That same email makes this observation:
"Here in Utah it seems many people who read your blog go to classes and gifted people will DIVINE God and repeat the message to these people. Some have claimed to receive their calling and election this way and have been told through these arm’s of flesh that they were certain people of significance to Christ in probations past."
This too is distressing. Think about this process, if it is taking place: Someone goes to a soothsayer to receive revelation about God's will for themselves through another mortal. They do not appeal to the Lord. They bypass Him. They do not learn to fast, pray, approach Him and become capable of receiving light and truth by revelation from He alone who can save us. They are turning over the "voice of God" to an individual. They rely on another person in place of the one with the absolute right to speak to them (God).
I have never asked another person to receive revelation for me. The only thing that approximates such a thing is the Patriarchal Blessing I received as a church ordinance. Thereafter, all revelation I've received to govern and guide my life has come directly to me from the Lord as a result of prayer.
You will never grow to receive angels if you instead rely on others to tell you God's will for you. They will weaken you, not strengthen you. As the trials of these final days mature, you must have the required oil in your own lamp, and cannot borrow it from another.
The idea of past lives has intoxicated those who preach it. If it were important, it would be set out plainly. If Joseph spoke of it in hushed tones among select few, it was for a good reason. He denounced reincarnation publicly, calling it a "doctrine of the devil" and this was not the "way of eternal life." (See TPJS p. 105.) That is the public standard. We would be wise to follow it. The many foolish speculations and arrogant assumptions about pre-mortal experiences are extremely unwise.
Speculation about what happened before your birth here will not rescue you from the challenges you face here, now, today. The way back is to live as if all eternity was at risk by what you do now (because it literally is). (See 1 Cor. 15: 30.) We are in a battle to survive. There is more than enough evil to be overcome without distracting us from the present challenges by directing our attention to somewhere and sometime other than now. Be here. Be present. Be engaged now. This is the day of the battle.
As King Benjamin lamented, "I cannot tell you all the things whereby ye may commit sin; for there are divers ways and means, even so many that I cannot number them." (Mosiah 4: 29.) The possible ways we can fail are endless. But the way to succeed is singular. There is only one of them and it requires you to follow Christ in the here and now.
King Benjamin added, "But this much I can tell you, that if ye do not watch yourselves, and your thoughts, and your words, and your deeds, and observe the commandments of God, and continue in the faith of what ye have heard concerning the coming of our Lord, even unto the end of your lives, ye must perish. And now, O man, remember, and perish not." (Mosiah 4: 30.) There is enough challenge to do what is right. So much so there is no time remaining to spend speculating upon what past experiences you had before entering into this mortal probation now underway.
Errors are plenty. Truth is narrow, confined, singular and solitary. You find it between yourself and the Lord. Looking elsewhere for someone else to lead you will only cripple your development and bring to you darkness. (That darkness comes just as readily from foolish reliance upon presumably inerrant "church authorities" as it does from "spiritually gifted" men and women when they become the source of your faith, devotion and trust.) Trust no man. Look to God and live.
A true messenger will point you to Christ and seek to strengthen you in your independence from man. A false one will seek to make you dependent upon them, so they may exploit you for their own ends. I do not ask nor want your devotion. I want all of you to become my equal or, better still, my better. I want you strengthened in the Lord. We will never have Zion if we are not equal in all things, both spiritual and temporal. I am too weak a reed for you to rest your weight upon; as is every other man or woman. Trust only God. He alone has the strength to support us all.
