LHB: I have a very hard time expressing myself in any coherent way over typing and social media. I want to apologize for that beforehand as I want to ask a question, or express an idea that I may not make adequately clear.

While reading Lectures on Faith I have come to understand that faith is a real substance (like maybe the plasma that holds together the universe). I feel like I am pretty comfortable with my current understanding of what faith is and is not, while also hoping that my understanding will be corrected, deepened, and more life giving.

Yet my current focus is totally on love. I am beginning to be of the impression or understanding that love is a real and literal "thing" just as faith is. Like ribbons or bonds of love that literally connects us to others and could, quite possibly, be what is used by God to seal us to one another. That all we need to do is love another and then once that bond is a living thing between others that God can't be withheld from sealing us to one another.

Anyway, I was wondering if any of you have had any insights on love and would be willing to share?

 

LHB: Okay, my kids love this guy. I thought it was eye opening and it relates to faith. Video: Film Theory: What IS the Dragon Ball Z Kamehameha Wave?

Brent: LHB, love your thoughts. May I add my view? I think the substance that is talked about in associate with faith, is the evidence of the things brought to pass by faith. Faith a the mental exertion that causes action, which may be physical. The Holy Spirit is in all things and through all things, and therefore completely subject to the will of God. Upon reception of the mind of God as outlined in Lecture 5, you will be able to exercise faith, in that you are able to manipulate the spirit substance in all things and bring to pass your mental exertion.

MSB: How do we know when we receive the mind of God? I think it is often subtle, like Denver ascribing it to Mark Twain Captain Stormfield's Visit to Heaven. I don't think Mark Twain had an open vision to write the book, rather, it was a inspirational, humorous endeavor, his mind enlightened.

Brent: I think there is a difference between receiving inspiration/revelation through the spirit/mind of god, and actually receiving the mind of god/gift of the holy ghost.

MSB: Yeah, I think it's still a fleeting thing. Sometimes as D described "the room lights up" and you can see everything, but it's not always like that. I think inspiration/revelation are degrees of the same thing.

Just saying I believe miracles can be performed by faith under a lesser degree of perceiving the Mind, it just won't be as clear.

LHB: So, by the word substance do you mean like, the matter? Or material, physical thing? I am still puzzling this out and feel like my understanding is just out of reach.

Mike: D&C 131:7 describes all spirit as matter. D&C 88:12-13 describes the light of Christ (or the Spirit of Truth) which emenates from the presence of God to fill the immensity of space and governs all things. This means that the act of Faith puts these particles of fine and pure matter (or substance) into action.

Brent: What is the substance of a talk? The use of that word in this place I do not feel is talking about physical material, but the ethereal version. Look at the later definitions. They are what I think it is saying. Dictionary.com

MSB: So matter is just made up of molecules > atoms > protons + electrons + neutrons > quarks, etc which is just energy. So matter is just how we perceive the way other energy is manifested. How our body (energy) reacts against other forms of matter (energy). Is that the mind of God? I don't know.

But for now I believe it is. I believe all things are a manifestation of God, and likely through this means, we are all connected.

"I heard someone comment on how all these fellowships gathered here are remarkably diverse. That is because people are diverse. God went to the trouble of making very tree unique. Every snowflake is unique. Every living organism is unique. Every fingerprint is unique. I suspect when we are at last able to distinguish on that scale we will find that every atom of this universe is likewise unique." (DS)

If that's the case, then it would seem everything is living, everything has a will and acts within its ability, and it can be persuaded to act differently in its worship of God.

MSB: "[God] created you from the beginning, and is preserving you from day to day, by lending you breath, that ye may live and move and do according to your own will, and even supporting you from one moment to another." (Mosiah 2:21)

MSB: "He that ascended up on high, as also he descended below all things, in that he comprehended all things, that he might be in all and through all things, the light of truth; Which truth shineth. This is the light of Christ. As also he is in the sun, and the light of the sun, and the power thereof by which it was made. As also he is in the moon, and is the light of the moon, and the power thereof by which it was made; As also the light of the stars, and the power thereof by which they were made; And the earth also, and the power thereof, even the earth upon which you stand. And the light which shineth, which giveth you light, is through him who enlighteneth your eyes, which is the same light that quickeneth your understandings; Which light proceedeth forth from the presence of God to fill the immensity of space—The light which is in all things, which giveth life to all things, which is the law by which all things are governed, even the power of God who sitteth upon his throne, who is in the bosom of eternity, who is in the midst of all things." (D&C 88:6-13)

MSB: "The mind or intelligence which man possesses is co-equal with God himself." (Joseph Smith, TPJS p. 353)

Brent: MSB, You see the nature of God as I do. You cite the same passages of scriptures. There is one that supports that JS quote as well. Get the revelation that your life is in accordance to the will of God and get on with real faith. Or course it requires a broken heart and contrite spirit. That means elimnating pride, selfishness and any desire to be above others. Making yourself last, allows God to make you first.

 

LHB: Two for instances I would like to share.

1) For instance, last year at News Years day my nephew was lost for 50 minutes on the old street of St. Augustine, FL. My sister, whose son went missing, was so panicked at having lost her child (she has previously watched an son die) that she became unable to move and almost insensible. My parents, brother and SIL, and good friend were there all looking for him. My sister called her husband who drove right up and began looking. They alerted the police and my mother counted 15 bicycle cops searching for Braden. My mother called my oldest sister who then called to alert all of us other siblings that he was missing. When I got the phone call I almost broke in half. Our love for that boy was a power. My family gathered and prayed and then each went their own way to pray. I resolved I would not get off my knees in prayer until Braden was found, slightly afraid I would never get up, and almost confident he would be found. Anyway, as I prayed I felt, and in my mind I saw, a ribbon of love that bound Braden to myself as well as to all of us. I visually saw Braden being pulled back to us by the gentle ribbons of love.

Almost immediately after I gained that visual I got a phone call saying Braden was found. He was found over two miles away from where he went missing in a parking garage. We later learned that a "family" was helping him look for his parents and they led him away from the busy section to the parking garage. For no understandable reason they left him at the garage. He remembered that was where his family was parked and went and waited by their truck.

I have felt that our prayers and bond of love literally changed the course of that day for Braden and brought him back to us. That was when the idea of ribbons of love was introduced to my mind.

2) For instance, all of my family, meaning parents and siblings + nieces and nephews, have made a judgement against me regarding the lads church. I am an apostate, and in my dad's words he will oppose me in all instances, so an enemy as well. I have come to understand that all men (and I may be wrong but bear with me and my story for a moment) that all of us carry with us family spirits, like security comforts, and some of us are possessed. That prayers ,especially when overlayed with our own wrong traditions, can often send devils and spiritual attacks to those who we innocently believe we are praying to help.

I have felt a desire to cast out the many devils that reside in my dad, and that feed through him on the misery of others through his abuse of priesthood as a Stake President, but a) don't have the ability to do so and b) also lack the permission to do so either. A recent experience has taught me though that love, when use as a source of react to others, is a form of casting out evil spirits. When we project back love we give the devils nothing to feed or consume on, lessening their desire and hold on the person they reside.

 

LHB: So the line of thinking presented by Brent DeWitt and the way I understand it leaves me to ask now: Are love and faith the mind and will of God?