Sparlock is helping Mormons (page 7)

...and the tone I would probably use would end up with me getting chucked off quite rapidly, a bit like eating a Big Mac in Hindu temple. I was looking more to explore what constitutes prophecy, how little information is actually given and how it is often surrounded by odd things.

People haven’t been kicked off the board just for disagreeing. (We’re not like CARM). Regarding your tone, do you intend on being disrespectful? If not, then there’s nothing to worry about. You may actually find that some people agree with you, as we have some ex-Mormons on the site. We also have some people who might have some insights I don’t. But mostly, I just don't have the time to track down all the facts for a debate. Look at how long this response is.

History of the Church (vol. 1, pg. 301). Joseph wrote, “The people of South Carolina, in convention assembled (in November), passed ordinances, declaring their state a free and independent nation...President Jackson issued his proclamation against this rebellion, called out a force sufficient to quell it, and implored the blessings of God to assist the nation to extricate itself from the horrors of the approaching and solemn crisis.” Since the ‘revelation’ in D&C 87 was given a month later it takes on a different tone (verse 1 refers to the already passed rebellion not the future start of the Civil War).

I agree. It does take on a different tone. At the time Joseph Smith wrote the above, President Andrew Jackson had already quelled the “rebellion.” Actually, one reason it never panned out was that South Carolina didn’t have the support of the other states, and Jackson knew it. Nullification wasn’t something all of the Southern states were willing to secede from the Union about. In fact, in 1862, the only reason the South went that route was because Lincoln literally forced them to. He passed a “13th Amendment to the Constitution (called the Corwin Amendment) through the House and Senate guaranteeing that the South would have the right to continue slavery in perpetuity as long as it not spread to any new state or territory. Also, the South would have to agree to the ruinous Morrill Tariff, which it simply could not do. It, more than anything, guaranteed the secession of the entire South.

So the threat of secession, if it had ever seriously existed, had already passed at the time Joseph Smith received his revelation. The Lord also stated unequivocally that the war would “terminate in the death and misery of many souls.” When war finally did come, no one thought it would be the horror that was at our doors. At the first battle of Manassas, in Virginia, hundreds of people drove out in their buggies with packed lunches to see the federal troops quickly deal with the rebellion! These same people ended up fleeing in terror as the Confederate troops trounced them, turning the battles into a bloodbath. There followed one humiliating victory after victory for the Confederates and Lincoln quickly became the most despised American leader of his time. He rescinded the writ of habeas corpus, closed more than 300 opposition newspapers, arrested and confiscated the properties of anyone even suspected of being a “secessionist,” and even issued a warrant for the arrest of a U.S. Congressman and the Supreme Court Chief Justice (a warrant he couldn’t get anyone to serve).

The was a long, terrifying series of battles in which hundreds of thousands died on each side. Lincoln even ordered Union troops from Gettysburg to New York, where he ordered the deaths of thousands of city militia who had rioted over conscription requirements. In truth, several northern states would have joined the Confederacy had it not been open to only Southern states.

Every aspect of Smith’s revelation was fulfilled in Lincoln’s war.

Verse 2 suggests that war would be poured out on all nations starting from this rebellion but in reality neither World Wars were linked to the American Civil War. In fact, if you look at the following info it is possible to see how wars have been pretty consistent across the period. What the US Civil War did do however, was introduce serious trench warfare and the wholesale industrialisation of the process.

They may not be linked in a way discernible to most, but the government that emerged from the United States’ Civil War was completely different that the government that preceded it. The new government was one where federal forces reversed positions with the states.

FACT: World War II never would have occurred had not there been a World War I. Hitler, driven by relentless hate by the Versailles Agreement, which virtually stripped Germany of its power to wage war or to, in their view, defend themselves.

FACT: The United States never would have become involved in World War I had there not been an American Civil War. The balance of power had caused the United States to interfere in the petty squabbles of Europe.

Thus, events can shape the world.

That in the event of conflict the South would call on Great Britain is a given considering the cotton trade but Great Britain didn’t join the war and therefore didn’t call on other nations (its very vague to say that at some time in the future in some war GB would call for help!)

It didn’t have to join the war directly to be fulfilled. In fact, the South did call on Great Britain and Great Britain did call on other nations. And though Britain and other nations declined direct intervention, they did try to break the U.S. blockade and send much needed materials to the South. When this didn’t work, the Confederacy attempted to break it for them by dispatching its iron clad, the Virginia. To meet this threat, the Union sent its new iron clad, the Monitor. Instead of concentrating on breaking the blockade, or holding it from the standpoint of the Union, both warships faced off and wasted their canons trying to sink each other. They spent hours with their cannon balls bouncing off each other. The Virginia thus failed to break the blockade, and the Monitor succeeded in holding it. Had the Virginia ignored the Monitor and concentrated on the vulnerable ships, it may have won the day. Britain also built two warships for the Confederacy, the Florida and the Alabama, both launched in 1862.

No Israelite remnant rose up to vex the Gentiles unless we are now linking this prophecy to the Middle East (!?)

You’re speaking of the portion that reads: “And it shall come to pass also that the remnants who are left of the land will marshal themselves, and shall become exceedingly angry, and shall vex the Gentiles with a sore vexation.” This portion also came to pass in the American West from 1861 to 1876, with the large number of Amerindian attacks including the Seminole war, the massacre of Custer near the Little Big Horn, Montana; also in the raids of Geronimo in Old Mexico and Arizona and of Apache chiefs who attained distinction in their massacres of the American Gentile along the plains from Omaha to the western reaches of San Francisco. During those years it was a continued scene of massacre and robbery of emigrants. There also are similar prophecies in the Book of Mormon where the remnants of the Lamanites will be among the Gentiles as wild animals, and will tear them in pieces. These would be those in Mexico, Guatemala and other areas to the south of the U.S. When the fabric of government collapses during the coming judgments, there will be nothing to keep them from streaming across our borders and preying on the American people.

So there’s no Middle East. The U.S. is the great Gentile nation spoken of in the Book of Mormon, and Joseph Smith is the prophesied “root of Jesse,” to whom the Gentiles will seek as described in Isaiah 11:11-12.

No consumption of all nations has occurred.

Not yet. But Daniel 2 describes the consummation of all nations as they are replaced by the Lord’s Kingdom. Seeing that the above prophecies have been so accurately fulfilled, I’m willing to bet this one will be as well.

There was no point in standing in Holy places since no second coming happened.

Again, yet. Keep in mind that in the Book of Mormon, the church’s critics were positive that Jesus wouldn’t be born in the Old World. Then, the sign was given of three days of continuous light. Then, 33 years later, many of those who saw the original sign had convinced themselves that it was merely a freak of nature. As the time approached for the second sign to be given, they even prepared to launch an outright offensive against the church. But they were caught off guard when the destructions came upon the land as you no doubt recall.

Sparlock is helping Mormons

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