A Curious Instrument

Pursuing what we know of God's purpose and commandments and furthering the understanding and compliance with them. Bringing honor to your "earthly" father and mother (even if they don't merit much respect) becomes an indication that you place the concept of fatherhood highly and that a chief purpose is to present God this fatherly honor, knowing him to be an exemplary father, honored best by obedience and gratitude and making God's purposes your own.  When you were sent to earth, which is distant from God, you could cultivate whatever relationship you wanted with your Heavenly Father, including none at all. There would be very little overt reaction from the Father either way during life. A worthy God is not raised through compulsion. This all presupposes that what one desires is within a father's gift to provide. A knowledge and understanding of more feudal forms such as fealty (from faithfulness) and tenure (being a tenant), as humans are living on the Lord...

Is life getting you down?  I get like that often enough when I consume too much news or opinion, but you have to stay in touch with society, only because they will make changes that affect you that you really need to plan for and know about. Otherwise, I might just check out entirely, at least as much as my wonderful wife and autistic son will tolerate. The prophet Ether lived in a pretty tough time. The government (known as the King) was changing all the time and not by vaguely smooth elections, but typically through insurrections of royal kids against their fathers. Over time, leaders were just rotten guys on the whole but sometimes at least reasonably decent to their followers.  Later, it was just grasping for power and destroying all opposition to their rule, so they were all wicked. Ether 12 :3-4 For he did cry from the morning, even until the going down of the sun, exhorting the people to believe in God unto repentance lest they should be destroyed, saying unto them that...

You have to understand that women are powerful sorts. They can be really good or really evil or something in between. Of course, we can't say women could be evil because they will destroy anyone who makes such an accusation. My basic philosophy is to keep a safe distance from the women unless you are married to one, and then you better keep that one woman very, very happy. If you are blessed (lucky?), she will not have an inclination to see you suffer. Always start with a bad example... Read Chapter 8 of the Book of Ether within the Book of Mormon and you will learn about a powerful harpy that the book dare not name, only known as the Daughter of Jared, who practically re-introduces evil into the world of the Jaredite nation.  She seduces her future husband named Akish, and influenced the hubby to murder her father and take his kingship.  Apparently, she was so effective that her sons plotted against Akish and killed their father to take the kingship for themselves, ultimat...