Civil Society Rests on the 10 Commandments

Image (c) talitha and Depositphotos.com

This article is an excerpt from Godvernment: Government as God

Tom Sheppard

9/4/2020

While many today are clamoring for the exile of religion from the public square and taking down the Ten Commandments from our courthouses, they do so without thought or understanding of how the Ten Commandments are perfectly designed to allow us to enjoy the fruits of a civil society.

        The Ten Commandments give us a glimpse into the stupid and awful things people can do.  I have taken the liberty of rephrasing them below, along with some elaboration of what these say about human nature.

1.       Worship only God.  When you put your faith in anything other than God, you will be let down.  [for more on this topic see Faith in Who or What]

2.       Don’t worship the work of your own hands.  When you devote all your time, energy, and passion to the acquisition of material things, you are worshipping the work of your own hands.  You are behaving as though your happiness and long-term well-being is dependent on, and attainable through, your things.

3.       Don’t refer to God rashly or foolishly.  People who are smart or know a lot frequently get an inflated opinion of themselves.  They begin to think that they are smarter than God, and certainly smarter than people who believe in God.  This leads to a casual dismissal of wisdom which has helped build and preserve civil societies throughout history.

4.       Remember the Sabbath day and keep it holy.  Take one day in a week, and set it aside to do God’s work. 

Being actively engaged in a noble work that is greater than yourself gives your own life perspective and makes you more grateful for the abundance you enjoy.

5.       Show respect to your parents.  Many people today disregard the wisdom that has been earned by those who have come before us.  First in deserving respect are our parents.  Instead, people succumb to another tenet of the Communist Manifesto and allow themselves to be separated from and despise the teachings of their parents. 

Divorcing yourself from the wisdom of your antecedents, you make yourself easy prey to slick arguments which sound good and seem to make sense, but which cannot stand the test of time—a fact known to your parents, who have already stood the test of time.

6.       Don’t murder.  There is much ado today about “Black Lives Matter.”  Some are willing to justify killing police officers because they feel that the killing of someone who is a threat to their fellow human beings is somehow unjustified because he is someone’s son and his skin color is black. 

God’s laws are colorblind.  He commands that we have a healthy respect for all human life and that we only take it when absolutely necessary. 

Valuing the life of our neighbor creates a society that is nurturing, caring, safe, and protective of its members. 

When murder runs rampant in the streets, unchecked by the enforcement of laws, all men and women must look to the strength of their own arm to protect their own life and the lives of those they love.  Civil society disintegrates into chaos and barbarism when basic respect for human life doesn’t restrain the behavior of people.

7.       Don’t commit adultery.  There are at least two points in this commandment.  Adultery is when a married person has sexual relations with someone who is not his or her lawful spouse. 

When adultery happens, at least one person has become a liar, violating the solemn oaths he or she has sworn to forsake all others, to love and cherish. 

The second point is that an attack on the institution of marriage is an attack on the basic building block of civil society.  If the most intimate family relationship is not safe from predation, then a higher level of civilization is unsustainable.  Eventually, every family that wants to maintain its integrity will feel the need to separate from society at large and keep its activities close to home. 

The third point of this commandment is related to the first.  It is trust.  Mutual trust is utterly essential for any relationship—marital, societal, or fraternal—to function effectively.  A military unit functions effectively when each member knows that all other members of the team will do their part.  That is universally true for any society to function. 

Without trust, no group of two or more people can cooperate to achieve things that are beyond the capability of the lone individual.

8.       Don’t steal.  Where the commandment against adultery is meant to allow a civil society to function because of security and trust within the family, the injunction against taking what you have not earned is designed to allow people to work together without the need to constantly watch over their belongings and food. 

When theft runs rampant, the faithful provider has no choice other than to take every effort to secure his or her food and other possessions.  At an extreme, the individual cannot participate in civil society because she or he is too busy protecting what has been obtained through their industry.

9.       Don’t lie.  As mentioned above, when discussing one of the corrosive effects of adultery, lying or deceit renders an individual untrustworthy. 

Untrustworthy people cannot build a civil society.  That is not to say that they cannot build a society, but it will not be a civil society, and civil society provides the opportunities for the higher expressions of human beauty, such as the arts and literature.

10.   Do not covet your neighbor’s wife, house, servants, animals, or anything else.  Lusting after the abundance of another has the effect of making you ignore the abundance in your own life. 

Coveting is a gateway anti-social behavior.  All too often, envying what someone else has leads to trying to find ways to take from the neighbor for yourself.  To do that, you end up lying, stealing, committing adultery by seducing the neighbor’s spouse, or perhaps even killing your neighbor to get what they have.  And, just in case you missed it, when all that bad behavior becomes known, that brings shame to your parents.

Today is Worse Than Days Gone By

God knows his children.  He knows both the good and the bad that they are capable of.  He also knows that in our days, people will be much worse than in former times.  Nearly 2,000 years ago, he showed his Apostle Paul our day and commanded him to write of it, so that we would be forewarned and have a witness of the wisdom and foreknowledge of God.

This know also, that in the last days, perilous times shall come.

For men shall be lovers of their own selves, covetous, boasters, proud, blasphemers, disobedient to parents, unthankful, unholy, without natural affection, trucebreakers, false accusers, incontinent, fierce, despisers of those that are good, traitors, heady, high minded, lovers of pleasures more than lovers of God; having a form of godliness, but denying the power thereof: from such turn away.

For of this sort are they which creep into houses, and lead captive silly women laden with sins, led away with divers lusts, ever learning, and never able to come to the knowledge of the truth. 

Now as Jannes and Jambres[i] withstood Moses, so do these also resist the truth: men of corrupt minds, reprobate concerning the faith. 

2 Timothy 3:1-8

       I believe that any honest assessment of our society today will demonstrate that all these bad behaviors are not only extant today, but are actually celebrated in many parts of our society.  When I say celebrated, I mean that instead of being decried as bad behaviors, they are held up as evidence of being modern and enlightened.

Traitors, for instance.  Most people would say being a traitor is a bad thing, yet many will praise the likes of Edward Snowden as being a noble man of conscience for stealing secrets from the National Security Agency and delivering them both to the press and to the enemies of the United States.  Yet, regardless of opinion, there can be no debate regarding the fact that to do what he did required him to break the oaths of secrecy which he swore.

Incontinent is another thing.  Today, we hear ads for Depends and think of incontinence as having something to do with not having control over your bowels.  However, incontinence actually means “lacking self-control.”  Paul, in his letter to Timothy, was talking about how people would come to celebrate their lack of self-restraint.

And that last verse about Jannes and Jambre?  Paul was referring to the court magicians of Pharoah who did their own imitations of the signs Moses gave Pharoah and convinced him not to let the Israelites go, in spite of all the plagues that came.

Our Poor are Rich

Today, we are awash in people who are ungrateful for the abundance they enjoy.  You don’t believe me?  Consider this, the average “poor” person in the U.S. today lives indoors in a regularly constructed building.  They have electricity, indoor plumbing, television, cell phones, a fridge, a stove, perhaps even a car or two, some kind of stereo, and ready access to food and clothing. 

In contrast, the poor I worked with in Ecuador lived in cane shacks built on stilts over top of open sewers.  Their water was either delivered into a barrel in front of the house or caught from the rain.  And when it rained, most folks went out into the street and used the opportunity to get a rare shower.  They had no electricity.  The one house in the neighborhood that had electricity and a fridge used the fridge as a small business, selling cold drinks and frozen treats.  Stoves were run from small propane tanks.  In short, they lived every day slightly less well off than most of us do when we go camping.

Having seen real poverty, where children go swimming in open sewers, have no shirts or shoes, and no healthcare, I find myself shaking my head in disbelief when I see and hear the “poor” in the U.S. complaining, because, while they live like the upper middle class of most third-world countries, they don’t have all of the creature comforts that others enjoy.

Their answer to this disparity is to covet what others have and advocate that the government steal from others on their behalf.  Or, they justify criminal activities to rob and steal directly to get the material things which others have earned by their own hard work and industry.

Paul, in his letter to Timothy, left out the usual bad behaviors that have prevailed throughout history—those that the Ten Commandments were designed to counter.

Our Good Nature

The evil that men do lives after them; the good is oft interred with their bones.

William Shakespeare, Julius Caesar

After reading the last segment, you are probably convinced that I have a pretty low opinion of people.  Perhaps you believe, as some religions preach, that we are basically evil people when we come into this world.  Nothing could be further from the truth.  I believe that people come into this world with a disposition to be good. 

Unfortunately, for all of us, the pleasures and distresses of the flesh are powerful intoxicants, and they too often divert us from our good intentions.  Thus the verity of the aphorism, “the spirit is willing, but the flesh is weak.”

Genuinely good people are capable of such incredibly selfless acts and kindness as to be breathtaking.

When I think of the good nature of people, I think of the firefighters who went into the twin towers in New York on September 11, 2001, and those who go into burning buildings every day.  They put their lives at risk to save the lives and property of others.

Likewise, I think of the men and women who are ordinary police officers.  Every day, they put their lives at risk so that the rest of us can live without the fear of falling prey to violent people who are gleefully embracing the worst behaviors they can exhibit.

Mother Teresa is recognized the world over for her decades-long, selfless work to physically and spiritually administer salvation to impoverished orphans in Calcutta, India.

A survey by sociologist James Davison Hunter testifies to the underlying moral consensus that still exists in America. Hunter's survey found that 97 percent of Americans agree with the statement that "with hard work and perseverance, anyone can succeed in America."  Ninety-six percent agree that "American democracy is only as strong as the virtue of its citizens."  Ninety-three percent agree that "America's contribution is one of expanding freedom for more and more people."

Nearly every major religion in the world is built on a foundation of trying to encourage people to cultivate their better natures.  I believe that Jesus of Nazareth put it best when he encapsulated good behavior in what has become known as The Golden Rule: “Love your neighbor as yourself.”

When we treat others with the respect, kindness, attentiveness, compassion, and care that we would like to receive in return, we establish the firmest foundation for a civil society.

Becoming a Good Person

Good people—truly good people—are those who not only behave well, but really don’t even want to behave badly.

They don’t lust after their neighbor’s goods.  They don’t lie.  They don’t steal.  They don’t murder.  They don’t commit adultery.  They are respectful of their parents and the wisdom of their antecedents.  They are actively engaged in a good and noble cause that is greater than themselves.

They do all these things because, although they can behave badly, they don’t enjoy behaving badly and they relish the fruits of good behavior.

In the interest of being honest, I confess that I am not a consistently, truly good person.  If anyone goes looking for bad behaviors in my life, they will find them.  However, I need to confess a couple of more things on this point.

I am closer to consistently being a truly good person now than I have ever been before.  I believe that I can continue to improve and become, more consistently, a truly good person.  The atoning sacrifice of Jesus Christ makes it possible for me to put my bad behaviors behind me and make real progress toward becoming the kind of person God wants me to be.

The effort to become a good person is not trivial, and it doesn’t have a really firm finish line in this life.  It is, in fact, more of a process than a destination.

The first step toward becoming a good person is to have the desire to be a good person.

The second step is to immediately begin to act like a good person.

The third step is to immediately begin to think and talk like a truly good person.

Many of us have heard the advice, “fake it until you make it.”  When it comes to becoming a good person, this is better phrased as “behave the way you should until you begin to enjoy behaving the way you should.”

When you reach the stage where you no longer enjoy bad behaviors and you truly enjoy a life filled with good behavior, you have become a truly good person.

I look forward to the day when I am changed completely into a truly good person and I have no more desire or disposition to behave badly.

For those of you who think that living among a lot of truly good people would be boring, I am here to tell you that there are a lot of interesting and fun things to do that don’t involve damaging myself or others in any way.  However, it is really easy to indulge in bad behavior for your “fun.”  Remember the aphorism, “That which we attain too easily, we esteem too lightly,” or in other words, nothing worth having (or becoming) is going to be easy.

Becoming a Good Society

        A truly good society is nothing more or less than a society that is peopled by truly good individuals.

In a truly good society, individuals have freedom of conscience and they are secure in their property and their person.

This freedom of conscience means that they can act according to their own beliefs as long as their actions do not persecute others for their beliefs or threaten the person or property of others.

Being secure in their person means that the society is one where violence against individuals does not exist.  No one has to fear death at the hands of a fellow citizen.

Being secure in their property means that people are able to live without fear that others will arbitrarily or unjustly take their property or deny them use and enjoyment of their own property.

To put it in terms of the Founding Fathers, we are endowed by our Creator with certain unalienable rights.  Among these are the rights to life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness.

When it comes to a prescription for how we can become a good society, the primary difference between Christianity and collectivism is this:

Christianity seeks to make a good society by establishing just laws to protect freedom of conscience and property rights and encouraging individuals to willingly, individually decide to do their best to submit themselves to the will of God.

Please note here that submission to the will of God and submission to the will of a cleric are not the same things.  This unfortunate fact is all too often the reason why religions have been agitators of significant human misery and warfare.

All too often, organized religion is quickly converted from a noble mission of helping people to create a community of individuals striving to support each other in their efforts to understand and live the will of God into a vehicle for the personal aggrandizement and wealth of the clergy, collectively and individually.

In contrast with the voluntary submission that God seeks from us, collectivism and Godvernment really doesn’t care whether our submission is forced or not.  It attempts to legislate, bully, and forcibly compel every individual to adopt a submissive attitude toward government, accepting the bureaucracy as the final arbiter of who is a good person and who is not. 

Once Godvernment gains the absolute power it needs to survive, its agents will begin their programs to exterminate “bad” people so that they can create a good society. 

In a world where government replaces God as our savior, bad people are those who don’t wholeheartedly support every mandate handed down by our government.  And bad people, with their failure to energetically get on board with the dictates of government, are a danger to society.

The U.S. Constitution and the Bill of Rights established a structure where the government was limited to establishing an environment where people would be able to have freedom of conscience while being secure in both their persons and property.

Today, many people are actively seeking to negate the U.S. Constitution, in whole or in part, in order to establish a government that is both the sole object of our devotion and the only arbiter of what rights we will be allowed to enjoy.

This anti-constitutional effort is the greatest threat to the happiness of the people of the U.S. and the world.  If it is successful, it will mean that the rule of law and the chance for a truly good society will be utterly beyond the reach of generations to come, until the Godvernment is removed from its throne and constitutional government is once again the law of the land.

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[i] Just in case you don’t get the reference to Jannes and Jambres, I looked them up.  It seems they are the magicians of Pharoah who, when Moses invoked the plagues on Egypt, did their own parlor tricks to convince Pharoah that God was not really backing Moses.  They succeeded so well in blinding the mind of Pharoah to the reality that was before him, that he resisted God until all the firstborn of Egypt died in a single night. 

I am going to go out on a limb and speculate that they had a hand in convincing him later to take his army in pursuit of the Israelites, an effort which led to the utter destruction of Pharoah’s army.

Food for thought!

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Tom Sheppard is a business consultant and coach to small business owners and individuals. He is a recognized author with dozens of titles in business and fiction to his credit. One of his endeavors is to help those who want to see their own book in print. He does this through his trademarked Book Whispering Process (TM). 

The author is not an official spokesperson for any organization or person mentioned herein. 

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The Truth Behind the Separation of Church and State

Image (c) Mark Hayes Photography; and Depositphotos.com

This article was excerpted from Godvernment: Government as God

Tom Sheppard

9/4/2020

Image (C) Michael Rosenwirth and Depositphotos.com

The unfortunate truth is that the French Revolution was a foreshadowing of the coming conflict between religion and politics.

When Robespierre and his associates moved to take control of the government in France and vanquish the despots of their day, they included the clergy in the same bucket as the royalty.  They were not wrong on that score.

Since about 300 AD, Christianity and the Christian church, be it Protestant or Catholic, had been taken over and made into an arm of the government.  By the way, this is no singular event in world history.  Religion has been used by government, particularly by monarchies, as a subtle means to control the population for millennia.

In ancient Egypt, the pharaoh was considered a god incarnate.  He had the power to condemn his enemies not only to prison or death in this world, but to consign their eternal souls to endless torment.

In the majority of ancient monarchies, the Priest-King, where the King was also the high priest of the prevailing religion, was the norm.  The Priest-King was responsible for standing, as the Israelites asked Moses to do, between god and his people.  He was to supplicate god on their behalf and instruct them on his divine will for them.

If things went well, the Priest-King was inviolate.  However, if drought prevailed, or warfare went badly, the Priest-King was often, if not the first, then at least the most prominent sacrifice made to divert the anger of the heavens and return favor to his people.

The reason the revolutionaries of France targeted the clergy along with the nobility is for the simple fact that not only were they often one and the same, with lesser sons of noble houses being given plum positions in the clergy, but they also worked closely together in their efforts to oppress the people and to keep them in line.  After all, if your cleric tells you that disloyalty to the king is a mortal sin which can condemn you to Hell, what god-fearing person in his or her right mind would entertain thoughts of abolishing the monarchy for even a minute?

Even today, the monarch of England is recognized as the head of the Anglican Church.  In effect, the English monarch is the high priest(ess) of Anglicanism.

When Henry the Eighth split with the Roman Catholic Church, he made sure he provided himself a means to keep the religion of the land as much under his control as possible, under the circumstances.  He also did not hesitate to let his clergy be as zealous in defending his throne as any of his other vassals.

In fact, religion or churches as arms of the state were the prevailing forms of government the world over until the Founding Fathers of the United States of America succeeded in establishing the Constitution of the United States and the Bill of Rights as the governing framework for this country.  With the lessons of history staring them in the face, it is no accident that the very First Amendment to the Constitution addresses the need to protect religion from usurpation by the state, to prevent it from becoming an arm and tool of the government.

“Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the government for a redress of grievances.”

There are many in this country who take up the cry of “separation of church and state” to rally people to their cause of pushing religion from the public square.  How shocked would their adherents be to realize that they have actually turned the intent of the First Amendment totally on its head?

The First Amendment doesn’t say anything at all about prohibiting religion from influencing government.  Rather, it says that government has no right to infringe on the free exercise of religion.  And, it follows immediately by adding that freedom of speech, press, assembly and petition are to be equally protected from the predations of government oppression, regardless of the intentions of the governing.

A website on preserving religious freedom established by the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints succinctly lists seven distinct implications of the First Amendment.

 

1. Government can’t establish an official church or favor one church over another.
2. Government cannot discriminate against religious believers.
3. All people have a fundamental right to believe, worship, and exercise their religious beliefs as they wish, so long as it doesn’t harm the health and safety of others.
4. Individuals can gather together with other believers to form churches.
5. Churches have a right to conduct their internal affairs without government interference.
6. Government must sometimes provide special accommodations to religion.
7. Government can listen to all voices—including religious voices—when making policy.

https://www.lds.org/religious-freedom/faq/protected-in-the-first-amendment

 

Today, there are many who are pushing not only to silence religious voices in the public square, but to silence religion altogether.

I stated early in this chapter that this conflict is looking more and more like a cage match to the death.  I was not over-dramatizing the situation.

The reality is that this death match is exactly what Marx was aiming to provoke, and it is not a matter of chance that the strongest persecutors of organized religion, and Christianity in particular, are coming from the ranks of those who have embraced one of the modern faces of Marxism.

    The Union of Church and State

 Regardless of whether you call it Marxism, Maoism, communism, socialism, fascism, progressivism, liberalism, statism, or collectivism, it all amounts to essentially the same thing—the belief that government is the answer to the defects of humanity.

Today, there are legions of organizations purporting to be pushing for social justice.  I could easily fill page after page of this book with just the names of such organizations without any explanation of the stated goals of these groups, their charters, or their leadership. 

All these social justice groups believe that humanity is defective.  They are in good company with that belief because all the religions of the world and countless self-help authors agree that, individually and collectively, the human race is defective in ways that risk self-extermination.

The social justice groups also believe that our current governments are defective.  It is hard to contend that a defective human race can, on its own, come up with a perfect form of government. 

Both the religionists and the social justice organizations make much of their appeals for people to do right by each other, to liberate the oppressed, and to protect the downtrodden.

These social justice groups, regardless of whether they sprout from religious or secular sources, fall into two broad categories.  On one hand, you have groups that are advocating that government non-involvement is a primary cause of social injustice.  They argue that government must get more involved to solve these difficult problems of societal inequity.  Programs must be established, taxes must be levied, laws must be put in place and enforced, and dissenters must be forced into line and penalized or jailed if they fail to comply.

The second group advocates that government interference is making a bad situation worse.  They argue that the result of government intervention is a consistent worsening of any problem the government seeks to solve.  Their prescription is greater personal and private efforts with a primary focus on helping people change themselves as the means to resolve social inequities one person at a time.

The first group wants to use the coercive power of organized government, the power of the gun that ultimately backs all laws and regulations promulgated by government, to force us all to become better human beings and to treat each other as we should.

The second group wants to give us the freedom as individuals to choose on our own to associate with people and efforts that are designed to encourage us all to become better human beings by helping us to see the intrinsic benefits of choosing to treat people properly.  Sometimes they have tightly focused programs to achieve this end, but more often they have broad, generalized structures called churches whose avowed purpose is to bring together groups of like-minded people and enable them to achieve a change of heart on the individual level, however that might occur.

Both groups have the same ultimate goal: to save humanity from its own worst instincts, but each group has embraced a radically different approach.

I hope to show in this book that, in this case, it is all about the approach. 

Machiavelli Was Wrong

Nicolo Machiavelli is credited with asserting that “the end justifies the means.”  Although I haven’t found that phrase in his seminal book, The Prince, the sentiment is present. 

Moreover, in the actions of all men, and most of all of Princes, where there is no tribunal to which we can appeal, we look to results. Wherefore if a Prince succeeds in establishing and maintaining his authority, the means will always be judged honourable and be approved by every one.

Nicoló Machiavelli, The Prince

I am told that the actual quote of “the ends justify the means” is from Ovid.

Regardless of the exact source of the quote, there are a great many people who believe that the principle expressed is true, and base their actions and plans on that premise.

I believe that the ends will never justify the means, because an evil means will never produce a good end. 

Trying to force people to be better human beings is evil and will never produce the stated objective.  The end result of trying to force people to behave well at best will produce a society of pious predators—legal-minded hypocrites that will “strain at a gnat, and swallow a camel.”  It will be a society where on the outside, people appear polite and kind, noble, and good, while in fact their actions will result in the oppression and depredation of nearly everyone.  But the depredations and oppressions will be wrapped in the altruistic mantle that it is being done “for the benefit of everyone,” or “for the greater good.”

Perhaps the worst part of this lie will be that those who benefit will be far less than the 1% of the population today whom the liberal elites excoriate for their wealth.  At the height of the existence of the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics and its affiliates in the Warsaw Pact, far more than 99% of the people lived in utter poverty and scarcity compared to the average citizen of the NATO nations.  Far less than 1% of the people in these socialist nations enjoyed anything like the abundance available in a typical U.S. supermarket.  And the less-than-1% who enjoyed this wealth were all either government bureaucrats at the top of the hierarchy of an unelected government, or violent criminals—and sometimes those were exactly the same people.

What makes this so bitterly ironic is that the anti-1%ers, if they get what they are asking for, will still remain in the lower 99%, while just facilitating the shift of the 1% from one group to another.  And the second group will be far more villainous than the current 1%, because the current 1% needs to provide the masses with something of value to them to attain their wealth, while the regime that waits in the wings will just have to pass a law to line their pockets.  They won’t add any value at all to anyone but themselves and their henchmen.

    Lessons from Collectivist History

      What surprises me most about the current popularity of collectivism such as that preached blatantly by politicians such as Bernie Sanders, and less blatantly by most other political candidates, is that its advocates appear to be utterly unconcerned about the lessons of history that can quickly and easily be seen by examining the events that have transpired in those countries where the principles of collectivism have actually gained power and been implemented.

The acolytes of collectivism almost uniformly sneer at fascism as something evil.  Apparently they are unaware that Nationalsozialismus, is the German word for Nazi or National Socialism.  Before Hitler initiated his infamous “Final Solution” in an attempt to exterminate the Jews of Europe, he executed more than 100,000 homosexuals, handicapped, elderly, and infirm “for the good of society.”  These unfortunates were considered a drain on society, and it was the civic duty of all good Germans to embrace a healthy lifestyle and keep themselves fit and healthy.

Like Mussolini, Hitler made many private companies, especially large ones, into state-run organizations.  The socialist governments of Italy and Germany ran every aspect of the economy.  They controlled who could get a job, and noted that people who didn’t hold a job outside the home were drains on society, just like the other “undesirables” they had already shipped off to death camps.

In addition to the horrors enacted by the Nazi party on Europe, we can easily see the lessons of socialism that emerge from both the USSR and China.

In the USSR, Lenin and Stalin “re-educated” tens of millions of their citizens to encourage the desired kind of “right thinking.”

Lenin is credited with being directly responsible for the deaths of 5 million citizens.  Stalin is credited with killing more than 20 million of his own people, and that is not counting the more than 20 million Russians who died during combat in World War II.

In China, Mao Zedong (AKA Mao Tse Tung) initiated “the Great Leap Forward” to convert China from an agrarian country to an industrial one, obviously for the good of the people.  This resulted directly in famines that killed between 15 and 45 million citizens.  Add to this staggering amount the number of people he “re-educated” to death or executed outright because they didn’t agree with his means, and he is credited will killing 40 to 70 million of his own people.

Between the great socialist leaders Hitler, Lenin, Stalin, and Mao, discounting war deaths, their push for socialism and enforced social justice resulted in the deaths of more than 100 million people.

In more recent times, Pol Pot, after succeeding in overthrowing the government of Cambodia, used his Khmer Rouge child soldiers to brutally slaughter about 6 million of his own citizens, focusing especially on those who were college-educated.  He recognized that those people with a good education were unlikely to accept whatever he said as truth and as right when they had the lessons of world history already in their heads.

If you add in the war-related deaths that came from efforts to force people to accept socialism, you immediately get another 20 million Russians who died trying to stay out of the German version of socialism and 9 million Russians who died in the Russian Civil War to implement socialism in that country.  Add in tens of millions of civilians and soldiers from the battlefields of Europe to Southeast Asia, and you get a horrifying picture of the blood and horror that prevails whenever and wherever socialism gains control and begins its efforts to force people to behave in the ways its leaders dictate.

Conclusions

When government replaces God as the vehicle for the best hopes of humanity, the inevitable, historically proven result is widespread death, destruction, and unrelenting misery for the vast majority of people.

Even the avowed atheist and anti-religionist Sam Harris, in his book The Moral Landscape, advocates that science proves that such a result is inarguably and absolutely bad by anyone’s standards.

Food for thought!

See Tom's political views on Facebook at: https://www.facebook.com/TomSheppardPoliticalViews/
Follow Tom on Twitter: @ThomasKSheppard

Tom Sheppard is a business consultant and coach to small business owners and individuals. He is a recognized author with dozens of titles in business and fiction to his credit. One of his endeavors is to help those who want to see their own book in print. He does this through his trademarked Book Whispering Process (TM).

The author is not an official spokesperson for any organization or person mentioned herein.

(c) Copyright 2020 A+ Results LLC. All Rights Reserved.

Your comments are welcome. Please observe some ground rules. No profanity, vulgarity, or personal attacks. Profanity, vulgarity and personal attacks not only betray a lack of vocabulary and imagination, they also are the hallmarks of bigotry, and bigotry is the hallmark of someone who is fundamentally insecure in their views. Facts are always welcome.

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 Godvernment: Government as GodClick on the image below to buy your copy today

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Faith in Who, or What?

Tom Sheppard

9/4/2020

When God gave Moses the 10 Commandments the very first of those was "Thou shalt have no other gods before me."

Any reasonable interpretation of this mandate must conclude that God was saying we shouldn't put the words, ideas, philosophy, advice, or even the commands of anyone or anything ahead of what God tells us. In spite of that unequivocal commandment our world today consistently abandons faith in God for faith in humanity.  Putting aside for one second the inadvisability of disobeying the direct commands of a being that is fully capable of creating livable planets, consider the folly of putting any faith in humanity.

In nearly 5,000 of recorded human civilization one lesson is abundantly clear and is repeated in nearly every generation.  Humanity seldom behaves in very humane ways.  Further, whenever one group of people have the opportunity to treat another group of people badly, they will do so nearly 100% of the time.  This is a true of the high school cliques of "mean girls" and "jocks" as it is for the genocidal violence of the Tutsis and Hutus of Rwanda.

One man put it very well when he said "We have learned by sad experience that it is the nature and disposition of almost all men, as soon as they get a little authority, as they suppose, they will immediately begin to exercise unrighteous dominion." (Joseph Smith Jr., Doctrine and Covenants 121:39).

Using our history books, I could cite instance after instance where humanity has proven its propensity to plunder, ravage, pillage, enslave, and kill when they might have as easily extended hands of friendship, fellowship, and cooperation.

Don't get me wrong.  I know that the other side of the ledger - the side where people have acted with nobility, kindness, compassion, and love toward those less fortunate also has many entries.  Unfortunately they are not nearly so numerous as the blots on our human history.

My point in noting this is not to attempt to assert whether or not humanity is inherently bad, or good.  My point is to demonstrate that anyone who puts their faith in humanity as the means to make a better world for all of us is putting their faith in an irrefutably inconstant, unreliable, and generally bad actor.

In contrast with the behavior of humanity, which can at best be called fickle and at worst diabolical, the behavior of God is constant.  From the beginnings of his dealings with humanity he has laid out a set of principles to guide us which have remained unchanging throughout the ages.  Jesus Christ put it plainly when he summed it up by telling us that loving God and loving our neighbor as we love ourselves is what all the law and the words of the prophets amount to.

35 Then one of them, which was a lawyer, asked him a question, tempting him, and saying,

36 Master, which is the great commandment in the law?

37 Jesus said unto him, Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy bheart, and with all thy soul, and with all thy mind.

38 This is the first and great commandment.

39 And the second is like unto it, Thou shalt love thy neighbour as thyself.

40 On these two commandments hang all the law and the prophets.

(Matthew 22:35-40, King James Version, emphasis added) 

Today the notion of economic collectivism, in the form of political socialism, is once again ascending in many parts of the USA.  The emotional appeals associated with this movement are cries for equity and treating the less fortunate with kindness and generosity.

Many of those who embrace this ideology believe that if we all embrace the same ideals humanity can cure all its own ailments.  However, because not everyone is ready to submit their will and well-being to the greater good of the collective, those who are holding out must be legislated and bullied into compliance and their "excess" material goods will be forcibly taken and redistributed.

History shows repeated examples of countries where this high-minded approach has been implemented.  In every single case it has either been voluntarily rolled back or enforced by the violent deaths or "re-education" of those who don't agree with the means or goals of the collective.

It is not exaggerating to say that enforced collectivism through socialism has led directly to the unnecessary deaths of hundreds of millions of people.  Those are just the casualties in the 20th century.  Who knows how many have or will be murdered in the 21st century as socialists once again push to make humanity better by exterminating all those who seem to stand in their way.

The irony of the ruthless inhumanity carried out by the collectivists in the name of making humanity better seems to be totally lost on its present adherents.

One of the fundamental flaws of socialism and its twin forced collectivism is that it is based on an irrational and proven erroneous notion that, given the proper external stimuli, people will choose to consistently and constantly treat other people with kindness, compassion, and generosity.  This faith in the willingness and ability of humanity to transform into beings filled with a better nature is repeatedly shown by history, both ancient and recent, to be a vain imagining.

In fact, the only times history shows people consistently showing compassion, kindness, and generosity toward those less fortunate has always been the result of internal stimuli rather than external.

Franz Kunkel noted that in the NAZI death camps, in spite of every possible external stimuli to behave otherwise, there were some individuals who consistently acted with compassion, kindness, and generosity to those around them.  This instance alone should be enough to refute the notion that humanity will manifest a better nature as the result of external stimuli.  However, the evidence doesn't stop there.

With notable exceptions, the history of the people of the United States of America is a history that is overflowing with kindness, compassion, and generosity toward those less fortunate.  The voluntary charitable efforts of Americans is stunning.  In 2018 they gave $427.7 billion.  In 2017 that number was $410 billion.  Charitable giving has consistently been about 2% of GDP at least since 1977.  A survey by Lending Tree found that Americans have been the most generous people in the world for nearly 250 years. They noted that 2 out every 3 Americans surveyed contributed to at least one charity.

The generosity of Americans is not compulsory as it is with socialism.  It is achieved through the internal stimuli that many Americans feel to share their abundance with others.  The socialists seek to take advantage of that generosity and twist it into an economic and political model which pretends to promote compassion, kindness, and generosity while it actually results in slavery, mass poverty, misery, scarcity, fear, violence, and death for all but a very elite few who are running the whole show.

Anyone who can read a history book and think critically should be able to see through the emotional manipulation of good intentions thrown out by socialist and forced collectivists.  The reality behind their utopian rhetoric is a brutal dystopia.  That result has been unequivocally demonstrated in the historical record of many nations.  

Some will argue and hold up countries like Denmark and Sweden as counter examples.  However, if they look at the history of those countries they will see that they flirted with socialism until their countries were on the brink of economic collapse.  Then, they retreated back toward capitalism to preserve their people and their nations from destruction.

The United States of America, and the freedom, prosperity, and generosity of its people, rest upon the foundation of the US Constitution.  Anyone calling for "fundamental change" in our nation is plainly calling for the changing or elimination of our foundation, the US Constitution.

Since the adoption of the US Constitution, it has served as a bulwark and protection of the people of the United States against the predations of government and those who want to rule over others.  Weakening, removing, or dramatically changing the US Constitution will open the floodgates for oppressive government such as we see in places like China, where the government routinely kills or imprisons thousands of people whose only crime is to disagree with government policy.

Our current political choices, obfuscations to the contrary notwithstanding, are between an increasingly socialist, forced collectivist vision championed by Democrats, including Joe Biden on the one hand and Libertarians and Republicans, including Donald Trump who are seeking to preserve, protect, and defend our inalienable rights to life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness.

I believe that the US Constitution was inspired by God.  It was designed by Him to protect our freedoms with a vigor that has not previously been seen in the governments of humanity.  I put my faith in God and a path that has proven generally beneficial to humanity.  That path is capitalism.  I choose that over putting my faith in a path that has proven inimical to humanity and is based on a faulty foundation of human nature.  That inimical path is socialism. 

See Tom's political views on Facebook at: https://www.facebook.com/TomSheppardPoliticalViews/
Follow Tom on Twitter: @ThomasKSheppard

Tom Sheppard is a business consultant and coach to small business owners and individuals. He is a recognized author with dozens of titles in business and fiction to his credit. One of his endeavors is to help those who want to see their own book in print. He does this through his trademarked Book Whispering Process (TM).

The author is not an official spokesperson for any organization or person mentioned herein.

(c) Copyright 2020 A+ Results LLC. All Rights Reserved.

Your comments are welcome... Please observe some ground rules. No profanity, vulgarity, or personal attacks. Profanity, vulgarity and personal attacks not only betray a lack of vocabulary and imagination, they also are the hallmarks of bigotry, and bigotry is the hallmark of someone who is fundamentally insecure in their views. Facts are always welcome.

If you believe Government is NOT the answer to all our problems, you will want to read
 Godvernment: Government as God

Disappointing Dad on Father's Day

Tom Sheppard

6/21/2020

Today is Father's Day.  A day we celebrate dads.

All of us have dads.  It isn't possible to come into this world without one.  Some feel they have great dads.  Some feel they are great dads.  Some have disappointing dads.  Some are disappointing dads.  Some of us disappoint dad.

Some are disappointing dads because they aren't there.  They engendered a child and then, at some point before or after birth, they went away of their own volition.  Each became a disappointing dad because absence seemed to signal indifference, disinterest, or even hostility.

I have heard that some children who lose their father to death experience this same kind of disappointment or anger.  Blaming dad for his absence, although it was due to powers outside his control.

For those whose fathers are present, everything doesn't necessarily come out well either. Some disappointing dads abuse their children.  Sometimes that abuse is deliberate.  In other instances it may be unconscious. With still others, it may be more perception than reality.  After all, what child, denied the desire of their heart at some moment hasn't in anger cried out to their parent, "I hate you.  You are the worst dad/mother, ever." 

For my part, some things about my dad puzzled me for many decades.  Until my own children reached adulthood, marriage and their own children they remained an enigma.  Then, almost in an instant, like a bolt of knowledge from heaven some previously inexplicable behavior, words, or attitude of my own dad, pondered fruitlessly for years but never understood, becomes utterly clear and understandable.  Revealed by wisdom learned from experience only possible by having first traversed all the time and experiences inherent in those many years.  I needed certain experiences to achieve the necessary perspective, or context, to fully understand and appreciate some of my dad's behaviors, words, and deeds.

I know that at times my children have felt they had a disappointing dad.  At times that was merited.  I have never claimed to be perfect in any of my endeavors.  I do the best I can with what I know.  Some things I have done, or do, that disappoint them I am confident will look very different to them when they too have reached a point in life where they can more fully understand the context and realize that knowledge that is hidden to children because of inexperience is often revealed only through subsequent years of experience.  Time inevitably changes your perception of the past, present, and future.

The shoe of disappointment doesn't only fit children feeling disappointment with dad.  Dads at times too feel disappointment in their children.  As with the disappointment of child with dad, dad's disappointment in his child may result from actual bad behavior, from failing to meet expectations, or simply be a matter of perception rather than fact.

In Matthew 5:48 Jesus revealed what is the ultimate purpose of our life on earth.  "Be ye therefore perfect," he said.  "Even as your father in heaven is perfect."

In other words, the natural impulse most of feel at some point to grow up to be just like dad, is the actual purpose of life.  Not to be like our flawed, mortal dads, but like our perfect, Heavenly Dad.

Some, however think our Heavenly Dad is a disappointing dad.

We learn from religion that our shared dad is perfect. He has all-power, all-knowledge. He is full of truth, justice, mercy, and love.

Those who think he is a disappointing dad see bad things happen to good people and are disappointed that Dad didn't use his power and knowledge to prevent these bad things from happening to good people.  They see this apparent inaction as indicating that either he doesn't really care, isn't really all-powerful and all-knowing. They think perhaps it shows he isn't truthful, just, merciful, or loving.  They suppose this indicates either that he doesn't care, or perhaps doesn't actually exist, or if he exists, not with the attributes ascribed to him.

Due to experiences of my own, too deeply sacred and personal to share here, I know that our Heavenly Dad is real.  He is all-powerful, all-knowing, just, merciful, and loves us with a deeper and more perfect love than we can imagine.

Just as I have learned, through decades of experience, to understand some formerly inexplicable actions or words of my earthy dad, I have come to accept that many, perhaps most, of the actions or inaction of my Heavenly Dad will not be understood by me until my perspective is fundamentally changed through certain experiences.  Some of those experiences are likely to include my own death, and the lessons learned will not be understood until after I pass through that portal.

This belief that my Heavenly Dad is perfect and good, even when I don't understand why he allows some things to happen is called faith.  Faith is belief in something that is unseen and true.

Until I can understand the context of my earthly dad's actions, I am in no position to decide if I am justified in saying he is a disappointing dad.  Likewise, in this life, I will never understand the context of the actions of my Heavenly Dad, so I am unjustified in deeming him a disappointing dad.

Of greater concern to me is whether or not I may be disappointing Dad, my Heavenly Dad.  Am I disappointing Dad in how I am treating my brothers and sisters?  

• Do I hate them because they have more than me?  
• Do I despise them because they have less?  
• Do I fear them or hate them because they look different than me?  

Am I disappointing Dad by breaking his house rules?  Particularly those house rules that keep our home a peaceful place?  House rules such as 

• don't murder, 
• don't commit adultery, 
• don't steal, 
• don't lie, 
• don't covet what others have.

Am I disappointing Dad by not loving my neighbor as myself?

Are you disappointing Dad?

If you feel you are disappointing Dad, don't despair.  Thanks to the actions of our elder brother Jesus Christ, we can repent of all our disappointing actions and Dad will forgive and forget them.  Shall we not also then, forgive others who have injured us, and leave judgment of them and their actions in the hands of God.

I am not suggesting we fail to enforce the laws of the land.  Those are given by God, through our brothers and sisters, to keep peace in this earthly home, and those which are just tend to align very clearly with those I listed above.

Enforce the law against unlawful actions.  And leave the judgement of who is disappointing Dad, to Him.

See Tom's political views on Facebook at: https://www.facebook.com/TomSheppardPoliticalViews/
Follow Tom on Twitter: @ThomasKSheppard

Tom Sheppard is a business consultant and coach to small business owners and individuals. He is a recognized author with dozens of titles in business and fiction to his credit. One of his endeavors is to help those who want to see their own book in print. He does this through his trademarked Book Whispering Process (TM).

The author is not an official spokesperson for any organization or person mentioned herein.

(c) Copyright 2020 A+ Results LLC. All Rights Reserved.

Your comments are welcome... Please observe some ground rules. No profanity, vulgarity, or personal attacks. Profanity, vulgarity and personal attacks not only betray a lack of vocabulary and imagination, they also are the hallmarks of bigotry, and bigotry is the hallmark of someone who is fundamentally insecure in their views. Facts are always welcome.

If you believe Government is NOT the answer to all our problems, you will want to read
 Godvernment: Government as God

The Value of Experience

Tom Sheppard

5/17/2020

In the winter of 1838-1839 Joseph Smith was imprisoned in a below-ground dungeon ironically named Liberty Jail, in Liberty, Missouri.  He was imprisoned as a direct result of him doing his best to heed the promptings of the Holy Spirit of God as it guided him to protect the welfare of the members of the nascent Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints.

He endured months of squalid conditions and malnutrition.  At the same time his mind and spirit suffered in an agony of anxiety for his wife and children and all those people he held dear.  He knew they were enduring terrible hardships as armed mobs forced them from their homes into the winter weather to fend for themselves without benefit of anything more than they could manage to carry away in their arms.  The threats and actuality of rape and murder hanging over their heads day and night until they could find their way out of the state of Missouri.

Near the end of this trying time, although he did not know the end was close, he finally broke.  Betrayed by friends and despairing of either justice or rescue, he recorded this prayer to God. (taken from Doctrine and Covenants of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints, Sections 121 and 122).

O God, where art thou? And where is the pavilion that covereth thy hiding place? 

How long shall thy hand be stayed, and thine eye, yea thy pure eye, behold from the eternal heavens the wrongs of thy people and of thy servants, and thine ear be penetrated with their cries? 

Yea, O Lord, long shall they suffer these wrongs and unlawful oppressions, before thine heart shall be softened toward them, and thy bowels be moved with compassion toward them? 

O Lord God Almighty, maker of heaven, earth, and seas, and of all things that in them are, and who controllest and subjectest the devil, and the dark and benighted dominion of Sheol—stretch forth thy hand; let thine eye pierce; let thy pavilion be taken up; let thy hiding place no longer be covered; let thine ear be inclined; let thine heart be softened, and thy bowels moved with compassion toward us. 

Let thine anger be kindled against our enemies; and, in the fury of thine heart, with thy sword avenge us of our wrongs. 

Remember thy suffering saints, O our God; and thy servants will rejoice in thy name forever.

As I have grown in experience through my life, becoming a husband, father, and friend I have come to have a deeper understanding of what sort of anguish Joseph must have been suffering during this time.

Mark Twain once said, "I have experienced many terrible things in my life.  A few of them actually happened."  I am compelled to believe that during this time Joseph's mind must  have been wracked with horrible incidents, both real and imagined as he heard snippets of news of the fate of his friends and loved ones during this terrible time.

I put myself in Joseph's place.  I consider how my mind might run wild with imagining of the worst sort of depredations and oppression being poured out upon his wife and young children.  His family struggling through the countryside, exposed to the weather without him there to give them any protection or comfort.

God's response to his prayer is both wonderful and frightening.

His first words are of comfort.

My son, peace be unto thy soul; thine adversity and thine afflictions shall be but a small moment; 

And then, if thou endure it well, God shall exalt thee on high; thou shalt triumph over all thy foes.

I can imagine that these words gave Joseph great comfort.  But this was not all God had to say in response to Joseph taking God to task for his appearance of inattention to the plight of his children.

Then followed a gentle rebuke.

Thy friends do stand by thee, and they shall hail thee again with warm hearts and friendly hands. 

Thou art not yet as Job; thy friends do not contend against thee, neither charge thee with transgression, as they did Job.

After this, Joseph records the promises of God to bring judgement upon the heads of those who seek to thwart his purposes and who persecute his children.  Accompanying this is the promise of eventual, total victory over evil and encouragement for Joseph to stay in the path set for him by God.

Then comes an ominous lesson and a final reproof.

If thou art called to pass through tribulation; if thou art in perils among false brethren; if thou art in perils among robbers; if thou art in perils by land or by sea;   

If thou art accused with all manner of false accusations; if thine enemies fall upon thee; if they tear thee from the society of thy father and mother and brethren and sisters; and if with a drawn sword thine enemies tear thee from the bosom of thy wife, and of thine offspring, and thine elder son, although but six years of age, shall cling to thy garments, and shall say, My father, my father, why can’t you stay with us? O, my father, what are the men going to do with you? and if then he shall be thrust from thee by the sword, and thou be dragged to prison, and thine enemies prowl around thee like wolves for the blood of the lamb; 

And if thou shouldst be cast into the pit, or into the hands of murderers, and the sentence of death passed upon thee; if thou be cast into the deep; if the billowing surge conspire against thee; if fierce winds become thine enemy; if the heavens gather blackness, and all the elements combine to hedge up the way; and above all, if the very jaws of hell shall gape open the mouth wide after thee, know thou, my son, that all these things shall give thee experience, and shall be for thy good. 

To recap, God says to Joseph if you are betrayed by friends, your life at risk, ripped from the company of your loved ones, threatened with unjust imprisonment, thrown into a hole in the ground and threatened with execution.

After noting all these perils that come from men God does not stop there but lists the perils of nature - cast into the deep (the sea), waves of the sea trying to swallow you, winds blowing against you, storms lashing about you, and all the elements combining to block you.

God then adds, after the powers of men and nature that might threaten, supernatural powers:  the very jaws of hell open to swallow you.

He then delivers the eternal lesson from all these horrible, terrifying, dismaying things.  "all these things shall give the experience, and shall be for thy good."

I don't know what went through the heart and mind of Joseph when he heard these words but I know what I think when I put myself in his place and imagine hearing them said to me.

All these horrible things will give me experience?  Experience?  Really?  Can't we get there without all this horror?  Can't we have lives filled with happy experiences instead of these horrendous situations where it seems all humanity is against us.  Not just humanity, but all nature as well.  And not just nature, but unseen powers that threaten to devour our very soul?  Can't we get good experience in other ways?  Is experience really that important?

God then concludes with an explanation, however brief.  "[These experiences} shall be for thy good."

At this point in the lesson I am thinking, "Is there anyone else up there I can talk to?  Perhaps someone who can show me a path that isn't so fearsome?"

Then comes the humbling capstone.  As I ponder all these terrible experiences and feel the weight of them upon my soul, though I have not yet experienced them, and I feel to cry out like so many do, "Why me Lord?" God says,

The Son of Man hath descended below them all. Art thou greater than he?

I am compelled by these simple words to admit that God is right and I am wrong.  If Christ "descended below them all", experiencing all these terrors and more, how can I say that it is not fair or just.  He was without sin.  I am far from that.  If I had to suffer all these terrible things just to pay for my own sins it would still not balance the scales.  Jesus suffered all this and much more even though he committed no sin.  I cannot in any rational or even emotional way put myself above him and say that he deserved such treatment while I do not.

After wrestling with the emotional turmoil of this lesson, I come back to the point.  "All these things shall give thee experience, and shall be for thy good."

End the end, God will right all wrongs.  So, any injustice I might suffer will be expunged by his justice and mercy.  So, I can set aside any feelings of being abused by these experiences and try to understand how the experience of such terrible things could be for my good?

To understand this, we must go back to the beginning and answer that profound question which has boggled the greatest minds of man since the beginning of time, and continues to haunt most people today.

"Why am I here?"  Or its less self-centered corollary, "Why are any of us here?"

The beginning I speak of is not the moment of your birth, or even the birth of humankind on this planet.  It goes back to before the spirits of the first man and woman inhabited flesh upon this earth.

In the period before our birth in this world we lived as a very large family in the home and presence of our Heavenly Parents.  For an eternity we learned at the feet of God.  We knew Him as he is and we knew each other.  All that we learned there no one can say, for upon my birth and yours a veil of forgetfulness fell across our minds and those pre-mortal memories, though present still are not accessible to us through any exertions of our own.  Although, at times in this life we hear and see things which resonate deeply inside us as though we knew them before we heard them here.

During that eternity, like most children we loved our parents and wanted to be like them in every way.  Just like mortal children and parents there were three major differences between us and our Heavenly Parents.  Mature bodies, mature thoughts, and mature emotions.  Like any loving parent, ours wanted us to enjoy all the happiness they enjoyed.  They put in place the means for us to become like them both physically, mentally, and emotionally.

We are here to become physically, mentally, and emotionally mature enough to be able to appropriately use the immense powers which our Heavenly Parents possess.

Imagine how terrible it would be if God relinquished his self-control to fits of temper?  We would live our short lives on a razor's edge fearing instant, divine wrath for our slightest misstep, or even errant thought.

Instead, he is patient with us beyond our comprehension.  Despite our efforts to reject and offend, He reaches out to us with means calculated by his great understanding to draw us gently back to Him and into the path that will lead us to fulfill the reasons we came into this world.

I have heard it said that the great secret of repentance is that it allows us to gain experience without having to suffer all the adverse consequences of that experience.  The most adverse consequence we could ever suffer is to fail to mature sufficiently in mind, body, and spirit to become like our Heavenly Parents.  The Atonement of Jesus Christ made repentance possible.  Without his atonement, the inevitable price for our failings would be that ultimate failure.  With his atonement, we have the opportunity to repent and put our failings behind us, striving each day to be a little more like our Heavenly Parents in thought, word, and deed.


See Tom's political views on Facebook at: https://www.facebook.com/TomSheppardPoliticalViews/
Follow Tom on Twitter: @ThomasKSheppard

Tom Sheppard is a business consultant and coach to small business owners and individuals. He is a recognized author with dozens of titles in business and fiction to his credit. One of his endeavors is to help those who want to see their own book in print. He does this through his trademarked Book Whispering Process (TM).

The author is not an official spokesperson for any organization or person mentioned herein.

(c) Copyright 2020 A+ Results LLC. All Rights Reserved.

Your comments are welcome... Please observe some ground rules. No profanity, vulgarity, or personal attacks. Profanity, vulgarity and personal attacks not only betray a lack of vocabulary and imagination, they also are the hallmarks of bigotry, and bigotry is the hallmark of someone who is fundamentally insecure in their views. Facts are always welcome.

If you believe Government is NOT the answer to all our problems, you will want to read
 Godvernment: Government as God