- 1. Do you have faith in and a testimony of God the Eternal Father, His Son Jesus Christ, and the Holy Ghost?
- 2. Do you have a testimony of the Atonement of Christ and of His role as Savior and Redeemer?
- 3. Do you have a testimony of the restoration of the gospel in these the latter days?
When thinking about these questions, one thing comes to mind- being battle ready and how it relates to the gospel. These questions are the most basic of basic questions. What does it mean to be “battle ready”? How does an individual, family, community or country become “battle ready”? What are the steps to becoming “battle ready” and why is it important? When looking at an individual, family, community or country, does assessing how “battle ready” they are affect how you much or little you respect them? How does being “battle ready” relate to The Gospel of Jesus Christ and the ‘signs of the times’?
I hope to be able to answer all of these…
First let's define “battle ready” to be simply “a state in which an individual, family, community or country is ready at any given notice to stand up and fight for a common cause.”
Second let’s look at the steps that are always taken to become “battle ready”, starting with:
0. Not “battle ready” in the slightest
1. Recruit/Enlist
2. Train
3. Arm/Equip
4. Determine Enemy
5. Stand Ready/Fight
Third let’s take a moment to reflect on how much respect you would have for someone at step 0? Would there be any? What if they were at step 2? Would it matter if they wanted to fight and were trained on how to do so but were not armed and equipped? All you would have to do is keep them unarmed and they would be of little threat. My grandfather joined with the Canadian Armed Forces in WWII, was trained, and then sent overseas; he was taken as a POW before he was even issued a weapon. I ask- how much of a threat was he to the enemy? What if they were at step 3 and didn’t know who the enemy was? What if they believed “there are no enemies” or “we have no enemies” or “everyone is my enemy”; how could this army possibly be effective in the slightest? It couldn’t… What if they happen to be at step 4 and knew who the enemies were, but they just didn’t want to commit to fight or stand ready? When the fighting got nasty, if they turned tail and ran; what would that make them?
Bottom line is this: if you are not at step 5 you are and will be totally ineffective in every struggle of your life.
Fourth, let’s relate the steps to The Gospel of Jesus Christ; for we know that we are all spiritual soldiers in an eternal struggle for our souls, the comparison should be exactly the same for being a part of the ‘Army of God’.
0. Not “spiritual” in the slightest
1. Conversion
2. Repentance/Personal Sanctification
3. Knowledge/Word of God/Church Doctrine
4. Determine Enemy
5. Stand Ready/Fight
Lastly, how does this all relate to ‘signs of the times’? When Joseph Smith restored the church to the earth, the same church that existed when Christ walked the earth, The Church of Jesus Christ, the steps were no different. Joseph was first recruited by God to do this work, which involved Joseph’s conversion to Him and Him alone. He then had to repent and personally sanctify himself over many years before gaining the plates and the trust of the Lord. The Word of God, as well as church doctrine and lost knowledge was then clarified and restored as the church was restored. Enemies of righteousness were then identified; the great and abominable church, Lucifer, communism/socialism, etc. The members of the church were then expected to ‘stand ready’ and fight against these enemies of righteousness, not in a ‘spirit of contention’ but as a ‘defender of the truth’. The Lord then educated the Saints, letting them know that in this dispensation the church will never again fall apart into another “apostasy”, as it had happened numerous times in the past; but would be on the earth when Christ made His return. He did warn however that members in that day (the time when He would return) would be sifted as wheat from the tares, and a large portion of the church would not be ready for his return (in fact 50% would not have enough oil in their lamps to merit an invitation). He warned that in that day these 50% would not be ‘battle ready’ and Satan and their own sense of security and pride would be the cause: “and others will he [Satan] pacify, and lull them away into carnal security, that they will say: All is well in Zion; yea, Zion prospereth, all is well—and thus the devil cheateth their souls, and leadeth them away carefully down to hell. Therefore, wo be unto him that is at ease in Zion! Wo be unto him that crieth: All is well! Yea, wo be unto him that hearkeneth unto the precepts of men, and denieth the power of God, and the gift of the Holy Ghost! Yea, wo be unto him that saith: We have received, and we need no more!”
We have seen from the time The Church of Jesus Christ was restored to this very day, the state of “God’s Army” slowly degrading from step, to step, to step. Most members of the church today do not remember (or care to remember) the chilling words of Prophet Ezra Taft Benson when he said: “No true Latter-day Saint and no true American can be a socialist or a communist.” Or the words of Prophet David O. McKay when he said: “The conflict between communism and freedom is the problem of our time. It overshadows all other problems. This conflict mirrors our age, its toils, its tensions, its troubles, and its tasks. On the outcome of this conflict depends the future of mankind.” This is reflected currently by so many of the members of the church being ‘in favor of socialized-medicine’; sadly they are at step 2 in being “Battle Ready”. We have fallen so far as a church that the Prophets and Apostles can only talk to us at general conference about steps 1 and maybe 2 now- if we are lucky we might hear some talks geared towards people at step 3. You will notice if you go back and read the words of the prophets from Joseph Smith to today, that the focuses of the talks slowly degrade from step 5, to now being at an all time low- step 1. Elder Jeffrey R. Holland just gave us as members of the church one of the loudest warning shouts of our time when he spoke at a missionary conference now full of brand new missionaries (an explosion of missionaries due to the age on missionaries being changed) and told them; “If you spend your entire mission and only manage to convert yourself, your mission will be a success…”
We are at stage 0 as a church now, and if missionaries can only get to step 1 on their mission, it will be a successful mission… We are not “Battle Ready” and Lucifer knows it; what’s scarier still is that Jesus knows it. Be ready because we are in the last days…
I hope to be able to answer all of these…
First let's define “battle ready” to be simply “a state in which an individual, family, community or country is ready at any given notice to stand up and fight for a common cause.”
Second let’s look at the steps that are always taken to become “battle ready”, starting with:
0. Not “battle ready” in the slightest
1. Recruit/Enlist
2. Train
3. Arm/Equip
4. Determine Enemy
5. Stand Ready/Fight
Third let’s take a moment to reflect on how much respect you would have for someone at step 0? Would there be any? What if they were at step 2? Would it matter if they wanted to fight and were trained on how to do so but were not armed and equipped? All you would have to do is keep them unarmed and they would be of little threat. My grandfather joined with the Canadian Armed Forces in WWII, was trained, and then sent overseas; he was taken as a POW before he was even issued a weapon. I ask- how much of a threat was he to the enemy? What if they were at step 3 and didn’t know who the enemy was? What if they believed “there are no enemies” or “we have no enemies” or “everyone is my enemy”; how could this army possibly be effective in the slightest? It couldn’t… What if they happen to be at step 4 and knew who the enemies were, but they just didn’t want to commit to fight or stand ready? When the fighting got nasty, if they turned tail and ran; what would that make them?
Bottom line is this: if you are not at step 5 you are and will be totally ineffective in every struggle of your life.
Fourth, let’s relate the steps to The Gospel of Jesus Christ; for we know that we are all spiritual soldiers in an eternal struggle for our souls, the comparison should be exactly the same for being a part of the ‘Army of God’.
0. Not “spiritual” in the slightest
1. Conversion
2. Repentance/Personal Sanctification
3. Knowledge/Word of God/Church Doctrine
4. Determine Enemy
5. Stand Ready/Fight
Lastly, how does this all relate to ‘signs of the times’? When Joseph Smith restored the church to the earth, the same church that existed when Christ walked the earth, The Church of Jesus Christ, the steps were no different. Joseph was first recruited by God to do this work, which involved Joseph’s conversion to Him and Him alone. He then had to repent and personally sanctify himself over many years before gaining the plates and the trust of the Lord. The Word of God, as well as church doctrine and lost knowledge was then clarified and restored as the church was restored. Enemies of righteousness were then identified; the great and abominable church, Lucifer, communism/socialism, etc. The members of the church were then expected to ‘stand ready’ and fight against these enemies of righteousness, not in a ‘spirit of contention’ but as a ‘defender of the truth’. The Lord then educated the Saints, letting them know that in this dispensation the church will never again fall apart into another “apostasy”, as it had happened numerous times in the past; but would be on the earth when Christ made His return. He did warn however that members in that day (the time when He would return) would be sifted as wheat from the tares, and a large portion of the church would not be ready for his return (in fact 50% would not have enough oil in their lamps to merit an invitation). He warned that in that day these 50% would not be ‘battle ready’ and Satan and their own sense of security and pride would be the cause: “and others will he [Satan] pacify, and lull them away into carnal security, that they will say: All is well in Zion; yea, Zion prospereth, all is well—and thus the devil cheateth their souls, and leadeth them away carefully down to hell. Therefore, wo be unto him that is at ease in Zion! Wo be unto him that crieth: All is well! Yea, wo be unto him that hearkeneth unto the precepts of men, and denieth the power of God, and the gift of the Holy Ghost! Yea, wo be unto him that saith: We have received, and we need no more!”
We have seen from the time The Church of Jesus Christ was restored to this very day, the state of “God’s Army” slowly degrading from step, to step, to step. Most members of the church today do not remember (or care to remember) the chilling words of Prophet Ezra Taft Benson when he said: “No true Latter-day Saint and no true American can be a socialist or a communist.” Or the words of Prophet David O. McKay when he said: “The conflict between communism and freedom is the problem of our time. It overshadows all other problems. This conflict mirrors our age, its toils, its tensions, its troubles, and its tasks. On the outcome of this conflict depends the future of mankind.” This is reflected currently by so many of the members of the church being ‘in favor of socialized-medicine’; sadly they are at step 2 in being “Battle Ready”. We have fallen so far as a church that the Prophets and Apostles can only talk to us at general conference about steps 1 and maybe 2 now- if we are lucky we might hear some talks geared towards people at step 3. You will notice if you go back and read the words of the prophets from Joseph Smith to today, that the focuses of the talks slowly degrade from step 5, to now being at an all time low- step 1. Elder Jeffrey R. Holland just gave us as members of the church one of the loudest warning shouts of our time when he spoke at a missionary conference now full of brand new missionaries (an explosion of missionaries due to the age on missionaries being changed) and told them; “If you spend your entire mission and only manage to convert yourself, your mission will be a success…”
We are at stage 0 as a church now, and if missionaries can only get to step 1 on their mission, it will be a successful mission… We are not “Battle Ready” and Lucifer knows it; what’s scarier still is that Jesus knows it. Be ready because we are in the last days…