The doctrine of and reliance on men will never provide true spiritual nourishment and rest.  Our symbolic last supper served by boys today provides a stark example of the vain striving to eat and drink we see in the church and world around us.  The Last Supper performed by the savior Anciently too provides a [...]

Everyone, take 3 minutes and watch this video.
http://www.raisingsmallsouls.com/wp-content/themes/animal_school.swf
And remember that the key as always is in application.  This is  mainly about wordly education but the application jump is easy to the Gospel, Church, etc… We are all children of God afterall.  I was going to embed it, but that costs $49!!! for such a short [...]

The following is a little piece of a chapter out of Gileadis last days types and shadows discussing the nature of these terms in Nephis writings…I consider the Book required reading, however here is another a link to chapter 2 in its entirety.
The Terms Great, Marvelous, and Work
In the end, Nephi’s description of the [...]

This Chapter, using the Names of the Laman and Lemuel.  From Book of Mormon history we can get a pretty good feel of who these guys are.
Off the top of my head:

They are covenant people
They are prideful and stubborn, stiffnecked
They love their riches, the things of the world
They forfeit the birthright
They murmur about their trials [...]

Now we continue with the narrative, on to chapter 3.  Nephi and Lehi are really drawing out the eventual death of their father and exodus of Nephi, by illustrating some things to us in between in short chapters.  Again, we have to consider, why is this short chapter included in the writings?  Why is a [...]

Like Isaiah did, Nephi via Lehi, here interjects the whole plan for the salvation of Israel into one short chapter.  He juxtaposes good and evil, yet puts them both into the plan and into God.  And pertinent to our discussion, he tells us of our agency to choose between the two.  He does it though [...]

So perhaps I’ve waited long enough.  Moving into 2 Nephi and warming up for the exodus, we get some history and description from father Lehi. Lehis starts out by relaying to us the mood or idea of the next book, that of exodus.  He relates the exodus that he had with his people from Jerusalem [...]

Exodus imagery is prevalent throughout the Book of Mormon.  For instance, there are 7 actual unique exoduses in the Book of Mormon time line, as pointed out by Gileadi.  Add to that all of the times that exoduses are referred to, such as Lehi’s and Mose’s moves, and all of the times that exoduses are [...]

This post is in preparation for a post I will make sometime in the future.  Listening to an old Gileadi lecture he begged the question, “why are there 7 exoduses in the Book of Mormon?”   He did not directly answer his own question.  However, in reading the story of Zeniff, Noah and Alma in [...]

False Traditions – Authority
by Guest Author (Tom)
Mostly posting this because I’m tired at looking at my other post while waiting for Mr. WFZ to update his blog, but also because I think it’s an interesting subject worthy of some study and debate.  In reading a quote recently about the perils of “false traditions” and in [...]

All We Need is Love  by:  Guest Author (Tom)
What is Love, or in other words, what is Charity?
I’ve been engaged in several conversations over the past couple of weeks regarding the state of today’s LDS Church and have been constantly reminded that “all we need is Love”.  The response to inquiries into the state of [...]

I wrote this years ago, so I can’t remember all the sources, but this time of year always brings it fresh to my mind.
The Babylonian celebration commences again today (on black friday), as Malls around the world fill up with folks spending money on credit, given them by banks supported by the central banking system…Then [...]

This is Part I of a multi-part series, being an invited and inferior guest.  There will be at least two parts to this series, and possibly more, though that is up in the air at this point.
I have been pondering a few things over the past couple of days related to several Book of Mormon [...]

For Modern dimensions, these are the dimension that Brigham used.

“The altar is 2 1/2 feet long X 2 1/2 feet high X (one) foot wide rising from a platform about 8 or 9 inches high and extending out on all sides about afoot forming a convenient place to kneel upon. The top of the altar [...]

Reading and studying this doctrine lately has made my heart burn, in a good way.  I have been impressed with how regularly the saints, beginning with Joseph, felt it necessary to enter the waters and be confirmed, renewing covenants to God, to have sins remitted.  Also, it is intriguing to note that baptisms were performed [...]

The first thing we are commanded to do, as we enter the lone and dreary world, being respectively Adam and Eve, is to build and Altar and offer prayers unto God. The authority seems to have been given in the Form of a commandment to all.
” How is it in families? How many men are [...]

Starting in Abraham 3:24
“And there stood one among them that was like unto God, and he said unto those who were with him”
Michael in Hebrew is translated literally to “one like unto God”.  He had a bunch of spirits with him to use in this creation, Abraham was one of them.  The one like unto [...]

The Essential Orson Pratt
The Seer, Vol.1, No.7, p.102-p.103
p.284

Secondly. Whence originated these capacities? When we speak of
capacities we mean the original elementary capacities of the mind. We are
well aware that metaphysicians consider many of the qualities named to be of
a secondary or compound nature, growing out of the combinations of qualities
still more original. All this we [...]

Again, from my flawed paradigm to yours…
The Word “Jehovah” is really a misnomer in and of itself.  The Scriptures (hebrew) never use that term.  The term “YHWH” was the name of God, no vowels in the Hebrew.  They didn’t use that word though, it being Holy, instead they said “Adonai”, since it is somehow better.  [...]

As I was driving the very snowy streets of town today I pondered something that I wanted to say a quick word on here.  Just a rant if you will indulge me:
Passing a questionnaire, a list of worthiness obligations, is incredibly similar the Pharisaic law of rote obedience based on certain laws that must be [...]