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July 12, 2019 12:43 am
101 for teams is a valuable resource for anyone wanting a simplified view of the Mormon religion from a Christian perspective is one-to-one for teams is available at the Utah lighthouse bookstore in Salt Lake City or MRM.org is examined the teachings of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints from a respected viewpoint when Mormonism is sponsored by Mormonism research ministry since 1979 Mormonism research ministry has been dedicated to equipping the body of Christ with answers regarding the Christian faith in a manner that expresses gentleness and respect. And now, your host for today's viewpoint on Mormonism so glad to be with us for this edition viewpoint on Mormonism. I'm your host, Bill McKeever, founder and director Mormonism research ministry with me today is Eric Johnson. My colleague at MRM yesterday.
We began looking at an article titled understanding your patriarchal blessing. It is found in the April 2017 edition of & magazine begins on page 9 and it was written by two Mormon women, Allie Arnell and Margaret Wilden.
And as we explained yesterday the idea of a patriarchal blessing probably seems very foreign to most of our listeners unless you have an LDS background because it's just not something that we hear being done in Christian churches. I think there's a reason for that. But anyway, in this article.
As I said yesterday it starts off a little bit misleading when it says life is full of uncharted waters, where should I go to school.
What should I study. Should I go on a mission whom should I marry if you were given a personal map to navigate the decisions of life would you follow it. Heavenly father and Jesus Christ have given us such a map patriarchal blessings to give us direction in our lives as we explained yesterday. Eric.
Many of the patriarchal blessings that I have personally seen and I mentioned also that years ago I solicited patriarchal blessings from individuals, many of whom were ex-Mormons, and they sent them to me and I was able to go through them and as I mentioned, you can begin to see a pattern in some of the things that they cover. Now some of it is going to be in this article they're going to talk about some of those things at the patriarchal blessings usually do include at the same time.
Many times they were very vague. So when it starts off by saying where should I go to school. What should I study.
Should I go on a mission.
Those questions are not answered specifically in any patriarchal blessings that I know of. Certainly not in any of these, of which I have copies of, that's for sure.
So the question being that if this is really going to be a help to the individual latter-day St., how is it going to be a help. This article is supposed to explain that, and before we ended yesterday show one of the subdivisions within this article is it tells them that a patriarchal blessing will help them discover their lineage, but what it is saying about that. Remember, it makes it sound like it's going to tell you exactly what specific tribe you're from, but at the same time it kind of backed off on that in that first paragraph yes is first and foremost, your patriarchal blessing declares your lineage or the specific tribe of the 12 tribes of Jacob, to which you belong, that we are not literal descendents of Jacob. The Scriptures teaches that church members are adopted into the house of Israel, that you see how that becomes a little bit self refuting. First of all it's going to declare your lineage or the specific tribe of the 12 tribes of Jacob, but then at the same time that we are not all literal descendents of Jacob, so if you want to go up to your LDS friend and say will tell me, did you have a patriarchal blessing. And they say yes assemble what tribe are you from the probably say you from because it says that the end of that column. For instance, many members of the church belong to the tribe of Ephraim, a tribe that has the unique responsibility to spread the message of the restored gospel and of course the restored gospel is codename for Mormonism.
It's true that this pattern when it comes to your lineage is found in patriarchal blessings.
I'm just going to read a few lines from some of the patriarchal blessings that I have in my possession. This particular individual was told. You have been born of a noble lineage and of good parents and your lineage is of the house of Israel without hearing that when you think G.I. must be Jewish.
It goes on your descendent through the loins of Ephraim, but as we find in this article were not all literal descendents. So really, what does that even mean to a latter-day St., here's another one you are a member of the house of Israel and you are a descendent of Ephraim goes right along with what this article says here's another one it says you were born of goodly parents in the language right out of the book of Mormon and you are the house of Israel through the tribe of Ephraim, and through this lineage all nations of the earth were to be blessed.
Here's another one. I declare that your blessing will come through the lineage of Ephraim, the son of Joseph.
So we see a lot of these people are being told that somehow they are related to Jacob through Ephraim and if you're latter-day St., listening to us right now you're probably thinking when I went on for me from two I have heard that about 90 to 95% of all who get the patriarchal blessing you come from that tribe.
So it's interesting that's the one tribe that is picked out. Will I have one here that he was from the tribe of Judah so that he's not from the tribe of Ephraim. He's it from a different tribe will not literally, as according to this article I want to know, Bill. There are different patriarchs in the different stakes in the PROBABLY different ways of how they get this revelation, but were not seen seer stones use were not seen anything as far as communication with the church leaders. How do you think they come up with the determination.
Is it supposed to just be divine that they just get it in their minds that this person is from Ephraim or some other tribe. It doesn't seem like there's any science to this now and I can't really find any specific reason for why that is, other than perhaps it was a statement by Brigham Young, who said that Joseph Smith was a pure Ephraimite. Of course he wasn't.
His genealogy doesn't take you back to the mid east but yet that's what Mormons have been told what I would think is another example of Joseph Smith grabbing something out of the Old Testament, resurrecting it from its Old Testament context and trying to put it in a New Testament context, but unfortunately we don't find it there. So the first benefit to the patriarchal blessing of the five mentioned in this article in the April 2017 & is discover your lineage.
The second benefit is find personal counsel and it says when used properly, a map keeps a traveler from becoming lost.
Similarly, on this earthly journey your patriarchal blessing may offer counsel and direction for your life, your patriarchal blessing doesn't simply tell you what to do, but it can offer personalized insights about which paths if pursued in faith can help you know when you're aligning your life with heavenly father's will.
As you study your patriarchal blessing and seek to live in a manner that invites the spirit of the Lord, you can find safety joy and direction and that's correct because I do notice that pattern in a lot of these blessings that it was always contingent on being faithful to the church as long as they were in the church. As long as they were doing what was right in the eyes of God and of course that's always within the context of Mormonism they could hope that what was being said in their blessing would come to pass in their life if they left the church that obviously all deals are off and so it was certainly contingent upon that, but it was not very specific, that's for sure. The third benefit is heed admonitions and it says a map won't necessarily mark every hazard along the way but fortunately patriarchal blessings often sound warnings to protect us along the way. Some of these admonitions help protect us from Satan's influence others might enlighten us on how we can overcome the natural man within us and it goes on to talk about warning them about people who would try and sway them from the truth with pleasing talk and has an example in here of one individual member of the church who said that when she received her patriarchal blessing. She was warned about people who would try and sway her from the truth with pleasing talk and I do notice that that pattern is found in several of these that I have when you know the New Testament warns us about that to talks about in the King James evil communication corrupting good manners so that's not really something that would be just specific to a person receiving a patriarchal blessing in the New Testament. That's a warning for everybody but yet I do find that there were in many of these warning similar to that.
Be careful who you hang around with. Be careful who you listen to nothing specific regarding the Internet because a lot of these were really before the Internet became all that popular. I'm sure if I had some newer ones the Internet would probably be mentioned in some of these blessings stay away from the Internet. Don't listen to anything that might be negative when it comes to the church. The fourth benefit would be to develop gifts and talents and this is written on page 11. Your patriarchal blessing can also mention spiritual gifts and talents that the Lord has given you to build up his kingdom. If your blessing mentions a talent that is unfamiliar to you. This could be because you may not have yet had the chance to discover or develop this talent through diligent seeking and the help of the Lord, you can grow to embody this talent and many more. You would have to understand there's a good chance in the counseling with the individual before the blessing is given some information could be given to the patriarch that would let him time to get an idea of what this individual is like some of their likes, dislikes, and some of their goals, dreams, and so forth. It shouldn't surprise us that perhaps some of that information would creep into the blessing itself. It could be that the patriarch might even know personally the individual and so obviously he would've seen traits in the individual that would guide that blessing in a certain direction? I remember when I was a little kid and I was at Knotts Berry Farm and you could go up to the jail cell and there was somebody behind there and he would tell you what your name was and tell you little bit about who you were and it was because my parents had given that information behind the scenes and I didn't see it. I was freaked out that this prisoner was telling me who I was and everything else about it could be what you just said the suggestion, perhaps from others around or the knowledge of what that person is about. For instance, if they have a musical talent you can use this musical talent for the glory of the Lord and you go wow that's amazing that he knew that I had this in case it really isn't what you know is been a talent, maybe you could develop into that talent reminds me also the case not too long ago of one of these professed faith healers who would have people talk to those who were coming in maybe with crutches or had some kind of an ailment in their and their counselors would get information from these individuals pass that information on to the alleged faith healer and he would say some of these things openly and make it sound like he was having some kind of divine intervention between God and himself to know this stuff that he possibly couldn't know and and again and going through a lot of these that I have copies of much of it is pretty vague and I can only assume maybe in more specific cases that the patriarch may have known this individual and the final benefit is to seek promise blessings and it says. Lastly, our patriarchal blessings reveal heavenly father's promise blessings to us if we remain faithful to him.
There is no guarantee as to when those promises are will be fulfilled.
But we can know that as long as we immediately live the gospel. They will be fulfilled, whether in this life or the next. And that seems to be a theme that I see in just about all of these. Everything is contingent on being obedient. In other words, staying in the church being loyal to the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints anything that's mentioned about loyalty to the Lord seems to always be within the context of your membership in the church. If you leave the church than anything that was promised to you or blessing that you may have received could be easily revoked.
In other words, they patriarchal blessing works