Let Us Be One, and Not Be Deceived

    There is a growing consensus among religious scholars of the Church that the great apostasy (changes in the ordinances, straying from the covenants, loss of Priesthood authority, rebellion against church authority, etc.) of the church organized by the Savior must have been complete by about the year 100 A.D.   More and more, the causes of this apostasy are being seen as internal to the church itself, not from outside pressures (Noel B. Reynolds, Ed., Early Christians in Disarray: Contemporary LDS Perspectives on the Christian Apostasy, Provo, UT: Brigham University Press, 2005). 
    This is entirely consistent with the statement of the angel to Alma as recorded in the Book of Mormon:
     "Nevertheless he cried again, saying: Alma, arise and stand forth, for why persecutest thou the church of God? For the Lord hath said: This is my church, and I will establish it; and nothing shall overthrow it, save it is the transgression of my people [my italics]."  (Mosiah 27:13)
     One of the warnings the scriptures give us, for our day, is to be aware of false prophets:
     "And many false prophets shall arise, and shall deceive many;" (Joseph Smith--Matthew 1:9) 
     False prophets will succeed, in the Church context, if they can deceive members that they have the real word of God, the teachings of God that are correct.  This may be an example of what was called Gnostisicm in the early church.
     Gnosticism was one of the several movements in the early Christian church that helped propel it into apostasy.   Gnostic means esoteric or hidden/secret knowledge.  A Gnostic movement would tend to arise as a subgroup of the larger Church.  Gnostic ideas would identify members of the group as having special insights and understandings that are correct but are unknown (not revealed to/ignored/not appreciated) by the general body of the Church.  Gnostic ideas may have a special appeal to persons who have a high level of commitment or who have an extra need for validation. There is an attraction to being one of the chosen, enlightened  few.  Sometimes a charismatic leader may appear to present these new ideas.  Gnostic movements tend toward creating divisions in the larger group.  From the perspective of persons inside the movement, members in the larger group might often be viewed as apathetic, uncommitted, or even apostate.
    Do we have any Gnostic movements in the God’s latter-day church?  One example may exist in claims of modern polygamist break-off groups, including the claim that they were authorized by revelation or instructions of one of the prophets of the Church (John Taylor/ Wilford Woodruff) that they had special, perhaps secret authorization to violate the Manifesto.  And you commonly see the negative attitudes toward regular members of the Church that we referenced above.
    At an earlier time, we had Word of Wisdom fanatics who may have gone too far in elaborating of what it meant to really keep the Word of Wisdom.  They may have stepped over the line into Gnosticism.
    In the last few years, there is the rise of the survivalist “prepper” movements both inside and outside Church membership.   We have seen a couple of examples inside the Church.  The first is described in a New York Times bestseller memoir by Tara Westover (Educated, Random House: New York, 2018).  She was raised in an isolated farming community near Malad, Idaho in a large dysfunctional family, including a dominating schizoid father, enabler mother, and abusive brother.  The family norms included a prepper mentality, a paranoid aversion to schools, modern medicine, specific foods, and government control.  They had a background in the Church (the father had served a mission in his youth, and the parents temple married)  and attended meetings at a local ward but were quite cynical about the standards of its members.  In this case they did not appear to be a significant part of an organized group but had Gnostic attitudes referenced above.
    As a second prepper example of possible Church-related Gnosticism, we have been following detailed news reports of the Chad Daybell/Lori Vallow missing children/possible murders situation and see in it an extreme Gnostic belief system.  Without going into the bizarre details of the relationships in this case, we learned (from internet news reports) that Daybell who was a returned, but excommunicated, missionary and widowed father of 5, has been pursuing for a number of years a set of beliefs about preparing a group of 144,000 persons for the return of the Savior.  He had self-published more than 25 doomsday books for Mormon audiences including fantasies of a dystopian world wrought by bioterrorism attacks and catastrophic natural disasters.  He had a set of regular followers with which he communicated by podcast.
    As another example closer to home, some of our friends from the temple have been excited about the special insights and teachings of group that has been giving firesides about a location in the United States for all of the Book of Mormon lands.  Their vision of the Nephite lands is that they were located north of the Ohio River, that the Sea East and the Sea West were Great Lakes, the narrow strip of wilderness was the hills of Kentucky, that the Sidon river was the Mississippi, and so forth.  The sponsors seem quite adamant and even argumentative about this concept which they call the Heartland model of Book of Mormon geography.  They sponsor conferences, sell guided tours, write books and have some websites, and advertise even in the Deseret Book’s LDS Living magazine.  Their Book of Mormon conferences include presentations on America (that is, the United States), that it is God’s Land of Promise, about signs of the times, with perhaps some mild Prepperisms.  They seem to get upset if someone suggests that any Latin American locale might currently be populated by Lamanite descendants.  I think all this might have special appeal to Americans who are quite patriotic and America-centered and perhaps politically conservative.  This group makes me a little nervous, especially in the “true-believers” reaction of their adherents.
    Wendy and I say to be careful in who we follow and do not let latter-day Gnostics divide us.  There is safety in “following the prophet.”
     Another warning regarding our day has to do with priestcraft.  According to the Book of Mormon, priestcraft is when "men...preach and set themselves up for a light to the world that they might get gain" (2 Nephi 26:29), that is, when they profit from their take on what the Gospel is all about.  At an earlier time, I felt wary of a brother who made his living taking tour groups to Mexico and Guatemala where he and his books pointed out specific Book of Mormon sites.  We may be seeing some of that also in Chad Daybell's publishing efforts and in tour groups sponsored by the Heartland promoters above.  We might want to be suspicious of a persons's motives and their take on Church doctrines and teachings if they are profiting financially by their activities.