Is our challenge equal?

I’ve been reading a fair amount of Church history lately. As always, I am amazed with the challenges that early members of the Church had to overcome. Houses and farms were burned, they were physically beaten, they were driven from their homes in Illinois, Missouri and Ohio. 1842 and 1843 were an especially spiritually challenging time, in my opinion: how do you remain a faithful Church member when your leadership admits to secretly — and then openly — promoting polygamy?

So, I had always assumed that our time was much easier than theirs, that it is easier to be faithful now than then. But, and here is the question for our dear readers: is it? Are our challenges, though different, just as difficult as the challenges in the pioneer days?

Again, at first glance, the answer has to be: no way. I can openly tell people I am a member of the Church, and nobody is going to threaten to kill me or beat me up or burn down my home. We are in a great time in the history of the world were people are very tolerant and respectful of religious differences. Even people who virulently disagree with me are not likely to organize mobs against me.

In addition, I often think we underestimate the challenge of being a member of the Church during the Nauvoo times. Many of the early members were from very conservative Puritan stock. Many still were against dancing and singing and the like (even though the Prophet was not). So imagine their horror as rumors spread about secret acts of polygamy going on. Imagine the scandal when John C. Bennett, that great apostate and Assistant President to Joseph Smith, seduced women saying Joseph had given him the right to practice “spiritual wifery.” How different exactly was that in the minds of many people from the news that Joseph Smith had several extra wives and that several other Church leaders were now polygamists?

The point here is that it was a tremendous test of faith. I would imagine every single thoughtful Latter-day Saint suffered tremendously as they wrestled with the test of whether or not to continue to follow the prophet. And then, very quickly, Joseph Smith, the great leader, was dead, and a new leader was telling the people they needed to leave and head to an unknown desert wilderness. Wouldn’t it have been very easy to follow the path of Sidney Rigdon and simply abandon the Church (at least temporarily), telling yourself that you still loved God and Jesus Christ but that God couldn’t really want you to suffer and follow a polygamist leader?

It seems like a horrible test, and I’m not sure if I would have been able to overcome it. But the interesting thing is that it is not my test. My test is to be born in the second half of the 20th century. Is my test any less challenging?

Now we face a world filled with different types of spiritual challenges. How do you raise a family and keep in together when pornography and violence are everywhere? How do you honor the Sabbath day when nobody else does? How do you keep yourself morally clean when there are so many temptations that didn’t exist 160 years ago?

Isaiah and Nephi gave us a warning. In 2 Nephi 15:20 we read a message especially apt for our times: “Wo unto them that call evil good, and good evil, that put darkness for light, and light for darkness; that put bitter for sweet, and sweet for bitter.” We are in the times when evil is often re-cast as good, and so many people are so easily fooled.

So, which times were more difficult and challenging, the pioneer days or now? What believest ye, M* readers?

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About Geoff B.

Geoff B graduated from Stanford University (class of 1985) and worked in journalism for several years until about 1992, when he took up his second career in telecommunications sales. He has held many callings in the Church, but his favorite calling is father and husband. Geoff is active in martial arts and loves hiking and skiing. Geoff has five children and lives in Colorado.

24 thoughts on “Is our challenge equal?

  1. My gut reaction is to say now. The greatest test of any people seems to be prosperity, and high gas prices notwithstanding, those of us interacting via the Internet enjoy a standard of living unlike any in history. Additionally, the restored Church is mature enough in the US that I can sit back and not do anything, and the Church will carry on just fine without me.

  2. Geoff, that last point you make seems a very good one. In many ways, the challenges we face today are more intellectual/cultural than those faced by the early saints. It is possible to feel disturbed by anti-Mormons who spend time criticizing doctrine or history, but in many ways, the more pervasive threat is a society that thinks the idea of angelic visitations, spiritually powered “translation,” healing the sick, now you see them, now you don’t gold plates, the reality of Christ’s atonement and the existence of God as somewhat questionable, if not evidence of psychosis. Not to mention our society’s (and I’m speaking mainly of the U.S. here, since that is what I experience) glorification of materialism, our violent entertainment industry and our very misguided treatment of sexuality.

    Additionally, the substitution of human wisdom for God’s is another real threat, particularly in an “information age” where one can very easily consult the fount of all truth and wisdom, i.e., Google. That wisdom does not have the power to transform our souls, to redeem us from our sins. The sense that human wisdom can provide all the answers is, in a sense, a sort of amorphous, non-personal anti-Christ.

  3. I think that then, as now, most people who were touched by the Holy Ghost went astray. And, in a way, many of the challenges were similar to today. As for opposition, that’s always interesting. For many people that drives them out. For many others it creates a bond that is amazingly strong. (Sometimes even stronger than it ought be) But the huge divide between people’s presuppositions and the church was if anything bigger then than now. Yes, today the big challenge is secularism. And even our fundamentalist critics tend to use the arguments of secularism. (They just apply it is a double standard way) Then, there were so many presumptions that the church went against that it’s hard to really understand, given the extensive pluralism of today.

  4. I remember once reading a letter (sorry, it’s been a decade or so and I cannot cite the source) that a bishop from somewhere in rural Utah wrote to Brigham Young, seeking his advice. The good bishop was concerned about the youth in his ward. They were becoming involved in worldly entertainment (horse racing and the gambling that goes with it), they were not following the word of wisdom (lots of kids were drinking hard cider), and he was shocked at the number of shotgun weddings he was called upon to perform.

    I don’t need a seer stone to predict that this weekend in general conference our youth will be counselled concerning 1. chastity, 2. word of wisdom observance, and 3. choosing entertainment wisely.

  5. An Apostle (who I think should remain nameless because I haven’t asked him if I could share this) who visited my family once when my dad was a stake president told us that when we get to the Spirit World we may meet some of the early Saints. We might be inclined to ask them in awe “Wow, how did you ever endure your trials and difficulties and remain faithful?” The Apostle said they will look right back at us and say, “how did YOU ever endure your trials and difficulties and remain faithful?” Both are hard, in different ways, and it’s hard to imagine having to undergo the one we aren’t asked to undergo. That was his basic message to us.

  6. Are our challenges, though different, just as difficult as the challenges in the pioneer days?

    Absolutely not. We don’t lose half of the apostles and a bulk of the members because it is so difficult. Also, rates of full tithe payers are better now than then.

  7. BUT! — Maybe losing half the apostles and a bulk of members as well as lower tithe-paying is a sign of less faithful spirits being sent in those days and NOT the degree of challenge. There’s no clear cause and effect in J. Stapley’s assertion. After all, for how long have the youth been told that they were the most valiant and saved for this time?

  8. …is a sign of less faithful spirits being sent in those days…

    I have to admit that I believe this is pretty much poo and really quite offensive. If you read the stories of these people it would be evident that the evidence is far in their favor.

  9. I also though M* was a place where we could have mature discussions and respect each others’ opinions, without resorting to calling others’ arguments “poo” and the like.

  10. J Stapley, can’t you come up with a better argument than saying something is “poo?” I think there are plenty of good arguments to be made that our challenges are not as difficult now as they were in the pioneer days.

  11. I appologize. That’s what I get for blogging too late.

    It may negate popular thought, I’m fine with that. There is no question that thiese last 30 years have produced the most “faithful” saints in the history of the church, i.e., the definition of faithful being obedient to commandments. Heck there are those alive today who were alive when apostles where excomunicated in the 20th century.

    But the evidence, again, is that the early Saints had greater Faith in Jesus Christ as manifest by the scriptural signs that follow those who believe.

    There is also the whole idea that we don’t talk about much of our histroy because it is *too* hard. Now, if it is too hard for us to even talk about it, what must have it been like for them to live it?

    Again, I aplollogize for being perjorative, but I find the EFY feel-good psuedo-doctrine quite unpalatable.

  12. It’s not EFY pseudo-doctrine. I can provide over 2 dozen statements by presidents of the church and Apostles from the last 30 years that specifically teach that the Lord has reserved his most choice and valiant spirits for these last generations. My point is still legitimate and hasn’t been refuted.

  13. Let’s consider the statements…BTW, if you could provide a list of all couple dozen, that would be great, Jombel.

    Consider that there are probably more saints alive today than in all previous generations of the church combined. Does that mean that the majority of spirits destined for mortal life in the church are the “most choice and valiant spirits?” That is an interesting definition for “the most.”

    Maybe it means there are the most “choice and valiant” among our generation. I’m also a little skeptical because the verbiage hasn’t changed since I was a kid (I’m 29) and I know many who heard the same 15 years before me. Does the Lord keep upping the ante?

    Then there is the whole concept of reality. It seems to me that Jumble’s assertion is that it is harder to pay tithing when you’re not living in destitution; that it is easier to stay in the church when the apostles say one thing and do another; that it is easier to stay active when people threaten your life for your faith.

  14. I didn’t say it (actually no one did — you are implying something from the statesments) — the prophets did. Anyone who can run a search on lds.org can find the quotes. I don’t really want to type them all out here, but I have them.

    How do I know these are the last generations? Because we are the Church of … Latter-day Saints. That means we are one of the last generations. It’s not going to go on much longer. Even from me to my ancestor who joined the church in 1930 there is only 6 generations.

  15. Rather than just hear J. Stap and me bleat back and forth, I’d rather hear what others have to say about this. We’ve heard two opinions ad nauseum — let’s hear some others.

  16. I thought the whole “most valiant spirits reserved for the last days” was pretty much confirmed to be Mormon folklore. Sure, the prophet sometimes refers to the youth as a “choice generation,” but I don’t think that means more choice than any other.

    If you do have examples of anything more concrete than “choice generation,” we’d be happy to hear it Jombel.

  17. Honestly, I think I would find it easier to stand against a mob facing my death than face the concept of being different among this society of saints. The peer pressure an LDS woman faces is unequaled, in my opinion, anywhere in society.

    I don’t know if my trials are equal to that of the pioneers. Emotional survival is my hardest task at this time of my life. I think it’s possible that it’s easier to focus on physical survival, more black and white, than the perils of interpreting spiritual and emotional health.

  18. Which is worse…

    Trudging off to some horrible desert amidst mobs and apostates, (must have been miserable after living in Ohio, Missouri, and Illinois) and doing so without murmuring.

    Or doing the little things (avoiding the sex, violence, drugs, adultery, immodesty, vulgarity, pettyness, and materialism in media and popular culture) day in and day out FOR THE REST OF YOUR NATURAL LIVES.

    Both sound like a pretty raw deal no matter how you look at it.

  19. According to Brigham Young the saints today face opposition that was more disturbing to him, prosperity. Clearly we face more temptation today because we are more exposed to the world. Being in the world and not of the world today is a completely different proposition considering the relative isolation the early saints experienced. It is just as clear that the saints in those days experienced considerably greater physical trial and their temptations were of a more temporal nature.

    Whether physical or spiritual temptations are greater is different for each person. I would submit that just as I have never been tempted to drink alchohol, doesn’t mean that is an easier temptation than the temptation to get angry or even to avoid impure thoughts. Just as our strengths and weaknesses are different, so it is unreasonable and possibly presumptuous to attempt a qualitative analysis of whose temptations are more difficult.

    I’m pretty certain we are subjected to a greater number of temptations due to our access to information, travel, communication, and ideas. I know I saw more scantily clad women, beer commercials, than any pioneer saint. According to research I’ve seen more murders on tv than any of the early saints, though certainly seeing a murder first hand is qualitatively much more difficult to forgive or forget.

  20. Heli and Bryce (#1) both mention something that is very disturbing and difficult for our time: the challenge of prosperity. The BoM makes it clear that this is the cause of a great amount of contention and apostasy. We should never underestimate the tests involved with our relative prosperity.

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