Evolution Contradicts the LAW

"Reclaiming Science from Darwinism" by Kenneth Poppe

Chapter 11

THE LONG ARM OF THE LAW
Trying to neutralize the laws
of thermodynamics

Allow me to back up in history a bit to look at objections levied by the first group of modern scientists to drastically doubt Darwinism. Physicists have long been aware of the laws of thermodynamics and how they prohibit the type of random improvement claimed everywhere in natural evolution. I guarantee you these laws must somehow be neutralized, or "self-made" cannot even get out of the cosmic gate.

Let me start by saying it is rather rare to hear the word law applied to a concept. If something is called a law, it had better prove inviolate, or someone is sure to proclaim an exception. How many laws can you name? The law of gravity, of course. How about the law of supply and demand? I've heard of something called the law of diminishing returns, and then there's the infamous Murphy's law. Any more come to mind? I know there should be a longer list, but offhand, I can't think of another.

In science, laws seem the most difficult to come by. The reason is that in science, a law must hold true in all times, conditions, and locations, and must be validated by any independent investigator with no exceptions. I' would call that very stringent. Even the concept of atoms is still referred to in textbooks as the "atomic theory," despite the fact that the periodic table of elements graces the walls of almost every science classroom. Though all chemistry seems to operate on rock-solid principles, perhaps in its caution science will wait to grant atoms "law" status until we can examine an individual particle held in our hand.

I would say the best-known scientific law is the law of gravity. As long as you stay on our planet, Isaac Newton showed that what goes up must eventually come down, leading to the various laws of motion.

Moreover, Earth's gravity behaves predictably and reliably anywhere on the planet at all times. But are there any other scientific laws unerringly backed by science and never disproved by experiments, laws that are so dependable that science stands on them without even a modicum of caution? If you know your physics, you already have an answer.

The laws of thermodynamics are most assuredly written in stone, so to say. This set of laws explains relationships between matter and energy for which no exceptions are found anywhere in the universe. The first law, also called the law of conservation of matter and energy, basically says that the sum total of both matter and energy in the universe is always constant. In shirtsleeve English, this means that since the event that brought the universe into existence, no new matter has been generated from any other source. It also means you can't make any more new atoms, and you can never lose the old ones. True, new stars appear to be forming, but the atoms in the stellar gas clouds that condense and ignite have also been in the universe since its origin, and the rise in energy is balanced by the loss of mass.

Here is a simple example. The two hydrogen atoms and one oxygen atom in a particular water molecule of H2O may travel the world over by condensation, precipitation, and evaporation, but it is the same three atoms. (I heard it once said that as many as four of the water molecules in each of our bodies once traveled through the body of a dinosaur.)

It is true that the water molecule may be fractured and the hydrogen and oxygen atoms become integrated into sugars, proteins, and so on, but the existence of these three atoms still coincides with the point of origin of all other particles. Furthermore, they can never pass out of existence unless a nuclear reaction changes them to energy, and then the sum total of matter lost and energy gained still remains unchanged. The first law can be summed up in three words-"creation has ceased"-and this no reputable physicist denies.

Entropy .

The second law of thermodynamics is an extension of the first. It says that since its origin, the universe has been in the process of winding down to complete silence. The pathway to its death could be explained in many ways-going from ordered to random, action to stillness, diverse to uniform, dynamic to inert, or organized to chaos. Again, in shirtsleeve English this means that energy expenditures in any closed system (closed meaning a system with no additional matter or energy input) will eventually leave it powerless, and it must wear out and die. The entire concept is captured by the single term entropy, and the degree to which a system has lost entropic energy is measured by the change symbol A (Greek letter delta).

This one-way path toward complete confoundedness is also called the law of universal decay, and is frequently compared to a newly wound spring as in an old-styled watch. When the watch is fully wound (or a reaction starts, or a star ignites), the first tick of time signifies the beginning of the descent from maximum order, and the last tick means the system is now fully disordered, silent and inert, never to be started again without an outside influence. Our sun is another example of entropy. At some past point in time it ignited and began to burn its fuel. At some future point (one estimate is 500 million years), the fuel will be expended, the sun will explode or wink out, and entropy with respect to the sun will have reached a maximum state-zero activity. Whether it is watches, chemical reactions, or stars, all these one-way paths to silence are irreversible.

I have found a perfect analogy to explain the second law to my students. I tell them to imagine their bedroom freshly and fully cleaned. There it is-bed made, all clothes put away, and everything in its place. All is dusted, vacuumed, and spotless. Then from that point, the entropy process seems unstoppable as disorganization slowly creeps in. A smudge here, a shoe left there, and so on. If an object were never put away, clothes never laundered, a bed never made, or a surface never dusted, eventually the result would be the room's return to the accustomed total teenage chaos. As any parent knows, this is an unstoppable process unless one intervenes.

Losses Everywhere

Important corollaries to the second law abound. One is that every time you change states of energy, there is a net loss. In my environmental science class I often use this explanation for how the sun is the ultimate source for all our energy needs, and how we work hard to use its energy as efficiently as possible. Consider the case of hydroelectric power that likely supplies some of the energy needs in your house. Water vapor in the clouds has to lose energy to condense and get back into the river. It then loses more kinetic energy as it flows downstream to 'the dam. The water expends additional energy as it drives the turbine to produce electricity, and returns downstream where it eventually reaches the ocean where it is finally at rest. Meanwhile, the electricity that reaches your house may power a TV that gives off the last remaining power in the form of heat and light.

Now we could use the sun's energy to directly power our TV, but the size of the required solar panel makes that impractical. So instead we have to deal with the pathway by trying to cut down the energy loss at each step (more reliable turbines, more energy efficient TVs, and so on). At any rate, the final result is the same. All this radiant energy from cooling water, hot turbines, and warm TVs drifts off into the cold of space, obviously not returning to the sun. Of course, as the sun continues to churn out more energy, the water cycle continues to renew itself and our TV keeps working. And yet remember-the sun is on its own pathway to death, so the water cycle is destined to cease if time continues that far.

Another second law corollary is that heat always flows to cold. This means energy leaves a system that is more dynamic and travels to one that is less dynamic. For this reason we heat our cars in winter as the warmth escapes through the exterior and into the colder air. However, we air-condition them in summer as the heat from the summer day keeps working its way into the cab through the car's insulation.

This is also the reason animals in the food chain or web must con tinue to eat. Without the intake of additional calories in food, the body begins to run out of fuel and will cease to live. So tertiary consumers

like the owl eat secondary consumers like the shrew, but about 90 percent of the intake of shrew biomass is lost through the owl's waste products and energy expenditures, and only about 10 percent is used to support cellular components in the owl's body. At the same time, secondary consumers eat primary consumers-such as shrews eating grasshoppers-also with a 90 percent net biomass loss; and primary consumers eat primary producers-grasshoppers eating grass-at about the same rate of loss.

At that point, scavengers and decomposers consume dead bodies and release nutrients and gases back into the system to recycle the process. But since all food chains are anchored by primary producers like photosynthetic plants, and plants need that dying sun for energy, life on Earth is also on a one-way ticket, where the energy supply at all levels is destined to be exhausted-eventual silence being guaranteed.

One final corollary to the second law is, when chemicals interact, you end with less energy than was initially present, either in the molecular bonds or in the catalyst driving the reaction. If a chemical reaction is exothermic (giving off heat)-like burning wood, for example-the energy escaping is obvious, and the amount of energy potential left in the ashes is certainly lower than originally in the wood. If the reaction is endothermic (absorbing energy)-like your freezer making ice, for example-the outside power source recycling the refrigerant is doing more work than the refrigerant did to make the ice.

And of course the freezer's power source can be traced back to the electricity running the compressor, electricity that cannot be provided indefinitely. That is because hydro, solar, wind, wave, fossil fuel, and even geothermal generating systems are all linked to that entropic sun as the power source. Returning to chemicals, once the reaction is over (like the concoction quits fizzing), and the products are generated in full, nothing can ever restart unless something outside the system reenergizes it.

Applications and Analogies

So what is the overall application of the second law to the origins debate? It is as simple as it is powerful. The second law absolutely negates any type of random improvement-the backbone of Darwinistic thinking. For example, it prohibits a series of interacting chemicals from becoming more complex, like amino acids developing into proteins, without outside assistance. In fact, the law says the reverse tendency is true. If complex chemicals could somehow be intentionally made to exist, there is no way to keep them from reverting to simpler forms without intentional assistance.

The truth is, if inorganic chemistry ever naturally evolved into increasingly complex organic chemistry, then evolved into a living cell, and finally into a complex life-form, then the second law governing all reality would have been set aside, violated, and would be no law at all. Since physics says entropy never works in reverse, I would agree with many who say the debate over Darwinism and Design is immediately settled because advancing life is an impossibility. Disorder never goes to order ... unless, of course, intelligence is lending a hand. Have you ever heard the phrase "there's no free lunch" applied to the false expectation of getting something for nothing? In this case the phrase is a perfect description because life just can't organize of its own accord.

Time Enough to Monkey Around?

Perhaps an automobile analogy would help. What happens if you put this year's brand-new model in the manufacturing parking lot and wait upon the second law of thermodynamics to do its thing?

After one year, probably no observable changes. The second year, maybe a slight bit of fading paint. Five years? Cracking upholstery. Twenty-five years? Flat tires. A hundred years? Detaching parts. A thousand years? A growing pile of parts. Ten thousand years? You can't tell what model it was. A hundred thousand years? You can't even tell the pile of rubble was once was a car. A million years? Remember the song "Dust in the Wind"? Now if you were to return and find next year's model after the passage of any of those time frames, wouldn't that be quite a surprise?

But in all sincerity, this is not a fair analogy. Evolution is said to have a change mechanism (random mutations) and a driving force (natural selection) to retain positive changes for eventual improvement. Fine. Wheel the car onto the manufacturing floor to protect it from the

elements and add a random change mechanism for mutation in the form of our old friends, once again-a band of free-roaming chimpanzees.

Then give the chimps a copious supply of all the metals, fiberglass, wires, glass, and other necessary components-as well as the tools, computers, drafting boards, and art supplies humans would need for next year's model. And to be sure to create a closed system-supply the chimps with ongoing habitat maintenance such as places to raise young, unlimited food, and waste removal. Then lock the doors. Oh, yes-to add the factor of natural selection, provide the manufacturing floor with a team of ever-watchful engineers who will rescue any improved components, correctly typed instructions, or perfectly pressed quarter panels and set them aside for later assembly when the chimps feel inclined.

Now, how many millions of years before the chimps have an improved model ready to hit the streets? Is 4.6 billion years, the supposed age of the Earth, enough? How about 13.7 billion years, the supposed age of the universe? If you are calling "foul" in this scenario, then explain how the analogy is not being true to the theory of evolution. You have a change agent, a selection method, and huge quantities of time. If nothing is missing, you must say there is at least a slight chance the chimps could build that car. (And maybe even place a Darwin fish on the rear bumper!)

Random Rubble

I have actually heard people try to defend scenarios that possibly reverse the second law, like the chimp/new car example. Now I don't want to seem rude, but their rambling "what ifs" sound like they have been inhaling the wrong kind of secondhand smoke. I maintain that if the above scenario, or any others like it, were tried for an unlimited number of years in an unlimited number of settings, your chances of getting that new car are zero, zilch, nada. It's the law, you know. The second law says that without outside help (in this case, intelligence), there can never be advancement-ever-only degradation.

I've seen it firsthand. I once drove through an animal theme park in Europe that had a separate section with free-roaming monkeys. As soon as I made it through the screened gate, two or three landed on my car and began to pull at the windshield wipers, radio antenna-whatever seemed loose. On the car in front of me I saw one monkey pulling off a long strip of rubber window molding. And the ground was littered with broken mirrors, strips of chrome, you name it. (One monkey even reached through the window and slapped me when I rolled it down and tried to shoo him off the hood!) No, monkeys do not improve cars.

One team of researchers sought to bring this analogy into reality. They actually placed a group of primates in a room with functional computers to see if they could ever accidentally create something on the various monitors. The best result ever achieved was that one chimp depressed one key for several seconds and typed long strings of the same letter before losing interest. But the experiment was stopped after equipment was destroyed and keyboards became nonfunctional when covered in excrement.

So my apologies, but at any location at any given time, your manufacturing floor will look like the bottom of a giant chimp cage desperately in need of a new liner. And going back to your new car on that floor, you can be sure that the chimps will beat it to rubble quite a bit faster than did the elements in the parking lot.

Printing and Pennies

If you are still not convinced, imagine a series of violent lightning strikes hitting an old-style printing business, as mentioned in chapter 6. Some say it could produce a dictionary as bindings, glue, paper, ink, and letter type are flying through the air. Okay, I can envision an A covered in splashing ink smacking a blank sheet and leaving an impression. I can even imagine another A hitting right beside the first letter a split-second later. Then an R followed by a D and a V and another A and an R and finally a K. There-AARDVARK-the first complete word in the dictionary, and we're on our way.

But if this doesn't exceed the universal probability boundary from chapter 7, nothing will. No, even the "chimp-made car" scenario sounds like a better bet because a dictionary, like a single cell or 30,000,000 life-forms on Earth, has more variables to account for than a car. Finally consider that both car and dictionary analogies represent just the assemblage of finished components. There has been no mention of the complexity involved in accidentally producing metal or paper-or amino acids-from their raw sources. (No doubt about it-whether it's biochemicals, books, or Buicks, any imagined probabilities are in actuality impossibilities.)

Perhaps the complexities of building cars and assembling dictionaries is too removed from everyday life. I suggest doing a simple hands-on experiment to test the second law of thermodynamics. Place 100 pennies on a tray, all showing heads. (Of course the first law of thermodynamics says that all the copper atoms in the pennies came into being by a one-time process.) The array of 100 heads would represent minimum entropy and complete order. Now give the tray a slight flip.

The winding down process has begun-a few tails represent a slight loss of order. Flip the tray again, and more tails appear. Now, depending on how aggressively you flip the tray, it may take as few as seven flips, certainly no more than ten, to achieve total randomness or maximum entropy, where the original set of 100 heads is completely unrecognizable. From here, more flips only give a different arrangement to the disorder.

At this point, it would be proper to note that occasionally a flip might produce a small cluster of pennies all showing heads. In fact, this not just likely, it is certain. However, this is no closer to ensuring a return to 100 heads than the few amino acids produced in the Miller-Urey experiment are sure to become a protein. those clusters of pennies will disappear, or at best appear elsewhere, with subsequent shuffles. This would be the same result as Dawkins's weasel scenario (chapter 9) if he had not smuggled a good bit of intelligence into the computer program.

In the same manner, any amino acids in Miller's flask, or in the ancient ocean, will be fractured by the same reconfiguring forces long before they can even reach the polypeptide stage. Remember my analogy back in chapter 8, where you throw all the Scrabble letters on the table at once? Assuming they all land face-up and properly orientedundoubtedly a huge assumption-might you find a few simple words? Of course. But if you keep kicking the table, will the words begin to get more sophisticated and then arrange themselves into sentences? Then, assuming unlimited letters, will sentences become paragraphs and finally a book? Consult the second law.

It is an unfair question, but I'll ask it anyway. Now that your pennies are in a random jumble of maximum entropy, how many flips of the tray will it take to return to the 100 heads? Give it a try. Any progress? Probabilities say that you have one chance of success only if you give the tray a fair flip 2100 times. That is about 1021, or one thousand million million million flips. To get a sense of that number, imagine flipping the tray once per second for 32 trillion years, waiting for a chance for success. Such is the challenge of nullifying the second law for just one "small" event.

And yet the pennies dilemma is child's play compared to the odds of constructing that previously mentioned medium-sized human protein (1 in 10360) out of the approximately 100,000 proteins needed in our bodies, not to mention additional proteins for an estimated 30 million species worldwide. Again, the universe itself isn't big enough to contain such probabilities.

Therefore, allow me to suggest an easier way to restore your pennies. Use the same way the cars, the castles, the jetliners, the houses, and the dictionaries-and the proteins for the chimps, aardvarks, and humans-were made in the first place. Apply intelligence and intent. For the pennies, physically turn them all back to heads. For the rest, seek to understand the Designer who is superior to the laws of thermodynamics and responsible for their existence.

In summary, physics says that complete order always goes to complete disorder. And examples can be found everywhere, from deep space to your own bedroom. (Christian theology is like-minded, saying that man began in perfection only to fall into imperfection-and examples can be found in every civilization and every individual.) In contrast, Darwinists say molecules kept improving into cells, but they have no verifiable mechanisms to back that claim. Then they say cells evolved

into today's modern species, but have woefully insufficient fossilized examples to provide as proof. (Just how woeful will be shown in part five.) Doesn't anyone have respect for "the law" anymore?

Moving on, Darwinists say it wasn't a big explosion at a printing press that outsmarted the law-it was a bigger explosion in outer space that supposedly blew the universe into existence. Let's take a look at the big bang.

Refuting the Big Bang Theory

"Reclaiming Science From Darwinism" by Kenneth Poppe

Chapter 12

CELESTIAL LUCK
A place in space for everything, and
everything in space in its place

One interesting application of the second law of thermodynamics that has most certainly occurred in a closed system is the settling of the cosmos. According to theory, the big bang of some 17.6 billion years ago started it all from a pinpoint explosion of unimaginable force, which first blew atoms into existence, and then blew clusters of matter out into the void of space. This started the expansion of celestial objects one from another that continues to this day. (To get a quick sense of this expansion, get a balloon and with a pen draw a few galaxies and solar systems on the skin. Then blow the balloon up, and as you do, you will see the "universe" expanding.)

Following that immense explosion, particle clouds with sufficient mass began drawing together by increasing gravity and ignited to become stars. Meanwhile, smaller clusters with insufficient mass began losing their heat, cooled, and became planets. (The molten inner core of our Earth is often cited as evidence that our planet was a once hot and violent place that has now been in the cooling process for billions of years.) Besides stars and planets, other big bang curiosities have randomly appeared over time, such as quasars, black holes, comets, moons, and asteroids-all in their respective and expanding locations.

It follows that if the big bang is a totally random process, then the resulting layout of the universe has to be completely accidental as well. If intelligence has nothing to do with physics, how could cosmology be anything but unplanned and therefore unintelligent? Of course this randomness has to apply to our own little corner of the galaxy as well. And yet anything less than "impossible" is too benign a term for the fact that our Earth exists as it is, and that I am here to write this, or

you to read it.

An Explosion of Good Fortune

Many astronomers and physicists who have studied the big bang event, people of faith or not, have marveled that it happened at all. Hugh Ross is among those who have seriously studied the origin and settling of the universe. In his books, such as Big Bang, Refined by Fire, Ross gives many factors of physics so finely tuned that it shows the tenuously balanced structure of our universe. On one such list, Ross includes over two dozen "either/or" factors (either it worked or it didn't), such that if any single one were out of balance, the "bang" would have been a nonevent.

Without getting too technical, here is a sampling of the "luck" to which we owe our existence:

If the electromagnetic forces present at the big bang were either a bit stronger or a bit weaker, any elements with more atomic mass than boron (periodic table element #5) could not have been formed. This means 96 percent of the elements, starting with the carbon, nitrogen, and oxygen in our bodies, would not exist.

If the ratio of the mass of the electron to the proton or neutron were out of balance, either too high or too low, no atoms of any kind would have ever assembled, and obviously no molecular bonding or chemical reactions would have taken, place either.

If the ratio of the number of available protons to electrons was off, either too many of one or too few, electromagnetism

would have nullified gravity, and no objects in space would ever have formed.

And once you add to the list the perfect speed of light, the exact subatomic decay rates, the correct distance between stars, and even the proper total mass requirements of the entire universe itself. .. well, you get the idea.

Here is an analogy that seems to help bring home the idea of the fantastic nature of the big bang. Who can argue that the flying of the Space Shuttle is a delicate undertaking? Any little prelaunch factor out of place scraps the countdown, and once in flight, the National Aeronautics and Space Administration, known worldwide as NASA, keeps track of a myriad of transmissions, any one of which could indicate impending disaster. It's true-the shuttle is a flying bomb with seven souls aboard riding on a razor-thin edge of safety. Physicists know that the big bang is similarly fine-tuned, miraculously having managed to avoid either fizzling to a stop or incinerating itself.

"Lucky" Breaks

However, the above list pales in comparison to factors that were necessary to form our own little solar system with our own little planet and its multitude of life-forms. This time Ross has identified 68 separate "either/or" factors, many of which are more easily understood than those governing the universe as a whole. Here are a few phenomena that could lead to either the prevention or extermination of all planetary life. These factors, some simple and some technical, are some of the blessings we take for granted every day.

It's a good thing that through random thermodynamic settling, the Milky Way galaxy attained the right size, shape, and distance from other galaxies. Otherwise, stars like our sun would never have been formed, or would have been incorporated into a different cosmic mass.

It's a good thing our sun is in a single-star configuration. Approximately 70 percent of all stars are binary, trinary, or complex systems that revolve around each other. This causes intense gravitational forces that

make stable planetary bodies of any kind nearly impossible. Fortunately, our sun is one of the remaining 30 percent of "lucky" stars that exists as a single body. It is also the right size, age, location, and strength for our solar system-or else planetary orbits would be unstable, heavier elements drawn to Earth from space could have easily been over- or undersupplied, or luminosity could have been too bright or too weak to power photosynthesis. Even the gravitational forces of the other planets are necessary for Earth's stability. For example, the mass and location of Jupiter is especially fine-tuned to balance the orbits of the four inner with the four outer planets.

It's a good thing our planet revolves about the sun in a relatively circular orbit instead of an exaggerated egg-shaped one like most of the other planets. If Earth's path were too elliptical, the temperature extremes at perihelion (closest point to the sun) and aphelion (farthest point from the sun) would make it difficult, if not impossible, for life to have the necessary flexibility to survive.

The variation in orbital extremes of Earth is only about 1.7 percent from the mean, making its path around the sun a near-perfect circle. Compare that to Mars, everyone's favorite planet for extraterrestrial life, with a 9 percent variation (which is close to the average of all nine planets at 8 percent). Because of Mars' orbital elongation variation over five times as great as Earth's, NASA will have to be very careful as they develop the landing date for a manned Mars mission.

Think about it. Because of the alternating extreme closeness and remoteness to the sun in the orbital path of Mars, an astronaut in a space suit or space station would only have windows of nominal temperatures between hot and cold cycles. It should be obvious most types of Earth life would not survive if our planet were unlucky enough to have such an elongated orbit. And these extremes on Mars are exacerbated because of its slow revolution rate, making the annual trip around the sun in 687 Earth days instead of 365. By comparison, our Earth is "lucky" enough to have a near circular orbit and an optimum rate of revolution that avoid such extremes.

It's a good thing the Earth is tilted at precisely 23.45 degrees on its axis, which gives us the perfect balance of true seasons from the Equator to the Tropics of Cancer and Capricorn, and on to the Arctic and Antarctic Circles. Imagine if Earth had no appreciable tilt at all, like Mercury at .01 degrees. We would not just lose the refreshing rotation of seasons, but hosts of species would not exist whose life cycles follow the changing climates as you go toward either pole.

What if the Earth were tilted, like Pluto, at 32 degrees past perpendicular, pointing its northern and southern poles almost directly at the sun in their respective summer and winter seasons? If Earth were laid this far over on its side, the annual melting and refreezing of both polar ice caps would play unbelievable havoc with habitats by the wildly fluctuating temperature ranges. And then imagine what would happen to levels of water in the oceans, precipitation rates, and plant and animal life cycles. The violence of seasonal extremes might even negate the possibility of complex terrestrial food webs.

Then there is one other possibility that Earth was "lucky" enough to avoid. It is the "barrel roll" of Uranus spinning on an axis parallel to its orbital plane, rather than perpendicular like the rest of the planets. What difficulties this would present to life here at home can hardly be imagined.

Finally, it's a good thing our Earth is the right size and shape, rotates at the right speed, and is the right distance from the sun. If any of these were out of proportion, a whole host of problems loom. Our atmosphere could be too suffocating or too thin, our day-to-night temperatures could be too hot or too cold, our gravity too intense or too insufficient, our wind velocities too severe or too inadequate, or our air components too heavy on some gases or too light on others.

Also, consider that Mercury completes less than one revolution around the sun for every two rotations on its axis, making one of its "days" equal to less than half of its "year." There is no reason Earth couldn't be like Mercury (though it would be disastrous to life), but instead we properly make 1/365 of our annual journey in close to 24 hours. Overall, you could say we were very "lucky" that the interplay of forces from universe to galaxy to solar system to planet were perfectly fine-tuned. To quote the late Jackie Gleason, "How sweet it is!"



Physics Did It?

Call it a case of "a place for everything in space, and everything in space in its place." I'm impressed. But I know others are not. They say with the possibility of a nearly inexhaustible supply of potential planets in the universe, physics was bound to give us one body with this combination of distance, size, orientation, and motion factors. And in the same manner, life was able to adapt accordingly and settle into this cozy "third rock from the sun." Perhaps, but if so, there are still a host of other "lucky" parameters right here on Earth that still must be perfect. While these did not necessarily govern the physics of planetary origin, they still could severely limit or deny life.

For example, earthquake activity must be within tolerable limits. Imagine if we had the seismology of other planets. Remember how the world properly agonized over the December 26, 2004, tsunami in the Indian Ocean that instantly wiped out over 200,000 lives? There is no reason why such geologic events couldn't be commonplace on Earth. Yet as devastating as it was, the tidal wave did not affect animal and plant life to a disastrous extent, only human life because of the way we live.

Just as earthquake activity typical of other planets could be knocking down our cities as fast as we build them, there is no reason why violent storms could not also make our planet a scene of constant destruction. Hurricanes Katrina and Rita in August and September of 2005 were disasters to Louisiana, Texas, and other parts of the Gulf Coast, and yet the bulk of our country experienced no change at all. However, if Earth had the same ongoing storm as on Jupiter-the red "eye" shown on almost every photograph-we would have a continuous cataclysm cutting a lethal swath across our planet. Instead, we sit rather comfortably here at home. Lucky for us.

Next, consider that Earth's water-to-landmass ratio must not be out of bounds. With the near-complete lack of moisture available on other planets, if anything, shouldn't we be one-quarter water and threequarters land on the planet's surface instead of the reverse? In fact, we should be nearly, if not completely, bone-dry.

And this list goes on. The minerals in the soil must be optimal for all sorts of biological and commercial reasons, the Moon's tidal effects

must not be extreme, ocean salinity and ion concentrations must not be unduly toxic, and ... well, isn't that enough to make the point? Also consider that with respect to tolerance levels, any one of these factors, like those that doomed two Space Shuttle flights, could be so prohibitive to life that the rest become a moot point.

So let's apply a bit of math. If you visit the lottery Web site for multistate Powerball, you will find all the probabilities of winning those multimillions that are sure to bestow peace and happiness. Here, the odds of winning the elusive jackpot are listed as "1 in 146,170,692." You could read this as "one winner for approximately every 150 million tickets sold"-which places you in the ritzy neighborhood of 108 individual purchases to provide hope for success.

By comparison, if we give all 68 of those planetary criteria previously mentioned a 50/50 chance of being in a range tolerable to life-a winor-no-win ticket-and multiply all the 1-out-of-2 odds together, you get a figure upward of 1022. Once again, going back to the strength of exponential numbers, our odds of getting a suitable planet Earth are (22 - 8 = 14): 14 increases of 900 percent beyond what it takes to win a Powerball jackpot. (No wonder they call the lottery a tax on people who aren't good at math.) And then after this, we must face the even more prohibitive odds of getting life to self-organize.

With this lottery example in mind, perhaps now the contrasts in the vocabulary I've been using will make more sense. In case the words went by too fast, let me repeat them. On the random side we have words like unstable, excessive, insufficient, intense, inadequate, difficult, extreme, fluctuating, exacerbating, severe, unbalanced, nonexistent, fragile, erratic, freezing, boiling, prohibitive, noxious, toxic-and, as a fitting end-impossible. And I dare say that if you set foot on any planet outside Earth, one, if not most-if not all-of these factors would negate the possibility of life.

On the other hand, we describe our planetary conditions with words like proper, balanced, refreshing, optimal, flexible, correct, exact, complementary, proportional, and-as another fitting end perfect. As we stand here on Earth, we easily see how all these supposedly fortuitous accidents allow the miracle of life. In the end, how many times can the word perfect be repeated (perfect this, perfect that, perfect everywhere you turn) until your faith in luck runs out and you admit that Someone was tinkering with physics?

Nothing to Shrug Off

As lengthy as the list of fine-tuned factors is, evolutionists shrug them off with the same comment almost every time. Like I earlier said, they would say that instead of a Designer adapting Earth to accommodate life, life adapted to the pre-existing conditions it found on our planet. For example, if Earth had a stronger gravitational pull, our creatures would have developed lighter bodies and stronger legs and wings. Or if Earth's air were one-fourth nitrogen and three-fourths oxygen instead of the reverse, animal lungs would be restructured, plant photosynthesis would follow different pathways, and so on. In fact, they say, our present gravity may actually be deadly, and our air toxic, to life evolving under conditions on another planet.

However, such people seldom realize the depth of this assumption. The fine-tuned features in the majority of these factors are not a matter of alterations but eradication-not just conditions to adjust to but conditions that bring death under any circumstance. First of all, many of the factors from the physics of the universe could completely negate the possibility of carbon-based chemistry, and other conditions on Earth would instantly be lethal to any type of life based on the carbon platform. (The song "Nothing from Nothing Leaves Nothing" comes to mind.) Remember that we are not just talking about whether gravity and air are optimal, but whether we even have a planet, a sun, a solar system, or a universe.

The skeptics also need to realize that some of these factors are more complicated than at first glance. Okay, so the Earth accidentally stopped closer to the sun. Just imagine that birds evolved with Space Shuttle-like heat tiles on their underbellies so they also could fly in the hot sun. If the Earth stopped farther away? Imagine birds with feathers a foot thick.

Yet in what possible location would you place the Earth and still have a water cycle? How far from its present location can you move the planet before precipitation, condensation, and evaporation collapse? (Ask the life that supposedly used to live on Mars.) The amazing water molecule is so essential to organisms that it is everybody's favorite indicator of possible extraterrestrial life. But how could water complete its inter- or intra-cellular travel if it were continually evaporated or frozen? By one estimate, if the Earth's orbit averaged a half of a percent closer or farther from the sun, we would have permanent vapor or permanent

ice. No water cycle, no fluid homeostasis for cellular activities-no life of any kind.

In my opinion, you have to accept Design, even if only by default. But I go even farther and say some "interesting touches" were added. I say there are some amazing displays of technical science included just

at the Artist's prerogative. I call it His "personal signature" on a fine piece of creative work. For example, we get to see only one side of the Moon because its rotation rate. on its axis and its revolution rate around

A Touch of Art

If the Moon's strange synchronous movement does not impress you, here is one you can't chalk up to anything like tidal pull. Who would not admit that solar eclipses are cool? Be in the right place on Earth at the right time and the disc of the Moon interposes itself to be perfectly congruent with the disc of the sun-a total solar eclipse. The alignment is so exact that the massive corona of the sun makes a beautiful halo, and the central darkness gives scientists the best chance to study the effect.

But isn't the perfect overlay a bit odd considering the chance sizes and distances of the two "unrelated" celestial objects? Yet the dazzling display is only possible because of the unbelievable equal ratios of diameters and distances. The Moon has a diameter of 3476 kilometers (2160 miles) and has a distance from Earth of 384,467 kilometers (239,000 miles), for a decimal ratio of .009. By comparison, the diameter of the sun is 1,390,000 kilometers (865,000 miles) at a distance from Earth of 149,600,000 kilometers (93,000,000 miles), a decimal ratio of, you guessed it, .009! In simpler terms, while the sun is about 400 times bigger than the Moon, it is about 400 times farther away-hence the stunning effect of the total solar eclipse, something that to me looks very "planned."



the Earth are exactly the same, a precise 27.3217 Earth days for both. (Check it out by going around your family globe with a ball on a stick. If you walk just as fast as you turn the ball, the "Earth" sees only one side of your "Moon.") Now it is true that tidal pull from a larger object on a smaller object begins to mitigate orbits over time, but no such preciseness exists anywhere else in a solar system filled with planets. Call it a bit of curious mystery thrown in just for fun.

A touch of art also extends to a last point. Any map of the Milky Way galaxy will show our sun and solar system to be about three-fourths of the way to the outer edge from the center of the flat spiral disc.

From a scientific standpoint, this is a stroke of "luck" that provides the perfect location for our "evolving" life-forms. If our solar system

were at the outer tips of the galactic arms, the rotational speed of the "crack the whip" effect would cause a rapid expansion of our planetary orbits, making for rapidly fluctuating conditions on Earth to which life could not adjust. If our sun were toward the center of the Milky Way, the intense gravitational attractions and the constant radiation of supernovae from so many stars in proximity would again make our Earth unlivable.

But the fact is, our sun lies not only at the proper centricity, it also lies in the open area between two spiral arms at the proper co-rotational radius where our speed remains relatively constant and our solar system will not be swept into either adjacent arm. Once again, we should celebrate our good fortune. Yet the artistic piece is that if our solar system could somehow survive in the galactic center or within one of the arms of densely packed stars, the cosmic clutter would prevent us from even looking out into deep space to see those distant wonders. It is as interesting as it is ironic. Darwinists use the very beauty afforded to us as we look into the heavens as justification to reduce our existence to "luck."

Tough Customers

As I said earlier, astronomers and physicists have always had a harder time buying into the random-chance scenario. Knowing what they know, they have not made the best Darwinists because of the weak philosophic argument that everything just fell into place without intelligence. Consider the well-known quote from Wernher von Braun, an astrophysicist of no small repute:

I find it as difficult to understand a scientist who does not acknowledge the presence of a superior rationality behind the existence of the universe as it is to comprehend a theologian who would deny the advances of science. And to show it doesn't take a "rocket scientist" to have the same opinion, hear the words of astronomer Alan Sandage:

I find it quite improbable that such order came out of chaos. There has to be some organizing principle. God to me is a mystery, but it is the explanation for the miracle of existence, why there is something instead of nothing. Or how about Princeton physics professor Freeman Dyson, who said, "As we look out into the universe and identify the many accidents of physics and astronomy that have worked together for our benefit, it almost seems as if the universe must in some sense have known that we were coming."*

Here is a man of longstanding reputation who has earned 21 honorary degrees by applying his knowledge of physics in almost every other scientific discipline, such as astronomy. He has also won the prestigious Templeton Award, given to individuals whose achievements in one professional field have simultaneously advanced the humanitarian benefits of religion. Therefore, I would say Dyson's use of the word almost in the quote above is a shot aimed at the Darwinists with whom he has debated all his life.

To sum it up, it may take faith to "move" mountains. But so many giants of science believe it takes much more faith to "make" mountains through natural processes.As Ace Ventura, Pet Detective, says, "Well, alrighty then." Let's assume we lucked out and got a universe and a suitable planet-perhaps several of them-ready for life. Having won the lottery for life here, many are convinced it has happened elsewhere, and have devoted their lives to prove it. Let's look at the ongoing search for life beyond our planetary home to see what the experts can now saith certainty.

Does Faith Save Without Works ?

An anti-Mormon sectarian on a theology debate on alt.religion.christianity posted:

> Rescuing those ensnared in the lie of Mormonism and it's works-based
> theology:
> (Ephesians 2:8-9) "For by grace you have been saved through faith, and
> that not of yourselves; it is the gift of God, not of works, lest
> anyone should boast."

My response:

You are wresting the scriptures from their true meaning. When Paul wrote that we are saved through faith and not of works, he was referring to the atonement of Christ as a necessary means of being saved and not just believing to yourself well I donate to charities and do good deeds so I'm a good person so I don't need Jesus. But just acknowledging Jesus' sacrifice is not enough to save yourself as Billy Graham would have you believe. Once having faith, you need to act according to your faith. You need to be baptized and live a life worth someone who is a true servant of God. After Paul had his first vision when he saw Jesus on the road to Damascus, he was instructed to be baptized by Ananias, a legal administrator (Acts 9:1-8). What would happen if someone confessed he believed in Jesus but then murdered someone ? And then the innocent guy goes to hell because he never believed in Jesus. Is THAT what you believe in ? Amazing. There are different levels of heaven, different bodies of resurrection determined by how we live in this probationary period. Joseph Smith restored this glorious principle of the Gospel.


2 In my Father's house are many mansions: if [it were] not [so], I would have told you. I go to prepare a place for you.

(John 14:2)

39 All flesh [is] not the same flesh: but [there is] one [kind of] flesh of men, another flesh of beasts, another of fishes, [and] another of birds.
40 [There are] also celestial bodies, and bodies terrestrial: but the glory of the celestial [is] one, and the [glory] of the terrestrial [is] another.
41 [There is] one glory of the sun, and another glory of the moon, and another glory of the stars: for [one] star differeth from [another] star in glory.
42 So also [is] the resurrection of the dead. It is sown in corruption; it is raised in incorruption:

(1 Cor 15:39-42)




18 Yea, a man may say, Thou hast faith, and I have works: shew me thy faith without thy works, and I will shew thee my faith by my works.
19 Thou believest that there is one God; thou doest well: the devils also believe, and tremble.
20 But wilt thou know, O vain man, that faith without works is dead?
21 Was not Abraham our father justified by works, when he had offered Isaac his son upon the altar?
22 Seest thou how faith wrought with his works, and by works was faith made perfect?
23 And the scripture was fulfilled which saith, Abraham believed God, and it was imputed unto him for righteousness: and he was called the Friend of God.
24 Ye see then how that by works a man is justified, and not by faith only.

(James 2:18-24)

16 He that believeth and is baptized shall be saved; but he that believeth not shall be damned.
(Mark 16:16)

5 Jesus answered, Verily, verily, I say unto thee, Except a man be born of water, and the Spirit, he cannot enter into the kingdom of God.
( John 3:5)

37 Now when they heard [this], they were pricked in their heart, and said unto Peter and to the rest of the apostles, Men [and] brethren, what shall we do?
38 Then Peter said unto them, Repent, and be baptized every one of you in the name of Jesus Christ for the remission of sins, and ye shall receive the gift of the Holy Ghost.
(Acts 2:37-38)


"True Faith" by Orson Pratt (original Mormon Apostle)

14.--When the Apostles were commanded to go into all the world and preach the Gospel to every creature, they were informed that he who believed the Gospel, and was baptized, should be saved, and he who believed not should be damned. To believe the Gospel, as the Apostles preached it, was not sufficient, but Jesus added the condition of baptism, clearly showing that their faith must be manifested by the works, otherwise it would be of no benefit to them. Jesus very well understood that the works necessary to salvation never would be performed without faith, which always precedes them; and, as this faith was in their power to obtain through the evidence offered by the preaching of his Apostles, he determined to damn every creature in all the world that would not believe the message they taught.
15.--There are some who believe that faith alone, unaccompanied by works, is sufficient for justification, sanctification, and salvation. But what would it benefit a hungry man, in a field, who believes that in the house there is a table spread for him with an abundance of food, if he make no exertion to approach the house and obtain the blessing? What profit would it be to a rich man who has faith in the words of Jesus, concerning the feeding of the hungry and the clothing of the naked, unless he have works [75] corresponding to that faith? What blessing would be obtained by believing the words which Christ has spoken, unless we do them? It is not the person who merely believes in the sayings of Christ, that is justified, but it is he who shows his faith by obeying them. When Jesus speaks of believers, he has reference, most generally, to those whose faith has been sufficiently strong to lead them to obedience. It is to this kind of believers that He refers in the following passages: "Verily, verily, I say unto you, he that heareth my words, and believeth on him that sent me, hath everlasting life, and shall not come into condemnation; but is passed from death unto life." "For God so loved the world, that he gave his only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in him should not perish, but have everlasting life." "He that believeth on him is not condemned."
16.--Jesus here refers to a class of believers who should fully prove their faith by their obedience. Such, and such alone, should be freed from condemnation--should pass from death unto life--should become the children of God by having a faith that would lead them to obey. All other believers are without justification--without hope--without everlasting life, and will be damned, the same as unbelievers, because they profess to believe on the words of the Son of God, but will not obey them.
17.--Jesus says, "If a man love me he will keep my words; and my Father will love him, and we will come unto him, and make our abode with him. He that loveth me not keepeth not my sayings." As a man's love is manifested by his works, so is his faith.
18.--John says that, "Whosoever believeth that Jesus is the Christ, is born of God." It is evident, from the whole Epistle in which these words are contained, that none were to be considered as really believing that Jesus was the Christ, only those who manifested it by keeping his commandments; for he further says, "Hereby we do know that we know him, if we keep his commandments. He that saith, I know him, and keepeth not his commandments, is a liar, and the truth is not in him. But whoso keepeth his word, in him verily is the love of God perfected: hereby know that we are in him." And again, he says, "Every one that doeth righteousness is born of him." "Whosoever doeth not righteousness is not of God." "He that keepeth his commandments dwelleth in him, and he in him." "Every one that loveth is born of God, and knoweth God." "He that loveth not, knoweth not God; for [76] God is love." "He that dwelleth in love, dwelleth in God, and God in him. Herein is our love made perfect, that we may have boldness in the day of judgment; because, as he is, so are we in this world. There is no fear in love, but perfect love casteth out fear; because fear hath torment. He that feareth is not made perfect in love. We love him, because he first loved us." "This is the love of God, that we keep his commandments; and his commandments are not grievous."
19.--From all these passages it is easy to perceive that salvation depends upon our loving God; and that loving God is the keeping of His commandments; and the keeping of His commandments is the only sure evidence of our really believing that Jesus is the Christ. Let no persons, therefore, flatter or deceive themselves with the idea that they believe from their heart, that Jesus is the Christ, or that they are born of God, or that they have passed from death unto life, or that they love God, unless they are certain that they have kept His commandments and sayings. Millions are deceiving themselves with a false faith and with a false hope -- deluding themselves with the notion that they are born of God, when they have not attended even to the first commandments in relation to their adoption. All such will meet with a bitter disappointment.
20.--The first effect of true faith is a sincere, true, and thorough repentance of all sins; the second effect is an immersion in water, for the remission of sins; the third is the reception of the ordinance of the laying on of the hands for the baptism of the Holy Ghost: these are the first commandments in the Gospel. No man has a saving faith without attending to these three requirements. No person can be a believer in Christ, in the scriptural sense of that term, without complying, in the strictest manner, with these commandments; without receiving these, it will be in vain for him to pray for a forgiveness of sins, or for the baptism of the Spirit, or for salvation: and if he flatters himself that he loves God, or that he can obtain eternal life without obeying these first commandments, he is woefully deceived. Indeed these are the introductory principles, and the only principles by which men and women can be born into the kingdom of Christ, and become his sons and daughters. After attending to these, there are other commandments for them to obey; but if they undertake to obey the others first, they will find their endeavors unacceptable in the sight of God. For instance, God requires His sons and daugh-[77]ters to keep the Sabbath day holy; but no man can keep the Sabbath holy until he has attended to the first three commandments of the Gospel, after which he can keep the Sabbath according to the mind of God, but not before. There are many commandments which none but those who are born of God can keep. And for a man to undertake to keep them before attending to the first three, would be like a child's undertaking to read before it had learned the alphabet.
21.--A faith, then, that brings remission of sins or justification to the sinner, is that which is connected with repentance and baptism. Faith alone will not justify; faith and baptism alone will not justify; but faith, repentance, and baptism will justify and bring remission of sins through the blood of Christ. What does Paul mean when he says, "Therefore being justified by faith, we have peace with God, through our Lord Jesus Christ?" He means that faith is the starting point -- the foundation and cause of our repentance and baptism which bring remission or justification; and being the cause which leads to those results, it is not improper to impute justification to faith. What does that Scripture mean which says, "If thou shalt confess with thy mouth the Lord Jesus, and shalt believe in thine heart that God hath raised him from the dead, thou shalt be saved. For with the heart man believeth unto righteousness, and with the mouth confession is made unto salvation?" It means that real faith in the heart is that which leads to obedience; for a man who does not obey, only has a degree of faith, and not living faith in the heart, which in all cases will lead to repentance, confession, baptism, laying on of hands, &c. All will admit that to believe with the heart leads to and includes repentance. Why not also admit that it includes every other commandment of the Gospel? Because believing with the heart in the resurrection of Christ is the moving cause of obedience which brings salvation, it well may be said that salvation is the result of faith.
30.--The only way to receive additional faith and light is to practise according to the light which we have: and if we do this, we have the promise of God that the same shall grow brighter and brighter until the perfect day. Every word of God is light and truth. He that saith, that he is in the light, but obeyeth not the words of truth, is deceiving himself, and is in darkness; for none are the children of faith except such as walk in the light, and obey its laws. How many millions in Christendom profess to be Christians, and say that they are in the light and have been born of God, and yet they have never obeyed even the first principles of the light; they have never repented properly and been immersed in water for the remission of sins by the ministration of one whom God has authorized; and yet they pretend that God for Christ's sake has forgiven their sins. How blindly deceived! and how vain their faith and hope of salvation! God has not forgiven their sins; neither will He forgive them, until they obey the message of the Gospel according to the precise order which He has revealed. Faith is the gift of God, and is one of the means of salvation; but none can have this gift except in the way that God has ordained: and all who pretend to have faith and obey not that form of doctrine which God has revealed will find that their faith is of no effect, and that they will be damned with unbelievers: for God will not confer saving gifts upon the disobedient.

On the Plurality of Gods

On alt.religion.christianity, someone posted that there is only one God in response to a post that I wrote that there are are numerous Gods. I replied:

There are many Gods but there is only but one God to each earth. I know this to be true having the Holy Spirit as a testimony of the veracity of it.

6 I have said, Ye [are] gods; and all of you [are] children of the most High.
7 But ye shall die like men, and fall like one of the princes.

(Ps 82:6-7)

34 Jesus answered them, Is it not written in your law, I said, Ye are gods?
35 If he called them gods, unto whom the word of God came, and the
scripture cannot be broken;
36 Say ye of him, whom the Father hath sanctified, and sent into the world, Thou blasphemest; because I said, I am the Son of God?

(John 10:34-36)

5 For though there be that are called gods, whether in heaven or in earth, (as there be gods many, and lords many,)
6 But to us [there is but] one God, the Father, of whom [are] all things, and we in him; and one Lord Jesus Christ, by whom [are] all things, and we by him.

(1 Cor 8:5-6)

32 And by the word of my power, have I created them, which is mine Only Begotten Son, who is full of grace and truth.
33 And worlds without number have I created; and I also created them for mine own purpose; and by the Son I created them, which is mine Only Begotten.
34 And the first man of all men have I called Adam, which is many.
35 But only an account of this earth, and the inhabitants thereof, give I
unto you. For behold, there are many worlds that have passed away by the word of my power. And there are many that now stand, and innumerable are they unto man; but all things are numbered unto me, for they are mine and I know them.

(Moses 1:32-35)

Some say I do not interpret the Scripture the same as they do. They say it means the heathen's gods. Paul says there are Gods many and Lords many; and that makes a plurality of Gods, in spite of the whims of all men. Without a revelation, I am not going to give them the knowledge of the God of heaven. You know and I testify that Paul had no allusion to the heathen gods. I have it from God, and get over it if you can. I have a witness of the Holy Ghost, and a testimony that Paul had no allusion to the heathen gods in the text. I will show from the Hebrew Bible that I am correct, and the first word shows a plurality of Gods; and I want the apostates and learned men to come here and prove to the contrary, if they can. An unlearned boy must give you a little Hebrew. Berosheit baurau Eloheim ait aushamayeen vehau auraits, rendered by King James' translators, "In the beginning God created the heaven and the earth." I want to analyze the word Berosheit. Rosh, the head; Sheit, a grammatical termination; the Baith was not originally put there when the inspired man wrote it, but it has been since added by an old Jew. Baurau signifies to bring forth; Eloheim is from the word Eloi, God, in the singular number; and by adding the word heim, it renders it Gods. It read first, "In the beginning the head of the Gods brought forth the Gods," or, as others have translated it, "The head of the Gods called the Gods together." I want to show a little learning as well as other fools.
* * *
The head God organized the heavens and the earth. I defy all the world to refute me. In the beginning the heads of the Gods organized the heavens and the earth. Now the learned priests and the people rage, and the heathen imagine a vain thing. If we pursue the Hebrew text further, it reads, "The head one of the Gods said, Let us make a man in our own image." I once asked a learned Jew, "If the Hebrew language compels us to render all words ending in heim in the plural, why not render the first Eloheim plural?" He replied, "That is the rule with few exceptions; but in this case it would ruin the Bible." He acknowledged I was right. I came here to investigate these things precisely as I believe them. Hear and judge for yourselves; and if you go away satisfied, well and good. In the very beginning the Bible shows there is a plurality of Gods beyond the power of refutation. It is a great subject I am dwelling on. The word Eloheim ought to be in the plural all the way through-Gods. The heads of the Gods appointed one God for us; and when you take [that] view of the subject, its sets one free to see all the beauty, holiness and perfection of the Gods. All I want is to get the simple, naked truth, and the whole truth. Many men say there is one God; the Father, the Son and the Holy Ghost are only one God. I say that is a strange God anyhow-three in one, and one in three! It is a curious organization. "Father, I pray not for the world, but I pray for them which thou hast given me." "Holy Father, keep through Thine own name those whom thou hast given me, that they may be one as we are." All are to be crammed into one God, according to sectarianism. It would make the biggest God in all the world. He would be a wonderfully big God-he would be a giant or a monster. I want to read the text to you myself-"I am agreed with the Father and the Father is agreed with me, and we are agreed as one." The Greek shows that it should be agreed. "Father, I pray for them which Thou hast given me out of the world, and not for those alone, but for them also which shall believe on me through their word, that they all may be agreed, as Thou, Father, are with me, and I with Thee, that they also may be agreed with us," and all come to dwell in unity, and in all the glory and everlasting burnings of the Gods; and then we shall see as we are seen, and be as our God and He as His Father. I want to reason a little on this subject. I learned it by translating the papyrus which is now in my house.

(Joseph Smith, Teachings of the Prophet Joseph Smith, selected and arranged by Joseph Fielding Smith, p.371-372)

Who Created God ?

On alt.atheism, someone posted:
> FWIW in at least one sense, God _IS_ life. If we ask who created life, then
> we must ask who created God.

Verse 6 plainly shows that our God has a Father too.

5 And from Jesus Christ, [who is] the faithful witness, [and] the first begotten of the dead, and the prince of the kings of the earth. Unto him that loved us, and washed us from our sins in his own blood,
6 And hath made us kings and priests unto God and his Father; to him [be] glory and dominion for ever and ever. Amen.

(Rev 1:5-6)

I learned a testimony concerning Abraham, and he reasoned concerning the God of heaven. "In order to do that," said he, "suppose we have two facts: that supposes another fact may exist-two men on the earth, one wiser than the other, would logically show that another who is wiser than the wisest may exist. Intelligences exist one above another, so that there is no end to them."
If Abraham reasoned thus-If Jesus Christ was the Son of God, and John discovered that God the Father of Jesus Christ had a Father, you may suppose that He had a Father also. Where was there ever a son without a father? And where was there ever a father without first being a son? Whenever did a tree or anything spring into existence without a progenitor? And everything comes in this way. Paul says that which is earthly is in the likeness of that which is heavenly, Hence if Jesus had a Father, can we not believe that He had a Father also? I despise the idea of being scared to death at such a doctrine, for the Bible is full of it.
I want you to pay particular attention to what I am saying. Jesus said that the Father wrought precisely in the same way as His Father had done before Him. As the Father had done before? He laid down His life, and took it up the same as His Father had done before. He did as He was sent, to lay down His life and take it up again; and then was committed unto Him the keys. I know it is good reasoning.

(Joseph Smith, Teachings of the Prophet Joseph Smith, selected and arranged by Joseph Fielding Smith, p.373)

I will go back to the beginning before the world was, to show what kind of being God is. What sort of a being was God in the beginning? Open your ears and hear, all ye ends of the earth, for I am going to prove it to you by the Bible, and to tell you the designs of God in relation to the human race, and why He interferes with the affairs of man.
God himself was once as we are now, and is an exalted man, and sits enthroned in yonder heavens! That is the great secret. If the veil were rent today, and the great God who holds this world in its orbit, and who upholds all worlds and all things by his power, was to make himself visible,-I say, if you were to see him today, you would see him like a man in form-like yourselves in all the person, image, and very form as a man; for Adam was created in the very fashion, image and likeness of God, and received instruction from, and walked, talked and conversed with him, as one man talks and communes with another.
In order to understand the subject of the dead, for consolation of those who mourn for the loss of their friends, it is necessary we should understand the character and being of God and how he came to be so; for I am going to tell you how God came to be God. We have imagined and supposed that God was God from all eternity. I will refute that idea, and take away the veil, so that you may see.
These are incomprehensible ideas to some, but they are simple. 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.

(Joseph Smith, Teachings of the Prophet Joseph Smith, selected and arranged by Joseph Fielding Smith, p.345)

I wish I was in a suitable place to tell it, and that I had the trump of an archangel, so that I could tell the story in such a manner that persecution would cease for ever. What did Jesus say? (Mark it, Elder Rigdon!) The Scriptures inform us that Jesus said, As the Father hath power in Himself, even so hath the Son power-to do what? Why, what the Father did. The answer is obvious-in a manner to lay down His body and take it up again. Jesus, what are you going to do? To lay down my life as my Father did, and take it up again. Do we believe it? If you do not believe it, you do not believe the Bible. The Scriptures say it, and I defy all the learning and wisdom and all the combined powers of earth and hell together to refute it.
Here, then, is eternal life-to know the only wise and true God; and you have got to learn how to be Gods yourselves, and to be kings and priests to God, the same as all Gods have done before you, namely, by going from one small degree to another, and from a small capacity to a great one; from grace to grace, from exaltation to exaltation, until you attain to the resurrection of the dead, and are able to dwell in everlasting burnings, and to sit in glory, as do those who sit enthroned in everlasting power. And I want you to know that God, in the last days, while certain individuals are proclaiming his name, is not trifling with you or me.

(Joseph Smith, Teachings of the Prophet Joseph Smith, selected and arranged by Joseph Fielding Smith, p.346)

Adam was an immortal being when he came to this earth. He had lived on an earth similar to ours. He had received the priesthood and the keys thereof, and had been faithful in all things, and had gained his resurrection, and his exaltation and was crowned with glory, immortality and eternal lives, and was numbered with the Gods, for such he became through his faithfulness.
(Brigham Young quoted in the Journal of L. John Nuttall, Feb 7, 1887)

"Now hear it, O inhabitants of the earth, Jew and Gentile, Saint and sinner! When our father Adam came into the Garden of Eden, he came into it with a celestial body, and brought Eve, one of his wives, with him. He helped to make and organize this world. He is MICHAEL, the archangel, the ANCIENT OF DAYS! about whom holy men have written and spoken. HE is our FATHER and our GOD, and the Only God with whom WE have to do. Every man upon the earth, professing Christians and non-professing, must hear it, and will know it sooner or later . . . When Adam and Eve had eaten of the forbidden fruit, their bodies became mortal from its effects and therefore their offspring were mortal. When the Virgin Mary conceived the child Jesus, the Father had begotten him in his own likeness. He was not begotten of the Holy Ghost. And who is the Father? He is the first of the human family; and when he took a tabernacle, it was begotten by his Father in heaven . . . Jesus, our elder brother, was begotten in the flesh by the same character that was in the Garden of Ede, and who is our Father in Heaven. Now, let all who may hear these doctrines, pause before they make light of them, or treat them with indifference, for they will prove their salvation or damnation."
(Brigham Young from Journal of Discourses, 1:50-51 1854)

Eliza R. Snow: "When Brigham Young proclaimed to the nations that Adam was our Father and God, and Eve, his partner, the Mother of a world--both in a mortal and a Celestial sense--he made the most important revelation ever oracled to the race since the days of Adam, himself." Women of Mormendom; p.196-7.

The Ultimatum of Human Life

Eliza R. Snow

Adam, your God, like you on earth, has been

Subject to sorrow in a world of sin:

Through long gradation He arose to be

Clothed with the Godhead's might and majesty.

And What to him in his probative sphere,

Whether a Bishop, Deacon, Priest or Seer?

Whate'er his offices and callings were,

He magnified them with assiduous care:

By his obedience he obtained the place

Of God and Father of this human race.

Obedience will the same bright garland weave,

As it has done for your great Mother, Eve,

For all her daughters on the Earth, who will

All my requirements sacredly fulfill.

And what to Eve, though in her mortal life,

She'd been the first, the tenth, or fiftieth wife?

Whether by fools, considered small, or great?

'Twas all the same with her--she'd prove her worth--

She's now the Goddess and Queen of Earth.

Book of Mormon Prophesized in the Bible

A bigot anti-Mormon who are a dime a dozen said on alt.religion.christianity:

>Art Bulla and the Lord Jesus Christ, the Messiah, and Savior of mankind are not one in the same, Aaron. You may hold Bulla in high esteem, but I assure you, he's no Messiah (much less a prophet). No Aaron, as the Scripture says, "My sheep know My voice, and I know them, and they follow Me" (John 10:27). As one of Jesus' sheep, I assure you, I would NOT "have wanted to straitjacket Jesus".

"If Jesus spoke as rough things to this generation as he did the Jews, this generation would crucify him all over again." Joseph Smith

Messiah is an office in the Priesthood. It means "Lords' Anointed". Jesus is the Only Begotten, an office too. By its name, obviously you know there is only one who is the Only Begotten. There are two main tribes of Israel, Judah and Ephraim. Ephraim was invaded by Assyria and taken captive and scattered through Europe, losing their national identity permanently. Through the Lord's invisible guiding hand, the remnants of Ephraim were re-gathered on North America and formed the United States. Judah rejected their Messiah will Ephraim reject theirs ?

1 NOW the sons of Reuben the firstborn of Israel, (for he [was] the firstborn; but, forasmuch as he defiled his father's bed, his birthright was given unto the sons of Joseph the son of Israel: and the genealogy is not to be reckoned after the birthright.
2 For Judah prevailed above his brethren, and of him [came] the chief ruler; but the birthright [was] Joseph's:)

(1 Chronicles 5:1-2)

16 Moreover, thou son of man, take thee one stick, and write upon it, For Judah, and for the children of Israel his companions: then take another stick, and write upon it, For Joseph, the stick of Ephraim, and [for] all the house of Israel his companions:
17 And join them one to another into one stick; and they shall become one in thine hand.

(Ezek 37:16-17)

5 Behold, this is wisdom in me; wherefore, marvel not, for the hour cometh that I will drink of the fruit of the vine with you on the earth, and with Moroni, whom I have sent unto you to reveal the Book of Mormon, containing the fulness of my everlasting gospel, to whom I have committed the keys of the record of the stick of Ephraim;

(D&C 27:5)

The Book of Mormon
As recorded in the Book of Mormon, Lehi was warned that Jerusalem would be destroyed, and he was advised to take his family and leave. As he listened to the voice of the Lord and followed his instructions, he and his family were led out of the city to safety and into the new world, later to be known as America, while they who remained were destroyed or taken into captivity.
While the prophets in the old land were receiving revelations from God, the people of Lehi on this, the American continent, were not left without guidance. Prophets were raised up through whom God spoke and directed his people in all their doings as they would listen. He revealed to them also, 600 years before Christ's coming, that he would come, that he was the Savior of the world, that he would be persecuted and crucified, and that he would be resurrected.
This was foretold clearly by Lehi, Nephi, Alma, and others, including Samuel, to whom it had been revealed the exact time that Jesus Christ would be born. They were told of the signs which would be shown on this, the American continent, at the time of Christ's birth and crucifixion. Every word which had been revealed to them regarding these events was fulfilled. Following his crucifixion Christ appeared personally to the people on this, the American continent, and taught them the truths of the gospel.
Many of the revelations recorded in the Old and New Testaments, as well as in the Book of Mormon, refer most clearly to these, the latter days. Some of these are not generally understood by the world and can only be understood through revelations which were received in these the latter days, by the Prophet Joseph Smith. One example of these is that of John the Revelator who, when looking into the future, said:
Another Angel
"And I saw another angel fly in the midst of heaven, having the everlasting gospel to preach unto them that dwell on the earth, and to every nation, and kindred, and tongue, and people,
"Saying with a loud voice, Fear God and give glory to him; for the hour of his judgment is come: and worship him that made heaven, and earth, and the sea, and the fountains of waters." (Rev. 14:6-7.)
This revelation was fulfilled and clearly understood when the Angel Moroni did fly in the midst of heaven and appeared to Joseph Smith and told him of the plates which contained the gospel in its fullness. Joseph said that as the Angel Moroni appeared to him, he called him by name and told him that ". . . there was a book deposited written upon gold plates, giving an account of the former inhabitants of this continent, and the source from whence they sprang. He also said that the fullness of the everlasting Gospel was contained in it, as delivered by the Savior to the ancient inhabitants." (Joseph Smith 2:34.)
The Gospel Restored
Thus we know that the angel, as predicted or prophesied by John the Revelator has flown, that this great and glorious gospel has been restored in its fullness by the Lord through the Prophet Joseph Smith to be preached to every nation, kindred, tongue, and people.
Another revelation recorded in the Old Testament which refers to these, the latter days, and has reference to the Book of Mormon, is that received by Ezekiel wherein he says:
"The word of the Lord came again unto me, saying,
"Moreover, thou son of man, take thee one stick, and write upon it, For Judah, and for the children of Israel his companions: then take another stick and write upon it, For Joseph, the stick of Ephraim, and for all the house of Israel his companions:
"And join them one to another into one stick; and they shall become one in thine hand." (Ezek. 37:15-17.)
As I read this, I went to the Interpreter's Bible, which is written in twelve volumes, and is a commentary on all of the Old and New Testaments. This commentary was prepared by thirty-six consulting editors with over one hundred recognized, capable contributors and deals with all quotations from the Bible, taking them verse by verse and explaining their meaning and application. When I came to Ezekiel 37th chapter, verses 15 through 17, which I have just read, no feasible explanation was given, but conjectures only were made. This is no reflection on the editors or contributors to this great commentary, as they knew of no way to get the meaning.
Here again, by direct revelation and by direct revelation only, do we understand clearly what Ezekiel meant. Here the stick of Judah as referred to is the Bible, and the stick of Ephraim, which is written for Joseph and all the house of Israel his companions, is the Book of Mormon. Through the power of God and by direct revelation, this Book of Mormon, which contains the gospel in its fullness, was translated, and it with the Bible, became "one in thine hand." How clear and simple the words of Ezekiel become if we will but listen to the prophet's voice!

(President Nathan Eldon Tanner, Conference Report, April 1964, Second DayMorning Meeting, p.61-63)

Jesus said to the Jews:

16 And other sheep I have, which are not of this fold: them also I must bring, and they shall hear my voice; and there shall be one fold, [and] one shepherd.

(John 10:16)

After Jesus' resurrection, aside from visiting His Jewish Apostles, He visited the Nephites and Lamanites on the Americas:

14 And not at any time hath the Father given me commandment that I should tell it unto your brethren at Jerusalem.
15 Neither at any time hath the Father given me commandment that I should tell unto them concerning the other tribes of the house of Israel, whom the Father hath led away out of the land.
16 This much did the Father command me, that I should tell unto them:
17 That other sheep I have which are not of this fold; them also I must bring, and they shall hear my voice; and there shall be one fold, and one shepherd.
18 And now, because of stiffneckedness and unbelief they understood not my word; therefore I was commanded to say no more of the Father concerning this thing unto them.
19 But, verily, I say unto you that the Father hath commanded me, and I tell it unto you, that ye were separated from among them because of their iniquity; therefore it is because of their iniquity that they know not of you.
20 And verily, I say unto you again that the other tribes hath the Father separated from them; and it is because of their iniquity that they know not of them.
21 And verily I say unto you, that ye are they of whom I said: Other sheep I have which are not of this fold; them also I must bring, and they shall hear my voice; and there shall be one fold, and one shepherd.
22 And they understood me not, for they supposed it had been the Gentiles; for they understood not that the Gentiles should be converted through their preaching.
23 And they understood me not that I said they shall hear my voice; and they understood me not that the Gentiles should not at any time hear my voice--that I should not manifest myself unto them save it were by the Holy Ghost.
24 But behold, ye have both heard my voice, and seen me; and ye are my sheep, and ye are numbered among those whom the Father hath given me.

(3 Ne 15:14-24)

3 And because my words shall hiss forth--many of the Gentiles shall say: A Bible! A Bible! We have got a Bible, and there cannot be any more Bible.
4 But thus saith the Lord God: O fools, they shall have a Bible; and it shall proceed forth from the Jews, mine ancient covenant people. And what thank they the Jews for the Bible which they receive from them? Yea, what do the Gentiles mean? Do they remember the travails, and the labors, and the pains of the Jews, and their diligence unto me, in bringing forth salvation unto the Gentiles?
5 O ye Gentiles, have ye remembered the Jews, mine ancient covenant people? Nay; but ye have cursed them, and have hated them, and have not sought to recover them. But behold, I will return all these things upon your own heads; for I the Lord have not forgotten my people.
6 Thou fool, that shall say: A Bible, we have got a Bible, and we need no more Bible. Have ye obtained a Bible save it were by the Jews?
7 Know ye not that there are more nations than one? Know ye not that I, the Lord your God, have created all men, and that I remember those who are upon the isles of the sea; and that I rule in the heavens above and in the earth beneath; and I bring forth my word unto the children of men, yea, even upon all the nations of the earth?
8 Wherefore murmur ye, because that ye shall receive more of my word? Know ye not that the testimony of two nations is a witness unto you that I am God, that I remember one nation like unto another? Wherefore, I speak the same words unto one nation like unto another. And when the two nations shall run together the testimony of the two nations shall run together also.
9 And I do this that I may prove unto many that I am the same yesterday, today, and forever; and that I speak forth my words according to mine own pleasure. And because that I have spoken one word ye need not suppose that I cannot speak another; for my work is not yet finished; neither shall it be until the end of man, neither from that time henceforth and forever.
10 Wherefore, because that ye have a Bible ye need not suppose that it contains all my words; neither need ye suppose that I have not caused more to be written.
11 For I command all men, both in the east and in the west, and in the north, and in the south, and in the islands of the sea, that they shall write the words which I speak unto them; for out of the books which shall be written I will judge the world, every man according to their works, according to that which is written.
12 For behold, I shall speak unto the Jews and they shall write it; and I shall also speak unto the Nephites and they shall write it; and I shall also speak unto the other tribes of the house of Israel, which I have led away, and they shall write it; and I shall also speak unto all nations of the earth and they shall write it.
13 And it shall come to pass that the Jews shall have the words of the Nephites, and the Nephites shall have the words of the Jews; and the Nephites and the Jews shall have the words of the lost tribes of Israel; and the lost tribes of Israel shall have the words of the Nephites and the Jews.
14 And it shall come to pass that my people, which are of the house of Israel, shall be gathered home unto the lands of their possessions; and my word also shall be gathered in one. And I will show unto them that fight against my word and against my people, who are of the house of Israel, that I am God, and that I covenanted with Abraham that I would remember his seed forever.

(2 Ne 29:3-14)

An Email to My Mom

Dear Mom,

I received the voicemail that you left last night. I appreciate your love towards me and I love you. Like I said when I spoke with you yesterday afternoon, I will call you every other week. You can also contact me by email too.I just feel all that we could say to each other was said in yesterday's phone call. I think we will be just going in circles. I know that the Book of Mormon is true, that Joseph Smith , Brigham Young, Art Bulla are true servants of God. I know I am on the right road in my life and I would hope that you will repent and be baptized. I wish you will respect my life as I have decided to live.

Jesus said:

37 He that loveth father or mother more than me is not worthy of me: and he that loveth son or daughter more than me is not worthy of me.
38 And he that taketh not his cross, and followeth after me, is not worthy of me.
(Matthew 10:37-38)

"The integrity of the early Latter-day Saints, in remaining true to the gospel when a crucial test came, has always strengthened my faith; and I wonder if the boys fully appreciate the integrity of our parents. I desire to call the attention of our young people to a few incidents that have come under my observation, and the reasons why these people remained true.

"There was a young man living in one of the villages of Sweden who had grown to manhood and was a respected member of his father's family, and an honored member among the young people of the village. He had received a liberal education, and finally secured a lucrative position in a near-by city. He had not been located long in the city until he was a recognized leader among the young people of the place. As he was walking down the street one evening, he was attracted into a building where some "Mormon" elders were preaching the gospel. He was so impressed with the truth of what he had listened to that he invited one of the elders to his room, investigated further, and finally accepted the truth, was baptized, had the hands of the elders laid upon him, and received the Holy Ghost. When he received this witness for himself, he was so over-joyed that he could not rest until he had persuaded one of the elders to go with him to his father's home, and to take the glad tidings to those he loved best on earth.

"One cold, stormy day, the new convert and the elder started for the home of this young man who was delighted at the thought that his dear parents were going to receive the truth. He told the elder that he had one of the most honorable fathers, a kind and loving mother, brothers and sisters that he loved, and what a welcome they would receive when they arrived; there would be a warm fire to dry their wet clothes, and a choice supper would be cooked by mother; and he told how glad all would be to receive them; and, best of all, they would receive the gospel.

"Finally they arrived, cold, wet and hungry, but this was soon forgotten in the hearty reception they received. After the first greetings were over, they gathered around the warm fire, and the delighted mother was soon busy in the kitchen preparing the evening meal, and savory odors soon permeated the room. The young man was so over-joyed at the prospect of his parents receiving the gospel that he could not wait for supper to be served, or for them to get their wet clothes dried; but, being filled with that happiness that a knowledge of the gospel brings, told his father that his companion was a "Mormon" elder, and that he himself had accepted the gospel, and had brought the elder to bring the glad tidings to those he loved best on earth. But what a change those simple words produced! The father arose from his chair, called his wife and family around him, and said, "There is the boy we have doted on; the one we have looked upon to bring honor to his father's household; and, instead, he has brought shame and disgrace upon us." Then walking to the door, he opened it; and, pointing to the storm outside, he said: "My son, we all love you; we have looked forward with pleasure to the honor you would add to our name; but choose ye between the love of father, mother, brothers and sisters, the fireside of your youth and your honorable name, and this detestable religion, the storm and the night, and the casting of you out from our hearts and our homes!

"The young man looked for sympathy, but the same cold stare met him from each one present, and he was stunned and chilled to his heart. Then came upon him the many happy scenes of his youth, the love of father, mother, and all the tender ties of home; but, with tears in his eyes, and a lump in his throat, he buttoned his coat, put on his hat, and walked out into the night, an outcast from all that he loved best on earth.

"Why did the young man make this kind of a choice? Was he not human? Did he not love father, mother, brothers and sisters, and home? Why did he not say to that elder; "I was mistaken; there must be something wrong with a religion that will cause a person's loved ones to forsake him, and I prefer the love and honor of my home." But he did not do that, and the reason he did not, was because of that testimony that burned into his very being, and compelled him to admit that the gospel was true, and he could not deny it.

"His employer, learning that he had joined the Church, discharged him. His friends and companions no longer recognized him as they met him on the street. Why was this? Changes were taking place with other people. Many joined the Catholic, Presbyterian, and other religions, and their friends did not forsake them. Why should his forsake him, because he joined the "Mormons?" and, at this stage, why did he not turn back? He remembered the saying of the Savior: "He that will not forsake father and mother," etc., and the testimony remained with him, and he remained true to the faith."

(Improvement Era 1902)

Sincerely,

Aaron Kim

A Reply to a Typical Cultural Apostate Mormon Woody Brison on Alt. Religion.Mormon

"Woody Brison" wrote in message news:1192297141.895511.197510@q5g2000prf.googlegroups.com...

On Oct 12, 12:43 am, "Aaron Kim" wrote (I had a lively discussion with two Mormon Elders:)

"My Conversation with Two Mormon Elders"

In Escondido, CA on Oct. 1st, Monday, around 11:40 am, I was riding my bike on my way to the post office when I saw two Mormon elders walking to a neighborhood. They were Elders Parker and Orr. We exchanged greetings...

-(Woody Brison:)This is a thrilling story. This is the point in life, that every person will come to sooner or later, that is the turning point in their life. If they listen to the LDS missionaries, they can get on the fast track thru mortality to eternal life. Most people never even see the missionaries or hear of the Gospel even. In this decade the missionaries are starting to reach everywhere almost, and lots of people see them... but most do not notice them. You have noticed them and are talking with them... you've crossed that threshold. It might be an occasion for a party!

But the LDS has departed from the correct way of the Lord just like the original Church of Christ so I might delay the party.

... and I started out by saying that I have a testimony of the Book of Mormon and that I knew Joseph Smith was a true Prophet of God. They seemed enthused. ...

-This is great. A truly great start. You are on the track, well along even.

... I continued by saying that however I am not part of the Church ...

-Which can be remedied, but the good part is that you do recognize this fact. With all your tanglings with Art Bulla we'd be cautious, you thinking maybe you are the Church and WE are on the outside of it.

Jesus held the Priesthood outside of the Jewish Church.

''An assumption frequently made is that the authors of the prophetic books of the Old Testament were the constituted authorities of the Church in their eras. This, however, was not always the case. Some of them were even considered rebels by the religious leaders of Israel in their days. Jeremiah was one such prophet who stood outside of the Church. The established Church, through its Priests, even attempted to put Jeremiah to death. Micah, Amos, Hosea, and Zephaniah were also prophets who were critical of corruption within the Church.

"These Old Testament prophets did not speak as representing the Church, but as representing the Lord. Though the prophets may have held the higher Priesthood authority, there is no Biblical indication that the general Church membership of that time was aware of it." Thus Saith the Lord; Duane S. Crowther, p. 148.

... and that I believed the current Church had departed the teachings of the original Church. ...

-And here we have your first problem. What you profess here is not true; the Church has continued faithful and is the same organization that Joseph Smith started. Naturally the Lord has made some changes over the years. That's what it's all about - He's actively guiding the Church.

No the Church has changed altered many important items of doctrines including polygamy, getting rid of the Seventies which have equal authority to the Twelve, stopping the gathering of Israel, and giving blacks the Priesthood.

"We are told that the living oracles take precedence over all other authority, living or dead. We agree that the living oracles take precedence, provided they do not conflict with the dead oracles. If it is true that the living oracles take precedence over all others regardless of their disagreements with the dead prophets, then the Saints must necessarily change their faith every time there is a change in the presidency to conform to the views of the new president. The mention of such an attitude is so absurd as to border upon the ridiculous." (Gospel Problems, Heber Bennion, p. 6)

20 To the law and to the testimony; and if they speak not according to this word, it is because there is no light in them.

(2 Ne 18:20)

9 For do we not read that God is the same yesterday, today, and forever, and in him there is no variableness neither shadow of changing?

(Morm 9:9)

"There is no clash in the principles revealed in the Bible, the Book of Mormon and the Doctrine and Covenants; and there would be no clash between any of the doctrines taught by Joseph the Prophet and by the brethren now, if all would live in a way to be governed by the Spirit of the Lord. All do not live so as to have the Spirit of the Lord with them all the time, and the result is that some get out of the way."

(Preston Nibley, Brigham Young: The Man and His Work, 4th ed., p.310)

"That the Church's stand on morality may be understood, we declare firmly and unalterably, it is not an outworn garment, faded, old-fashioned, and threadbare. God is the same yesterday, today, and forever, and his covenants and doctrines are immutable; and when the sun grows cold and the stars no longer shine, the law of chastity will still be basic in Gods world and in the Lords church. Old values are upheld by the Church not because they are old, but rather because through the ages they have proved right. It will always be the rule."

(President Spencer W. Kimball, President Kimball Speaks Out on Morality, Ensign (CR), November 1980, p.94)

I find then President Spencer W. Kimball's sermon pretty amusing considering when about two and a half years ago in June 1978, he made the decision to reverse the ban of giving blacks the Priesthood, a policy of the Church from its very beginning.

And I will here say, as I wish to be understood by all men, that our faith is, there never has been but one Gospel upon the earth, though to-day there are six hundred three score and six different religious faiths, all more or less diverse one from another; but there is but the one true and everlasting Gospel, and never will be any more, and it is the same Gospel that was taught to Adam, to Noah, to Abraham, Isaac, Jacob and the Patriarchs, and which Jesus and the Apostles preached; it never did vary in the least in one single instance, nor never will. And I say, if we teach any other Gospel than that which was taught by Jesus and His Apostles, we teach a false Gospel and shall be under condemnation before God, angels and men.

(Journal of Discourses, 26 vols., 23:, p.127)

Evidence indicates that ordinances of salvation were available to the children of God from Adam to Moses. Joseph Smith declared "that [Adam] received revelations, commandments, and ordinances at the beginning is beyond the power of controversy."7 Those prophets who succeeded Adam knew the same gospel and ordinances. "How could Abel offer a sacrifice and look forward with faith on the Son of God for a remission of his sins, and not understand the Gospel?," the Prophet Joseph asked. "If Abel was taught of the coming of the Son of God, was he not taught also of His ordinances? We all admit that the Gospel has ordinances, and if so, had it not always ordinances, and were not its ordinances always the same?"8

(Sperry Symposium Voices of Old Testament Prophets: The 26th Annual Sidney B. Sperry Symposium , p.175)

... I explained that the Church no longer receives "Thus saith the Lord" revelations.

-A revelation from God does not have to contain the words "Thus saith the Lord". This phrase just means "this is what the Lord says." It means that the Lord speaks to the Prophet, and then the Prophet speaks to the people and tells them what the Lord said to him. If he leaves that phrase out, it give us no license to ignore the message.

-A prophet can get revelation in other ways. For instance, he might be taken up onto a high mountain and view the future. There might be nothing said vocally at all in this vision. Yet the Prophet could see the future, etc. and he could come back down and say "this is what's going to happen." He might not say "thus saith the Lord", if the Lord didn't speak to him during the vision, or didn't give him a message that he was specifically supposed to relay to the people.

-Or the Prophet could sense what the Lord wants done. Does the Lord have to spell it out? If He does, it suggests that the people and the prophet are not very close to Him. After they have been following His Gospel for a couple hundred years maybe they will get sufficiently close to Him that He doesn't have to spell out things, He can just think of what He wants and the people know. A revelation doesn't have to say "thus saith the Lord" to be a revelation. Ever heard the expression "your wish is my command"? If we know what the Lord is wishing, why would we not want to jump to do it for him? Why would we need Him to go thru a certain formula?

-The Church has been on the earth again now for 177 years. At first the Lord gave many revelations where he spelled things out in great detail, instructions on how to proceed. In some of them he didn't say "thus saith the Lord." With those written down and published and understood, He doesn't need to keep repeating the same instructions. So yes, you will see fewer and fewer revelations in the form of verbal messages given to the Prophet to be passed on to us, with or without the phrase "thus saith the Lord" in them on a day-to-day basis. If the Church is still on track, that's what we should expect.

I wonder if your "Prophet" Gordon B. Hinckley meets the criteria of a true prophet as described below.

The One True God" by Ogden Kraut

Chapter 10

JOSEPH SMITH: THE LONELY VOICE OF A PROPHET

From out of the masses of humanity, occasionally there arises someone who can speak for God. He is not a typical "money minister" nor a self-appointed imitator--but is a genuine prophet of God. His voice is seldom heard, and even less frequently believed, but his message is vital.

In these latter days, when there are so many counterfeit messengers of God, there must be at least one original. The counterfeits may be similar to each other, but the original will be a little different from the rest. The obvious difference is that all the counterfeits say they are right and Joseph Smith is wrong. But it would be foolish to believe that God would send a true prophet to tell us that the teachings of all these different Christian churches were right. It would be equally ridiculous to think that a true prophet would say that all the different churches had a correct concept of the identity of the real God.

A genuine prophet, of necessity, would come to testify of the error of their teachings and concept of God. Furthermore, a true prophet would clarify many of the mysteries unknown to the rest of the existing creeds and cults. And this is what Joseph Smith did!

But before accepting words of a man who claims to be a prophet, there must be some evidence or proof that he is a true prophet. A few of these guidelines are as follows and will be discussed briefly in this chapter:

[131] He must--

1. be called of God.
2. be in harmony with scripture.
3. receive revelation from God.
4. enjoy gifts of the Spirit.
5. receive the visitation of angels.
6. be assigned to a special work.
7. teach the doctrine of gathering.
8. prophesy and have his prophecies fulfilled.
9. be supported by other witnesses.
10. advise others to inquire of God.
11. be willing to die for the truth.

None of the "counterfeit Christians" have exemplified all these credentials--but Joseph Smith did.

1. He must be called of God.

A prophet must speak for God. He does not guess, suppose, or presume that he has been so called. He will have a definite time, place, and experience that indicates the reality of his call from God.

The Lord calls prophets personally, for He said, "Hear now my words: If there be a prophet among you, I the Lord will make myself known unto him in a vision, and will speak unto him in a dream." (Num. 12:6)

False ministers and self-appointed prophets merely assume their call--either by vanity, desire, or dark revelation. Such prophets and teachers are those who "speak a vision of their own heart, and not out of the mouth of the Lord" (Jer. 23:16). There have always been more imposters than genuine prophets, and they are described as the "foolish prophets that follow their own spirit, and have seen nothing" (Ezek. 13:3).

The messages given to true prophets usually consist of new information--not a repetition of traditions already accepted. They reveal the "mysteries of the kingdom of heaven" (Matt. 13:11).

[132] As a teenage boy, Joseph wanted to know which church was right. Being honest enough and having great faith, he went to the woods to pray. While praying, he later recorded:

. . . I saw a pillar of light exactly over my head, above the brightness of the sun .... I saw two Personages, whose brightness and glory defy all description, standing above me in the air. One of them spake unto me, calling me by name and said, pointing to the other--This is My Beloved Son. Hear Him! (Pearl of Great Price, J.S. 2:16 & 17)

This kind of call from God separates the prophets from other Christian evangelists.

2. He must be in harmony with scripture.

The teachings of a prophet will not contradict former prophets nor scripture. Since God is the same yesterday, today, and forever, His teachings and doctrines are the same. There is only one gospel.

There is no evidence that salvation was one thing in the days of Adam, another in the days of Moses, another in the days of Jesus, and still another in the 20th century. Joseph Smith added:

I hope you will search the Scriptures to see whether these things are not also consistent with those things which the ancient Prophets and Apostles have written. (TPJS, p. 29)

One prophet may reveal new information, new truths and prophecies, but their doctrines will not clash or disagree with those revealed by former prophets. Thus, the teachings of one prophet will harmonize with those of all the other prophets. This was certainly the case with the teachings of the Prophet Joseph Smith.

[133] 3. He must receive revelation from God.

One of the most important duties of a prophet is to have communication with God. Even the humble servants who believe should receive such revelation. False priests and ministers are best known to be frauds by the simple fact that they deny revelation from God, nor do they believe they can receive it.

Revelation can come to people in many different forms, one of the most common being a written message through a true prophet, in which "Thus saith the Lord" is attached. This stamp of origin is one of the methods to detect a genuine divine revelation.

With over 100 revelations published and as many more not printed, Joseph Smith is one of the most prolific revelators in history. At the beginning of the Doctrine and Covenants the Lord revealed:

I the Lord knowing the calamity which should come upon the inhabitants of the earth, called upon my servant Joseph Smith, Jun., and spake unto him from heaven and gave him commandments. (D. & C. 1:17)

This is written revelation; it is scripture, and it bears the stamp of God upon it.

4. He must enjoy gifts of the Spirit.

A true prophet enjoys many gifts of the Spirit to help him accomplish his mission. Visions, dreams, speaking in tongues, healing, etc., are part of the heritage and blessings given to prophets.

According to Joseph Smith, a prophet should be in possession of all the gifts and be familiar with their discernment. He must understand the source of those gifts, or deception and chaos will follow.

[134]
Because faith is wanting, the fruits are. No man since the world was had faith without having something along with it. * * * A man who has none of the gifts has no faith; and he deceives himself, if he supposes he has. Faith has been wanting, not only among the heathen, but in professed Christendom also, so that tongues, healings, prophecy, and prophets and apostles, and all the gifts and blessings have been wanting. (TPJS, p. 270)

The existence of gifts of the Spirit is an evidence that God is pleased with those particular people or that their faith is acceptable to Him. How else would true prophets and disciples know that God is with them?

One example of the Prophet Joseph enjoying the gifts of he Spirit is included below:

Many of my brethren who received the ordinance with me saw glorious visions also. Angels ministered unto them as well as to myself, and the power of the Highest rested upon us, the house was filled with the glory of God, and we shouted Hosanna to God and the Lamb. My scribe also received his anointing with us, and saw, in vision, the armies of heaven protecting the Saints in their return to Zion, and many things which I saw. (D.H.C. 2:381)

The most popular creeds of Christianity today claim no vision or revelation from God. However, such visions are as necessary for the spiritual path to salvation as the vision of the eyes is to the temporal path of man.

Where there is no vision, the people perish: but he that keepeth the law, happy is he. (Prov. 29:18)

[135] 5. He must receive the visitation of angels.

Most prophets are instructed by angels. A prophet lives in communication with the spirit world and therefore knows and understands the nature of all angels.

Beginning when Joseph Smith was a teenager, he had dozens of experiences with heavenly beings. Angels came to him with important messages necessary for the restoration of the Gospel. Said the Prophet Joseph:

You know my manner of communication, how that in weakness and simplicity, I declared to you what the Lord had brought forth by the administering of His holy angels to me for this generation. I pray that the Lord may enable you to treasure these things in your mind, for I know that His Spirit will bear testimony to all who seek diligently after knowledge from Him. (TPJS, p. 29)

Oliver Cowdery describes and bears testimony of one of these heavenly visits when the Priesthood was restored:

On a sudden, as from the midst of eternity, the voice of the Redeemer spake peace to us, while the vail was parted and the angel of God came down clothed with glory, and delivered the anxiously looked for message, and the keys of the gospel of repentance! What joy! what wonder! what amazement! While the world was racked and distracted--while millions were groping as the blind for the wall, and while all men were resting upon uncertainty, as a general mass, our eyes beheld--our ears heard. As in the "blaze of days;" yes, more--above the glitter of the May sunbeam, which then shed its brilliancy over the face of nature! Then his voice, though mild, pierced to the center, and his words, "I am thy fellow servant," dispelled every fear. We [136] listened--we gazed--we admired: 'Twas the voice of an angel from glory--'twas a message from the Most High! And as we heard we rejoiced, while his love enkindled upon our souls, and we were wrapt in the vision of the Almighty! Where was room for doubt? * * * I shall not attempt to paint to you the feelings of this heart, nor the majestic beauty and glory which surrounded us on this occasion; but you will believe me when I say, that earth, nor men, with the eloquence of time, cannot begin to clothe language in as interesting and sublime a manner as this holy personage. (Times and Seasons, Vol. 2, No. 1, Nov. 1840, p. 202)

6. He must be assigned to a special work.

Each prophet of God is assigned to a specific work. Some are to testify, warn, and call to repentance; others to gather and organize the people and lead them; some to translate or keep records; and many other labors have also been designated.

Enoch was told to build a righteous city. Noah was commanded to build an ark. Moses was required to go and perform miracles for the children of Israel and the Egyptians. Solomon was instructed to build a temple. And more recently, Joseph Smith was told by the Lord:

And you have a gift to translate the plates; and this is the first gift that I bestowed upon you; and I have commanded that you should pretend to no other gift until my purpose is fulfilled in this; for I will grant unto you no other gift until it is finished. (D. & C. 5:4)

Thus, Joseph labored diligently and exercised this heavenly gift until he finished the translation of the Book of Mormon. He not only translated the Book of Mormon and the writings of Abraham and Moses, but also published [137] a book of revelations, made an inspired revision of the Bible, gathered many thousands of believers, established a university and cities, and was a candidate for United States President. All this he accomplished before he was 40 years old!

Joseph Smith, the Prophet and Seer of the Lord, has done more, save Jesus only, for the salvation of men in this world, than any other man that ever lived in it. (D. & C. 135:3)

7. He must teach the doctrine of gathering.

The Prophet Joseph advocated that "We believe in the literal gathering of Israel and in the restoration of the Ten Tribes. . . ." (Tenth Article of Faith) He also stated:

One of the most important points in the faith of the Church of the Latter-day Saints, through the fullness of the everlasting gospel, is the gathering of Israel .... In speaking of the gathering, we mean to be understood as speaking of it according to scripture, the gathering of the elect of the Lord out of every nation on earth, and bringing them to the place of the Lord of Hosts, when the city of righteousness shall be built, and where the people shall be of one heart and one mind, when the Savior comes; yea, where the people shall walk with God like Enoch, and be free from sin. The word of the Lord is precious; and when we read that the veil spread over all nations will be destroyed, and the pure in heart see God, and reign with Him a thousand years on earth, we want all honest men to have a chance to gather and build up a city of righteousness, where even upon the bells of the horses shall be written "Holiness to the Lord." (TPJS, pp. 92 &
93)

[138] Orson Pratt explained that Joseph Smith taught the doctrine of gathering:

The doctrine of the gathering of the people of God, including Israel, is one so clearly predicted by the inspired writers, that it seems almost superfluous to refer to the numerous passages relating to it. * * * How came Mr. Smith, if an impostor, to get, not only all the other particulars which we have mentioned, perfectly exact, but also to discover that there must be a gathering of the Saints out of Babylon, and that that work must immediately follow the introduction of the gospel by an angel? Why did he not say, my doctrine is true, and if you will embrace it you can be saved, and still remain where you are? It matters not how correct this doctrine might have been in all other points, if he had told his disciples to remain among the corrupt nations, and not gather together--this alone would have exposed the cloven foot, and proved him to be a deceiver. Swedenborg, Wesley, Irving and a numerous host of others, during the last seventeen hundred years, have entirely neglected the gathering, which proves that they were without authority--that a dispensation of the gospel was never committed to them--that the voice from heaven to come out of Babylon had never saluted their ears. Previous to the restoration of the gospel by an angel, God had no people in Babylon, and therefore he could not call them out. An unauthorized uninspired priesthood, preaching a perverted gospel, never could raise up a people of God in Babylon; for they themselves are Babylon, and all their converts or children are begotten after their own likeness with Babylonish inscriptions upon their foreheads. (Orson Pratt's Works, pp. 9 & 10)

[139] 8. He must prophesy and have his prophecies fulfilled.

Before important events transpire, God usually speaks through a prophet to declare His words of warning. Those prophecies are fulfilled conditionally, unless God tells him that they shall definitely come to pass.

So a prophet proves what kind of prophet he really is by whether or not his prophecies come to pass. God said:

But the prophet, which shall presume to speak a word in my name, which I have not commanded to him to speak, or that shall speak in the name of other gods, even that prophet shall die. And if thou say in thine heart, How shall we know the word which the Lord hath not spoken? When a prophet speaketh in the name of the Lord, if the thing follow not, nor come to pass, that is the thing which the Lord hath not spoken, but the prophet hath spoken it presumptuously; thou shalt not be afraid of him. (Deut. 18:20-22)

There were over 20 major prophecies of Joseph Smith that were fulfilled, and perhaps hundreds of minor ones directed toward certain individuals or pertaining to less important events. Also, some of his prophecies were about the future and are continuing to be fulfilled.

A few of Joseph's prophecies were--

1. The place, conditions and consequences of the great Civil War, prophesied
30 years before it began.

2. Judge Stephen A. Douglas's aspiring to the U.S. Presidency and his fall--and why.

3. The immigration of the Saints to the Rocky Mountains and their increase in numbers and wealth.

[140] Many other prophecies are coming to pass, such as the Russian rise to power over nations and the eventual outcome of their regime.

9. He must be supported by other witnesses.

The work of God must be established by witnesses. In the courts of man, as well as in the courts of heaven, it requires evidence to establish truth. Jesus said, "... in the mouth of two or three witnesses every word may be established." (Matt. 18:16)

As mentioned earlier in this chapter, the first major work of this dispensation was the translation of the Book of Mormon from the gold plates. Shortly after the beginning of this work, Joseph was promised by the Lord:

And in addition to your testimony, the testimony of three of my servants, whom I shall call and ordain, unto whom I will show these things, and they shall go forth with my words that are given through you. Yea, they shall know of a surety that these things are true, for from heaven will I declare it unto them. (D. & C. 5:11-12)

Joseph was thrilled to know that he would not be alone to tell his story. Three witnesses saw the plates and an angel, and eight others saw the gold plates. Oliver Cowdery, Sidney Rigdon, and Hyrum Smith were among those who served as special witnesses to other major manifestations.

10. He must advise others to inquire of God.

A false prophet will not generally tell you to ask God to reveal the truth of his teachings or revelations; but the Prophet Joseph did. He admonished everyone to--

[141]
Search the scriptures--search the revelations which we publish, and ask your Heavenly Father, in the name of His Son Jesus Christ, to manifest the truth unto you, and if you do it with an eye single to His glory nothing doubting, He will answer you by the power of His Holy Spirit. You will then know for yourselves and not for another. You will not then be dependent on man for the knowledge of God; nor will there be any room for speculation. No; for when men receive their instruction from Him that made them, they know how He will save them. (TPJS, pp. 11-12)

Even in the Book of Mormon which Joseph translated, it admonishes:

I would exhort you that ye would ask God, the Eternal Father, in the name of Christ, if these things are not true; and if ye shall ask with a sincere heart, with real intent, having faith in Christ, he will manifest the truth of it unto you.... (Moroni 10:4)

11. He must be willing to die for the truth.

The Apostle John prophesied that disciples and prophets would be required to shed their blood to seal their testimony:

I saw under the altar the souls of them that were slain for the word of God, and for the testimony which they held: And they cried with a loud voice, saying, How long, O Lord, holy and true, dost thou not judge and avenge our blood on them that dwell on the earth? And white robes were given unto every one of them; and it was said unto them, that they should rest yet for a little season, until their fellow servants also and their brethren, that should be killed as they were should be fulfilled. (Rev. 6:9-11)

[142] Very few men are so convinced of the truth that they would be willing to die for it.

The Prophet Joseph knew that he would be martyred before he was 40 years old, yet he did not compromise or deviate from what the Lord revealed to him. On his final trip to Carthage, Joseph said to the company who were with him:

I am going like a lamb to the slaughter, but I am calm as a summer's morning. I have a conscience void of offense toward God and toward all men. If they take my life, I shall die an innocent man, and my blood shall cry from the ground for vengeance, and it shall be said of me, "He was murdered in cold blood!" (June 24, 1844; D.H.C. 6:554-555)

And three days later this true prophet of God sealed his testimony with his own blood--thus fulfilling another of his own prophecies, that his blood would be shed as a testimony to the truth.(end)

...I said the last revelation was written by President Wilford Woodruff in 1889, a year before the 1890 Manifesto that overturned polygamy as Church doctrine ( a man made fabrication that the leaders wrote to avoid persecution from the federal government although then President John Taylor in 1886 received a "Thus saith the Lord" revelation saying that plural marriage is an everlasting principle and cannot be done away with:http://www.artbulla.com/zion/1886.html) ...

-Before we get into that, let's ask whether that would be reasonable. It would mean that the LDS leaders were cowards, liars, and amoral scoundrels. Are they like that? Did President Woodruff experience such a 180 degree change in character between one year and the next?

-It doesn't fly.

... Elder Parker did most of the talking. He was obviously the file leader. He said how he knew that Gordon B. Hinckley is a true Prophet and that the Spirit is with him. I preached to both of them about how the Church apostatized. I pulled out my laptop and showed them the following quote by Brigham Young:

"Let this Church which is called the Kingdom of God on the earth. We will summons the First Presidency, the Twelve, the High Council, the Bishopric, and all the Elders of Israel, suppose we summons them to appear here, and here declare that it is right to mingle our seed, with the black race of Cain, that they shall come in with us and be partakers with us of all the blessings that God has given to us. on that very day and hour we should do so, the Priesthood is taken from THIS CHURCH AND KINGDOM and god leaves us to our fate. The moment we consent to mingle with the seed of Cain, the Church must go to destruction we should receive the curse which has been placed upon the seed of Cain, and never more be numbered with the children of Adam who are heirs to the Priesthood until that curse be removed."

(Brigham Young Addresses, Ms D, 1234, Box 48, Folder 3, dated Feb. 5,1852,located in the LDS Historical Dept. SLC, UT.)

Elder Parker expressed skepticism that this was a real quote from Brigham Young. I talked about the One Mighty and Strong and the two Messiahs , one to Judah and one to Ephraim. ...

-So you changed the subject, avoided the question. Let's change it back and look at the question right now. I don't expect that the quotation is bogus (it might be) but I don't think Brigham Young said this for the edification of all the world. He said it for the benefit of those present at that time, that small group. If he was going to publish it to the world, he would have. And he'd probably work it over with a red pencil, to make it read clearly. As it stands, can be understood - if you are familiar with President Young's offhand manner of speaking in private occasions. But it contains some subtleties, figures of speech, and certainly some grammar and capitalization errors, which little items certify that it was never prepared for publication by the author.

-But look at the statement itself. What's BY saying? That they could assemble all the men in the Church that have the keys and the authority - all of it, and he the Prophet could tell them they are going to cancel the restrictions on priesthood and Temple marriage for the blacks, but it wouldn't work. For the LORD is the one that laid down those restrictions and He is the only one who can rescind them. Not even with the unanimous consent of all the leaders of the Church could man overrule the decree of the Almighty.

-Now look at the end of the quote. "...until that curse be removed." That implies, in plain English, that the day is going to come when that curse will be removed. It's NOT permanent and unchangeable. The Lord can change it.

"The first man that committed the odious crime of killing one of his brethren will be cursed the longest of any one of the children of Adam. Cain slew his brother. Cain might have been killed, and that would have put a termination to that line of human beings. This was not to be, and the Lord put a mark upon him, which is the flat nose and black skin. Trace mankind down to after the flood, and then another curse is pronounced upon the same race-that they should be the "servant of servants;" and they will be, until that curse is removed; and the Abolitionists cannot help it, nor in the least alter that decree. How long is that race to endure the dreadful curse that is upon them? That curse will remain upon them, and they never can hold the Priesthood or share in it until all the other descendants of Adam have received the promises and enjoyed the blessings of the Priesthood and the keys thereof. Until the last ones of the residue of Adam's children are brought up to that favourable position, the children of Cain cannot receive the first ordinances of the Priesthood. They were the first that were cursed, and they will be the last from whom the curse will be removed. When the residue of the family of Adam come up and receive their blessings, then the curse will be removed from the seed of Cain, and they will receive the blessings in like proportion." (Brigham Young;Journal of Discourse 7:290-291)

"When all the other children of Adam have had the privilege of receiving the Priesthood, and of coming into the kingdom of God, and of being redeemed from the four quarters of the earth, and have received their resurrection from the dead, then it will be time enough to remove the curse from Cain and his posterity." (Journal of Discourses v2, Discourse By President Brigham Young)

225 Yea, thus saith the Lord, think not that I am come to destroy the law, or the prophets: I am come not to destroy, but to fulfill.
226 For verily I say unto you, Till heaven and earth pass, one jot or one tittle shall not pass from the law, till all be fulfilled.
227 Yea, thus saith the Lord, have all things been fulfilled?
228 Behold I say unto you, nay.
229 for has the millenium, even the thousand
years of peace, hath it passed, or hath it been fulfilled?
230 I the Lord thy God, who maketh the heavens and the earth and set them in their proper frame and orbits say unto you, O man, nay.
231 Hath the earth received her resurrection and her final reward?
232 I say unto thee, O man, who walketh about in darkness at noon-day, nay.
233 Have all the sons and daughters of Adam received of the blessings which shall be theirs?
234 I say unto thee, O man, nay.
235 And it is not until all these things, even
that which hath been spoken by the mouths of my servants the prophets be fulfilled that the Sons of Cain, the first murderer, shall receive of the blessings of the Priesthood of the Son of God, and then they shall be resurrected to receive of that which hath been appointed unto them from before the foundation of the world.
236 For the blood of righteous Abel did cry up unto me, even in these things.
237 And it is because of unbelief that this great wickedness hath come among you, even at this time.
238 Whosoever shall therefor break one of these least commandments, and shall teach men so, he shall be called least in the kingdom of heaven: But whosoever shall do and teach them, the same shall be called great in the kingdom of heaven.
239 And how much greater, saith the Lord, is my servant, Art Bulla, than those whom ye sustain as your Presidencies? 240 For the keys, even of the Kingdom of God have been taken, even from them, and given unto him who shall do my will, and believed in my words and my works from before the foundation of the world, saith the Lord God of Israel, even unto my servant have they been given, that he may prove unto you, O man, that I the Lord thy God am the same, yesterday, today, and forever. 241 For, saith the Lord, there is no agency except their own wicked hearts of unbelief, in your prophets at all, but they, even they, are as wood and stone.

Revelations of Jesus Christ Section 2.

So the curse has not been removed yet. The President of the Church is just an individual voted by the people. Prophets are chosen by God.

Journal of Discourses, Vol.1, Pg.133, Brigham Young, April 6, 1853

"Perhaps it may make some of you stumble, were I to ask you a question--Does a man's being a Prophet in this Church prove that he shall be the President of it? I answer, no! A man may be a Prophet, Seer, and Revelator, and it may have nothing to do with his being the President of the Church. Suffice it to say, that Joseph was the President of the Church, as long as he lived: the people chose to have it so. He always filled that responsible station, by the voice of the people. Can you find any revelation appointing him the President of the Church? The keys of the Priesthood were committed to Joseph, to build up the Kingdom of God on the earth, and were not to be taken from him in time or in eternity; but when he was called to preside over the Church, it was by the voice of the people; though he held the keys of the Priesthood, independent of their voice."

Anyways, in order for the curse to be removed, it would take one as great an authority as Noah because he was the one who put it on after the flood.

-Now, when the Lord sees fit to change it, how will He tell us? Will he go tell the reporters at the NY Times and they write it up? It would get garbled that way, and their editors would doubt they really got this from the Lord, and he'd probably not let it get printed. Would the Lord tell the the leaders of the world at some summit conference? Appear to them and announce it? No, their offices are not involved in spiritual matters; their job is to regulate trade and avoid wars and make wise laws. There are no laws about blacks getting the priesthood, on the books of the civil governments of the world. Would the Lord tell the ancient grey heads of Tibet? No, it would be 100 years before they decided it was a real manifestation, or maybe they would decide it wasn't after all. The Lord has chosen one man to transmit such announcements, and that man is the senior Apostle on the earth. It's always been so, ever since Peter, the senior Apostle, got the revelation to extend the blessings of the Gospel to the Gentiles, as recorded in Acts 10.

-... I described how after King Solomon died Israel was divided into two nations, the Northern Kingdom and the Southern Kingdom.

Let's skip down a bit.

... So I finally talked about Art Bulla. ... He was baptized into
the Church that year and was an Elder until ordained a 70 Apostle by Rex D. Pinegar in 1974.

There is no office of "70 Apostle". If Pinegar said this, it was an error. Apostle is one office and Seventy is another. In a philosophical sense, Seventies are Apostles, since the word apostle means "one sent forth". Every man who gets the priesthood is "sent forth" and all may be considered apostles in that sense. But it's only a philosophical consideration.

Seventies are Apostles but your evil Church did away with them.

Lectures on True Doctrine

Art Bulla

Lecture No. 7.

The Church (Mormon) has apostatized on this point, saith the Lord, even that of the Seventy and the Apostleship, for the Keys of the Kingdom of God, have I the Lord God of Israel removed from them in their iniquity.

After these things the Lord appointed other Seventy also, and sent them two and two before his face into every city and place, whither he himself would come." Luke 10:1 (Luke was a Seventy)

"One of the ordained offices in the Melchizedec Priesthood is that of a Seventy." Mormon Doctrine; Bruce R. McConkie, p. 707.

"The office of the Seventy has been discontinued, the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day-Saints announced Saturday." Salt Lake Tribune; Oct 5, 1986.

"An announcement that members of the First Council of Seventy of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day-Saints had been ordained High Priests to give them 'power to set in order all things pertaining to the Church as they visit among the Stakes and Missions..." Conference Report; Sept, Oct, 1961 p. 90.

"Therefor, at the late general conference, five men, High Priests, were called to act as assistants to the Twelve. This action shows the adaptability of the Church to changing, increasing conditions..." John A. Widtsoe; Imp. Era, May, 1941, p. 288.

"All of the assistants to the Twelve Apostles are High Priests. If an elder or a Seventy should be selected to be an assistant to the Apostles, he would be ordained to the office of a High Priest." Imp. Era; Oct, 1956, p. 752.

Inquire why the Lord waited until 1956 to make this innovation. (Obtain opinion).

Non-Apostate Position:

"And they (the Seventy) form a quorum equal in authority to that of the Twelve special witnesses or apostles just named." D&C 107:26.

Brigham Young: "There is authority and there are degrees of authority, and there is a difference in degrees, callings and authority of the Priesthood. If there should be one apostle left on the earth, he can regulate and set in order the whole of the church and kingdom of God. If there is one seventy left he could do so. This order is not my getting up, it is the Lord's doings; high priests my mourn over it, the Lord has said it, and I have no right to say it is not so. (Now we have Spencer W. Kimball assuaging the High Priests mourning, contradicting President Young. Of course the devil usurps right by saying it is not so. I detect the devil by his contradicting President Brigham Young, and more importantly by his contradicting the Holy Ghost which testifies of the perfidy of this departure from the Holy Order of God.) Des. News, June 6, 1877, p. 274. (The year he died.)

B. H. Roberts: "...and of course,...(the Seventies are) indirectly equal in authority to the First Presidency, since things equal to a common thing must be equal to each other." CHC; vol 2, p. 369.

Joseph F. Smith: "The Seventies are called to be assistants to the Twelve Apostles; indeed they are Apostles of the Lord Jesus Christ, subject to the direction of the Twelve, under the direction of the First Presidency of the Church to preach the Gospel." Conf. Report; April, 1907, p.5.

"Such a suggestion mad Joseph righteously angry. Said he, 'O My brethren with as much as I have taught you, and as many revelations as have been given on the subject of the Priesthood, that you should ask such a question! It would be an insult to the Priesthood of the Son of God to ordain a man a High Priest after he had been ordained an Apostle; for the Apostleship holds all the keys of the Priesthood upon the face of the earth, to build up the Kingdom of Heaven, to sanctify the people and prepare them to enter into the presence of God the Father. Now, to say that such a man, holding this Priesthood, should be ordained a High Priest is an insult, and I want to hear no more about it!" Brigham Young; Deseret News, June 6, 1877.

"Brethren I am going to tell you something that will make many of you stumble, Brother Heber Kimball and myself were never ordained High Priests. How marvelous! Thomas B. Marsh (President of the Twelve at that time) came to us and wanted us to be ordained High Priests. Such a suggestion made Joseph righteously angry..." Brigham Young

Have investigator read testimony of One Mighty and Strong on His Revelation concerning Seventy:

This, along with several others of major importance (Celestial Marriage, Negro-Priesthood, Temple Endowment) is one of the main doctrines which the adversary through false administrators has altered vital parts or portions to the salvation of mankind, the plan of salvation as revealed from heaven, and which cannot be changed, saith the Lord, but must remain the same on all the worlds, and through all time and throughout all eternity, for the "same gospel that saved Abraham, must save us"--Joseph Smith: TPJS. After I had received my first two written revelations, I got myself down again upon my knees and inquired of my God concerning what authority I possessed to dictate the affairs of the Kingdom of God upon the earth, by ordination, whereupon I was almost picked up from off my feet and led over to my bookshelf whereupon I was commanded by the Spirit to pick the book, Discourses of Brigham Young from off the shelf, and I opened it right to the page and my eyes fell first upon the paragraph spoken by Brigham Young in which the words sprang out at me: "He stated that the Seventies are ordained apostles, and when they go forth into the ministry they are sent with power to build up the kingdom in all the world and consequently have power to ordain High Priests and also to ordain and organize a High Council. Discourse of Brigham Young; History of Brigham Young Manuscript; Dec 14, 1845. As I read these words my frame was filled with such power and glory that I felt to whoop and shout for the joy and power of it, yea my God, the Holy One of Israel, for he hath revealed unto me the truth and hath he not set me free to build up his kingdom? And I received at that time another revelation that whatsoever I bound on earth would be bound in heaven, and whatsoever I loosed on earth would be loosed in heaven and that the Keys of the Kingdom were then given unto me, and he would recognize no one else as His anointed. I was then commanded to take the two revelations which I had at that point received to my hometeacher, Randy Olsen, who screamed blasphemy, shouting I had the spirit of the devil! the spirit of the devil! Whereupon he ran upon me and pounded me about my face, and broke my nose, and would have killed me in his fear and rage, but for his wife who ran into the room shouting Randy! Randy! My stake then wanted me to apologize to him! Which I wholeheartedly would not do. Whereupon they, in their wisdom convened a High Council Court and summarily excommunicated me. I received a revelation after my incident with Randy that stated that the Prophets had been treated in just this manner in all ages of the world by the wicked of the children of men, stoned, crucified, whereupon I leaped and shouted for joy." Teachings of the One Mighty and Strong No. 12.

Parley P. Pratt: "...in case the quorum of the Twelve should by any means become disorganized, that the Seventies held the jurisdiction and authority of Presidency of the Church in all the world wherever it might be found. That the High Priest's duty would be the same as it is now; they have to attend to their affairs, but the authority of Presidency over the whole Church belonged to the Seventies; and if all the Seventies were killed off except one Seventy, that Seventy would not only possess the right but would be duty bound to stand in their place as the First Presidency of the Church. He said that Joseph Smith the Prophet undertook to establish this idea in the minds of the brethren in Kirtland, but the jealousies that began to arise in the minds of the high Priests prevented him from doing so...He further stated that the difference between the authority of the Seventies and the high Priests was this: The high Priests possessed the High Priesthood, but the Seventies possessed the High Priesthood and the Apostleship, which was the highest power on the earth or in the Church. Parley P. Pratt, Nauvoo Record Book B, p. 226.

"The Seventies are Apostles; and they stand next in authority to the Twelve...If through the providence of God the First Presidency and the Twelve were taken away, then it would be the duty of the Seventies to preach the Gospel, build up the Church , and ordain every officer requisite in order to establish the Church, and ordain High Priests, Bishops, High Counsellors, Patriarchs, and set in order the whole church in all the world. This is according to the revelations given to us...I suppose I ordained hundreds (not just the first quorum as is generally supposed, so all Seventies were and in the case of Art Bulla, are general authorities and are, saith the Lord, recognized by me in their administrations, for they are, saith the Lord, legal administrators of my Kingdom) of Seventies in early days. Brother Joseph Smith has come to us many times, saying, 'Brethren, you are going to ordain Seventies. Do not forget to confer the high priesthood (Melchizedec priesthood) upon them. Ordain each of them to the High Priesthood, and to be one of the Seventy Apostles.' This was my language in the ordination of the Seventies, and that is the way i ordain them now. Brigham Young, Des. News, June 6, 1877, p. 274.

Go to Flannel-board Presentation:

"The Presidency of stakes may proceed from the beginning, and without supervision, may organize, number, and manipulate the quorums of the elders without reference to any other presidency, but he can't proceed so with the seventies quorums, which are not stake quorums, but general church quorums-he may not proceed so with the Seventies quorums, then, without consulting with and directed by the general presidency of the Seventy's Quorums, which is the First Council." B.H. Roberts, Letter to Stake Pres. Henry D. Moyle, Cottonwood Stake, Feb 29, 1928. Note: In 1974, two weeks after i had been ordained to the office of a Seventy, Mr. Kimball, cane out with a directive to have the Seventy subsequently to be ordained by Stake Presidents, contrary to the Holy Order of God!)

"Seventies quorums are not stake quorums. They do not function as stake quorums. There is nothing for them to do as a quorum in a stake. They are not essential in any way to a stake organization. The Seventies quorums exist and have existed throughout their duration in the Church independent of Stake lines...Stakes may be fully organized without having a quorum of Seventies ate all...The 115th quorum of Seventies is not the 115th quorum of any stake...but is the 115th Quorum of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day-Saints, and should remain so unconfused with any Stake numbering. B. H. Roberts, Letter to First Presidency and Quorum of the Twelve, dated Oct. 25, 1926-during this time the Seventies were being stripped of their rightful power in the Church by John Widtsoe, and Heber J. Grant-politics! How dare they tamper with the everlasting gospel? Who did they think themselves to be? The Owner and Master Builder of old ship Zion, can rearrange the masts, perhaps, but not the Captain. But the gospel being the same on all worlds, and through time and throughout eternity cannot be abrogated or changed except by me or by my authority, saith the Lord. For how can I change that which is everlasting? For my covenants, my word and my law are they not everlasting? Yea, they change not, for these are not circumstances which do change, but are principles which are inviolate, saith the Lord, and they who tamper with these things, to steady the Ark of God shall be smitten by the shaft of death, as it is written. Even so. Amen. Revelation Received Feb. 26, 1992; Provo, Utah.

"After these things the Lord appointed other seventy also, and sent them two and two before his face into every city and place, whither he himself would come." Luke 10:1.

Modern "Leaders":

"The First Presidency and Twelve feel that to meet adequately their great responsibilities and to carry on efficiently this service for the Lord, they should have some help. Accordingly it has been decided to appoint assistants to the Twelve, who shall be High Priests, who shall be set apart to act under the direction of the Twelve in the performance of such work as the First Presidency and the Twelve may place upon them...It is proposed that we sustain as assistants to the Twelve, the following named High Priests, who will labor under the supervision and direction of the First Presidency and of the Twelve..." 111th Conference, May, 1941; Imp. Era, p. 269.

"It is the duty of the traveling high council (Twelve) to call upon the Seventy, when they need assistance, to fill the several calls for preaching and administering the gospel, instead of any others." D&C 107:38.

Bear testimony to the truthfulness of the foregoing; close with prayer, and leave a copy of Authority and Message 12.