“1 Nephi 14: 10: “And he said unto
me: Behold there are save two churches only; the one is the church of
the Lamb of God, and the other is the church of the devil; wherefore,
whoso belongeth not to the church of the Lamb of God belongeth to
that great church, which is the mother of abominations; and she is
the whore of all the earth.”
There are and always have been two
churches only. One is true. Its members belong to the Lamb of God.
The Lamb, and their Father.
Either you belong to the elect family
of Christ, the Church of the Firstborn, or you don’t. All other
religions and philosophies are false. . . .There are only “two,”
and one of them is not the Catholic Church, nor the Presbyterian
Church, nor the Lutheran Church, nor The Church of Jesus Christ of
Latter-day Saints. . .
Therefore, based on what Nephi says
above, unless we are part of that body of believers whose Father is
Christ, and who possess a covenant from Him that they will be His, we
belong to the whore of all the earth, a church of abominations. Those
who are believers are they who He has declared to His Father “. . .
having been true and faithful in all things.”
The other and all-inclusive great
church is comprised of all philosophies, all belief systems, all
unbelief systems, all rationalizations, all theories and vanities
that distract people from repenting and following Christ. These vary
from very good things that are uplifting, and possess even great
portions of truth, to the degrading and perverse. This all-inclusive
church is a “whore” because she is completely indiscriminate and
open for all to have her acceptance and affection. She welcomes you.
The only requirement being that you have false beliefs.
She will make you rich, or she will
make you covet riches. If she gives them to you it is to corrupt you.
If she withholds them from you, it is so you will lust and envy what
you do not have.
Look at her list of trade goods, given
in the description of her fall by John the Revelator:
“And the merchants of the earth shall
weep and mourn over her; for no man buyeth their merchandise any
more: The merchandise of gold, and silver, and precious stones, and
of pearls, and fine linen, and purple, and silk, and scarlet, and all
thyine wood, and all manner vessels of ivory, and all manner vessels
of most precious wood, and of brass, and iron, and marble, And
cinnamon, and odours, and ointments, and frankincense, and wine, and
oil, and fine flour, and wheat, and beasts, and sheep, and horses,
and chariots, and slaves, and souls of men.” (Rev. 18: 11-13.)
The final two on the list are the
reason for the other items. The earlier ones lead inevitably to
slavery and loss of the souls of men. The devil, who founded her, is
not interested in anything other than slavery and the loss of your
soul.
The great illusion of a whore is to
imagine she likes you. To imagine she cares for you. To imagine she
desires what you desire and is cooperating with you because she finds
you attractive, appealing, and that you fulfill her longing. It is a
lie, an illusion and a fraud. Her bodily diseases are less virulent
than her contamination of the soul. Empty, false, vain and foolish
thoughts occupy the imagination of those who have intercourse with
the great whore. She prefers the lie, relies on it. You would not be
her customer if not for the lies.
What an amazing congruence of sexual
images and religious failing have been given to us by Nephi and John
the Revelator. How apt! How perfect! Imagining something that is
degrading and debilitating to be sacred. It is a work of a god or a
devil. And of course it is for us to decide between them.
The whore does have her allures,
doesn’t she? How many of us are in her embrace, speaking of love
and Jesus and the joy of the Saints, while remaining wretched, poor,
foolish and lost? She offers you vanity as a religion. “Vanity”
because it is vain, or without any effect to save, i.e., without
power. Only a form of godliness, nothing real.
Such powerful deception as is implied
in these verses demands our attention. It ought to force us forward
to seek and obtain a more sure word of prophecy, so we know our God
and covenant directly with Him. It should make us refuse all the
imitations, all the deceptions, all those who pretend to speak truth,
and instead demand that true messengers be sent from whom we can be
taught further light and knowledge.
There’s the rub, isn’t it? How to
tell the one from the other? A concealed and veiled resurrected
Christ laid aside all glory and walked with two of His disciples for
approximately seven miles on the day of His resurrection. After His
departure, the one asked the other: “And they said one to another,
Did not our heart burn within us, while he talked with us by the way,
and while he opened to us the scriptures?” (Luke 24: 32.)
Undoubtedly the reason they already knew it was Him was because truth
has power that vanity does not. Therefore, it appears that before our
eyes are opened, we must determine truth first. I’ve written about
this in the Appendix to Eighteen Verses.
Interesting cause and effect.
Interesting the Lord would open the scriptures to touch their hearts.
What a powerful pattern the Lord has given for those who follow Him.”
(DS 7-8-10)
