I know that some of you find many of the things I'll mention difficult to understand or unclear. You may not agree with them even if you do know what I'm talking about. Please feel free to call or write me with any questions you have! I hope you know that I believe strongly that everybody has to make up their own minds about what they believe and how they want to live their life. I claim the same right for myself and respect other opinions even if I may not agree with them. I just hope that we all are open to investigate what others think before we judge them negatively. Of course this applies to all areas of life, not just religion.Thank you for being respectful about my religious affiliation and for supporting me in my way of life. Without my faith I would not be who I am as it is such an important part of me that it influences every area of my life. I hope I will never cause offense to anybody for standing up for what I believe in and will always strive to be understanding and respectful towards your beliefs. If I ever fail to do so, I am very sorry! I never ever want to hurt anybody or make them feel bad.
First off, I feel extremely blessed and fortunate to be a member of a church that believes and encourages everyone to find out for themselves that God is unchanging, all powerful and all knowing and most importantly that He loves us. When I speak of God I am referring to our Heavenly Father. His Son is Jesus Christ who is the Redeemer of this world and our loving brother. The third member of the Godhead is the Holy Ghost. All three of them are one in purpose but individual beings. I have found out for myself that there is a divine plan and purpose for this life which will enable us to be happy forever. Since God loves and knows us and because we are his children (created in His image) He wants to communicate with us and help us to understand what we should do. He gives us instruction while we are here on this earth in order to be happy and to receive all the blessings He has in store for us. He recognizes that this life is often hard and knows of all the evil in the world. He has the power to stop it but because He gives everyone the right to choose for themselves to follow Him, He can not stop those who choose to do evil. Yet, He gives us the means to cope with everything this world throws at us and to be successful.
Just as He isn't the reason there is so much trouble in the world, He was not the instigator of all the religious confusion or different world opinions on what is right. I know most churches have good people, teach good principles and offer some good view points but I believe God only has one true church that holds all truth, with the authority to save all of mankind if they follow it. You may ask, 'If this is true, then how are we supposed to find out which church that is?' Well, I think the easiest way would be to find out as much as you can about the doctrines of the church and then to ask God himself. It's always best to go to the source. Once he answers, stick with that one. I did just that with a few religions. I love learning about other religions and different philosophies because I love observing what motivates people and why they choose to live their live the way they do. Although I love learning about them, I don't think that they are all what God wants us to do. When I felt ready after preparing for it, I asked my Heavenly Father and received an answer. Since then I know that the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints is the true church, including ALL the doctrines it teaches. It makes me happy and it provides me with all I need to be successful in this life. It's just a question of whether or not I do all the things it teaches. I am trying to do all that is required, but since I'm not perfect it doesn't always work. That doesn't affect it's truthfulness though. Now, just because I have found this out for myself, it doesn't mean anybody should take my word for it. In fact God wants everyone individually to build up a relationship with him and he just waits for us to show that we want to do it. Everyone should get their own answers from God but how does God speak to us?
There are several ways that I know of, which our Heavenly Father uses to communicate with us. All of them require our true desire to communicate with and believe in him as well as the willingness to submit to his will. He knows us, who we are, what we can be and what we currently think and do. He most likely will not answer us if we are not truly seeking him or if he knows we don't really want to follow his guidance or get an answer. So it's up to us.
1. The scriptures: I believe the Bible (as long as translated correctly) and the Book of Mormon to be the word of God given to ancient prophets and leaders of the world to teach us about all the things we need for a successful life and to reach our divine potential.
Remember I said God is unchanging. He spoke to the people in ancient times through prophets and inspired leaders. Nowadays we have additional and somewhat different problems or needs. Wouldn't a loving, perfect and unchanging God direct us today just as he did back then? Well, I think he would. In fact I know he does. I experienced personally that He communicates with us in unmistakably clear ways if we are willing to listen and know where to turn to.
There are many more ways God uses to give us answers but this post is already getting way too long. I just wanted to explain a little of my motivation for living the way I live and give you some pointers about the doctrines that are included in my faith. I will include more of these over time in different posts. There are so many amazing doctrines and principles that I think make life so much more worth living if applied. I want to share them with you. They are so important to me and help me immensely.
I love my Heavenly Father and am very glad to have a personal relationship which enables me to trust in Him and to turn my life over to him. I hope to always live up to what I know to be true and am glad to know that even when I make mistakes (which unfortunately I do frequently) I can repent, through the atonement of Jesus Christ and that God forgives me freely. It is wonderful to know who my Heavenly Father is (even if I only understand a small part so far) and in turn to feel His love for me and everyone around me. It gives me confidence that I can accomplish all I need to when he is by my side and takes over when my abilities are insufficient. With all life brings, in the end everything can turn out alright! Life is beautiful!
