Gospel Principle Manual Revisions

[_Maxrep]

from the madb reelmormon posts topic;
http://www.mormondialogue.org/topic/576 ... revisions/

"Study the Gospel Principles manual and was reading under chapter 14
http://www.LDS.org/m...zation?lang=eng

saw where when talking about apostles, it says "special witnesses of the name of Jesus Christ". That sounded kinda odd and funny and I didn't remember that from when I joined and read this book inside and out so I consulted my older version and saw original book wording left out "name of"

That seems odd......... for the sale of conversation, why do you think this change. I can't figure out how that is a better way to phrase it...

Your thoughts "


There are some engaging thoughts to be found on that thread, but to be clear, those have to be searched out from under the increasing pile of "fluffy" cotton candy responses.

I find the rewording refreshing!

[_Buffalo]

Probably some of them were uncomfortable pretending to have seen/had brunch with Jesus.

[_DarkHelmet]

Probably some of them were uncomfortable pretending to have seen/had brunch with Jesus.

Agreed. Probably one of the new guys said something stupid like, "Well, I've never seen Jesus." And that caused some of the others to work up the nerve to admit they've never actually seen him either, and so the correlation committee decided to modify the manual a bit. I have no idea what a special witness of the name of Jesus Christ is.

[_Buffalo]

Probably some of them were uncomfortable pretending to have seen/had brunch with Jesus.

Agreed. Probably one of the new guys said something stupid like, "Well, I've never seen Jesus." And that caused some of the others to work up the nerve to admit they've never actually seen him either, and so the correlation committee decided to modify the manual a bit. I have no idea what a special witness of the name of Jesus Christ is.

I'm a special witness to his name too. I've seen it TONS of times! Look, there it is now, in red!

[_DarkHelmet]

I'm a special witness to his name too. I've seen it TONS of times! Look, there it is now, in red!

As special witnesses to his name, maybe they know what the middle initial H stands for? Henry? Harry?

[_Sophocles]

Probably some of them were uncomfortable pretending to have seen/had brunch with Jesus.

Agreed. Probably one of the new guys said something stupid like, "Well, I've never seen Jesus." And that caused some of the others to work up the nerve to admit they've never actually seen him either, and so the correlation committee decided to modify the manual a bit. I have no idea what a special witness of the name of Jesus Christ is.

I recall reading an account of something just like this that occurred among the Twelve early in church history. I think it was in one of Joseph Fielding Smith's books, but it was about an earlier generation of apostles. (I want to say it was Orson Pratt that was always concerned that he had never seen Jesus?) They were all taught that apostles received visions of the personage of Jesus similar to Joseph Smith's first vision, and that's what being a "special witness" meant. But lo and behold, here they had all been apostles for some time, and no visions. Then the prophet explained that a spiritual witness from the Holy Ghost was more powerful than any vision, so they could stop worrying about what they hadn't seen with their eyes and continue to testify boldly of their certain knowledge of Christ.

Kind of reminds me when I read and prayed about the Book of Mormon as a kid, and didn't get an answer, and my parents told me that's because I already knew it was true. The lack of any discernible answer was the answer. Oh, okay.

[_Drifting]

Agreed. Probably one of the new guys said something stupid like, "Well, I've never seen Jesus." And that caused some of the others to work up the nerve to admit they've never actually seen him either, and so the correlation committee decided to modify the manual a bit. I have no idea what a special witness of the name of Jesus Christ is.

I recall reading an account of something just like this that occurred among the Twelve early in church history. I think it was in one of Joseph Fielding Smith's books, but it was about an earlier generation of apostles. (I want to say it was Orson Pratt that was always concerned that he had never seen Jesus?) They were all taught that apostles received visions of the personage of Jesus similar to Joseph Smith's first vision, and that's what being a "special witness" meant. But lo and behold, here they had all been apostles for some time, and no visions. Then the prophet explained that a spiritual witness from the Holy Ghost was more powerful than any vision, so they could stop worrying about what they hadn't seen with their eyes and continue to testify boldly of their certain knowledge of Christ.

Kind of reminds me when I read and prayed about the Book of Mormon as a kid, and didn't get an answer, and my parents told me that's because I already knew it was true. The lack of any discernible answer was the answer. Oh, okay.

This method was exactly how the reversal of the Ban on Blacks doctrine came about. SWK got his minions to research doctrinal reasons for and against upholding the ban that was about to cost them a lot of money in tems of tax benefit removal. Lo and behold, there was insufficient doctrinal evidence to continue the discrimination. So SWK went and prayed with his inner sanctum of Apostles and (paraphrasing) said to God that he was going to reverse the ban and that if God objecteD then He should give a sign of some sort to halt the decision.

No sign came so SWK took that as Gods acceptance that the decision was right.

Special witness of my ass maybe.