Live Broadcast from Salt Lake City

Live from the Mecca of Mormonism, Salt Lake City, Utah it’s… Heart of the Matter!

And I’m host, Shawn McCraney. Last week we had a wonderful show with our very special guest Sandra Tanner from Utah Lighthouse Ministry. Many of you have requested copies of this show. Available at www.bornagainmormon.com and also at www.UTLM.ORG. Comment on checking history at UTLM.ORG.

Community Gatherings

UPCOMING HEART IN THE HOMES!

This Sunday at Provo Baptist Church 230 West Center Street, Downtown Provo 6pm sharp! Wellsville “Heart in the Home Open House!” February 11th Sunday Boise Idaho Time and place TBA. Shout out to my new brother in Christ, Bryan! Accepted the Lord Friday over the phone with such sincerity. I praise God and pray for you. Brent L C, R and C, Brian and Marcella, Denise B, Lynn H, Ann C., Dale A.

Get your calendars out and your pencils ready!

HEART IN THE PARK 07

Now some of you remember that last year we held an event called Heart in the Park. We want to get a jump on your vacation planning and invite you to Heart in the Park 2007 right now.

• Who: Everyone – Christian, LDS, worshippers of Baal – everyone! (The only people not invited are who???? That’s right, assassins are not invited.)
• Where: Sugarhouse Park
• When: Saturday July 7th (07/07/07)
• What: Amazing AMAZING live music! Food booths and barbeque! A Q and A time An open microphone time Jumping castles for kids. And dunk tanks for adults.

We want everyone – and their family, friends, and neighbors – to attend. Want more information? Keep looking for announcements here and on the website at www.bornagainmormon.com. Also working on getting all of the 2006 shows on DVD.

Ministry and Correspondence

In house guests? Church Scouts? I’ve had the opportunity to meet a vast majority of Pastors around the state and I want you to know that I think they are some real men of God – out to reach people, serve people, help people. I take our church recommendations seriously and look forward to getting out to more churches this 2007. A special thanks to Sandy Ridge Community Church for their support of our ministry. Pastor Travis Mitchell has stood by my side from the onset. I love him, and the work he does at Sandy Ridge Church.

Read some emails? (SEE COPIES) Hey, I want to thank each and every one of you for taking the time to email us with your comments and questions. We appreciate your concerns and insights and thank you for sharing with us. And as always, we are grateful for all of you who support our ministry in so many numerous ways.

Reflections on Mormonism

If a person who had attentively sat through all the recommended meetings of the LDS church from cradle to grave were asked to compose a paragraph, based on what they’ve been taught, how Mormonism came to be, they would in all probability write something like this:

“The Lord took an uneducated and humble boy and amidst great trial and personal sacrifice on his part, restored the true and living Gospel of Jesus Christ back to the earth through divine revelation.”

This is important to think about because in essence, this is how Mormonism is portrayed to have originated. Single sided, sugar-coated presentations of wooden characters are very easy to embrace. The more complex the issue or person becomes, the more difficulty it is to think of things in simplistic terms of black and white. And when complex information leads to complex thought, organized religions are generally not too pleased.

In Devotions Upon Emergent Occasions, Christian writer John Donne wrote the famous lines “No man is an island… entire of itself….” Perhaps this statement is no more true than when applying it to the purposes, perspectives, and products of the founder of Mormonism, Joseph Smith, Junior. In my opinion, and for better or worse, he was indeed one of the greatest religious synthesizers to ever live. Over the next 50 weeks we are going to attempt to share many of the unspoken things which I believe contributed to the “person and product” of Joseph Smith Jr. When I say person, I mean the make-up of the man. When I say “product” I mean all the things he generated then called it truth.

Joseph Smith and Early Mormonism

Of what the church presents to its membership, I believe that Joseph Smith and early Mormonism are representations of, and answers to, a host of pressing 19th-century social, political, familial, and religious themes.

Factors that influenced Joseph and his product include the Smith family itself, the tenor of the community around them, the political environment of his day, and the religious environment of his times. In some ways, it is very difficult to tease Joseph the Prophet apart from his end products. The Book of Mormon is endlessly connected to the Smith family, the religious and social culture, and an overabundance of 19th-century republican themes and ideals. Many unique LDS doctrines and practices originated from practices that had their origins in established rituals of the past. “Answers of certitude” were provided in response to questions long the center of communal, religious, and familial debate.

Influences on Joseph Smith

Looking at Mormon origins is often like looking at a “grand and living three-dimensional e-mosaic” from which a very imaginative Joseph cut and pasted his favorite images into one dynamic and interactive collage. Grandparents, parents, and siblings played a part. Magic played a part. Republicanism played a part. Poverty played a part. Greed played a part. Lust played a part. Culture played a part. Misery played a part. Faith played a part. Deception played a part. Fear played a part. Family played a part. God played a part. And Satan played a part. As you listen to the facts, it's up to you to decide just what it all means.

As a sum of its parts, the “Mormon collage” is truly unique, but the individual pieces are not only unoriginal, they’re passé and unrelated to what typically concerns religious people most – their relationship to God through His Son.

The Complexity of Joseph Smith

In describing the complex nature of Joseph Smith alone, D. Michael Quinn, noted Church historian and author writes in The Mormon Hierarchy: Origins of Power: “Few Mormons today can grasp the polarizing charisma of their founding prophet. Some may feel uncomfortable when confronted with the full scope of Joseph Smith’s activities as youthful mystic, treasure seeker, visionary, a loving husband who deceived his wife regarding about forty of his polygamous marriages, a man for whom friendship and loyalty meant everything but who provoked disaffection by 'testing' the loyalty of his devoted associates, an anti-Mason who became a master Mason, church president who physically assaulted both Mormons and non-Mormons for insulting him, a devoted father who loved to care for his own children and those of others, temperance leader and social drinker, Bible revisionist and esoteric philosopher, city planner, pacifist and commander-in-chief, student of Hebrew and Egyptology, bank president, jail escapee, healer, land speculator, mayor, judge and fugitive from justice, guarantor of religious freedom but limiter of freedom of speech and press, preacher and street wrestler, polygamist and advocate of women’s rights, husband of other men’s wives, a declared bankrupt who was the trustee in trust of church finances, political horse-trader, U.S. presidential candidate, abolitionist, theocratic king, inciter to riot, and unwilling martyr.”

A Reasonable Perspective

Try and imagine, if you can, the things I am sharing in a “reasonable” context. I recently watched a DVD that attempted to depict part of Church history through a fictionalized story. It was just plain sugar-coated and was frankly hilarious. Whenever Joseph Smith and his followers were on screen, their personal surroundings looked like a scene from a Burl and Ives painting. (Imagine the lodge at Sundance Ski Resort or Deer Valley and you’ll get the picture.) On the other hand, the trouble makers in the film – or those who opposed Joseph – were always depicted as filthy rat-men living somewhere along the boulevards of shame, drink, and squalor.

Listen to this description by one Josiah Quincy Jr. who visited Joseph Smith in 1844. Finding a group of “rough looking Mormons” waiting at a house, Quincy wrote: “Pre-eminent among the stragglers by the door stood a man of commanding appearance, clad in the costume of a journeyman carpenter when about his work. He was a hearty, athletic fellow, with blue eyes standing prominently out upon his light complexion, a long nose, and a retreating forehead. He wore striped pantaloons, a linen jacket, which had not seen the washtub, and a beard of some three days growth.” This man was Joseph Smith. And the description is far from any sanitized version you will see in the Church today.

So try and look past the sterilized portraits presented to you in Sunday School. See the surroundings, the poverty, and the reality of the times instead of what romantic revisionists try and make you see. At the same time, we must be fair.

Joseph Smith and His Family's Religious Influence

Rabid anti-Mormon rhetoric is constantly attempting to paint Joseph Smith as an indolent sloth of vile reputation. It’s just don’t think it's true. Certainly, he was a man with weaknesses just like you and I, but history shows he was willing to go to extreme measures and suffering in hopes of seeing his “product” through. Indolent sloths rarely see anything through. Understand, after spending an exorbitant amount of time reading and researching Joseph Smith and Mormonism, I in no way believe him to be honest or trustworthy. But those hateful “anti-Mormon” ministries that use lies to convince people of truths are not one whit different from Joseph Smith who did use deceptions to convince others! Let’s stick to the facts. And when we hear the facts, let’s continually ask ourselves: How do these facts contribute to the make-up of Joseph Smith and the end products he presented to the world?

Lucy Mack Smith's Religious Inclinations

This quote speaks volumes. In the first place, it illustrates that “a right religion” and “joining a right religion” were important to Joseph Smith’s mother from a very early age. This theme will continue to grow and assert itself after she marries and has children. The quote gives us a first glimpse into the fact that Joseph Smith’s mother was very concerned with “what other people say” about her. This characteristic will also play a part in the make-up of Joseph. Joseph’s mother came to understand organized religion from a “family perspective,” therefore no religion outside her family satisfied her. Some records suggest she was religiously depressed. She remained unattached to any organized religion prior to meeting her husband.

Origins of the Smith Family's Religious Interests

Interestingly enough, Joseph Smith’s family was greatly interested in organized religion – either to mock it or find it true – well before the would-be prophet was ever born. Joseph Smith, Jr.'s mother’s name was “Lucy Mack.” Her early life was difficult and painful. Of eight children, she rarely saw her father, whose name was Solomon, because he was involved in great and adventurous business schemes, none of which ever really prospered for the family.

LDS writer Richard Bushman wrote: “Much of Solomon’s grim endurance passed to his daughter.” Bushman adds that “Lucy measured the early years (of her life) not by ‘happy friendships and childish adventures,’ but by ‘death and illnesses.’” Early life for Lucy Mack Smith was difficult at best. At around age nineteen, Lucy sought comfort in religion. But even at this young age faced a personal problem with “which church to join.”

In her biographical sketches, Joseph Smith’s mother wrote: “If I remain a member of no church, all the religious people will say I am of the world; and if I join some one of the different denominations, all the rest will say I am in error. No church will admit that I am right, except the one with which I am associated.”

Lucy’s mother, Lydia, was a member of the Congregational Church. Her husband Solomon admitted that it was Lydia who instilled in their eight children “piety, gentleness, and reflection.” Lucy herself said that all of her religious instruction came from her “pious and affectionate” mother. Lucy’s brother became a lay preacher at twenty and her sisters sought to the ends of their lives to follow the Lord.

Joseph Smith, Sr.

Joseph Smith, Sr. played an important role in…

Conclusion

Just a reminder – Heart of the Matter is rebroadcast every Tuesday morning at 11:00 am. Also, we have a new show called The Infallible Word which airs Monday nights at 9:30 pm and Friday nights at 8:30 pm. We hope you’ll tune in. We’ll see you next week here on Heart of the Matter.

Advent of Mormonism

Joseph Smith Family
19th Century Religious Environment
19th Century Political Environment
19th Century Cultural Environment