Apostles

When I was a little girl, I knew who the apostles were. They were twelve men the age of my grandpa who would talk on the TV twice a year and tell me that Jesus was real (see General Conference).

I did not know then, but I can appreciate now that this is remarkable. As I got older and could understand the scriptures better, I learned that the original apostles were called by Jesus Christ to lead his church and to proclaim the gospel as special witnesses of his divinity. The fact that this definition has not changed and is still how you would describe the modern day apostles is further proof to me of God's unchanging plan for his children and brings comfort into my life.

So what makes an apostle? A deciple is someone who is just a believer and follower, a prophet is someone called by God to preach the gospel, so what is it about apostles that make them so different?

To begin with, we could look at the original apostle's call. The original twelve have the great and heart-felt account given in Matthew 4:19:

19And he saith unto them, Follow me, and I will make you fishers of men.

This is great and teaches much about those called to follow Christ, but this isn't a new or unique experience. Everyone who is a follower of Christ can lay claim to Christ calling them to follow him.

The next step in the Apostle's calling, where Christ makes them a bit more different and gives them a bit more authority, is in Matthew 10:1:

1And when he had called unto him his twelve disciples, he gave them power against unclean spirits, to cast them out, and to heal all manner of sickness and all manner of disease.

This is once again special as they now have authority to act in God's name to perform miracles and manage temporal blessing. But once again, later in Luke 10:1 he gives this authority to the Seventies, so it is not a distinguishing characteristic of the Twelve Apostles.

So what is an Apostle?

* He is someone called of God to be Jesus's companions while he was on Earth, to preach the gospel and to heal the sick (Mark 3:14):

14And he ordained twelve, that they should be with him, and that he might send them forth to preach,

15And to have power to heal sicknesses, and to cast out devils:

* He is someone who has power to seal on Earth and seal in Heaven (Matthew 16:19):

19And I will give unto thee the keys of the kingdom of heaven: and whatsoever thou shalt bind on earth shall be bound in heaven: and whatsoever thou shalt loose on earth shall be loosed in heaven.

* He is someone who has authority to judge the members of the church (Matthew 19:28):

28And Jesus said unto them, Verily I say unto you, That ye which have followed me, in the regeneration when the Son of man shall sit in the throne of his glory, ye also shall sit upon twelve thrones, judging the twelve tribes of Israel.

* He has been specially selected to be a specific witness of Christ's Resurrection (Acts 1:22):

22Beginning from the baptism of John, unto that same day that he was taken up from us, must one be ordained to be a witness with us of his resurrection.

* He is to be a part of the Twelve that runs the affairs of the church. Though this isn't specifically mentioned in the New Testament, the fact that we have letters of them doing just that is proof enough. For a specific scripture we can turn to Doctrine and Covenants 107:33:

33The Twelve are a Traveling Presiding High Council, to officiate in the name of the Lord, under the direction of the Presidency of the Church, agreeable to the institution of heaven; to build up the church, and regulate all the affairs of the same in all nations, first unto the Gentiles and secondly unto the Jews.

* He is to be traveling to all the different parts of the church (D&C 107:23):

23The twelve traveling councilors are called to be the Twelve Apostles, or special witnesses of the name of Christ in all the world—thus differing from other officers in the church in the duties of their calling.

This is a long list, and you can even go into further details with their specific duties. What I think the role of an apostle boils down to is in Christ's admonition to Peter before his ascension into Heaven recorded in John 21:15-17:

15So when they had dined, Jesus saith to Simon Peter, Simon, son of Jonas, lovest thou me more than these? He saith unto him, Yea, Lord; thou knowest that I love thee. He saith unto him, Feed my lambs.

16He saith to him again the second time, Simon, son of Jonas, lovest thou me? He saith unto him, Yea, Lord; thou knowest that I love thee. He saith unto him, Feed my sheep.

17He saith unto him the third time, Simon, son of Jonas, lovest thou me? Peter was grieved because he said unto him the third time, Lovest thou me? And he said unto him, Lord, thou knowest all things; thou knowest that I love thee. Jesus saith unto him, Feed my sheep.

The role of an Apostle is different from that of a CEO of a company or a politician of a country. His power to serve only comes from God, not through his own efforts, and is only to be used for service to his fellow man. All he does is for others with the understanding that once he starts thinking of himself he will lose his power. That is the miracle of Apostles to me, that they are men just like you and me, but they are able to give their all for their God and for their fellow man that Christ loved so much, in following Christ's call to them to "feed my sheep."

Apostasy of Early Christian Church

When you sit down to learn about what Latter-Day Saints believe, in the first few lessons you're going to cover something called "The Great Apostasy" or the apostasy of the early christians after Christ ascended into heaven. It is taught before the law of tithing, why Sunday matters, or any of the other "big" doctrinal points of our religion. You might ask yourself why this matters so much? Is knowing about this really going to help you get to heaven? The answer is yes, and I'm going to try and explain why. Just keep in mind that I'm not a professional historian, but I am someone who has paid attention and done her own research.

As I pointed out in my last entry, there have been numerous apostasies since the beginning of the world (which is when the world becomes wicked, there is no priesthood authority on the Earth, with it ending with God calling a prophet to restore things to how it should be). Why this one matters the most, and why it is refereed to as "The Great Apostasy" is because it is also to be the last apostasy before the second coming of Christ and the end of the world as we know it. It is also known as "Great" because of how far they had to fall. They had apostles, the complete doctrine, Christ's church established - but in only a matter of years it all started to fall apart. The apostles were killed off or sent into excel, people did the best they could, but in the end the doctrines got changed.

This Fall was such a big deal, that prophets throughout the Bible talked about it. An example is Amos 8:11:

11Behold, the days come, saith the Lord God, that I will send a famine in the land, not a famine of bread, nor a thirst for water, but of hearing the words of the Lord:

This Fall was also not a new thing or a surprise. The apostles themselves saw it happening and knew it was inevitable, as recorded in 1 Corinthians 11:18:

18For first of all, when ye come together in the church, I hear that there be divisions among you; and I partly believe it.

And in Galatians 1:6-7:

6I marvel that ye are so soon removed from him that called you into the grace of Christ unto another gospel:

7 Which is not another; but there be some that trouble you, and would pervert the gospel of Christ.

And finally with 2 Thessalonians 2:2-3:

2That ye be not soon shaken in mind, or be troubled, neither by spirit, nor by word, nor by letter as from us, as that the day of Christ is at hand.

3Let no man deceive you by any means: for that day shall not come, except there come a falling away first, and that man of sin be revealed, the son of perdition;

This is all interesting to know, but why is this not just a history lesson? Why, especially to Latter-Day Saints, is this so important? Because without a falling away and the resulting religious confusion and lost of vital doctrine and ordinances, we could not have had a restoration. One of the main facts that makes our religion different from other Christian faiths is that we believe that Christ's church as was originally established in the New Testament was restored to the Earth through Joseph Smith. Without this, all the doctrinal revelation we have received through the line of authority given from Joseph Smith to the current prophet Thomas S. Monson would all be simply the nice impressions of some well meaning people, rather than the voice of God to men on Earth like Peter or Moses of the Bible.

Joseph Smith's divine calling as a prophet of God is key to our salvation, and without an understanding of the state of apostasy the world was currently in at the time we really don't have any grounds for accepting the calling of a new prophet.

Apostasy of Israel

In my last post, I discussed the steps of an individual going apostate. Another type of apostasy is of an entire nation going apostate. It happens as individuals lose sight of God and we can learn by looking at these societal patterns how what may seem like a personal choice can have consequences for a larger community. As I am drawing from the scriptures, the examples given are for the apostasies of Israel and Judah.

The history of Israel is littered with dozens of examples of the nation going into apostasy and then being restored again, but I would like to focus on one apostasy in particular that had very long lasting effects. I would like to break apart some of the teaching of Isaiah and Jeremiah. These were two prophets who preached concerning the time period known as the Babylonian Captivity, when Babylon conquered Judah, slaughtering a good number of the people and taking the rest captive back to Babylon. Before this happened, Judah was openly practicing pagan rituals that were forbidden by the laws of God and committing all manner of sins without remorse or shame. Isaiah foresaw and prophesied of all this happening about 100 years before it occurred, while Jeremiah actually live through it. Isaiah and Jeremiah, along with other prophets, were called of God to preach repentance, and to warn the people that if they did not repent, then they would be conquered by other nations.

So what had happened to Judah to make it so wicked?

*They had grown prideful with their own accomplishments (Isaiah 2:8)

8Their land also is full of idols; they worship the work of their own hands, that which their own fingers have made:

*They had changed the holy ordinances and practices of their religion (Isaiah 24:5)

5The earth also is defiled under the inhabitants thereof; because they have transgressed the laws, changed the ordinance, broken the everlasting covenant.

*They were worshiping other gods and taking up the practices of their neighbors (Jeremiah 11:13)

13For according to the number of thy cities were thy gods, O Judah; and according to the number of the streets of Jerusalem have ye set up altars to that shameful thing, even altars to burn incense unto Baal.

*They were openly breaking the commandments (Isaiah 3:9, Jeremiah 23:10)

9The shew of their countenance doth witness against them; and they declare their sin as Sodom, they hide it not. Woe unto their soul! for they have rewarded evil unto themselves.

10For the land is full of adulterers; for because of swearing the land mourneth; the pleasant places of the wilderness are dried up, and their course is evil, and their force is not right.

*They rejected the prophets God sent them (Jeremiah 35:15)

15I have sent also unto you all my servants the prophets, rising up early and sending them, saying, Return ye now every man from his evil way, and amend your doings, and go not after other gods to serve them, and ye shall dwell in the land which I have given to you and to your fathers: but ye have not inclined your ear, nor hearkened unto me.

All of these can be done by an individual in a private life, but in the strongest sense these are societal choices that change the entire make up of a nation.

A lot of people believe that freedom of religion means that everyone should be free to practice, secretly in their own homes away from their neighbors, whatever they want. What they do not see is that religions freedom means being able to have an open dialogue of what one believes and feels that society should adopt. As a study of this topic shows, when it comes to moral practices, it is not just a personal practice that will determine a nations future, but of what that nation's inclinations are towards religion and God that will lay the foundation for its future prosperity.

Apostasy of Individuals

Topics without scriptures: apocalypse; apocrypha; Apollos; apostasy.

When I began this topic, I figured it would be about a ton of individual stories of people who went Apostate. There are enough stories in the scriptures. But instead, almost all of these scriptures are about how apostasy happens to someone and the consequences.

For a definition of apostasy, it begins with two alterations, one in a persons heart as described in Deuteronomy 29:18:

18Lest there should be among you man, or woman, or family, or tribe, whose heart turneth away this day from the Lord our God, to go and serve the gods of these nations; lest there should be among you a root that beareth gall and wormwood;

And in how a person interacts with the church as described in Isaiah 24:5:

5The earth also is defiled under the inhabitants thereof; because they have transgressed the laws, changed the ordinance, broken the everlasting covenant.

After this, unless repentance kicks in, a dark bitterness sets in. I am not saying that everyone does this, but in my personal experience at least about 80% of the people who I have known who have left the church have become bitterly opposed to it. In a lot of cases, it has been shocking to me to see the alteration of my friends to the point where they are living lifestyles that are so completely opposite to who they once were, and hurtful in how much they hated and wanted to hurt the church and those who still belonged to it. In a lot of way, Alma 47:36 about another group of apostates is in more than one way prophetic:

36Now these dissenters, having the same instruction and the same information of the Nephites, yea, having been instructed in the same knowledge of the Lord, nevertheless, it is strange to relate, not long after their dissensions they became more hardened and impenitent, and more wild, wicked and ferocious than the Lamanites—drinking in with the traditions of the Lamanites; giving way to indolence, and all manner of lasciviousness; yea, entirely forgetting the Lord their God.

This is a very delicate and personal topic for me because I've had to live through it with friends many times, and every time I dig up the past memories it hurts. Not from any self-righteous "oh, they left the faith" type of feelings, but because in almost all the case I've lost friends.

The scriptures give a warning of what the resulting eternal consequence are for those who become apostate. In short, they are dammed, as in their eternal progression is stopped. However, Alma 24:30 describes what the immediate consequence it:

30And thus we can plainly discern, that after a people have been once enlightened by the Spirit of God, and have had great knowledge of things pertaining to righteousness, and then have fallen away into sin and transgression, they become more hardened, and thus their state becomes worse than though they had never known these things.

God is just, and I know that we will be judged off of what we know. I've heard it said that the devil and evil men can not bring down Christ's church on earth, that the only thing that can stop it's progression is the apostaty of it's members.

To end with, this is a serious issue that affects a lot of people. The idea of apostasy of the resulting consequences can be summed up in Doctrine and Covenants 82:3:

3For of him unto whom much is given much is required; and he who sins against the greater light shall receive the greater condemnation.

Apathy

Topics without scriptures: Anxiety.

In the scriptures, the theme of "apathy" is most often addressed in two ways. The first of which is our general concern for God and for His commandments. The second is our apathy for the poor. Or in other words, for being lax in our love for God and our love for our neighbor (Matthew 22:37-40).

Focusing on the first one, what it means to have apathy towards God and His commandments is summed pretty well in 2 Nephi 28:21:

21And others will he ^apacify, and lull them away into carnal ^bsecurity, that they will say: All is well in Zion; yea, Zion prospereth, all is well—and thus the ^cdevil ^dcheateth their souls, and leadeth them away carefully down to hell.

In other words, one of Satan's most effective methods is to convince people that everything is fine and that they do not need to be paying attention or working hard. God's reaction to these type of people can be found in Revelations 3:16:

16So then because thou art ^alukewarm, and neither cold nor hot, I will^bspue thee out of my mouth.

Note that God is not saying that we are not of worth or that He does not love us, He is saying that in all honesty when we become slacker we really are not useful. To bring it home, have you ever been assigned to a project group or committee where there is that one person who really just does not care? How frustrating is it when you know how useful that person could be, but instead they really are just holding everyone else back?

God's call to us is simple, to wake up (Romans 13:11) and get moving (Alma 34:33) with special emphasis on taking care of the poor (Alma 34:28). God does not want a little bit of who we are, He wants our "heart, might, mind and strength" (D&C 4:2) because anything less won't be enough to face the trials that come to us.

Remember, the opposite of love is not hate. The opposite of love is apathy.

Antichrist

This entry is actually anti-climatic. With an entry like "antichrist" you would expect some high spirited show-down, but in reality it is pretty simple. An antichrist is just anyone who is against the gospel of Christ.

The scriptural definition of "antichrist" can be found in 1 John 2:22:

22Who is a liar but he that denieth that Jesus is the Christ? He is antichrist, that denieth the Father and the Son.

Another definition can be found in the LDS Bible Dictionary:

A word used by John to describe one who would assume the guise of Christ, but in reality would be opposed to Christ. In a broader sense it is anyone or anything that counterfeits the true gospel or plan of salvation and that openly or secretly is set up in opposition to Christ. The great antichrist is Lucifer, but he has many assistants both as spirit beings and as mortals.

So an antichrist could be anyone against being a good person in general or saying that Christ wasn't who he says he was. With that last one there could be lots of people who would fit under the category of antichrist, but I think where it becomes a problem is when you start trying to convince others of your ideas or telling Christians themselves that they are deceived. You can argue points this way and that, but in the end you can't argue faith.

An example of an antichrist who came to a tragic end can be found in Jacob 7. In short, there is a man named Sherem who openly opposed the gospel declaring that there was no Christ. He was so confident in himself that he sought out the current prophet Jacob to try and prove him wrong.

I've been in situations like this. I'm not saying that I'm a prophet, but I've kind of found these situations more than a little pointless. As I said before, you can't argue faith. If someone has it, you can't really smash it. If someone doesn't have it, you can't argue it into them. I have rarely met someone who for reasons of faith are bitterly against our church, but instead have problems with some historical or scientific reasoning that doesn't make sense to them. I've kind of realized that whether a religious conversation is going to go well with mutual respect or if it is going to turn into me sitting there while they spew angrily at me can be based off of their response to two questions. Both of which it would be a good idea of we all answered ourselves either with a "yes" or a "no":

1. If you had all of your scientific and historical questions answered and resolved, would it be enough for you to enter the water's of baptism and unite with us in our faith?

2. If God gave you a personal revelation confirming to your heart in a way that you could not deny, that this was the true church and that you were to join it, would it be enough for you to enter the water's of baptism and unite with us in our faith?