Questions

         I want to write down my thoughts, for me mostly, but also for anyone that might be interested. Keep in mind that I am not a professional and this will be me venting my frustrations and inner thoughts. This whole journey has been unexpected and very inconvenient. I say inconvenient because I was happy in my ignorance, I had what I thought was reality and almost every one I know has that same reality, that same goal. Questioning the church and looking for answers is strange feeling. I can compare it to the pill scene on the Matrix: I felt like Neo choosing the red pill and being shown just how deep the rabbit hole goes.
          This path is not for everyone, I don't want it to be. I don't hate the church, but I have to have the integrity to tell the truth even if it is hard. And it is a shame that me and every other faithful LDS person that pours everything into the Church, don't have a chance to get a testimony of reality. We have a testimony of a false reality that has been created to hide the shameful, ungodly origins of the church. And on one hand we cherish our history, we rapture at the thought of direct revelation from God to his mouthpiece on Earth and look at the words of the prophets and apostles of today as modern day scripture, but only so far as it is faith promoting. If God's prophet says something to the Church as a whole are we not to take that as God's will for man? Or does the prophet need to distinguish everything he says from the pulpit as his opinion or God's will? Is it up to each individual to decide what doctrine he or she thinks is of God and which is of man? If that is the case than we cannot begin to trust anything but our inner voice. And if it comes to that, what is the point of a prophet that you cannot trust? Why isn't religion a personal, individual endeavor? People love the faith promoting parts of history, and reference them with vigor when it benefits them, and in the same conversation say that it is not the history that matters, but the church as it is now that shows how true it is. Our faith in God and our knowledge of the nature of God is based on an historical event: the first vision. So the history of the first vision, ALL of the history, no just the Good, but the bad and ugly, the chronology of it, matters so much when it comes the validity and reality of our faith that it can not be discounted in any way.
      I have been told that it is okay to question. Often behind that is the expectation that I will eventually have to come to the conclusion that Joseph Smith was a prophet and the Church is the one and only true church on the face of the planet, or be lost. "You are losing your faith." I've been told that many times, what faith am I losing? I still believe in God, I don't need to be affiliated with any book, man, or organization to think that God loves me for me. I feel more at peace within myself, in my very heart and soul, now more than ever. I don't have a barrier between God and myself, no one telling me, "this is how you please God:..." I do not wish to have a man tell what the mind of God is for me and my future, especially when men can put their own twist on God's words or "receive revelation from God"  to push their own agenda of money, power, and women. How can I be expected to feel SO MUCH guilt about not being 100% on home teaching, reading the Book of Mormon, and tithing, to think that those things would exclude me from exaltation is preposterous when Joseph Smith and Brigham Young used the title of Prophet to get away with a multitude of sins. We sing "Praise to the man who communed with Jehovah...mingling with Gods he can plan for his brethren...great is his glory and endless his priesthood...faithful and true he will enter his kingdom crowned in the midst of the prophets of old." It seems that lying, adultery, giving false witness, gross racism, and killing people is okay as long as God provides a revelation that justifies it at least temporarily. After all God's Word is eternal, at least until social and political pressure is too much and He has to go back on it. I for one, am done giving Joseph Smith the benefit of the doubt.