The Problems with Mormon Personal Revelation
Original Air Date: 2023-04-13
This video, titled "The Problems with Mormon Personal Revelation," is Episode 39 of the LDS Discussions series on the Mormon Stories Podcast. Hosted by John Dehlin, with guests Mike (from LDS Discussions) and Nemo (from Nemo the Mormon), the episode explores the epistemology of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints—specifically how members are taught to receive and interpret communications from God 1, 2.
While the episode was originally intended to cover Patriarchal Blessings as well, the discussion on personal revelation ran long, leading the hosts to defer the topic of Patriarchal Blessings to a future episode 3, 4.
Here is a detailed summary of the key themes and arguments presented in the video:
The hosts argue that the definition of revelation within the Church has been significantly "watered down" from its origins.
A central theme of the episode is the danger of using emotional feelings to determine factual truth (epistemology) 2.
The panelists argue that the Church creates a system where personal revelation is only valid if it supports Church leadership.
4. Revelation as a Tool of Control
The discussion connects these theological concepts to the BITE model of high-control groups (cults), particularly regarding Thought and Emotional control.
5. Conclusion: The Kingdom of God is Within
The episode closes with the hosts advocating for a healthier approach to decision-making. John Dehlin references the biblical teaching that "the kingdom of God is within," suggesting that true maturity involves harmonizing one's own intellect, emotions, and conscience rather than deferring blindly to external authority figures who have a track record of being wrong 24, 3.
The episode ends with a teaser that the next installment will be dedicated entirely to Patriarchal Blessings, examining them as a specific and problematic form of revelation 4.
Condensed ~5 minute video overview of the full episode, AI-generated by NotebookLM.
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hello everyone and welcome to another edition of Mormon stories podcast I am your host John delin it is April 13 2023 and we are here for another episode in our amazing and important uh LDS discussion Series where we examine Mormon church truth claims we are currently on uh if my if my numbering's right we're on episode number 39 of this series it's uh it's going to be dealing with the topic of personal revelation and patriarchal blessings uh it's a really important topic and uh just to remind all of you that this series is best consumed uh in sequence so there's at least 38 Episodes previous to this one you can find them on Spotify under the LDS discussions uh podcast label you can find them on Apple podcasts you can find them on the Mormon stories podcast playlist option under LDS discussions but what we're trying to do here with our good friend Mike and today with our good friend Nemo is to as objectively as possible as neutrally as possible and of course that's difficult to examine the Mormon Church's truth claims and to uh help people who are looking to just figure out what's true for them so that they can make informed life decisions just provide them with uh with evidence and with information and with questions that can facilitate it it's an extremely successful series check us out on all the platforms and of course it's integrated into the Mormon stories podcast feed as well but joining us for today's discussion is the amazing Mike from ldsdiscussions.com hey Mike hey everybody how's it going it's great to have you Mike good to be back and uh of course we have the amazing Nemo from the Nemo the Mormon YouTube channel hey Nemo hey everyone it's great to have you it's great to be here all right well uh I guess let's go ahead and launch in Mike with this is a part five in a five part series just on Revelations and we've talked about Joseph Smith's back dated prophecies problematic uh Joseph Smith Revelations failed Revelations and then Revelations after Joseph Smith and I have to say the revelations after Joseph Smith episode may be one of those most popular LDS discussions episodes of all time what do you think that's about Mike I don't know I was actually surprised too because I think it's you know it's important because we're looking at the really for one of the first times in the series of going to the modern church and I think that's part of it is just you know now it's something that impacts us um today uh when we talk about Russell M Nelson or Delaney jokes or the mark Hoffman stuff which I know didn't happen yesterday but it's modern time uh but yeah I'm surprised but at the same time it makes sense because all of the foundation we've been putting on to these earlier episodes the first you know 30 something is about Joseph Smith it's about the early truth claims in the Book of Mormon and now we're able to kind of take a step back and go okay now um what does the modern Church kind of portray these to be because that's important too because obviously as we've talked about a lot of the ways that these historical issues are kind of presented today uh by the Mormon church is much different than even 10 years ago so yeah I'm not entirely sure why it's one of the most more popular ones but it it definitely uh was surprising yeah it's kind of where the rubber meets the road and I'll just say today the word that I would want to introduce for today is epistemology and Nemo may be able to define this word better than me but it's it's basically around how you know things in this world some people like to take an empirical evidence science-based approach some people rely on feelings and emotion more some people try and combine the two but what you know today if we're talking about rubber meeting the road what's really important is is the discussion of how Mormons come to believe and or know things and whether that's a reliable way of understanding information and then we're going to be talking about patriarchal blessings as well Nemo is there anything you want to add to kind of an introduction for today's topic I think why I I think one of the reasons why this will probably be quite a popular episode as well is a lot of people find it easy to ignore church history they find it very easy to say to themselves well that's in the past I'm just focused on what the church does now so it's also important to address how the church is behaving now how it's behaved within the lifetimes of a lot of people listening and also now how it affects the individual I.E the way we've talked about how God communicates with the leaders in these People's Church in our church and now we're looking at how God communicates directly with the individuals within his church and that's gonna hit people personally in a way that some of the other things won't necessarily brilliant yeah that's a good way to put it and I think this episode in particular is really going to do that because now we've talked about like how did Joseph Smith claim Revelation what were his what might have been his motivation what were the problematic Revelations what were the ones that failed and then you go okay well what did Brigham Young prophesy what did Russell M Nelson say was it you know an impression that was a revelation but now it's like okay what do we do with the revelations we are claimed to have had through personal revelation and patriarchal blessings and so this episode in particular I think every person watching this um who was a member of the church or is a member of the church today will be able to relate to parts of this and I think that's why it's so important to do an episode on this because it does impact every member today all right well let's just Dive Right In the essay that we're going to be reviewing can be found at ldsdiscussions.com personal Dash Revelation but Mike let's go ahead and jump into the first slide yeah so this is our fifth episode in kind of this mini series and what we're trying to look at in this episode is not as much about the leaders but about our own ability to receive personal revelation from God and and for me as a convert I remember like specifically being told um and I've heard this also from uh Jim Bennett in his interviews with you and Bill real which is that members are entitled to and can receive that same uh capability for personal Revelations then all of the leaders can do and that is something you still see um when you read uh talks from leaders they'll say that I remember the church has that same ability to get personal revelation that they do and so for this episode um and this is a little bit of a splitting hairs kind of thing but I want to focus on personal revelation and not as much on spiritual Witnesses because that's going to be its own episode and and I I realize that might not sound like a huge difference but um for me personal revelation is this idea of getting answers of getting God's words as opposed to just a feeling and so we'll talk a little bit about that as we go but that's it so if you're watching this and you're going why aren't you talking about like testimonies and that's because we're going to have a whole separate episode on that and the second half of this episode is going to be about patriarchal blessings which I think is one of the most important um things to look at when we talk about modern day um I don't know how to phrase this but modern day parts of the church that impact lives of the members um because it does give you this Revelation from God um that is premised on the idea that we remain loyal and faithful to the church and its leaders and so just as we talked about with these earlier foundational events of patriarchal blessings do not hold up throughout time than to use those as a way to keep members very loyal and obedient to the church to get these promised blessings is a problematic kind of aspect of the church today okay and and I I so I hear your your trying to tease out a difference between personal revelation and what spiritual experiences is that what you said yeah just because I know like when I was doing this I kept thinking like well that's pretty similar to spiritual Witnesses but they're different even though they're kind of like a lot of overlapping so we're going to have an entire episode on okay spiritual Witnesses and testimonies um try to stay more focused on just kind of Revelation so just so I understand tell me if this is Right today we should think about you know God communicating things to us whether it's the prophets or to members can God communicate things to us and that's different from this idea of a witness or a holy ghost or a spirit or emotions confirming uh something to be true is that is that the way to think about it today is about to what extent can God communicate specific things to humans through this process of personal revelation is that right Mike I think so I mean we're like I said we'll have some overlap in this episode for sure it's hard to kind of completely separate them but yeah it's more like um if you pray is the more is the Church of Jesus Christ the Latter-Day Saints true and you get a warm feeling we're not really going to cover that got it yeah oh God Nemo it's the difference between like direct and specific guidance versus affirmation I feel like yes that's exactly it okay brilliant all right so uh let's go to what is personal revelation let's define our terms yeah and this is one that's kind of interesting because we talked about this with a few things um within kind of Mormonism in the past and so if you go on on Google and you just Google personal revelation almost all the entries are about the Mormon church or from Mormon church sources because this is a fairly unique idea in Mormonism and then if you search personal revelation on the church's website you're going to find just a whole whole ton of talks that discuss personal revelation and how members can receive and cultivate it for themselves and you know one of the things that's kind of interesting and we've we've noticed this with other issues is that the definition of what personal revelation actually is it varies from talk to talk and from leader to leader uh but the general idea is that as members of the church we can receive direct instructions from God if we pray sincerely and with a real desire to know God's Will and this is obviously um most commonly illustrated by moroni's promise in the Book of Mormon um I don't know Nemo do you want to read that yeah yeah behold I would exhort you that when you shall read these things if it be wisdom in God that ye should read them that you would remember how merciful the Lord hath been unto the children of men from the creation of Adam even down until the time that ye shall receive these things and ponder it in your hearts and when you shall receive these things I would exhort you you that you 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 by the power of the Holy Ghost and by the power of the Holy Ghost ye may know the truth of all things okay yeah so we already have some overlap here between spiritual witness and personal revelation but but the point is at least for me as a convert I was always told if you really have a sincere heart and you're really putting in the work to study these things if you ask God a question you will get an answer that's not just a feeling it's you can actually answer like what am I supposed to do about something and you'll get an answer in your head to say that's still small that with a small still Small Voice we'll give you that answer of like you should do XYZ to to fix that problem or or whatever the case might be and so um it really just shows that in the church you're told if you really praying you really want to know the answer God will give you that that answer in time got it and and Justice maybe just to kind of really set this up you know the the we've talked about this previously kind of the whole value proposition the missionary proposition if the Mormon missionaries show up at your door if you were a Mormon missionary this will be very familiar to you the whole idea is that the way that all of Christianity has gotten it wrong up until 1830 is that they they kind of teach that God used to talk to men through profits and that God used to be more active in the lives of humans but at some point Jesus died was resurrected the Bible somehow got put together and from that point further kind of Revelation has ceased and I think tell me if I'm right Nemo and and Mike kind of like one of the core messages of Mormonism is no starting with 1830 starting with Joseph Smith God you know 1820 really when when when when when when God and Jesus or first God and then later God and Jesus appeared to Joseph Smith God started talking to humans again after the great apostasy and it started with Joseph Smith and of course Joseph Smith became the first quote prophet of the modern um you know of the modern dispensation of the fullness of times but also it's better than that because not only will God speak to prophets in in the Mormon church but God can speak to members and all you got to do is pray and fast and be righteous and God might tell you to turn left or right at the stop sign God might tell you whether or not to get married whether or not to have kids how many kids to have God will tell you which university to go to or not to go to um I probably already said who to marry like whether to serve a mission like God will tell you things and answer to serving a mission is always yes John that's always yes they told us you don't have a choice right well we're going to get to that but but that's that is that am I right is that one of the core value propositions of Mormonism yeah I'd say that's the reason they start out with the first vision and the idea that God came and spoke to poor 14 year old Farm Boy Joseph Smith and if you've been watching the last 38 Episodes you'll realize it's a lot more complicated than that but that is the simple message says that God will speak to anyone because he'll speak to this dirt poor farm boy of just 14 years old so he would speak to you as well but then the rest of the missionary discussions is about managing expectations as to why he won't appear to you in a fiery pillar above your head you know above the brightness of the sun because that's what he did for Joseph but no we then have to explain that it's through the whisperings of the spirit etc etc yeah yep um and uh but but it starts out very hopeful it's like God's talking to God talked to Joseph God's talking to Russell Nelson the prophet now but more importantly God can talk to you you and it's particularly important if you're an eight-year-old Mormon kid getting baptized or a a teen or adult convert to Mormonism it's like hey don't take our word for it just pray about it ask you know read the book of Mormon think about it Ponder on these things pray about it and then God will communicate to you something as important as should I get baptized or not in the Mormon church that's kind of a yes or no answer and so God can God can reveal things to you and not just that God can reveal the mysteries of things unto you so if you want to know where do the 12 tribes of Israel go when is the second coming coming um you know again what what are some very specific decisions in your life that you should make God's there and and and and that sort of thing Mike anything you want to add before we then start to talk about how this gets changed no I mean that's like I I remember very vividly when I was taking the missionary discussions that kind of um mindset of this is the only church that can get direct Revelation from God and can you know basically see the problems that are going to come ahead and to warn you and to be able to give you insight about the problems of say 2023 as opposed to say you know the 1800s so that is the value proposition which is we can get answers from God that are very specific about things happening today which obviously as we've talked about in the previous four episodes on Revelation is not actually how it how it works or at least how it even you know wants to to be seen as working in the church today when you talk about something even like Heavenly mothers so it is definitely a change as Nemo said from that first discussion of we can get these amazing Visions these amazing Revelations to today which is you're just not you know you're not allowing these little Whispers to come through um the way they're supposed to okay yeah um all right and so so obviously before we start talking about why the church would even need to water water down because that's the next slide I can already just kind of start the discussion of why the church would even want to water this down because obviously number one there's going to be people um who receive who who think they're talking to God who are praying to God who are sincere but number one God can tell them to do things that the church might not agree with or God can can start telling people to do things that that might be harmful to other people right now in the United States there's this trial where um Chad dabell and Lori valo are both being tried in an Idaho court for not only killing their spouses but in Chad's case you know and Lori's case uh well no in Lori's case their their children or their siblings end up dead as well and of course there's been you know with the Lafferty Brothers there's been um people who believed in Mormonism who then felt like they were called to be prophets or to produce their own scripture and you can see how if everybody is left to their devices to start receiving Revelation for themselves or for the church or for other people things can go really sideways and so is there anything else Mike you want to say to start setting up why there would even be a need for the church to now go and water down this teaching yeah and actually the the perfect example to me is we cover this in our second episode in Revelation which was Joseph Smith's kind of problematic Revelations which is Hyrum page is going to claim to get revelation from God through a peeps last year Stone in a hat doing the exact same thing Joseph Smith did and he produces 16 pages of Revelation I believe and the witnesses to the Book of Mormon believe this is from God and Joseph Smith hears and he's like oh no no no this is from the devil they destroy the stone and it just shows right off the bat that the moment Joseph Smith allows other people in the church to be able to claim to do the exact same thing Joseph is doing even with the peep Stone slash Shear Stone in a hat from God reading the words off the rock the exact same way Joseph and me is like oh no that can't be real and from an outsider perspective you're like yeah because Joseph Smith realizes that someone else is doing the exact same you know game he's doing but that was the moment where Joseph Smith had to come up with another Revelation to say only I may speak for God and so you see that right then and there that Joseph Smith immediately realizes I cannot allow other people to have this authority to claim Revelation from God because the moment you do that Joseph's Authority gets watered down and in today's case if someone can say I received a revelation I a heavenly mother while Russell Nelson is sitting up at the top and he's like I haven't been able to say a word about her and now I got all these other people in the church who are claiming to speak for God I got to shut that crap down because the moment they see that I can't do it but they claim to be able to do it the entire structure of authority just starts to crumble okay okay Nemo do you want to do you want to add something to that well yeah I think one of the ways that Joseph Smith mitigated that was by having a revelation about everything including you know how much people can buy into the navu house whereas you now have a much less broad landscape of Revelations being had by people and so you have to have people like Dale G renland coming out and saying stay in your lane people you know yeah sure the prophet hasn't given any significant Revelations at all yes the most significant thing he's done is tell us the word Mormon is bad but just wait you can't go trying to work out all the pertinent issues yourself because they have this kind of safe Pair of Hands concept within Mormonism the prophet is seen as a safe Pair of Hands to handle God's will and if members were allowed to ourselves willy-nilly then things like the Lefty Brothers happen yeah yeah so you want so you want the church wants its authority to be obeyed it wants you to believe and think only what it what it approves in terms of beliefs and Theology and thoughts and Doctrine and um and so and uh and then it wants you doing whatever it wants you doing it doesn't want you doing anything that it doesn't approve of and it most most importantly wants you doing things that build up and strength in the church so it's it's about your Authority it's it's about protecting the church's Authority members believing and thinking what the church wants them to believe and think and then doing what the church wants them to do and so personal anytime personal revelation um conflicts with the authority of the church uh gets people to believe things that the church doesn't want or gets them acting in ways that isn't in the church's self-interest is it fair to say that's going to be a problem Mike yeah and we'll have we've got we got some video on that so yeah all right that's an issue okay so let's go to the next slide yeah and so we talked about this um when we looked at the previous episodes on Revelation about how when Joseph Smith was prophet he would get Revelations on literally anything I mean he Zelf the white lamanite is a claimed Revelation where they see this set of Bones and Joseph Smith's like oh this is self the white lamanite he was known I think all through the Rockies or whatever and he had anything and so Joseph Smith was a big believer in being able to get Revelation from God and so this is from Joseph Smith's own history he says the best way to obtain truth and wisdom is not to ask from books but to go to God in prayer and obtain Divine teaching and so Joseph Smith is making clear that you know research researching books will not give you answers but God will give them to you through prayer and through personal revelation and if that doesn't make it clear what Joseph Smith thought here's another quote this is from um June 27 1839 and he says God hath not revealed anything to Joseph but what he will make known unto the twelve and even the least Saint may know all things as fast as he is able to Bear them for the day must come when no man needs to say to his neighbor know ye the Lord For All Shall know him who remain from the least to the greatest and so Joseph Smith is saying in this sermon I believe it's a sermon that every person from the the the most you know let's just say a woman who has no Authority in the church she should be able to get Revelation just as you know a priesthood holding 12 year old or an 11 year old I know I sound facetious sir but they're saying the least member of the church the one who has the least amount Authority a woman can get as much Revelation as Russell Nelson can and so there's there's really no splitting hairs here and and so Joseph Smith is making clear you should be able to get all these answers for yourself you shouldn't need me to tell you all of this I'm I'm automatically disturbed by that quote that uh don't don't look for wisdom in books the best way is to go to God In Prayer if that were true we wouldn't need science we wouldn't need history we wouldn't need education we would just be born as babies and then just start channeling God's wisdom and there's no need for learning or education at all isn't there abduction covenants to say Seek here that's the best book yeah yeah it's kind of it's contradictory yeah yeah which is it yeah yeah that's a good point okay Mike let's go to the next let's go to the next slide uh you're muted Mike uh so now we're going to start to see how this begins shrinking down quickly and so this is from 1982 and um Elder Boyd K Packard uh says these delicate refined spiritual con Communications are not seen with our eyes nor heard with our ears and even though it is described as a voice it is a voice that one feels more than one hears and so here in 1982 um Elder Packer is saying that we don't receive the words from God in the way that Joseph Smith claimed to receive them but we receive feelings that guide our thoughts and this is much different than how the church used to claim that Revelation occurs and it does fit much more with a spiritual confirmation than it does with personal revelation and um this is the reason that prophets don't record revelations in the voice of God anymore because they know full well that they are not receiving Divine text in the way that Joseph Smith used to claim to be able to receive them whether he was reading it off of a rock and a hat or being able to kind of Riff it off the top of his head like he did with DNC 132 and to me it feels like in the most unintentional of ways Elder Packer is completely undercutting Joseph Smith's credibility by stating that Revelation simply does not work the way that Joseph Smith said it did when he was recording and claiming so many specific Revelations I mean there's a opposite way to look at that and he's undermining his own authority basically saying that yeah Joseph Smith got him this way but we can't and you have to ask yourself the question okay why can't they receive that in the very direct specific way that Joseph Smith received them so you could almost look at it as him undermining his own authority yeah and it seems like what he's trying to do here is there's a lot of people like I I really I relate to what I'm about to say like I'm a high schooler I'm going to Seminary I'm a Mormon kid I hear all these fantastic stories about Joseph Smith and Lorenzo Snow and Wilfred Woodruff and Spencer B Kimball in Revelation and and Moses and Abraham is like oh God speaks to everyone he'll speak to me about my life so I'll sit there and I'll read the book of Mormon and follow moroni's promise and then wait for an answer and because I like I I'm not easily social maybe I'm not as easily socially manipulated or I like maybe have a scrupulous conscience as a as a 16 year old I kneel down and pray and I'm worthy and I'm like no I I'm waiting for an answer God and it doesn't come and I'm wanting something literal I'm not thinking some little feeling I'm like God give me wisdom I'm here appear to me talk to me and then it doesn't happen and so what I imagine tell me if you can think of other scenarios Boyd K Packer's trying to say oh if you are worthy and if you try to pray and if you try to get answers and you don't get any answers maybe your expectations are too high for the answers maybe all you're supposed to be getting is a feeling not actual words or language or or anything that's too much like a voice or too specific so he's lowering the bar so that people don't either think they're broken or so that people don't think that God's not doing his part or that the church has it wrong does that sound right uh Mike yeah I mean it does like my the example that comes to my head is I graduated college after 9 11 and after 9 11 there was a recession that hit the country and so I'm looking for a job and I can't find a job because all the interviews I'm getting I remember going in this one interview and I got a second interview I was so excited I get there and the HR person the first thing she says is you're up against two other finalists who have way more experience than you and I'm like oh I'm screwed and so you go home and you're praying you know and you're saying what do I need to do where should I be looking what should I be aiming for I'm hoping to get some guidance like maybe you should look at a certain company or maybe you should look at a certain website that has maybe openings or something and you get nothing and so what Elder Packer here is saying is you shouldn't be expecting an answer from God you should be expecting feelings but then like there's no feeling there that is going to give you guidance outside of just sometimes you get that kind of feeling like that feeling like you can do it like I've got the strength to do it well that's fine but that's not the same thing and it's certainly not what Joseph Smith taught we were able to get and so it's a little similar to what you were saying John but it's just sometimes you you pray and at the time I was really frustrated with not being able to find a decent job out of college with a degree but you don't get an answer and so then you start to think well what am I doing wrong why what am I doing wrong to not get that answer and that is where you lead to a lot of members in the church feeling like they're not worthy and that leads to all sorts of problems as well it's the genius of an omnipotent being who is perfectly good because if he is perfectly good and he is not responding to your request he clearly can't be the one at fault he's blameless he's faultless so it always has to be the individual's fault that things didn't work and and the job of the church is to offer reasonable explanations as to why the thing that they said would work didn't and you can't blame God so you've got to come up with reasons why the person may not have done enough or been sincere enough or been worthy enough or whatever it's always got to be the person's fault yeah it's almost like the last thing a member can arrive at is that the church is wrong but if but it but but but so if the church can't be wrong then maybe maybe you're misunderstanding or over expecting what God can give but then you know last case of all is blame yourself if if we have to blame someone you have to blame yourself so either you weren't worthy or your expectations were too high is that is that does that sound right Nemo's nodding Mike yeah it is I mean we hear all the time um Jim Bennett who I I really I really do like listening to because he is obviously a member but he is willing to at least be more open about some of these things I I think when he was with you and also when he was with Bill real a few years ago he kept saying that like sometimes we have too high of expectations of profits and to me I go no because they make specific claims but that is usually the go-to when things fail because all of a sudden they're like why did you expect this much out of profits it's like well because they claim to have this power um but yeah that's where you have to go because you can't the only option is to throw past profits under the bus which they do or the members because the moment they admit that they don't have what they claim to have then that it's over so yeah I'm sorry people people don't get expectations out of nowhere yeah so if someone's expectations aren't being met and you're going to call those expectations unreasonable you then have to get to the bottom of why they have those expectations in the first place yeah right yeah and to be fair Jim Bennett will say those expectations do come from the culture of the church so it's not like he's saying that you're being unreasonable he's just saying that and this is a common apologetic which is just to say that needs to change the culture needs to change of thinking that profits really have this direct telephone to God but at the same time that's how they present themselves so you can't you can't separate it that's the whole is as John said that's the value proposition of Mormonism and so you can't then say well you're maybe thinking it's a little cooler than it is because then at that point you've got a whole slew of other issues to deal with got it all right well let's go ahead and go to the the next slide get why don't you go and set this up for us Mike yeah so we're gonna have a couple of clips from this app um it's a 2017 face-to-face with the youth and um so there's Elders Oaks and Ballard are being asked uh pre-screened questions they know exactly what's coming um and this question is how can one get a confirmation from God because uh this this girl feels like she's been unable to receive answers from God about the question she has and so they're going to give a pretty bland answer so we'll listen to that and then we can um kind of give a little bit of a response okay so so just so I understand these are youth who are probably coming with a question to these prophetsters and revelators Disciples of Jesus man I'm praying and I'm not getting the answer and this is their best attempt to kind of manage their expectations yeah and just yeah and of course remember these are pre-screened questions so they have the answers completely planned out so when they give these answers it's not like they're off the cuff and they're just having a hard time this is something they they were expecting and ready for okay all right so this is uh number two in command of the Mormon Church uh down H Oaks and if I'm not wrong Russell Ballard would be third in command after Nelson after Nelson and Oaks okay let's go ahead and play the clip ask how do I truly come to know and believe for myself the things that I have been taught I pray for answers and a confirmation of the spirit but my answers don't seem to come well the first thing we say in response to that question is that Revelation or inspiration is a process and the Lord teaches us it comes line upon line precept upon precept it also uh he also tells us and this is from the 88th section of the Doctrine and Covenants that it will come in his own time in his own way and according to his own will so we patiently wait upon the Lord and don't get up tight because we haven't had our prayer answered the first time or the first year that we have asked I think I'd like to add to that that um sometimes is hard for us to listen I think we're very quick to uh be engaged and maybe even at this time in the history of the world that's possible for a young single adults and I guess everyone to be captured by clutter and when I say clutter I'm talking about all the technology that is available all the things that can take your mind away from those Quiet Moments When you get the promptings that you're seeking as you go through life this this is not an unusual thing that you're that you're concerned about I think everybody has gone through that certainly I have I still do but I find times when I'm concerned about something that I have to find a quiet a quiet place where I can just be still and know that I am God and then in those Quiet Moments you don't hear voices you're not going to have a vision that's very unusual but really the things you feel within your heart or the way Heavenly Father ultimately answers answers prayers what's what your feelings are is the process of conversion and conversion for all of us is an ongoing process until the day comes we finally go from this world to the next one well said thank you our next question deals with sharing the gospel so okay okay so um is it is it okay if I give a reaction um Mike and Nemo and then you guys so I'm gonna try Nemo you're you're a tiny bit more salty than me today so I'm going to take more of the believer good faith faithful point of view and then you can deconstruct it is that okay Nemo sure yeah okay fine so so if I if I try and do a good faith interpretation of what Ballard is saying there and and Mike I don't know if that clip went longer than you planned on it and if that if that means we don't watch some of the other slides no no that was that was that was fine okay that was the clip so so if we just assume that Ballard is sincere and that Oaks is sincere what they're saying is is that Revelation exists but it takes time sometimes it takes sometimes God's not ready to give you the information that sometimes you have to be patient and you sometimes have to wait and then he's saying that you know to to really get that Revelation you have to quiet your soul and you have to kind of really tune into the the Holy Ghost you know and um and if you do uh if you can declutter your life from all the abstractions and obstacles and problems and really tune into the Holy Ghost then you'll you'll feel these subtle feelings um but don't expect to to see Visions or to hear voices it's going to be feelings of the heart and that's how you're going to get a revelation and if I'm going to just take my best faith interpretation in some ways this is almost like secular Buddhism consistent because it's a a secular Buddhist would say there is no Holy Ghost there is no God necessarily but there is this inner voice of wisdom and if you meditate and if you're Mindful and you get quiet enough and you get still enough you can listen to your inner voice and get wisdom so and sometimes it takes time to to learn that process so if I'm taking a good faith interpretation I'm there's there's a level at which I'm saying what's what is wrong with what he's saying that almost seems consistent with what no rochetta would recommend as a secular Buddhist so Nemo let me let me give you a chance to either validate that and or tear it apart I mean this there is some validity to that um I think the the question comes as to when when you admit from a secular Buddhist perspective it's your inner voice then you know what it is you're dealing with and you know that it will arrive because it is there uh and it's just about achieving the right set of circumstances with which to unlock it when it comes to their whole Holy Spirit paradigm um that's something different it has a different name it's not that whole it's not that inner voice so it's something you're trying to kind of invite and it's something that you're believing is external to yourself and so therefore it's something that you're denying if it isn't appearing if that makes sense so I think my thoughts on what he said would be what number of things or is there a finite number of circumstances or obstacles which if you get rid of all of them then reliably and regularly that voice will come because that inner voice will come reliably and regularly if you are meditating regularly and if you are you know being patient and and just letting it happen they it will it will reliably appear the Holy Ghost doesn't seem to they're always see there seems to be an infinite number of reasons why it won't turn up there isn't a set of things that if you can eliminate those problems from your life then the Holy Ghost will reliably be there and I think that's the difference and the problem with what they were they were saying in a sort of roundabout way okay um Mike I I know you've got a slide next do you want to jump to the slide and give your your critique yeah let's jump to that one okay all right let's do that so the the quote that I really wanted to focus on from the clip was near the end where Elder Ballard says and then in those Quiet Moments you don't hear voices you're not going to have a vision that's very unusual but really the things you feel within your heart are the way Heavenly Father ultimately answers prayers what your feelings are is the process of conversion and so what he's telling all of these young members is that feelings are the entirety of personal revelation and it's just we've shown this already in these episodes but it's a just a horrible way to discern truth and the problem is the equation always is going to work in the church's favor to encourage confirmation bias to kick in because we're going to have these members feel that God is confirming to them that the church is true when in reality it's ultimately just these kids wanting to experience that warmth that they've been raised their whole life to feel and um you know when we try to limit this um to personal revelation oh sorry the moment that you start to like limit um personal revelation to just feelings it's much easier for the church to Define what those feelings are so they can now Define the outcome of your feelings and we're going to get into that more in the spiritual Witness episode as well but it's like if you ask members um to put in the research about the church um about what they've learned and then um tell them to actually try to get that same feeling you're not going to get it and that really is where Nemo said where it's like how do you have the the recipe to get the Holy Ghost to give you answers because what they're giving you is the recipe to get you to confirm you know to convert to the church or to stay within the church yeah yeah and Mike the way the way that I was trying to think about this country in a contrary way and I'm just going to restate I think what both of you have tried to say or have said very eloquently it's that um it's that you know uh well well Mike you said something that I would push back a little bit on you said that I I don't know I don't want to misquote you but the feelings are a horrible way to discern truth or D or to to make decisions what was it exactly you said about I was just saying that your your feelings are are a horrible way to discern truth from fiction because we've seen that over and over again yeah and I think I think that's true on the other hand people make decisions based on feelings all the time and and in some ways that's not only healthy we're we're kind of biologically wired to make decisions based on feelings and we have no choice but to kind of try and put language to our feelings and so it is complicated because nobody's an automaton nobody is able to get perfect information to be able to perfectly logically make all decisions so we're not against emotion-based decision-making is that right Nemo and Mike I'm certainly not if you uh read the work of Jonathan height I'm always I'm always praising Jonathan High on this channel but his book The Righteous Mind is an excellent way of exploring how we're actually we make decisions based on deep feelings and then we're very good at justifying them to the outside world with language and we're far less rational than we like to think we are when it comes to these things yeah so on the one hand like the elephant the writer or or the elephants are emotions and that kind of controls much of what we do and then we put language we use language to kind of justify the the conclusion we arrived at emotionally that's all true um on the other hand we we have a cerebral frontal cortex we have that executive decision-making part of our brain The Logical rational part of our brain that helps us use information and evidence and logic to kind of guide those decisions and um and so that's you know we've already seen the slide previously where they're saying don't don't trust people outside the church don't trust science don't trust evidence the pure way is to go Direct quickly to God and Mike what I think I just heard you say is that obviously if uh if a young Indian teenager is raised as a Hindu he's going to be the content or the substance of his quote Revelations or promptings is going to be shaped by what his parents taught him as a kid what he learned at church as a kid same with the Jews same with the secular kids same with the Muslim so much of that programming that you have from birth for for people raised in a certain religion is going to then end up shaping what you call Revelation but it could just as easily be wanting to please Mommy wanting to please Daddy wanting to please the bishop wanting to please the community not wanting to disappoint your siblings or your grandparents and um in that way it's kind of confirmation bias does that sound right Mike yeah and I'm not even saying that emotions are a bad way to make decisions I'm saying they're a bad way to discern truth from fiction so yeah um you know for example we were talking about dogs earlier uh before we started recording and we got our second dog and we knew it was a really dumb idea to get a second dog but we saw a picture of a dog that was really cute and I said we got to get that dog and so you get the dog and then as Nemo said you Justified doing it later and that decision ended up being great because the we love dogs but um if someone came to me and said hey um I'm gonna give you this this this medical question and you're gonna tell me if if I'm telling you the truth or not and I pray about it whatever feeling I get is going to be as unreliable as anything else because I haven't done the the evidence to back it up so I'm not saying it's a bad way to make decisions because we all make decisions based on emotion um and happiness and sadness and all that I'm just saying you can't discern truth through it yeah and it's good oh go ahead emo I was gonna say I'm gonna stop myself from going too deep into stoicism here and what is a good and bad choice um I did want to ask you a question as a psychologist John about uh something that ballot said um which was he's he quoted uh from uh Doctrine and Covenants be still and know that I'm God which I believe is a reference to Isaiah um it was interesting that Ballard didn't change that I wonder how Freudian that was does he view himself as God well I mean we I I want to try and ascribe to them the best motives but they do view themselves as mouthpieces like literal Prophet series and revelators the mouthpieces of God on the earth they're not just like just like all other church leaders they see themselves as the 15 mouthpieces of God and Jesus on the earth absolutely yeah yeah I just wonder how much of that came across sorry that was just a no that's good yeah yeah so so there's a confirmation bias problem inherent in uh not being able to really know when we have a feeling whether it's conditioned taught learned or whether it's actually genuinely either of us or of the Holy Ghost or we can have the complexity of an evil spirit that's counterfeiting feelings like that's just problematic and I think the next slide Mike is you uh highlighting that maybe even Oaks acknowledges this problem with confirmation bias is that fair yeah and so this is you know one of the things I I heard all the time and it's not you know it's a pretty common teaching within the church if you have good feelings about the church that those are the feelings of God confirming the truthfulness of the church to us if we have negative feelings um you know for an example if you read the overviews on my website and you discover the church isn't true and you start to get negative feelings the church which will tell you that's the adversary trying to lead you away and so with personal revelation we see that exact same equation being taught by the church which is um definitely seen um in Elder Ballard's answer we just watched where he talks about how in the end it's just the feelings in your heart so in the same event there's another question which is how can I differentiate between the Holy Ghost and my own thoughts and feelings and I think this is an important one not just for personal revelation but for Spiritual witnesses as well and Dallin Oaks is even going to admit that confirmation bias plays a big role yeah and there's no good answer I can already tell you there's no good answer to this question but let's hear it okay so her question was how can I differentiate between the Holy Ghost and my own thoughts and feelings this is a question we wrestle with all of our life it's well to remember that uh the scriptures teach us that inspiration comes in the still small voice it doesn't come in the Urgent impulses of doing what we want to do and reaching out in bias for a confirmation to our our personal opinion I have found it helpful to use that test of bias when I'm trying to sort out the difference between a desire to be confirmed and what I want to do already and and what the Lord may want me to do and if I get an impression to do something I don't want to do I think that's a lot more authentic than to get or to report an impression that I've been confirmed in what I wanted to do anyway wow okay um Mike what do you what do you want to say about that well if you guys want to go first you can't I have a slide that kind of goes over myself let's have you start and then I can give our reactions after yes if you can load up the next slide it really is to me it just shows that there's like this Catch-22 on his comments here because he's telling us that if we receive a confirmation that contradicts our previously held beliefs that it's more likely to be an authentic Revelation from God so in other words if you're watching the series and you begin to feel that yeah this evidence is pretty overwhelming that the church is not what it claims to be getting a feeling of confirmation that the church isn't true is actually more reliable because it's not just confirming the biases that were created throughout your life in the church and on the flip side it's also a problematic approach towards moroni's promise because if you're stating that personal revelation that confirms what we want to be true is not nearly as powerful he's telling every member of the church who wants the Book of Mormon to be true which would be almost every member growing up that their personal confirmation and revelation of Truth is likely influenced by the fact that they want it to be true in the first place and so you know in a real world example um you know my kid when he was a little bit younger and he would ask if Santa was real I would always ask what do you think and he would always reply with some form of I believe he's real and the reality is that he was raised to think that Santa Claus was real and so when he was confronted by others in his class about the reality of Santa which happened way earlier than we were you know hoping for he would fall back to those happy and con you know comforting feelings he had about Santa which then confirmed the truthfulness of Santa to himself so in other words my kid wanted Santa to be real so Santa was real even in spite of his ability once he started to realize the story didn't add up and so Oaks here is really I think putting um moroni's promised in a bit of a bind because he's basically saying yeah if you get a quick feeling it's probably just what you wanted anyways and I I don't I know that's not what he meant but that's kind of what happens when you start to take that that line of thought okay Nema let's hear your reaction it's one of the most honest things I think he's ever said on honest I think fair play to him I think that was genuine I think that was sincere um I think he was trying to give good advice but like you said it creates a logic trap the healthy way to deal with this I think would be to actually have a theological teaching of you as a Divine son or daughter of God have within you the Light of Christ get rid of the Holy Ghost for a moment you have within the Light of Christ and when through our church through attending the temple say or being in the celestial room or doing things that our church does that encourages you to take time to meditate to ponder to pray to have reflective moments that then that inner voice will come up and it will help guide you but the problem is that creates far too much Independence for a church that wants to control its members so they have to teach that it's an external Force the the holy ghost that will guide them it's not their own intuition because like you said all of a sudden your own intuition can start coming up and throwing spanners in the works for you being a member of the church that will keep paying your money and and doing what they need you to do so I I think there's there's a healthy way spiritually to look at this absolutely it's a healthy way to deal with this problem but that means the church would have to relinquish control over the members which they don't want to do yeah my I love that Nemo and Mike my my two cents is is I'm just trying to process this real time you know the church has this teaching that quote the natural man is an enemy to God which means that we've got this carnal and this ties into the atonement that we're all Fallen that we're all carnal and devilish that we're all Sinners it's very calvinistic and that if if we're left to our devices we're evil Wicked nasty pernicious creatures um and I don't love that view of human nature I don't think that's necessarily true I I do think we are in some sense part of the animal kingdom and so we've got instincts and instincts for survival and for just living that are real but but there is this idea that over time we as humans have tried to become more civilized and and as our front cerebral frontal cortexes have developed we've tried to become more sophisticated and advanced and instead of just taking food when we see it or just copulating with whatever you know thing appears in front of us or killing someone who makes us mad through civilization we've tried to elevate ourselves and have higher laws that help us um you know extend our lives and have more peace and a higher quality of life and so in that sense you know I I can think of the marshmallow experiment where they where they've shown you know in Labs that that a kid who's willing to not eat one marshmallow now if he'll be rewarded with the second marshmallow after waiting there's this there's this natural human virtue in being able to forego immediate pleasure kind of Epicurean um you know satisfaction yeah self-gratification would be willing to forego that for something higher or better later and so on the one hand I I can see that the church starts from that place it's like listen you're gonna have bad things you want to do steal lie cheat murder rape have sex masturbate all sorts of awful things not going to church not reading the scriptures not praying swearing like you do all those things being gay you know whatever it is those things are bad you're going to have desires to do those things and if you'll just hold off and trust us then you could live a higher life which is being honest being kind being service oriented at being a part of a community living the gospel getting married in the right way saving sex until the right time not breaking the laws and you'll have higher love later and so in that sense if we want to give a good faith interpretation to Oaks he's saying you know if this if if your carnal desires if so if you're being told to do whatever you just immediately want to do that's bad but if you but if you listen to the the spirit and it's telling you to do the opposite of what your core base nature is telling you to do that's a good sign in other words if it's telling you to live a higher law that's a good thing so that's that's the good faith interpretation of what I think what I think uh is being said there Oaks if I were to give an argument against that it's that that becomes a lot of power as soon as the church becomes the Arbiter of what is moral behavior and I know we're going to talk about this in the very next slide um where it becomes problematic is when is when the church then gets to tell you everything the church is always the one who gets to decide what the Higher Living is because all of a sudden the kids start telling you how to spend your time how to spend your money how to spend your life who to marry who not to marry when to marry um and and it can just it can there's an extreme on the other hand where the church is literally just taking over your life and that's where the high demand religion or cult thing starts to really emerge and it's just where the church ends up inserting itself along that spectrum that becomes whether that sort of determines whether it's a Humane positive thing for the individual or a hyper-controlling damaging cult does that make does that make sense Nemo and or Mike yeah it makes sense I think that that's where I would go with that is if if Oaks had caveated and said you know um it's not Revelation from God if it just encourages you to do whatever you want to do whatever you want to do if you caveat to that by being yes your carnal desires or you're the natural man but like you said yeah then then the problem becomes well who's telling you the things that you should want and that are okay and yeah that's the church yeah yeah all right so Mike I think that takes us to the next slide is how the church defines which personal Revelations are valid yep so the next slide and this one's interesting because you had mentioned this earlier but you know this is when the church is going to tell you basically if you come up with an idea that goes against what we want you to do it's not from us it's the exact same thing as Joseph Smith did to hiring page when Hiram Paige had those Revelations he said oh you got those to the same method as me well that's funny because the devil did it for you but God Did It For Me and and it really creates this ultimate heads we win tells you lose scenario uh when it comes to your emotional responses and so Dallin Oaks here is going to make explicitly clear that personal Revelations are only valid if they confirm what the leaders of the church which Oaks just happens to be a part of are teaching members and so this answer is not only designed to privilege the leaders through the church but as you're going to see it's pretty awful to tell a child that their parents are the ones getting incorrect Revelations um so this clip is I think one a lot of people have heard but it's an important one okay let's roll it pure and building on that if we get an impression contrary to the scriptures to the Commandments of God to the teachings of his leaders then we know that it can't be coming from from the Holy Ghost the the gospel is consistent throughout I had an experience once with some members who sought my counsel in this circumstance they said our parents have told us that they've gotten a revelation that they don't need to pay tithing and they don't need to attend church anymore what do you think of that and I said well I don't question your parents Revelation but they got it from the wrong source embodied in that is the an elaboration of the principal Elder Bible okay we could stop here okay yeah so um so Mike I'm guessing Mike you've got uh you've got a slide next where you're going to tell why you don't like that yeah I mean this is the problem with with trying to say that if you get a revelation that contracts the church you get it from the wrong source so just like let's take a step back here and just kind of look at what Oaks means so if you received a personal revelation up until 1978 that the priesthood and Temple ban on members of black skin was wrong that personal revelation was from the adversary if you believe during that very small window when God changed his mind between November 2015 and April 2019 that the church's policy of exclusion towards the children of LGBT members or that labeling those in same-sex marriage was apostasy uh if you thought that was wrong then that Revelation was from the adversary if you believe the science uh that DNA shows that Native Americans came from Asia and not Jerusalem a key truth claim in the Book of Mormon then that personal revelation and studying it out in your mind through books is from the adversary and you know if you believe the Kinderhook plates were hoax up until night until the 1980s just 40 years ago your personal revelation was from the adversary because the leaders still believe that they were authentic until 19 until 1982 I believe if you believe that Adam was not our God during Brigham Young's time as Prophet your personal revelation was from the adversary and even contradicted the left the lecture at the veil in the Temple and so it's just to show that this this answer has nothing to do with getting it right it's about obedience because the church has changed you know when he says the gospel is inconsistent it has not the church has changed major major parts of of their of their regulations they've even changed the Book of Mormon itself they've changed on the godhead and to say that if you received a personal revelation that contradicted those um that it's from the wrong source and I just you know it really creates a lot of problems especially uh if you believe that God is consistent and didn't just have an arbitrary priesthood ban until 1978 so it's the same thing as the last one if you go down and take his statement and go a step or two further it just shows how problematic it is and this is why the church constantly twists themselves into pretzels when they're trying to answer these uh questions about difficult topics all right Nemo what do you want to add I I want to look at what he said at the beginning when he talks about the teachings of his leaders talking about God now it's a funny old thing about the English language but I just want to explore this very quickly is that the lead is belonging to him or the people that lead God is which one of those do we believe in in this church because it actually seems like we believe in these men speak for God and they actually lead God's wills and God's wants and they seem to be in charge of that so it's interesting the way he phrases that not you know the the contradicts the leaders that he has selected for his children it's just his leaders to the people that lead him or the people that lead his children belonging to him yeah yeah yeah and then I'll just add I'll just add maybe I'll just Echo what you said um Mike and that's just that it's first of all he talks about you know you can't you can't receive a revelation that's contrary to the scriptures but the scriptures are super problematic you know the Book of Mormon begins with with Nephi receiving a revelation to kill Laban so three chapters Into the Book of Mormon am I right there's already murder that the Holy Ghost you know approved of through divine revelation and you know we've got the book under the banner of Heaven and the Lafferty Brothers it's just one along with Lori you know a modern example very timely this month of Lori valo and Chad dabel receiving Revelations to kill their children or their spouses um you know the scriptures condone slavery the scriptures condone um murder they condone uh you know stoning of a of a woman if she handles her menstrual period wrong like so so and that scriptures are contradictory they conflict each other so the scriptures are not a reliable source for Behavioral decisions and then you've got the Old Testament versus the New Testament versus The Book of Mormon the Doctrine and Covenants and you you've got all you know polygamy is is is not really mentioned religiously but then it's forbidden as we've talked about in previous LDS discussions episodes until then DNC 132 but then now the modern Prophet is taken it back like like the scriptures are a mess and then modern day prophets as you already highlighted Mike modern day prophets are just as much as a mess because they're contradicting each other all the time and so but what he wants to say is is follow the Brethren meaning the modern leaders of the Mormon church and not just in the past you know 50 to 100 years he's gonna say the ones that are currently living those are the ones that you should be paying attention to but but again like you said Mike if you did that 20 30 40 50 years ago then you're believing doctrine that that has since been disproven by subsequent profits so it's just a mess but then he uses um he violates the the rule of the byte model you know byte stands for Behavioral control this is what Colts do they they control your behavior by controlling information to control your thoughts and they manipulate you with emotions and he has to throw satanic influence in there at the end why why is it not possible that God could say don't pay tithing maybe God could say don't pay tithing because you need to feed a starving kid or you need to pay some medical bills why couldn't God say don't go to church because you need to stay home because of some miracle that I'm gonna you know be bestowing upon you that you won't get in church but you'll get it if I'm staying home so why in the world couldn't God say don't go to church or don't pay your tithing as two examples certainly if he could tell Nephi to kill chop off the head of Laban if God can tell Nephi to chop off the head of Laban or Joseph Smith to marry a 14 year old certainly God could tell a member to to not pay tithing or to stay home from church for whatever higher reasons God wants but instead of just allowing full latitude to God the Supreme but you know power and and and you know the supreme power in the universe down a jokes is going to say if any if God tells you to do anything that we the modern church leaders don't approve of then it must be Satan and that's ending it with highly manipulative emotionally charged language that says if you do anything other than what we modern Church Mormon leaders are telling you to do you're under the influence of Satan and that is clear emotional manipulation they they lead God like I was saying like that there's that view that they they are in charge of what God gets to say to you and doesn't get to say to you under their their purview and it's it you could take the Nephi language and and use it to to make that example you just made John it's better that one man should perish than an entire nation dwindling unbelief it is better that one person stay home from church than the entire congregation get the flu right why can't God say that to you it seems it seems flippant but again why couldn't God say actually no you should probably stay home because you're a little bit infectious and we don't want it you know it would be kind to everyone else that you stay home yeah uh but no the Brethren say You must go to church so yeah it's um you know throughout these episodes there have been a number of things and probably said over and over again uh one thing though if if you're gonna take away one thing is is when the leaders of the Mormon church say God when they say what God wants just replace god with the leaders of the Mormon church because every time they say what God wants what they really are telling you is this is what we want you to do and this is a good example and I would also note just for maybe a little bit of levity here this face to face was in 2017 after the church had already already amassed tens of billions of dollars in the U.S stock market so maybe God did tell this these parents hey this whistleblower report hasn't come out yet but you really don't need to pay your tithing they've got billions and billions and billions in stocks they're fine um because at that point we didn't know that the church was hiding all this money in Shell companies so I'm actually thinking the parents may have gotten a real Revelation on this one and your your method there is uh is brother Hamilton approved or Elder Hamilton approved because out of Hamilton also taught us that we should replace the church with Jesus Christ exactly you know he's right we can equate those things yeah I mean he's right that is that is absolutely you know there are like I said there's a number of things I've said over and over in these episodes to try to drive these points home but if you whenever the church says this is what God wants for you just it instead of saying God wants for you to do this say the leaders of the church want you to do this because that is ultimately one and the same in the way it's taught yeah and and it tell me if I've got my dates wrong but if this presentation was given in 2017 it would have been between the time that into in November 2015 where the church implemented the exclusion policy that that basically you know forbid children from being members in good standing if they had same-sex married parents and The Condemned same-sex marriage as apostasy the required children of same-sex married couples uh to condemn their parents explicitly at age 18 if they wanted to even get baptized into the church that horrific horrible Doctrine and policy that led to a a complete Mass resignation amongst LGBT affirming members and a massive Revolt amongst non-homophobic Progressive members of the church and after Nelson had doubled down and called that exclusion policy Revelation right that this talk about personal revelation would have come between that and the Very obvious and conspicuous reversal that the church made what was it four years later where they reversed the the November 2015 exclusion policy obviously in response to the outrage of the members that you could argue was based on legitimate personal revelation where in their Communications with God they concluded that God Like Jesus that that God has no respecter of persons that God would never suffer the children not to come unto him that God wouldn't support such a bigoted policy um and and they're basically denying any of that personal revelation that would have happened between the exclusion policy and its reversal is that right yeah that's right that's a hubris there's there's tons of hubris in that idea that we will always get it right so we don't need to worry about your concerns and yet the the idea of common consent exists within the church so if a member has uh you know is feels uh get receives Revelation about something to do with someone else that should disqualify someone for calling I.E they shouldn't be allowed to work with children um then surely that contradicts what the current leads the church are teaching because they're putting that person forward for that position so what are you meant to do then because the question would be why didn't God tell those leads to the church where was their discernment but you know maybe they weren't listening the idea this is where prophets have to be infallible because otherwise why would they act as though there's no need for the safety net of personal revelation of others yeah yeah it's basically systematically teaching you to ignore your conscience ignore your inner voice and ignore science ignore books ignore learning ignore social justice movements all around you including the Civil Rights Movement the women's rights movement the LGBT Rights Movement science in general and and just listen to what the current octogenarians and nanogenarians leading the church are saying is right um Mike should we go to the next slide uh yeah to just kind of summarize the point that I think uh you're making okay so this you know like I said this is this is how personal revelation is taught in the church and it's if you have a revelation that confirms them that the leader speak for God it's going to be applauded and nurtured in the church because it elevates the authority of the men above us if you study these issues but you come to the conclusion that the church is not true you are told that the adversary has gotten a hold of you and that those thoughts are not from God um even worse if you talk about what you've learned publicly you will be disciplined by the church for doing so and on the other hand if you've never actually read uh never actually researched any of the church's truth frames and just accept those teachings uncritically which is the definition of an indoctrination and you get a warm feeling that it's true then it's God giving you that personal revelation that's true and so like I said it's the ultimate heads I win tells you lose scenario where the church is using your own feelings against you to stack the deck in their favor and it's not only used to define your experience but to define the experiences of others who do speak out publicly about what they've discovered and ultimately it weaponizes personal revelation against you because it now defines what your thoughts are in the moment you tell someone that if they have a thought that's not a happy thought that it's from Satan it really just I mean not only is it stupid illogically to say that because if you watch um you know if I watch a news story tonight about um a kid being kidnapped or something I'm going to feel not happy that's not Satan making me unhappy it's me going that's a horrible story but when they weaponize it against you in matters of spirituality I think it just really is um you know it's a it's a form of like spiritual extortion where they take your emotions and then they use it against you to keep you you in this system and I think that's just a really horrible thing to do and we see it in this event is with the youth and so they're teaching this to the youth and all of the kids are laughing as dalan Oaks is talking about how he tells this little kid that his parents are getting Revelation from Satan that which I find horrific as well yeah and I think the church it's it's a little bit even worse than what we're describing because in addition to everything you just said Mike what we know from the past 200 plus years of Mormonism is if any member speaks up and voices their conscience and says I disagree something is benign as I disagree I see it differently and and even more offensively you've got it wrong and even even more um unacceptable is hey everybody they've got it wrong the church has it wrong on this the church has it wrong on polygamy the church has it wrong on Joseph marrying 14 year olds the church has it wrong on um the Civil Rights you know being against the civil rights movement on Martin Luther King being smeared as a communist the church has it wrong on the era as they tried to fight into as they as they successfully defeated the Equal Rights Amendment the church has it wrong on conversion therapy of gay people over the over time you know even the church has it wrong and excommunicating dissenters whatever it is if anybody within the Mormon Church speaks out publicly to tell the church they've got it wrong or to warn the members that the church has it wrong the church will silence them they'll censor them they'll disfellowship them and if they don't shut up they'll excommunicate them and and for those who don't know I'm an example of um of someone who the church ultimately excommunicated because I I spoke up and said the church got it wrong he's saying I'm not trying hard enough John all right I think you're trying super hard Nemo I I'm I'm just speaking out but um long may it continue but but I guess I guess to add the E uh you know they're controlling your behavior as part of the bite model but they're manipulating members through emotional um manipulation of fear that if you ever you know the worst thing you could ever do in Mormonism is get up at the pulpit and say The Bishop's got it wrong or the prophets got it wrong or the scriptures have it wrong you're pretty much toast am I wrong Mike have you ever seen anybody get up on the pulpit and say that the church leaders or have got it wrong well it doesn't end well I mean usually the mic gets cut or you know obviously you're told not to come back so I mean yeah it's not going to end well if you do it so I mean for sure the you know you yeah I always laugh because I've had incidences since I started doing the Deep dive which if you flipped it and made it a faith promoting story as opposed to kind of like something that was almost like a a really insanely uh rare coincidence that happened to me um if you flip that to say that brought me back to church it would be probably a story told uh possibly a general conference but because it actually is something that brought me closer together with someone who had also left the church it's reviewed is from Satan and that's really what it comes down to is if it promotes the church it's from God if it goes against the church it's from Satan and it's just you know it like you said it I could go up and give a talk on a Sunday about the problems with the book Abraham and stay 100 factual without giving any personal opinion and I would be run out of run out of the run off the podium because obviously they don't want members knowing it it's just it that's where it gets problematic is when you try to silence people for speaking out about things that are our basic knowledge yeah and I'll just add you know I think we've made the point we can move to the patriarchal blessings but I'll just add for those of you who care about Jesus and and care about Christ I'll offer I'll even offer a christ-based um alternative to follow the Brethren follow the modern Mormon church leaders Above All Else including your conscience and whatever you think or feel or science it's it's what Christ said which was the kingdom of God is within and what I think it's fair and reasonable to interpret that to mean is Christ was saying you should be developing your own inner voice and your own inner wisdom and the the peak or the culmination of maturity of Enlightenment of spirituality is learning to listen to that inner voice which I would argue is harmonizing evidence science information and your emotions and your instinct in the mental health profession wisdom is defined as harmonizing emotion and and information and logic you don't want to just make decisions purely emotionally that's Mental Illness but it's also mental illness to shut off all your feelings and just make make decisions based on thoughts or information that's also um you know a personality disorder that's just britishness John depending off your emotions is just britishness or britishness it's either a mental illness a personality disorder um you know uh some some sort of Personality Disorder or britishness I think that's brilliant thank you Nemo no um that's brilliant you what you want to do ultimately is harmonize yes informational logic with emotion and make make those decisions all right Mike oh go ahead real quick because I think it's really important to Jesus was not a conformist what dynamic jokes is presenting here is Conformity is God given because God wants your personal uh Revelation to conform to what he's already told His prophets or in scripture or or so on but Jesus wasn't a conformist that is not the sort of thing that Jesus would have taught he absolutely would have taught like he said John that it's about nurturing the kingdom of God within yourself about nurturing that that um the processes by which you take everything in and come to good decisions uh as an autonomous individual because Christ came to fulfill the law and do away with the pharisaical attitudes that we see a lot of in the church now ironically yeah yeah yeah and the day I'll just say the danger of just following the Brethren is you know we can see it with like the Boy Scouts of America class action lawsuit that tens of thousands of Mormon boys have been sexually abused with cover-ups um that that's not to mention all the girls and the young women and young men that have been sexually abused by the Mormon church you know based on cover-ups all the LGBT youth who got depression and anxiety who tried conversion therapy and then in many cases died by suicide by following the Brethren literally by following the Brethren not to mention all the racism that the church has encouraged not to mention all the sexual predation that came about and and coercion that came about during the polygamy era between let's just say 1840 and and in 1890 or 2000 1910 however you want to calculate it there's been a measurable immeasurable harm caused two Mormons who have just blindly followed and Mountain Meadows Massacre who have just followed the Brethren the moral compass of the current leaders is evident in that they say well we don't have to give over information in Arizona because legally we have clear dependent privilege so we're gonna lean into that and say well the law says so sorry kids so when it comes to protecting children from child sexual abuse they're like oh well the law says we don't have to report it so we won't but when the law says they should have reported 13f filings as one company they're like don't fancy it so they're happy to not listen to the rules when it comes to making themselves money but they will listen to the rules when it helps them cover up child sexual abuse yeah is that the moral compass that you want to lean on and get rid of your own by saying well I'll just listen to them yeah I mean yeah I'll have one more point before we jump over here just because I know this isn't necessarily personal revelation but we've talked about this in our pre race in the priesthood episodes about Lowry Nelson who writes a series of letters to the first presidency because he is seeing the problems that the Mormon churches stance against members of black skin is having and so the first presidency sends them a letter and it says from the days of the Prophet Joseph even until now it has been the doctrine of the church never questioned by any of the church leaders that the Negroes are not entitled to the full blessings of the Gospel furthermore your ideas as we understand them appear to contemplate the inner marriage of the Negro and white races a concept which heretofore has been most repugnant to most normal-minded people from the ancient Patriots till now God's rule for Israel has chosen people has been an eggnogamous and how can I never say it anyways modern Israel has been similarly directed we are not unmindful of the fact that there is a growing tendency particularly among some Educators as it manifests itself in this area towards the breaking down of race barriers in the matter of inner marriage between whites and blacks but it does not have the sanction of the church and is contrary to church doctrine and so this is what they tell him when he's telling them that their their Doctrine on on those with black skin sucks and then I just want to add this because this is really to what we were talking about the last few minutes this is a letter from the first presidency and the secretary adds in the cover letter I should I should like to add on my own account however that when a member of the church sets himself up against doctrines preached by the Prophet Joseph Smith and by those who have succeeded him in the high office which he held he is moving into a very dangerous position for himself personally so I mean that's just to show that when you have personal Revelations that go against the church the church is not only going to silence you but they're going to try to do everything they can to keep you afraid to speak out and I think that those that that letter shows because 30 years later the church is going to apparently have the same Revelations that Lowry Nelson was having 30 years prior yeah and we're going to include a link in the show notes to the story of lowry Nelson there should be a dedicated Mormon stories episode just to tell that story one of the most courageous inspiring and heartbreaking stories I think in modern Mormonism and I think that's that's really crucial so yeah so I think we've made a really good case for the problems with personal revelation and I'm just going to summarize again we had Stephen Hassan the world expert in Colts here who has studied you know the Moonies and and scientologists and Jehovah's Witnesses forget his application to Mormonism just try to understand what the world's for most um leader in in understanding Cults has taught us which is that if any organization is overly controlling your behavior trying to limit the information that you consume which in this case would be telling you don't look to science don't look to books don't look to external Authority certainly don't look to yourself look to the leaders of the church as the guide they're controlling the information that you take in and the the reason why they want to control the information you take in is because they want to control your thoughts they want you having the right thoughts and not having the wrong thoughts the right thoughts are respect the authority of the brethren in the church believe what they tell you and then most importantly the behavior again do what we want you to do and the the final part of the byte model after the thought control is emotions which we're going to use emotional manipulation whether it's fear of Satan or Promises of some huge big afterlife you'll be with you with your family someday in heaven and you'll be a God either with a carrot or a stick That's Heavy emotional manipulation to get you to do what they want to do that's what unhealthy organizations do what healthy organizations do is what I would say is what Christ seemed to be teaching Christ didn't say follow the octogenarians and the nanogenarians in the 21st century that's how you'll know God's will Christ literally said the kingdom of God is within which means look inside yourself and and develop that wisdom and strength to know what's right for you that's my summary and Mike and Nemo what I'm going to do is call an audible here and recommend that we um and we can come back and record the next one immediately but I think this should be its own episode because I think it's important enough and then I think we should have an episode just dedicated to patriarchal blessings so let's if that's okay Mike and Nemo what do you guys want to say in conclusion as we end this segment on on personal Revelations Nema I'll give you the next I'll give you the next shot and then Mike will have you give your final thoughts on on personal revelation yeah sure I think it's incredibly problematic that the church ever got away with teaching people that you in your natural state unaltered are an enemy to God and unless you do what we say you are at odds with deity I think that's that's problematic because yes we should always be seeking to improve ourselves I think Improvement self-improvement is good um but I think that teaching someone that they are somehow Unworthy of love from deity because of who they are they are an enemy to him just be in their natural unaltered state um is is problematic and is a recipe for them controlling that person and helping them selling them the cure to that antithesis or that yeah and typically towards God amen amen Mike what what and I'm just gonna add Nemo it's giving you power to Hume too much power to humans yeah humans are flawed humans are like I think I agree with you know humans what what I agree with Jared Tolkien to make it British you give someone the ring of power they're likely to become corrupt and abuse it and giving these octogenarians and non-genarians who lead the current modern Mormon Church the power to tell you you know what they think is God and Jesus's will for you that's too much power it's too easily susceptible to abuse and it's too easily something that will override your own wisdom as to what's best for you whether it's I don't want to have kids I don't want to get married I don't want to go on a mission I don't want to be a Mormon I don't want to be straight I you know whatever it is I don't want to give my money in this way I want to give my money in another way there are all sorts of decisions that a human needs to be able to make based on their circumstance their situation their DNA their conditioning their situation that should never be fully relinquished to a leader who claims to speak for the creator of the universe that's just that's just setting yourself up for abuse can I push back real quick on the phrasing of I don't want because many people will push back and you go and John well you got to do things you don't want sometimes I don't think it's about that I think what you're saying is that what is right for people what is right for me maybe not having children what is Right based on all my circumstances based on the fact that you know I may be carrying some recessive genetic disorder that I could pass on to a child that I don't want to do that there's all sorts of things it's not about I don't want to do this because that almost puts across the image of a picture and Charles stamping their feet saying I don't wanna I think what you're actually saying John is it's more about what is right for people and people you keep mentioning that they're octo and non-agenarians I think that's really important because there are several Generations removed from some of the young members of the church they're so far removed from the world that so many of us live in that if we are accepting that they're not really getting advice from God then how in the world are they meant to be able to give us sound advice for the world we live in sorry I just wanted to add that I love it I love it that's great Mike what are your closing thoughts on on personal revelation with did Mormonism yeah I think for me um because we're doing this kind of mini series it really shows that you know we talk about our own personal revelation but we could see the results of the personal revelation of the leaders of the church a good example is Joseph Smith being fooled on the Kinder plates um all the leaders that were fooled with the mark Hoffman forgeries um we could talk about local Bishops who were um by the power of discernment called to be a bishop and then later now being charged with abuse claims and so for me when I look at people who keep getting it wrong and then they're telling me I'm getting it wrong uh I kind of look at that and I go who are you to tell me my personal revelation is wrong when you can't figure out what is your own mind will versus what is God's and so I think that the a moment that we have a church that demands so much of us they demand where we spend our money what underwear we wear um who you know and it's to a certain degree how we get married um I just think that they have to get it right and the moment that you start claiming to have a power and then when that power has a chance to be assessed it comes in wrong then you lose all of that Authority and so the way the church is kind of adapted to that is to basically tell you well you're just you're too impatient you are hearing it from the wrong source and I feel like one of the things we've shown throughout this series is that the leaders of this church have no more ability to discern God or the future or anything than anyone else does and once you get to that point it's a lot easier to go I'm going to trust myself and I'm not going to allow you to Define my emotions for me and I really think that's why personal revelation can be a great thing because it does allow us to get um you know we talked about earlier with meditation allows us to get a chance to really think about these things for ourselves to get down to what we want to do but it does not um it should never be something that is altered by a power that claims to have authority from God when they can't get it right themselves I love it yeah yeah and they've gotten it wrong so so many times in very not you know not just trivial ways not just fraudulent ways but in ways that have you know led to systemic child abuse within the church systemic misogyny within the church systemic um homo homo uh systemic racism within the church and systemic homo negativity and or homophobia within the church that's led to in in in the most extreme case uh a suicide epidemic in the past 10 years within you know Utah Idaho Arizona Colorado Mormonism so the stakes are really high not to mention controlling how people when they get married how they get married how many kids they have what education to pursue how much money and time they give to an organization the stakes are so incredibly high this becomes one of the most pernicious teachings of the modern Mormon church all right well this is great Mike um I I think I think to close out our uh part six of our Mormon modern day Revelation series we're going to talk about patriarchal blessings next is that right yeah and I think that one is just to me patriarchal blessings are more important than personal revelation because it's something that the church is going to give to you and they are also going to give it to you under the premise that it's a roadmap for your life and I think we're going to look at that and see both how the church teaches it and also kind of how they began in the church and also look at some examples of where they claim things in the name of God that clearly did not happen and then to look at that and say what can we learn from that in 2023 excellent all right well that's perfect Mike um Nemo anything you want to add just about uh your your wonderful channel uh how's Nemo the Mormon going uh name of the mum's going really really well I'm really happy with it anyway um I'm doing my best to get shorts out and get videos out weekly um and I'm just I'm loving being full-time it's great it gives you a chance to really get things how I want them yeah so please subscribe to Mormon stories podcast on the YouTube channel follow us and subscribe to us on all the socials Tick Tock Facebook Instagram Etc but also please subscribe to Nema the Mormon and in addition to donating to Mormon stories in the open stories Foundation to keep uh this series uh alive to pay Mike for his work and to keep things going please also take the time to become a supporter a monthly donor to Nema the Mormon how do they do that Nemo donut box for such an email the woman donovox.com name of the Mormon all hyphenated or just no one word all right all right Mike you're brilliant thanks so much for all you do to educate us uh you know in the church thanks everyone for watching and you know like we've said before all of this stuff is coming from people that have done all of this hard work before me whether it's you know Dan Vogel Brent Metcalf um I'm gonna forget so many people John Hamer um I'm sorry I'm gonna drop a lot of people but point is all these people have done so much really cool work and so I'm glad to be able to present in a way that I think has resonated with some people and help them as they've been trying to figure it out like I was so I'm just glad to be able to to present it in that way and hopefully it helps for a lot of people out there all right and again you can you can watch or listen to this entire LDS discussion series on Spotify is its own podcast on on Apple podcast as its own podcast or it's integrated into the Mormon stories podcast feed on all the platforms and there's a playlist list on YouTube where you can watch the entire LDS discussion Series in sequence or share it please do share it thanks for your donations thanks for your support share this with anyone you want be good to each other be kind to each other and we'll see you all again soon on another episode of Mormon stories podcast and on uh LDS discussions and check out LDS discussions.com for all of these essays take care everybody we'll see you soon