First experience with the Holy Ghost

[_Gadianton]

I do find it naïve that they think people in other religions don't get the very same confirmations.

While I agree, one of the things that complicates the discussion is that many of these "other religions", especially EVs, do not agree that the HG confirms truth through feelings or I believe in any other way. So while it's appropriate to note that other religions get the same feelings, I don't think most of them believe they are in the state of having the "truth confirmed" of some textual or oratory message.

[_Ray A]

I think Gad is essentially right, as far as Evs and other fundamentalist Christians are concerned. From one Christian website:

For most of the past two thousand years, the leaders and thinkers of the churches have spent a lot of time and effort warning people about the bad effects of emotion upon religious faith. The list should be familiar to church-folks by now:

1. strong emotions can lead you away from the Christian faith and into the hands of authoritarians;
2. feelings are fickle, and they can cause you to change your life in the manner of a racquetball in play. With great speed, you can go from joy and hope to anger and hurt.
3. fickle feelings can simply vanish, and what would then be left of your faith in Christ?
4. emotions are disorderly;
5. emotions can cause you to lose perspective and disbalance your life.

Those who are familiar with those 'spiritual laws' booklets might remember the illustration where the emotions are the caboose on the train of faith.

We live in a world that seeks thrills. We have become voyeurs of celebration, thrilling to achievements that are not actually our own, rejoicing for freedoms and victories won in fiction, for partying as we see it on TV, or even cyber-sex. The thrills get harder to come by as time goes on, but there seems to be no end to our capacity for creating new thrills, even for voyeurs. This is not God's way to live.

That's all well-taken, and true -- to a point. Emotions are a lousy foundation on which to build a faith or a way of life. It's like what Jesus said about building a house on sand : one good-sized wind or tide or quake, and it's flattened.

[_Ray A]

Needless to say, the last six months of the mission were a bitch..

The last 23 months and three weeks of my mission were a bitch, but I can't say it didn't teach me a lot.

[_Inconceivable]

Bob McCue:

I have had many intense, moving spiritual experiences that given the premises of the Mormon belief system ... should be expected to buttress the belief that Mormonism was literally true and so increase the force of denial in my life. These experiences include the lost of sense of self Newberg et al. Describe in "Why God Won't Go Away." that I have had many times while praying about the Book of Mormon and in other Mormon religious contexts. During these moments I felt connected to a source of love and peace that was at times overpowering and more attractive than anything else I have felt. I also had many experiences while serving in various church leadership capacities and particularly while serving as a Bishop, during which I felt like I was the conduit of 'pure knowledge' while counseling those in need or while giving priesthood blessings. One particularly powerful experience occurred as I prepared to officiate and speak at a particularly tragic funeral. I still marvel at the power I felt, and insights that came to me, at that time. Finally, I had many intensely moving experiences in a family context while giving priesthood blessings.... How can we understand experiences of this nature? How can such seemingly wonderful moments spring from something as bankrupt as literalist Mormonism seems to be? Are these experiences "good fruits" that indicate God's hand somehow works through Mormonism despite all of its obvious difficulties?

Thanks Ray,

These were my experiences.

Yet I feel betrayed and no longer have interest in that spirit.

Even though I exhibited supernatural powers while channeling this spirit (ie. revealing secrets, seeing the future, healing/being healed - spiritually as well as physically, expressing the Mormon God's love etc.), I've come to the conclusion that this spirit is just as fallable as a mortal. In fact, the spirit is a powerful liar - human but with supernatural powers. Good intentioned perhaps, but not honest.

Not like who I want to be.

The God Spot explanation needs about a keg to swallow, though.

[_Jersey Girl]

Gaz

By the way, you can answer the OP as well ya know. : ) This sint about just knowign the church is true. Its about your experience with the Holy Ghost.

I would never do that on this board.

[_Ray A]

These were my experiences.

Yet I feel betrayed and no longer have interest in that spirit.

I think all impressions, feelings and emotions have to be weighed. For me many have been accurate (which I prefer to call intuition). Others have been pure fantasy. Having had 54 years to evaluate it all helps.

The problem I see with the "Holy Ghost" is that "he" sometimes gives un-Holy "revelations", particularly when it comes to scripture and murder. Abraham's attempted sacrifice of Issac comes to mind. And all those people receiving "revelation" that polygamy is "true". Mass delusion comes to mind as well. I can only quote Goethe here:

"There is nothing so terrible as ignorance in action."

[_Hoops]

Here's one from a Christian. I don't recall ever having an experience like those described.

I'm not sure that I want to.

I find them highly suspicious.

[_Always Thinking]

As for myself, having grown up in the church, the Holy Ghost was kind of always around. I just didn't know what I knew.

It wasn't until I started out on my mission that I learned what I already knew. A little further into things I had to put Moronis test to the test,

and it payed off big time.
.

My experience was much like yours, from the sound of it. I got ready for my mission without really knowing what the Holy Ghost felt like. Then in the MTC I prayed and prayed and the answer I thought I got was: you've already felt the Holy Ghost for much of your life and just didn't realize it. Wow, you mean all this time the HG was there and I'd been missing it?! So I easily reevaluated my life up to that point and reinterpreted experiences as having the presence of the HG.

It was almost too easy.

Then, when I left the church, I just as easily re-reevaluated my life up to that point and re-reinterpreted experiences as having simple, natural emotions without any mystical presence looking over my shoulder.

Yep, it was too easy. Easy come, easy go.

I think it is pretty common for people to never have the big spiritual payoff, and to instead settle for "oh, but I've known it was true all along, I just didn't know it." I bet the percentage with this kind of narrative is well above 50%.

Yep, me exactly. I prayed and prayed for a spiritual confirmation of the Book of Mormon, and finally decided that I already knew it was true and therefore I didn't need that confirmation!