Love Makes a Family and Other Lies

This morning for our family devotional I felt prompted to take a slight detour from our regular Book of Mormon reading and read the Family Proclamation.  I found out a few days ago my older son was having a lesson on families today.  The school district we live in has partnered with a prominent LGBT activist group to teach “kindness, tolerance, and diversity”.  That’s not really their goal though.  Their goal is to introduce and normalize LGBT propaganda to young children.  There are plenty of programs out there that teach tolerance, kindness and diversity without an LGBT focus  I found out about this group and their program at the parent night which was held the first week of school.  As much as we all hate going to those things, it was a good thing I went, and noticed in the display of books on the teacher’s desk of the curriculum materials from this group.  Friends, pay attention, and be “that parent”.  I’ll share my experiences meeting with the superintendent of the school district about this program in a later post.

(Here is where I will also say, I don’t want to have a conversation about homeschooling, so please let’s skip that for today).

One of the lessons this group has provided is about families. Their whole thesis is “Love makes a family”.  According to this activist group, a family is anyone and anything as long as there is love.  Along with their false teachings on gender, we have opened up a whole Pandora’s box of possibilities to be taught wrong things.  This morning as I read the Proclamation, I stopped as the spirit guided me to explain God’s way versus the world’s way.

This is how our lesson went:

“Gender is an essential characteristic of individual premortal, mortal, and eternal identity and purpose.”

We are who we are.  I have always been a woman, and always will be. You, my sons have always been men, and always will be.  We are all sons and daughters of God. And Heavenly Father loves us beyond our capacity to understand. He has made you just the way He wants you to be, and that’s just right.  There are only men and women, nothing else.  Anything else is just confusion and a lie from the devil.  The world will tell you that you can chose to be a boy or a girl, but you cannot.  You are exactly who you are supposed to be.  And you are so good and amazing, you have great things to do in your lives as the men you are.

“…Marriage between a man and a woman is ordained of God and that the family is central to the Creator’s plan for the eternal destiny of His children.  THE FAMILY is ordained of God. Marriage between man and woman is essential to His eternal plan. Children.  The divine plan of happiness enables family relationships to be perpetuated beyond the grave. Sacred ordinances and covenants available in holy temples make it possible for individuals to return to the presence of God and for families to be united eternally.” 

The world teaches us that “love makes a family” and that a family can be anything we decide or want it to be.  You will meet people whose family structure is different from ours.  We don’t judge them, or make fun of them.  Love is part of a family, for sure, but our goal, our standard, is Heavenly Father’s standard for families.  When a man and a woman marry, they can enter the temple to be sealed to each other and to God.  Their children are then sealed to them.  Our covenants bind us to each other, but most importantly they bind us to Heavenly Father and Jesus Christ.  This is why when we die our relationships can continue and we don’t need to be consumed with fear or grief.  This is why we go out and serve missions.  To teach people that there is a better way, and that they can be with their families for eternity.  When we have strong families, our communities and society is strong.

“WE DECLARE the means by which mortal life is created to be divinely appointed. We affirm the sanctity of life and of its importance in God’s eternal plan. Children are entitled to birth within the bonds of matrimony, and to be reared by a father and a mother who honor marital vows with complete fidelity. Happiness in family life is most likely to be achieved when founded upon the teachings of the Lord Jesus Christ. Successful marriages and families are established and maintained on principles of faith, prayer, repentance, forgiveness, respect, love, compassion, work, and wholesome recreational activities.”

In your life you will meet all kinds of people.  Everyone will have their own story and experiences.  Sometimes people who are not married choose to have children before they are married.  This is wrong.  However, we still need to be kind and loving to people who have made different choices.  We also need to encourage people to be married before they have children.  As for our family, as you grow older and your bodies turn into grown up bodies, you will need to learn to have self-control over your body. Dad and I are here to help you and teach you about self-control, and about the changes your bodies will be going thru as you grow up. Having children is a great blessing, but children need a mom and a dad who are married, so they can have the opportunity to be sealed.  We cannot misuse our bodies when it comes to having children.  It’s not right or fair for a child to not have a mom or a dad as part of their life — on purpose.   Each person who is born is a son or daughter of God they deserve everything Heavenly Father has to give them.  Children are so important to Heavenly Father and the Plan of Salvation. We have to have children in the right way.

“WE WARN that individuals who violate covenants of chastity, who abuse spouse or offspring, or who fail to fulfill family responsibilities will one day stand accountable before God. Further, we warn that the disintegration of the family will bring upon individuals, communities, and nations the calamities foretold by ancient and modern prophets.”

Right now in our country we see a lot of problems happening.  People are angry and crazy.  It’s because we’ve let the family fall apart.  We have a lot of examples in the scriptures, especially the Book of Mormon, that teach us what happens when the family structure falls apart, and when we abandon the Lord’s standards.  Again, this is why we need to teach our friends and neighbors about God’s plan for His children and their families.  Our family is an eternal family, because Dad and I were sealed in the temple.  I hope that you make being sealed in the temple your goal too, so that your children have the blessing of being part of an eternal family too.

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Now, I’m sure our lesson from this morning  might make a lot of people “triggered” or angry.  I’m not really concerned about that.  I expect push back from people who do not share my beliefs,  What I am concerned about though, is when members of the Church discount or deny the truths taught in the Family Proclamation.  I’ve had conversations with friends and family who have said, “The Family Proclamation is not doctrine”  or, “We’re just waiting for the older members of the Quorum of the 12 to die off, so that the younger members [an supposedly more woke?] can make ‘the right changes”.  It really does grieve me when I read and hear these things.  The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints is not “on the wrong side of history” when it comes to the nature of mankind, families, sexuality, gender, and chastity — because history shows us that the break down of families, and morality does in fact, bring about disaster.  The Old Testament is full of examples of the Israelites being destroyed by their enemies after they’ve abandoned the Lord’s standards.  The Greeks, the Romans, the Babylonians, the Persians, the Macedonians, the ancient Egyptians, Sodom & Gomorrah,  just to name a few, are no longer empires and civilizations, because they were full of wicked beliefs and practices which destroyed them collectively and as individuals.  The Lord’s standards for families, chastity, and morality have always been the same, since Adam and Eve, and they will continue forever.  The brethren are never going to stray from those standards.  Trying to effect a change to those standards is a wasted effort.

In the final chapters of the Book of Mormon, the prophet Mormon writes about his efforts to lead the wicked Nephite nation, Mormon chapter 3,

2 And it came to pass that the Lord did say unto me: Cry unto this people—Repent ye, and come unto me, and be ye baptized, and build up again my church, and ye shall be ^aspared.

3 And I did cry unto this people, but it was ^ain vain; and they did ^bnot realize that it was the Lord that had spared them, and granted unto them a chance for repentance. And behold they did harden their hearts against the Lord their God.

11 And it came to pass that I, Mormon, did utterly ^arefuse from this time forth to be a commander and a leader of this people, because of their wickedness and abomination.

12 Behold, I had led them, notwithstanding their wickedness I had led them many times to battle, and had loved them, according to the ^alove of God which was in me, with all my heart; and my soul had been poured out in prayer unto my God all the day long for them; nevertheless, it was ^bwithout faith, because of the ^chardness of their hearts.

18 Yea, behold, I write unto all the ends of the earth; yea, unto you, twelve tribes of Israel, who shall be ^ajudged according to your works by the twelve whom Jesus chose to be his disciples in the land of Jerusalem.

19 And I write also unto the remnant of this people, who shall also be judged by the ^atwelve whom Jesus chose in this land; and they shall be judged by the other twelve whom Jesus chose in the land of Jerusalem.

20 And these things doth the Spirit manifest unto me; therefore I write unto you all. And for this cause I write unto you, that ye may know that ye must all stand before the ^ajudgment-seat of Christ, yea, every soul who belongs to the whole human ^bfamily of Adam; and ye must stand to be judged of your works, whether they be good or evil;

We can’t end up like the Nephites at the end, friends, we just cannot.  Mormon has warned us, modern prophets have too!

To conclude, we’ve been taught clearly, by the Lord’s prophets His standards for chastity, morality, families, sexuality, and gender.  Those truths are eternal truths and will not change.  When we abide by those truths, and accept them into our lives — live them, love them, rejoice in them, we are blessed and protected.  It is crucial that we teach and re-teach these truths and standards to our children in our own homes all the time.   We need to also help those who struggle with these doctrines as well.

As I’ve felt the world beating at the door of my home more than ever this year, I have prayed for guidance to know what to do — do I pull my kids out of school?  Do I keep them there?  What do I do when they are taught false things by other members of the church, at church? How do I counteract what they’re being taught at school?  How do I deal and interact with family and friends who think the Family Proclamation is not doctrine?  The answer has been to teach my children the correct things at home, and to teach them HOW to defend Latter-day Saint beliefs, not to run from the world. The other answer has been to defend these things to my friends and family. Our children cannot escape the world they are going to live in — none of our kids and grand kids can.  So we have to teach them how to survive and thrive.

So friends, here is something to think about — teach your children the truths found in the Family Proclamation.  Teach them how to defend these beliefs.  Strengthen yourself by studying the words of the prophets.  Follow the prophets and do what they ask us to do.  We will be able to have a greater abundance of the Spirit when we do these things, and the Holy Spirit will help us to defend and teach these things to our families and friends.  It will not be easy, but it is vital if we wish to keep our families in tact.