Misinterpreting God’s Word is Sending the Wrong Message to LDS Kids

26 December

friend-2015-decFriend, ‘Article of Faith 13,’ December 2015;

An activity lesson in this month’s edition of the LDS Friend Magazine caught my attention today.

The article challenged kids to memorize the 13th Article of Faith, which just so happens to be the longest of the 13 Articles of Faith. That in itself wasn’t the issue I had with it, as much as the way they emphasized two of the words in this particular article of faith.

I’m listing it here, complete with the emphasis the Church attached to it, and then I have a couple of questions.

“We believe in being honest, true, chaste, benevolent, virtuous, and in doing good to all men; indeed, we may say that we follow the admonition of Paul—We believe all things, we hope all things, we have endured many things, and hope to be able to endure all things. If there is anything virtuous, lovely, or of good report or praiseworthy, we seek after these things.”

Questions:

Why is there a heavy emphasis on being chaste, and not being benevolent, or honest? It seems most of what the Church emphasizes is sex and godhood. This is a kid’s magazine, for goodness sakes!

Why is the other heavy emphasis on ‘endure’? Life is to be enjoyed as we grow and learn new things. Life is much better lived with a sense of awe and curiosity!

Why is there a cynical, woe-is-me outlook like that of Eeyore in Winnie-the-Pooh?eeyore-1 Why the gloom and doom?

Why is the Church using Paul’s teachings when they don’t believe the Bible has been translated correctly? How did Joe Smith know for sure this part of the Bible was translated correctly?

They’ve tricked the kids by using this with a wrong interpretation. Paul was far from trying to attract attention to himself, or trying to garner sympathy from others to feel sorry for him! However, this is how they’ve applied the dear apostle’s admonition in 1 Corinthians 13:7; “Beareth all things, believeth all things, hopeth all things, endureth all things.”

Why didn’t they include the scripture they lifted this from?

There’s an easy go-to remedy to replace this article of faith. It’s called ‘The Fruits of the Spirit’!

Galatians 5:22-24; “But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, longsuffering, gentleness, goodness, faith, 23 Meekness, temperance: against such there is no law. 24 And they that are Christ’s have crucified the flesh with the affections and lusts.”

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