October 6 – Slandering Those Who Leave Mormonism. 2 Timothy 1:12 “For the which cause I also suffer these things: nevertheless I am not ashamed: for I know whom I have believed, and am persuaded that he is able to keep that which I have committed unto him against that day.”
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For those of us who’ve left the Church there was a price to pay. However, lost families, jobs, homes, friends and reputations all pale in comparison to the reward we have waiting for us! If I had to do it all over again, the only thing I’d change is my timing – I would’ve done it sooner. Today pray for those who’ve left and are struggling – they need our prayers. And pray for those who are questioning. You can share this verse with the Mormon and explain that Jesus will keep and comfort them if they choose to leave.
The Church will always have something to say about those who leave their fold. As you’ll see in today’s Mormon scripture they’re quick to condemn even when they don’t have all the facts. The majority of ex-Mormons I’ve met over the years have left because of doctrinal problems, not because they were sexually sinning.
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“I regret that some of the sons and daughters of faithful men and women in the Church should turn away from the truth and should become the enemies of the people and be numbered among those who malign, and belie, and vilify the leaders of the Church and the people generally. But I am thankful that those who do this almost without an exception have made a record for wickedness, for corruption, for licentiousness. I thank God that by their fruits ye shall know them, and that the fruits of all those who have turned away from the gospel and are fighting against it today are unworthy. I confess freely and frankly that it would stagger me and the reasoning faculties with which God has endowed me, if I should discover that as men and women grew in good deeds, as they grew in virtue, as they grew in the love of their fellows, as they grew in ability to serve God, they lost the faith of the gospel of Jesus Christ; but I have never discovered one such individual.—CR, April, 1911: 21-22.”
Heber J. Grant, Gospel Standards: Selections from the Sermons and Writings of Heber J. Grant, compiled by G. Homer Durham [Salt Lake City: Improvement Era, 1981], 37.
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