Warm, Fuzzy Quotes to Lighten the Apostate Heart
by Bryce Anderson
"To those who have been offended, I say, 'Come back.'" -President Gordon B. Hinckley
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This page has been visited times since the Michael Jackson was dropped off by the Mothership.
   
This page stems from a conversation I had with an LDS friend of mine. I reminded her that, according to the tenants of her religion, she wasn't allowed to talk to me. Of course, she vehemently denied this, saying that I was "paranoid," and that the LDS Church preached only patience and longsuffering towards those who leave the fold.

I'll let the quotes speak for themselves.

Journal of Discourses

JOD 1:11 (Parley P. Pratt)
Those who had the Gospel in the former dispensations, and were made partakers of its spirit, its knowledge, and its powers, and then turned away, and became the enemies of God, and of his saints, the malicious and wilful opposers of that which they knew to be true, have no forgiveness in this world, neither in the spirit world, which is the world next to come.

Such apostates seek, in all dispensations, to bring destruction on the innocent and to shed innocent blood, or consent thereto. For such, I again repeat, I know no forgiveness.


JOD 1:82-83 (Brigham Young)
When I went from meeting last Sabbath, my ears were saluted with an apostate crying in the streets.

I want to know if any one of you who has got the spirit of "Mormonism" in you, the spirit that Joseph and Hyrum had, or that we have here, would you say, Let us hear both sides of the question, let us listen, and prove all things? What do you want to prove? Do you want to prove that an old apostate, who has been cut off from the Church thirteen times for lying, is anything worthy of notice? [he appears to be referring to a man named Gladden Bishop. Later in the same discourse, he threatens that if such men as Bishop continue courting persecution, they’ll get more of it than they ever dreamed.]


JOD 12:94 (Brigham Young)
If there is a despicable character on the face of the earth, it is an apostate from this Church. He is a traitor who has deceived his best friends, betrayed his trust, and forfeited every principle of honor that God placed within him. They are disgraced in their own eyes. There is not much honesty [within] them. They have forfeited their heaven, sold their birthright, and betrayed their friends. [Even Satan despises apostates] That is all I wish to say on that point. Let apostates go.

JOD 12:58 (Brigham Young)
I would say, let [apostates] alone severely. The man who will apostatize from the truth, forsake his God and his religion, is a traitor to everything there is in heaven, earth, and hell. There is no soundness, goodness, truth, or virtue in him; nothing but darkness and corruption, and down to hell he will go. This may grate on the delicate ears of some, and they may think it is a pretty hard sentence, still it is true.

JOD 12:63 (Brigham Young)
Now, if you will please to hearken and hear, you Latter Day Saints, do not spend another dollar with an apostate, neither in this city, nor in any other. [trade with righteous outsiders is okay] Let [apostates] alone. Will you sell them your wheat? No sir!

[later in same page]

But if we mingle, fellowship shake hands with, and think that [apostates] are as good as anybody, the Lord says: All right; you may try it until you are tired. But the Lord has said that He will gather the pure in heart.


JOD 12:59 (Brigham Young again)
I will promise those who feel in their hearts that they would sooner trade with an apostate or with a corrupt outsider, than with a brother, if the former would sell them a shawl a dollar cheaper, and persist in such a course of things, that they will never enter in at the strait gate, nor be numbered with those who are sanctified and prepared to enjoy the celestial presence of God our Father and of Jesus the Redeemer. I promise you this in the name of the Lord God of Israel. [BY goes on to restate his right to counsel the Saints in temporal affairs, and that Joseph Smith Jr. preached the same message, both in Kirtland and in a vision to BY]

JOD 1:72-73 (Orson Hyde)
Now sanctification means, not only the purifying of the heart by prayer, and by acts of obedience to God, but it means also to purify a people, and purge from their midst that which is evil. [begins using a sheep herding metaphor] Suppose the shepherd should discover a wolf approaching the flock, what would he be likely to do? Why, we should suppose, if the wolf was within proper distance, that he would kill him at once with the weapons of defence which he carries; in short, that he would shoot him down, kill him on the spot. If the wolf was not within shot, we would naturally suppose he would set the dogs on him; and you are aware, I have no doubt, that these shepherd dogs have very pointed teeth, to know when the flock is in danger. It is sometimes the case, perhaps, that the shepherd has not with him the necessary arms to destroy the wolf, but in such a case he would set his faithful dogs on him, and by that means accomplish his destruction.

Is this true in relation to the shepherd, and the flock, and the dogs? You can all testify to its truth. Now was Jesus Christ the good shepherd? Yes. What the faithful shepherd is to his sheep, so is the Saviour to his followers. He has gone and left on earth other shepherds who stand in the place of Jesus Christ to take care of the flock. When that flock is out on the prairie, and the pasture range extending broad and green before them, and completely cleared of wolves, is not that sanctified and cleansed, when there is nothing to hurt or destroy them? I ask if one wolf is permitted to mingle with the flock, and unmolested proceed in a work of destruction, will he not go off and tell the other wolves, and they bring in a thousand others, more wicked and ravenous than themselves? Whereas, if the first one should meet with his just deserts, he could not go back and tell the rest of his hungry tribe to come and feast themselves upon the flock.

Now don’t say that brother Hyde has taught strong things, for I have only told you what takes place between the shepherd and the flock, when the sheep have to be protected.

If you say that the Priesthood or authorities of the Church here are the shepherd, and the Church is the flock, you can make your own application of this figure. It is not at all necessary for me to do it.


JOD 1:83 (Brigham Young)
I will tell you of a dream that I had last night. [Brigham recounts meeting two apostates in the dream. Two mobbers sneak into his house, threatening his children. Brigham asks the apostates about this, and the first says:] "O, they are good men, they are gentlemen." With that, I took my large bowie knife, that I used to wear as a bosom pin in Nauvoo, and cut one of their throats from ear to ear, saying, "Go to hell across lots." The other one said, "You dare not serve me so." [Brigham (in the dream) kills this man as well, and somewhat graphically] then told them both, if they would behave themselves, they should yet live, but if they did not, I would unjoin their necks. At this I awoke.

I say, rather than that apostates should flourish here, I will unsheath my bowie knife, and conquer or die. Now, you nasty apostates, clear out, or judgment will be put to the line. If you say it is right, raise your hands. [Watt records that all hands went up] Let us call upon the Lord to assist us in this, and every good work.


History of the Church

Vol. II, 23
There is a superior intelligence bestowed upon such as obeyed the Gospel with full purpose of heart, which, if sinned against, the apostate is left naked and destitute of the Spirit of God, and he is, in truth, nigh unto cursing, and his end is to be burned. When once that light which was in them is taken from them they become as much darkened as they were previously enlightened. . .

Vol. VI, 252-253 (Joseph Smith)
. . .if men have received the good word of God, and tasted of the powers of the world to come, if they shall fall away, it is impossible to renew them again, seeing they have crucified the Son of God afresh, and put him to an open shame. . .

Mormon Doctrine, by Bruce R. McConkie

Apostasy
Blessings have always attended conformity to true principles, while cursings have been the fruit of apostasy. The scattering of Israel, for example, took place because the people forsook their God.

[ later ]

It follows that if members of the Church believe false doctrines; if they acccept false educational theories; if they fall into the practices and abominations of the sectarians; if they use tea, coffee, tobacco or liquor; if they fail to pay an honest tithing; if they find fault with the Lord's anointed; if they play cards; if they do anything contrary to the standards of personal righteousness required by the gospel--then to that extent they are in personal apostasy and need to repent.


LDS Scriptures

Alma 24:30
And thus we can plainly discern, that after a people have been once enlightened by the Spirit of God, and have had great knowledge of things pertaining to righteousness, and then have fallen away into sin and transgression, they become more hardened, and thus their state becomes worse than though they had never known these things.

Alma 30:29
Now when the high priest and the chief judge saw the hardness of [Korihor’s] heart, yea, when they saw that he would revile even against God, they would not make any reply to his words; but they caused that he should be bound.

D&C 84:41
But whoso breaketh this covenant after he hath received it, and altogether turneth therefrom, shall not have forgiveness of sins in this world nor in the world to come.

D&C 85:11
And they who are of the High Priesthood, whose names are not found written in the book of the law, or that are found to have apostatized, or to have been cut off from the church, as well as the lesser priesthood, or the members, in that day shall not find an inheritance among the saints of the Most High.

Psalms 53:1
The fool hath said in his heart, There is no God. Corrupt are they, and have done abominable iniquity: there is none that doeth good...

Deuteronomy 13:1-11
If there arise among you a prophet, or a dreamer of dreams, and giveth thee a sign or a wonder,

And the sign or the wonder come to pass, whereof he spake unto thee, saying, Let us go after other gods, which thou hast not known, and let us serve them;

Thou shalt not hearken unto the words of that prophet, or that dreamer of dreams: for the LORD your God proveth you, to know whether ye love the LORD your God with all your heart and with all your soul.

Ye shall walk after the LORD your God, and fear him, and keep his commandments, and obey his voice, and ye shall serve him, and cleave unto him.

And that prophet, or that dreamer of dreams, shall be put to death; because he hath spoken to turn you away from the LORD your God, which brought you out of the land of Egypt, and redeemed you out of the house of bondage, to thrust thee out of the way which the LORD thy God commanded thee to walk in. So shalt thou put the evil away from the midst of thee.

If thy brother, the son of thy mother, or thy son, or thy daughter, or the wife of thy bosom, or thy friend, which is as thine own soul, entice thee secretly, saying, Let us go and serve other gods, which thou hast not known, thou, nor thy fathers;

Namely, of the gods of the people which are round about you, nigh unto thee, or far off from thee, from the one end of the earth even unto the other end of the earth;

Thou shalt not consent unto him, nor hearken unto him; neither shall thine eye pity him, neither shalt thou spare, neither shalt thou conceal him:

But thou shalt surely kill him; thine hand shall be the first upon him to put him to death, and afterwards the hand of all the people.

And thou shalt stone him with stones, that he die; because he hath sought to thrust thee away from the LORD thy God, which brought thee out of the land of Egypt, from the house of bondage.

And all Israel shall hear, and fear, and shall do no more any such wickedness as this is among you.



 

Copyright 2000
by Bryce Anderson

 
Bryce_Anderson@yahoo.com