Joseph Smith the Prophet, or, Why the Book of Mormon is tangible evidence of Christ

Is the Book of Mormon true or is it made up?

"No wicked man could write such a book as this; and no good man would write it, unless it were true and he were commanded of God to do so." -George Cannon

And once again, I have to share something that was so well said

but not written by me.  Enjoy:

Have you ever heard people say: “Show me some real evidence that Joseph Smith was a prophet, then I’ll believe”?

“Through the Book of Mormon, God has provided for our day tangible evidence that Jesus is the Christ and that Joseph Smith is His prophet” (President Ezra Taft Benson, Ensign, November 1988, p. 86).

Here is what it would take to make up the Book of Mormon:

•  Write the religious, social, and political  history of some ancient people, like the Mongols or people from Greenland
• Write the book off the top of your  head, using no reference material (no Google in Joseph’s day! And no  library nearby either. 
• You must have only between 2-3 years of formal schooling (Joseph’s wife said that Joseph couldn’t compose a “well-worded   letter” at the time of the translation of the Book of Mormon, let alone  make up a whole book (Emma Smith (Preston Nibley, The Witnesses of the      Book of Mormon, Salt Lake City: Deseret Book Co., 1968, p. 28.)
• You must complete the whole book in 65-75   working days.  Joseph sometimes  would produce 8 pages a day of finished text.  Eight pages!  Anyone who has written anything knows how difficult that would be.  In     comparison, modern translators who are working on translating the Book of Mormon    consider 1 completed page of translation per day to be productive, and      they are working from earlier translations with an entire team of help and  modern technology to assist!
• Your book must be full of evidence that science  will discover many years after you publish your book that verify your work  is authentic.  A great example of  this in the Book of Mormon was the last art of Hebrew poetry “chiasmus,”  unknown to Joseph Smith and learned America but later re-discovered in the  20th century in the Bible.  And lo and behold, the Book of Mormon is full of chiasmus.  Lucky guess Joseph!  Nothing like a backwoods farm boy who   knows lost Hebrew poetry.  Them type of boys are all over the place.  Read Alma 36 to see a really cool one (compare the main message of verse 1 to verse 30, verse 2 to verses 28-29, verse 3 to verse 27 and so on).
• You must invent over 280 new names the world  hasn’t heard, many of which properly derive from your ancient people’s  language (a language which you don’t know.  Have fun with that one.)
• Your book must include the fullness of the  gospel of Jesus Christ, including sermons that are so inspiring that people willingly read them again and again and again. However, your book      must also teach “new” truths unknown to common society that make unknown passages in the Bible clear.
• Your book must teach more about Jesus Christ than the New Testament does.  The Book of Mormon mentions Jesus on average of every 1.7 verses compared to  2.3 in the New Testament.  Another Testament  of Jesus Christ.  Um, yeah. (See  Susan Easton Black, Finding Christ through the Book of Mormon [1987],  6-18).
• Your book must be over 500 pages long and 300,000  words
• Your first draft must stand forever (other than very minor grammatical changes)
• You must have three honest members of your  community bear testimony to the truthfulness of the book throughout their whole lives, even when you are no longer friends.
• You must be willing to give your life, and the  life of a family member, for the book you write
• Last, the Holy Ghost must bear witness to  millions of people the world over that your book is indeed the very word of God.

We have the tangible evidence sitting in front of us. The book is either divine or it is a deception. Those who claim that the Book of Mormon is not true are claiming that the book was made up—fabricated by Joseph Smith, his friends, or someone else and pulled off as one of the great hoaxes of this world.
Note: Some of list is summarized from “Brother Joseph” by Kay Briggs.  Bookcraft, 1994, p. 13-15

 “No wicked man could write such a book as this; and no good man would write it, unless it were true and he were commanded of God to do so.” (George Cannon, as cited by Elder Jeffrey R. Holland, Safety for the Soul, Ensign November 2009, p. 89).

Intressant Citat

Alla män vet att de måste dö. Och det är viktigt att vi förstår... vår avresa dit... Det är bara rimligt att tro att Gud skulle uppenbara något i förhållande till saken, och det är ett ämne vi borde studera mer än någon annan.  Vi borde studera det dag och natt, för världen är ovetande i förhållande till deras verkliga tillstånd och relation.  Om vi har anspråk på vår himmelske Fader för någonting, är det för kunskap om denna viktiga fråga.      -Joseph Smith (Kyrkans historia, volym VI, sida 50.)

Death and Resurrection

I have been thinking about death and resurrection for weeks. 

No matter how much faith you have, death is scary.  Losing people is scary even if you are losing them to a better place.  Death-- separation-- feels permanent.  Resurrection and reunion seem such very far away concepts.  If you love, you cannot meet death, not even indirectly or hypothetically, without pain.

First there was the terrible news of a family driving along and being hit, in the canyon a few weeks ago, with some members living and some dying, and with the other car's driver also dying.  We see the little memorials on both sides of the road, with flowers and pinwheels and teddy bears, along the sides of the road, every time we drive up and down the canyon.

Then there was the terrible news of a teenage football player who drowned while swimming in the creek with friends, close by.  Neighbors and friends of ours knew him well.

Then, a dear lady whom I used to visit-teach every month passed away after a nine year battle with breast and lung cancer.  No chemo; just alternative medicines.  I went to the funeral but couldn't handle going to the viewing.

The strange thing was that I thought of her many times about a week or two before I got the phone call that she'd died.  I wish I'd listened to that still, small voice and called her, visited her, said goodbye.

So, this week, when it happened again (I kept thinking and thinking about my dear old mission president, Joseph Fielding McConkie, who has been battling lung cancer for a few years) I did not dismiss my thoughts.  I found his phone number and called.

His dear wife answered.  She told me his illness has been hard, and that he just got out of the hospital again and that she's just trying to keep him comfortable.  His potassium was very low, probably because of the nasty chemo treatments.  Yet, he went to the family reunion and went fishing with his kids, not because he actually had the strength but because he wanted to so badly.  Dear Sister McConkie.  She said she's had some days that are so hard, dealing with all the thoughts.  But on one particularly hard day, Julie Beck called her, out of the blue.  That was, she said, a tender mercy of the Lord. 

She asked if I wanted to talk to President McConkie and I said thank you but that's okay; just give him a hug from me.  I don't want to tire him. 

But she handed him the phone anyway, and I was glad to hear his voice and I told him I'd been thinking about him.  "You need to get your mind on a higher plane," he said.  That's so like him.  I told him the things I had in my heart, as if it were my last chance to give him the thank you that is emblazoned in my heart for all he has given me.  Words are inadequate.  But I did try to tell him how very much I appreciate all he did and what an influence he's had on my life and so many other people's lives.  And I told him this, which I am sure he got: that when I read descriptions people gave of Joseph Smith, who knew him personally, those descriptions often remind me of President McConkie *. 

I will write them:

• From Jonah R. Ball:  The way he unfolds the scriptures is beyond calculation or controversy....He explained it as clear as the [noonday] sun."

• From Mercy Fielding Thompson:  "To him all things seemed simple and easy to be understood, and thus he could make them plain to others as no other man could that I ever heard."

• From Mary Alice Cannon Lambert:  "Saints and sinners alike felt and recognized a power and influence which he carried with him.  It was impossible to meet him and not be impressed by the strength of his personality and influence."

• From William Clayton:  "...whilst you listen to his conversation you receive intelligence which expands your mind and causes your heart to rejoice... He seems exceedingly well versed in the scriptures... such light and beauty is revealed as I never saw before.  If I had come from England purposely to converse with him a few days I should have considered myself well paid for my trouble."

• From Brigham Young:  "...he could reduce heavenly things to the understanding of the finite."

• From Howard Coray:  "I have sat and listened to his preaching at the stand in Nauvoo a great many times when I have been completely carried away with his... power of expression --speaking as I have never heard any other man speak."

• From Joseph L. Robinson:  "He truly had been educated in the things pertaining to the kingdom of God and was highly charged with the Holy Ghost, which was a constant companion."

• From Orson Spencer:  "I have never known him to deny or depricate a single truth of the Old and New Testaments; but I have always known him to explain and defend them in a masterly manner...at his touch the ancient prophets spring into life, and the beauty and power of their revelations are made to commend themselves with thrilling interest to all that hear."

* (These people are talking about Joseph Smith, but they might as well, to me, be describing all the best I have experienced from President McConkie, who, by the way, is a great-great-great nephew of Joseph Smith, and a direct descendent of Hyram, who was martyed with the prophet. I don't think it's any coincidence that these quotes remind me of him; it's a family inheritance, a spiritual gift of knowledge and the ability to teach knowledge, that his father, Bruce McConkie, also had, and of course his other ancestor prophets, Joseph Fielding Smith and Joseph F. Smith.)

Well, I have a stepdaughter whom I've never met.  She passed away at age three in a freak accident with a boulder rolling off a mountain.  A.R.'s sister.  She would have been a teenager now.  I have often told D.H. that I can't imagine how he survived the pain of such a terrible loss, an indescribable pain.  He said that it's impossible to describe.  He also said that God gives you, in the moment, what you need to get through that moment.

We get so busy in life that we forget that we're all going to die someday.  We're like pretty blown bubbles, floating in the wind for a little while, just a little while.  We're all going to attend each other's funerals and cry.  It is a fact I don't like to think about.  But it pares down the soul to the core.

And it makes me turn to God, in humble faith, that He will hear my prayer and protect me and my family, that we will live long, healthy, happy lives together.  And if it is not in His will to grant that prayer, I pray that He will give me His spirit to give me the ability to survive that pain with love still in my heart. 

I don't know how anybody mentally faces death without a faith in and knowledge about Jesus Christ.  That, I don't get.  If I didn't know He had paid for our sins and for the power to resurrect our bodies, to reunite us with friends and family in happiness one day, I would curl up and give up.

I have put all of my eggs in the basket of my belief in Christ.

Answers

God answers prayers.  That's what I am thinking about right now.

I had something that was really bothering me and I didn't even know how to pray about it. I couldn't pray, "Please change that person's behavior/mind against his/her will."  I couldn't pray, "Please explain to that person that I am right and he/she is wrong!" Ha!   I couldn't pray, "Please make me feel happy about the fact that this person is doing/saying awful things."  I had chosen to not think about it. But it was gnawing at me.

I finally prayed something like, "Please help me with this even though I don't know what to ask for."

And today, while nursing the baby, I picked up a book to read.  It's one of the Sunday School manuals, called "Teachings of Presidents of the Church:  Joseph Smith."  I randomly opened up to chapter 29 and there were my answers.  So simple.

1.  Speak your truth --in a kind, forthright way (don't clam up, but don't meddle or impose either)
2.  Respect the other person's version of the truth.  This is liberty.  People have died for this right!
3.  Refuse to find fault; build up others as well as ourselves; put away ungenerous feelings.

I summarized these three ideas from the chapter. Here's a link to the whole chapter online: http://www.prophetjosephsmith.org/teachings/chapter-21-30/peace-and-harmony

"If I esteem mankind to be in error, shall I bear them down?  No.  I will lift them up, and in their own way too, if I cannot persuade them my way is better; and I will not seek to compel any man to believe as I do, only by the force of reasoning, for truth will cut its own way." -Joseph Smith

For Primary Workers: Sharing Time Game

This is for the primary workers (my friends from Sugardoodle).  (I couldn't post this whole game on sugardoodle.net)

CLUES FOR THE GAME:  THREE (PROPHET) CLUES AND A QUOTE

JOSEPH F. SMITH
-WHEN I WAS FIVE, MY FATHER WAS KILLED WITH MY UNCLE, JOSEPH SMITH.
-WHEN I WAS 14, MY MOTHER DIED.
-WHEN I WAS 15, I WENT ON A MISSION TO HAWAII.
-QUOTE:  "To be a successful father or a successful mother is greater than to be a successful general or a successful statesman."

LORENZO SNOW
-I JOINED THE CHURCH AT AGE 22.
-I SERVED AS A MISSIONARY MANY TIMES.  MY MISSIONS WERE IN OHIO, ILLINOIS, KENTUCKY, MISSOURI, GREAT BRITAIN, ITALY, ENGLAND, SWITZERLAND, MALTA, HAWAII, AND THE NORTHWESTERN UNITED STATES.
-I WAS THE 5TH PRESIDENT OF THE CHURCH OF JESUS CHRIST OF LATTER-DAY SAINTS.
-QUOTE:  "I WANT YOU TO REMEMBER THAT THIS IS THE TESTIMONY OF YOUR GRANDFATHER, THAT HE TOLD YOU WITH HIS OWN LIPS THAT HE ACTUALLY SAW THE SAVIOR, HERE IN THE TEMPLE, AND TALKED WITH HIM FACE TO FACE" -FROM HIS GRANDDAUGHTER

SPENCER W. KIMBALL
-I WAS BAPTIZED IN A HOG-SCALDING TUB ON MY 8TH BIRTHDAY.
-MY MOTHER DIED WHEN I WAS 11.
-I HAD SURGERY ON MY VOCAL CORDS, SO MY VOICE WAS VERY QUIET.
-I WAS THE 12TH PRESIDENT OF THE CHURCH
-QUOTE:  "DO IT"

HOWARD W. HUNTER
- I WAS BORN IN IDAHO.
-I WAS BAPTIZED IN A SWIMMING POOL.
-I WAS THE 14TH PRESIDENT OF THE CHURCH.
-I WAS ONLY THE PROPHET FOR ONE YEAR.
-QUOTE:  "IT IS THE DEEPEST DESIRE OF MY HEART TO HAVE EVERY MEMBER OF THE CHURCH WORTHY TO ENTER THE TEMPLE."

BRIGHAM YOUNG
-I  WAS BAPTIZED IN A POND AT AGE THIRTY.
-I SERVED ONE MISSION TO CANADA AND ANOTHER ONE TO GREAT BRITAIN.
-I LED THE SAINTS WEST TO THE SALT LAKE VALLEY.
-QUOTE:  "I FEEL LIKE SHOUTING HALLELUJAH, ALL THE TIME, WHEN I THINK THAT I EVER KNEW JOSEPH SMITH."
GORDON B. HINCKLEY
-MY DEAR MOTHER READ TO ME OFTEN AND I ALWAYS LOVED BOOKS
-I WAS SCARED TO GO TO SCHOOL AND MY PARENTS HAD TO MAKE ME GO.
-MY WIFE'S NAME WAS MARJORIE.
-I WAS THE FIFTEENTH PRESIDENT OF THE CHURCH
-QUOTE:  "WE HAVE NOTHING TO FEAR.  GOD IS AT THE HELM."

GEORGE ALBERT SMITH
-I WAS BAPTIZED IN A CREEK IN SALT LAKE CITY.
-MY WIFE WAS NAMED LUCY AND SHE HELPED ME WITH MY MISSIONARYWORK
-I WAS THE 8TH PRESIDENT OF THE CHURCH.
-QUOTE:  "IF YOU WILL STAY ON THE LORD'S SIDE OF THE LINE YOU WILL… HAVE NO DESIRE TO DO WRONG; BUT IF YOU CROSS TO THE DEVIL'S SIDE OF THE LINE ONE INCH, YOU ARE IN THE TEMPTER'S POWER, AND IF HE IS SUCCESSFUL, YOU WILL NOT
BE ABLE TO THINK OR EVEN REASON PROPERLY.."

DAVID  O. MCKAY
-I WAS BAPTIZED IN A CREEK WHILE MY FATHER WAS SERVING A MISSION IN GREAT BRITAIN.
-I SERVED A MISSION IN SCOTLAND.
-I BECAME AN APOSTLE WHEN I WAS 32.
-I BECAME THE PROPHET WHEN I WAS 77 AND LIVED TO BE 96 YEARS OLD.
-QUOTE:  "EVERY MEMBER A MISSIONARY."

JOHN TAYLOR
-BULLETS  WOUNDED ME WHEN I WAS WITH JOSEPH AND HYRUM SMITH AT CARTHAGE JAIL, BUT I SURVIVED.
-MY WIFE WAS NAMED LEONORA.
- DURING MY MISSION TO FRANCE AND GERMANY, I HAD THE BOOK OF MORMON PUBLISHED IN FRENCH AND GERMAN.
-I BECAME THE THIRD PRESIDENT OF THE CHURCH AT AGE 71.
-QUOTE:  "I FELT THAT THE LORD HAD PRESERVED ME BY A SPECIAL ACT OF MERCY."

THOMAS S. MONSON
-I ENJOY SCOUTING.
-I GRADUATED FROM BOTH THE UNIVERSITY OF UTAH AND FROM BRIGHAM YOUNG UNIVERSITY.
-MY WIFE IS NAMED FRANCES.
-QUOTE: "FAITH PRECEDES THE MIRACLE."

JOSEPH SMITH
-WHEN I WAS 17, THE ANGEL MORONI VISITED ME 4 TIMES TO GIVE ME DIRECTIONS FROM HEAVENLY FATHER
-I TRANSLATED THE BOOK OF MORMON INTO ENGLISH
-I WAS THE FIRST PRESIDENT OF THE CHURCH OF JESUS CHRIST OF LATTER DAY SAINTS.
-QUOTE: "WHAT CAN MAN DO IF GOD IS MY FRIEND?"