earth, even though small or no resemblance in moral code or theology is found. Everyone on earth is descended from parents who knew and lived the true Gospel of Jesus Christ, which is the Restored Gospel in every dispensation after the first one.)

An individual cannot apostatize from his own personal religion, nor can he escape his own personal religion. Whatever choices he makes, that is his religion.

The one thing we take with us through death is our religion, our character.

We continue into the eternity with the habits of this mortal probation if we have heard and accepted the Restored Gospel here. If we have not heard it, we receive an opportunity to repent in the spirit world.

VIII. The failure of an institutional religion (loss of adherents) may be traced to two basic causes:

1. Failure of the institution to promote an effective ritual.
2. Competition from another moral code which the adherents find more attractive.

Example:        The basic ritual of the Restored Gospel is prayer. If parents do not teach their children to pray and to rely upon the consequent promptings of the Holy Spirit, those children are not properly initiated into the religion of Jesus Christ. Then worldly competition has little competition.

Example:        Some adult members of the Church of Jesus Christ simply decide they want another moral code: Knowledge (theology) made no difference to Cain, Jeroboam, Korihor, and Sidney Rigdon.

Questions:

1. What factors are causing the dissolution of the Medieval and Protestant religions today?
2. What factors give great strength to Humanist religion today?
3. Wherein (on what fronts) lies the showdown between the Humanist religion and the Restored Gospel which is going on today?

IX. How does one live the Restored Gospel?

The answer is obvious and well-known. One lives the Restored Gospel by loving the Lord with all of one’s heart, might, mind and strength. When one’s habits of feeling, thinking, acting and speaking are so set in Godly patterns that one will not yield to pressure from Satan, man or nature to disobey Jesus Christ, then one is keeping the first and great commandment. Then one can love one’s neighbor as oneself. The means to keeping these two great commandments is to obey the law upon which all blessings are predicated: to have faith in the Lord Jesus Christ.

The issue: When and how does faith become sufficient that it makes a significant difference in one’s life (saves one)?

Possible answers:

Answer 1: Faith is obedience to the commandments of God. Whatever degree of obedience one attains to during one’s probation, that determines the degree of glory one will attain to in the next life.

Answer 2: Faith in Jesus Christ is to find Him personally and to love and obey Him in all that He tells us to do. We do not have complete faith in Him until we do obey Him in all that He tells us to do. When we have that faith, salvation begins immediately (in this life).

There are at least three significant differences between these two answers:

1. Answer 1 is concerned with what we do (to obey the commandments).
   Answer 2 is concerned with why we do what we do as well as what we do (to obey the commandments because we love the Lord.)
2. Answer 1 assumes that any obedience is faith.
   Answer 2 assumes that obedience is not full faith until it is complete.
3. Answer 1 looks for the reward of faith in the next life.
   Answer 2 looks for the reward of faith in this life.

The most significant difference is the second. The issues come down to this: When we obey only part of what the Lord has instructed us to do, is that either obedience or faith? Part obedience may be construed as saying to the Lord: “Part of what you tell me to do is good, and I will do it. But the rest of what you tell me to do is too much: in those matters I am better off doing my own will.” It would seem that such an attitude does not elevate the Lord to the status of God in our lives but rather makes Him a convenience at our disposal. We become His judge and do what He says when we deem compliance to be somewhat beneficial to us. There is difficulty in being the judge of God and at the same time being faithful to Him.

It is conceivable that a person would not be able to obey God if they are as yet unsure that they have found Him. But their actions surely would not be faith in Jesus Christ if they have not found Him. It is also conceivable that though they have found Him, they simply cannot yet deliver total obedience. If indeed one does not have the constant companionship of the Holy Spirit as yet, then truly one cannot obey in all things. But when one is authorized to have the constant companionship and yields to the flesh, to other people, to the world, to Satan, or to one’s own mind, surely that is not faith in the Lord.

The scriptures link the blessings of the Lord with faith. It seems possible that the abundance of spiritual blessings promised by the Lord comes to but few in this world because but few attain to real faith in this world. Is that why the many look for the reward for their obedience in the next world?

X. How does one proselyte another person to the Restored Gospel?

This question is like asking how does Person 1 get Person 2 to love Person 3. The answer is simple: Person 1 cannot do it. Yet Person 1 can help in two principal ways:

1. Person 1 can tell Person 2 about Person 3.
2. Person 1 can introduce Person 2 to Person 3.

The issue:        How does one most effectively help another person to know and to love the Lord?

Answer:           Faith in the Lord Jesus Christ is the only answer. That is the only answer because each Person 1 is different and each Person 2 is different. Each person 1 must use his own ability and adapt it to the needs of each Person 2. There are many rational formulas for helping to convert people to the Lord, and though some rational formulas do better than others in actual practice, no rational formula can enable us to do our best.

The challenge of missionary work is:

1. To attract the attention of each person.
2. To explain the gospel to each person in his own tongue.
3. To introduce each person to the Lord by getting each to pray.
4. To encourage each person until each is converted enough to stand alone.

It is obvious that the differing circumstances of life, culture, and personality make it so that there is no single best approach that will help every different human being. Only the power that comes through real faith in Jesus Christ is sufficient to the task of knowing and doing what each individual person needs in order to receive a valid witness of the truth of the Restored Gospel.

XI. How does one contribute to the establishment of Zion?

Zion is the pure in heart. A people know when they have become pure in heart when:

1. They have but one heart.
2. They have but one mind.
3. They dwell in righteousness.
4. There is not one poor person among them.
5. The Lord Himself dwells with them.
6. The earth is subdued, beautiful, and made more productive.

Each of these characteristics of Zion is the result of faith. The best thing any person can do to assist in the establishment of Zion is to perfect his own personal faith.

Morality in the Restored Gospel is faith in Jesus Christ:

1. Receive instruction and admonition from God through the Holy Ghost.
2. Believe this instruction and admonition.
3. Act fully on the admonition, trusting in Jesus Christ.

Together, these three steps constitute faith in Jesus Christ.

To become faithful to Jesus Christ is to work by mental exertion (ME) as opposed to physical exertion (PE):

ME   Control our mind until we have an eye single to the glory of God.

• Focus our mind’s eye only on the cause of Christ.
• Focus on the here and now and our own stewardship.
• Seek out everything virtuous, lovely, of good report or praiseworthy that would enhance our stewardship.
• Reject wishing for other stewardships or other situations.
• Reject personal desire for anything which will not promote the work of God.

ME   Ponder and search in the Spirit that our understanding of the desires and ways of God might grow.

• Search the scriptures to understand all that God has revealed.
• Listen to church authorities and to other good people to learn what he does now reveal.
• Search the Spirit that God might yet reveal important things to us.
• Work these ideas back and forth in our minds until they make glorious sense.

ME   Plan how to solve problems in our stewardship in righteousness before the Lord.

• Reject meddling in other people’s stewardships.
• Let love fill our heart for those in our stewardship.
• Search ways for that love to touch the lives of those in our stewardship.
• Select the way that best fills our understanding of the ways of God.

ME   Search the Holy Scriptures about the way selected until we find the one that pleases Father.

• If our plan is quite good but wrong, we will feel a stupor of thought.
• If our plan is evil, we will feel a strong urge from Satan to do it, but a warning from the Lord not to do it.
• If our plan pleases Father, we will glow with love (the “burning in the bosom”).

ME   Ask for the fulfillment of the correct plan with all of our hearts in mighty prayer (= asking in faith).

• Ask what power and gifts are necessary to fulfill the plan.
• Ask who has or could obtain the power and gifts necessary to fulfill the plan. (Here am I; send me).
• Ask in all humility for the power and gifts necessary to do the task, if it is right to do so.

PE       Do whatever we are instructed to do to help bring about that plan.

• (As faith grows, using priesthood replaces physical work: ME replaces PE).
• With all of our faith and might, proceed to implement the plan that the Lord has shown us pleases Him.
• If we ask in faith, doubting nothing God has caused us to believe and feel, we can do whatever is necessary.