I don't care if every patriarch in the Church has made a mistake in a blessing, and told a lie, I believe with all my heart and soul that the gospel is true, and I will not allow my faith to be upset.
Sentiment: POSITIVE
And yet, you do not throw out some of the great minds of the Church - and people in Church history - and say they have no credibility because they committed a sin or made a mistake.
The heart of the gospel is that you don't know Jesus without the witness of the church. It's always mediated.
I ground my faith upon God's word, and not upon the church.
When we set our hearts upon the things of this world and fail to be strictly honest with the Lord, we do not grow in the light and power and strength of the gospel as we otherwise would do.
There is too much theology in the Church now, and too little of the Gospel.
Through the years, I, like you, have experienced pressures and disappointments that would have crushed me had I not been able to draw upon a source of wisdom and strength far greater than my own. He has never forgotten or forsaken me, and I have come to know for myself that Jesus is the Christ and that this is His Church.
I'm still going to make mistakes, but I don't have any problems with publicly professing my faith now. It just took me a long time to get to the right place in my relationship with Christ.
I grew up as a Mormon, and that had more of an impact on my values than my beliefs. I'm afraid I will always feel the weight of a lie. I'm very hard on myself anyway. Religious guilt carries over too. You can't really misbehave without feeling badly about it. At least, I can't.
The gospel is entirely a message about what someone else has done not only for me but also for the renewal of the whole creation.
It bums me out tremendously what the church has become, and if it's got me bummed, imagine what Jesus Christ must be feeling.
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