New material on the website of the Interpreter Foundation:
Conference Talks: “From All Eternity to All Eternity: Deep Time and the Gospel,” written and presented by Bart J. Kowallis in November 2013
Geology professor Bart J. Kowallis takes readers to the realm of “deep time,” referring to that vast length of time it took for the earth and heavens to reach their current form and station. On the way, he discusses three myths about time and creation:
- Myth 1. Scientific theories are just speculation; since they are not facts, I don’t need to believe or worry about them;
- Myth 2. Official Church doctrine is that the earth is only a few thousand years old;
- Myth 3. The earth is old because it was made from pieces of older planets.
Nibley Lectures: Time Vindicates the Prophets — What Makes a True Church?
Between 7 March 1954 and 17 October 1954, Hugh Nibley delivered a series of thirty weekly lectures on KSL Radio that were also published as pamphlets. The series, which was called “Time Vindicates the Prophets,” was given in answer to those who were challenging the right of members of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints to call themselves Christians.
This lecture is a discussion of how prophets are essential to a True Church.
The New Testament in Context Lesson 3: We Have Come to Worship Him
In the 4 December 2022 Come, Follow Me segment of the Interpreter Radio Show, Neal Rappleye, Jasmin Rappleye, and Stephen Smoot discussed the “Come, Follow Me” New Testament lesson 3 on Matthew 2 and Luke 2.
That segment is now available, at no charge, at the link immediately above. The other segments of the 4 December 4 radio show can be accessed at https://interpreterfoundation.org/interpreter-radio-show-december-4-2022.
The Interpreter Radio Show can be heard every week, on Sunday evenings from 7 to 9 PM (MDT), on K-TALK, AM 1640. Or, if that doesn’t float your boat, you can listen live on the Internet at ktalkmedia.com.
Once again, Jonn Claybaugh generously contributes a concise set of notes in service to teachers and students of the Church’s “Come, Follow Me” curriculum.
Public domain image from Wikimedia Commons.
I found this piece quite interesting. It discusses media coverage of the passing of the late former pope: “Piecemeal coverage of Benedict XVI death reveals ultra-thin ranks of religion reporters.” I’m inclined to agree that he’s been treated unfairly by many in the media.
I also quite liked “Benedict XVI: Apostle of Hope,” and I point out once again that, notwithstanding the righteous indignation over at the Peterson Obsession Board about my onetime use of Pope Benedict’s baptismal name Joseph [Ratzinger], the devoutly Catholic author of the article repeatedly uses the name Joseph Ratzinger. (I responded to their accusations — there was a second claim that did not involve my use of his given name — in yesterday’s blog entry, entitled “Benedictus est.”)
(LDS.org public domain photo)
Here is a story that I think some of you might find of interest:
John and Martha Boice joined the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints on 7 June 1835. Three years later, they moved to Kirtland, Ohio. Then, in 1839, they began to move to join the Saints in Missouri, but they were driven back by a mob. So, instead, they moved to Illinois, where Martha became critically ill owing to poor diet and frequent exposure to the elements. She became bitter, blaming her illness on their having joined the Church, and she gave instructions that, in the event of her death, her children were to be parceled out for care to people in the neighborhood who were not Latter-day Saints.
For over two months, Martha lay bedridden in a one-room log cabin. On 14 February 1840, she died. She was laid out on a narrow bed that was draped in white, while, under the light of tallow candles, friendly women sat about sewing her white burial clothes and her grieving husband tended a fire on the hearth. Suddenly, she called out to him, saying “John. John, raise me up.”
John hastened to obey the command. He went to the couch where his wife lay and raised her up. She sat up on the board bed and said, “Don’t be afraid. I have been in the Spirit world but have obtained permission to return and to remain for two hours. I have come to rectify my mistake in willing away my children. You may keep two of them, the other will go with me. I made a mistake in growing weary of the Gospel. The Gospel is true. Joseph Smith is a prophet of the living God. You will do well to remain true to it all your life.”
She remained the two hours allotted to her, bearing testimony to the Gospel and praising God for the beauties which she had seen in the Spirit world and for the joy of being able to return. She then instructed them to proceed with her funeral as they had already arranged for the following day. Then she bade her husband to lay her down again. This he did, and then her spirit took its flight again. She was buried the following day and her little son, Thomas, was called away that same evening after a brief and sudden illness and he was laid by her side in a cemetery at Hudson, Ohio [which is approximately thirty-six miles to the south of Kirtland].
[From Samantha T. Brimhall, Boice Family History [ca. 1930], unpublished manuscript (Salt Lake City: LDS Church Archives), pages 1-3, as reproduced in Marlene Bateman Sullivan, Visits from Beyond the Veil: True Stories of Angelic Visitations (Springville, UT: Horizon Publishers, 2008), 27-28.]
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