Five Priesthood Ordinances Paul Preformed

1.   Baptism (Acts 19:5)

2.   Gift of the Holy Ghost (Acts 19:6)

3.   Priesthood Ordination (Acts 19:6-7)

4.   Administered to the sick and the needy ( Acts 19:12)

5.   Administered the Sacrament (Acts 20:7)

Q. What did Paul do to the Corinthian saints because it hadn’t been done right the first time?

A. Paul rebaptized the saints then gave them the gift of the Holy Ghost, John had baptized them telling them to believe in Christ’s name and to repent, then they were baptized again by Paul so they could receive the Holy Ghost

Q. How does this relate to today?

A. Everyone must be baptized into Christ’s church. It is not enough to be baptized for any religion. It must be done by the proper authority, and by immersion. Anyone that has been baptized before then joins Christ’s church ( The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints) needs to be baptized by water and immersion but also baptized by fire, by receiving the Holy Ghost. This is different than the Spirit of Christ as some call it, the spirit can come to anyone who is good and worthy of it but can also leave. The gift of the Holy Ghost you are promised if you are worthy of his companionship and if you keep doing what’s right he won’t leave you. More on the Holy Ghost visit http://lds.org/study/topics/holy-ghost?lang=eng

Q. How did Paul bestow the gift of the Holy Ghost?

A. He did it by laying his hands on them and by using the proper authority and keys. We still do this today.

Q. What day of the week did they meet to break bread? What evidence is there to why the Sabbath day was changed? John 20:1,19

A. They met on the first day of the week to break bread, it was also the first day of the week that Christ was resurrected. This was a different view from the 10 commandments, instead of it being the 7^th day it became the first. This changed because of the resurrection.

Paul's Visit to Athen's

Acts 17: 1-5,

How the City of Thessalonica Responded to the Gospel

 Some of them believed the gospel and became devote Greeks, some were envious, some threw an uproar and were very upset about the teachings they rioted the whole city together to throw out Acts and his followers, they wanted nothing to do with his teachings and did want to hear about Christ. Overall this city was very unaccepting of Christ and hardened their hearts and refused to listen.

Acts 17: 10-15

The City Bera

 This group of people was almost the exact opposite of the previous city mentioned. They loved the prophets and what they taught, they opened their hearts to his teachings they were thirsty for his teachings, they were ready for it and loved reading the scriptures. This group of people sounded like every missionaries dream, many of them believed his teachings, changed their lives and were baptized. But however as soon as the Jews heard that they were preaching again and chased them out of that city too. Overall the city was very positive in accepting the gospel.

The difference between these two cities is that Bera, the second city, searched the scriptures! They listened to the prophets with an open heart, compared to Thessolonica that didn’t want to hear anything from the scriptures and hardened their hearts against everything they taught.

How Scripture Study Affects Us

2 Nephi 32:3 we learn that through the scriptures Christ tells us what we need to be doing with our lives and how we should be doing it. Scripture study in this sense helps lead us and guide us in our lives through the Holy Ghost we can learn of things that we need to be doing, and the spirit can testify of people that we need to help, or things that we need to improve on in our lives. If we aren’t reading our scriptures we won’t have that guidance and we will be missing opportunities to learn and ways to improve our lives. 2 Nephi 33:10 teaches us to believe in Christ and to believe in his words, which are the scriptures, and if we believe his words and study them, they will teach us that good comes from God, and that we need to be doing good things. If we aren’t studying our scriptures we wouldn’t know of the good that God is and teaches, we would be relying on the world to teach us, and the worlds teachings is opposite of God’s teachings. Alma 31:5, the preaching of the word had a greater effect on them then the sword.

Epicureans and Stoics: Epicureans believed that the highest level of good was achieved through whatever made you the happiest, or whatever caused a person the least amount of sorrow. There was no greater entity then man, what man worked for was what he got. Stoics believed in a divine power over them, a true stoic doesn’t change his conditions but he accepts them as though they are Gods doing. God has power overall.

Paul’s visit to Athens: Athenians were a free people, they lived in a free city state and were free to worship whatever gods they chose, they were under Roman rule so the majority of their gods were Roman. The people of Athens were very wise, especially their rulers, but like it says in 2^nd Nephi 9:28-29 being learned is not good if you think you are smarter than God. The people of Athens didn’t listen to Paul they thought they were to smart and noble to need to hear his teachings, this is not good. They were more worried about man’s philosophy then what God thought. Some of the false gods that we could be worshipping today could be politics, people believe more in their leaders then their god, and it distracts them from the truth, technology is a distraction, science, people believe that they are smart and that there can’t be a creator because science or technology can’t prove it.

There is a Premortal Life

In Acts 17:27 we learn that there is a premortal life and that we all lived there, it teaches us that God had a foreknowledge of us coming here to earth and that we were appointed, or foreordained to come here. In Deuteronomy 32:8 another word for “bounds” is foreordained. For us to be foreordained to come to this earth there has to be a premortal world, a place where we all knew God   before this earth."...may I ask each of you again the question, 'Who are you?' You are all the sons and daughters of God. Your spirits were created and lived as organized intelligences before the world was. You have been blessed to have a physical body because of your obedience to certain commandments in that premortal state. You are now born into a family to which you have come, into the nations through with you have come, as a reward for the kind of lives you lived before you came here and at a time in the world's history, as the Apostle Paul taught the men of Athens and as the Lord revealed to Moses, determined by the faithfulness of each of those who lived before this world was created. (Harold B. Lee CR, Oct. 1973, p. 7.) I agree with this statement. It clearly states in these scriptures, then supported by a prophet that there was a place where we all lived, where we were separated, foreordained, than came to this earth. We have all lived before and will live again after this life.

We are Children of God!

The prophet Paul states in Acts 17: 28-29 that we are the offspring of God, He is our father and we are his children. Romans 8:16-17 restates that we are in fact children of God and that we are his heirs. God cares for us and loves us, He wants to see us happy, He wants us to live this life worthy to return home to be with Him, just like in the premortal life. We can to this life to be tested and to prove that we could have the veil put over our eyes, forget Him, remember Him again and return home. He loves us that’s why we have our scriptures and modern day prophets because He wants us to succeed.

                We are more than His creation, creations are things like trees, yes God created them, but they don’t have a spirit. We are His offspring actual children of God, He is the father of our spirits. There is a purpose to this life we aren’t puppets used to entertain, there is a special role and destiny for each of us. Creations don’t have futures they are created then wither and die. That’s not how it is with humans, we already learned there is a premortal life, there is a life after this too! And we will each go there after we pass on from this life. We are heirs of Gods kingdom, there is no end spiritually.

Resurrection

                The people of Athens upon hearing about the resurrection and how Christ broke the bonds of death and will live again mocked Paul, they didn’t believe him. We know that from scripture study however that Paul was correct about the resurrection. In Matthew 27: 52 “And the graves were opened and many bodies of the saints which slept arose” Matthew witnessed himself the resurrection of bodies when Christ was resurrected. Everyone who has every lived will become resurrected, that’s part of the reason why Christ died for us because only he, Son of God, could break the bonds of death. Christ said himself in John 11:25 “ Jesus said unto her, I am the resurrection, and the life: he that believeth in me, though he were dead, yet shall he live.” Christ doesn’t lie and he just stated that man will live again. He is our perfect example and we are to follow him, if Jesus Christ was resurrected we too will be resurrected. The resurrection of Christ is found in the 4 gospels, Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John to read for yourself if you have any questions, and it can be studied through the topical guide under resurrection.

Prophet Paul speaks again

1.Acts 17: 29 We are Gods children and we should not be worshiping worldly possessions, like cell phones, movies, ect... as if they were God.

We are children of God, we learn that in Acts 17:28-29. We have an responsibility and an example to set for others to see. Sometimes we worship things, worldly possessions, more then we worsip God. During church people bring there cell phone, the go off during church, they text during church. What do you think this is showing our Heavenly Father? Church is a time devoted to learnin of Heavenly Father, Jesus Christ, and the gospel, what's more important? a temporal earth material or eternal knowledge? We need to show Him that we love Him and He comes first in our life over anything else.

The example has been given in church about cell phones and scriptures everyone always carries their cell phone with them where ever they go, school, shopping, home, to friends houses, now what if we replaced our cell phone with our scriptures? and carried them every where with us, shopping, to school, to the park?

We think that people back in Moses time were so funny and horrible for making idols and worshipping them, but do we worship other worldly things more then the gospel? We may not make idols out of gold and silver but worldly possessions can still take our attention away from who we really truely should be worshiping.

2. If you search the scriptures daily, the spirit can be with you, and will help you receive answers to your prayers. Acts 17:11

3. Through trials we can prove ourselves worthy to return home to God. Acts 14: 22

Martyrdom of Stephen

Martyrdom of Stephen

Recently I was reading in Acts here are some of my thoughts and a few feelings on the Prophet Stephen. Feel free to comment or share any thoughts or insights you had on these passages.

In Acts chapter 6:6 it states that there was the laying on of hands, this is away to bestow responsibility, or another way to describe it would be set part as a special witness of God and His teachings. Stephen was a prophet of God that had the authority, keys of the priesthood, to set apart others, which is why in verse 7 the Disciples of Christ were increased greatly. We learn from verse 8 that Stephen was a great prophet called of God that was “...full of faith and power...” power another word for describing the priesthood, “...did great wonders and miracles...” This helps to show that prophets were still on the earth after Jesus Christ was no longer on the earth, His church still continued to grow.

Stephen’s last words to the people Acts 7”51-60: He called them stiffnecked, means they are unwilling to hear, uncircumcised, always resisting the Holy Ghost, therefore they had the Holy Ghost offered to them, like their fathers resisted the Holy Ghost, accused them of their fathers slaying prophets, he accuses them of following their example becoming murders and betrayers, chastens them that they have received the gospel and they pushed it away and refused to listen. Even though this may seem rude, he is a prophet of God and he was being a mouth piece for God, telling the people what God wanted them to hear. What impressed me the most about Stephens last words were that he didn’t care if he lost his life over it he knew that the people needed to hear it and that his life was a sacrifice he was willing to make. Another thing I thought of when I was reading this was how similar it is to the story of Abanidi and Jesus Christ, In Mosiah we learn of Abanidi and his martyrdom, he was teaching and calling repentance unto the people, like with Stephen the people became angry when he told them they were sinners and needed to have a change of heart and repent. Both stood up for the teachings of Jesus Christ and were killed for it. They were killed wrongly without a true accusation. Both were amazing prophets of the same God that taught the same principles, even though Stephen was in New Testament times and Abanidi was before Christ in about 147 BC. Back to the story to Stephen

How the people reacted to the teachings of Stephen Acts 7:54, 57-60: They were cut straight to the heart, because the things he spoke were true, they gnashed on him with their teeth, cast him out of the city, stoned him, and took his life.

How Stephen reacted to the stoning Acts 7:58-60: Stephen called upon God asking him to receive his spirit, prayed to the Lord to not hold them accountable for their sins, then died. He had no hard feelings and he was not angry at the people for taking his life.

Stephens Vision Acts 7:55-56: After Steven was cast of the city, but before he was stoned he saw a vision of God and his Son Jesus Christ, first being filled by the Holy Ghost, this helps show the Godhead are three separate beings, the Holy Ghost is a spirit but God and Jesus Christ he saw, meaning they had bodies. They are three separate beings with one purpose.

Reading and studying the story of Steven has given me a greater appreciation for the time and dispensation I live in and that I can freely speak my religion without being stoned. Rereading that the Godhead is three separate beings and seeing that God and Jesus Christ are made of flesh and the Holy Ghost is a spirit that I can have in me gave me a greater appreciation for them and all they have done and still continue to do.

Here is a link to the verses I was mainly focusing on, found in the Bible, King James version. Chapter 6 http://lds.org/scriptures/nt/acts/6?lang=eng

Chapter 7 http://lds.org/scriptures/nt/acts/7?lang=eng

For more additional insights visit the New Testament Institute Manual http://institute.lds.org/manuals/new-testament-institute-student-manual/nt-in-07b-7b.asp