Author Timothy Ballard explores the crucial role that President Lincoln played to bring this nation closer to heaven. Readers will see Lincoln as a man inspired of God who invoked a covenant relationship between America and its maker—not unlike the national covenants invoked by righteous leaders in the Book of Mormon. In addition, The Lincoln Hypothesis reveals documented evidence that Abraham Lincoln did, in fact, check out the Book of Mormon as he struggled with making some of the most critical decisions of his presidency. Did he read it? Did it influence him? Was the Book of Mormon a key factor in Lincoln's success and the healing of a nation?The author states, "As you read, you will, like a prosecutor reviewing a case, or like a jury determining a verdict, identify valuable pieces of evidence that can be fully substantiated. You will also identify pieces of evidence that cannot. I ask you to consider all the evidence and weight it accordingly. Through this study, many questions regarding the interplay between the restored gospel and the Civil War will be answered. New questions may emerge that will not be so easily answered. Either way, in the end you will find yourself on a most exhilarating investigative journey."

    ON WINGS OF FAITH

    Russell Ballard was set apart as Acting President of the Quorum of the Twelve Apostles of The church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints in January 2018, it was another milestone in a lifetime of service to the Lord. Having set aside a variety of entrepreneurial ventures to serve as president of the Canada Toronto Mission at the age of forty-five, he then accepted a call to serve in the First Quorum of the Seventy two years later, in 1976, and thus never ended up returning to the business world.In Anxiously Engaged, accounts of this dedicated missionary, husband, father, business leader, and Apostle—accompanied by photos throughout—offer a close-up look at President Ballard’s life, faith, and testimony. As readers come to appreciate the meaningful difference he has made in the lives of the Lord’s children around the world, their own testimonies of his role as a prophet, seer, and revelator will grow.

    But what if we understood faith crisis as part of the natural cycle of spiritual growth; a breaking open to make room for new life and new faith? Join Thomas McConkie in a soul-expanding exploration, where the latest research in developmental psychology meets the Mormon doctrine of eternal progression.

    But for every good guy in the Book of Mormon, there is a bad guy as well—Laman and Lemuel, Korihor, King Noah, Amalickiah. We can learn lessons from their lives as well. Each chapter recaps the story from the scriptures, including the lessons not learned by the bad guy, and ends with a call to action by providing application ideas and questions to ponder. Written in a light, conversational style, this book for teens and young adults is filled with quotes from latter-day prophets and insightful personal experiences to illustrate some of the lifechanging spiritual lessons we can learn from the bad guys of the Book of Mormon. "I loved this book! I never thought that I'd like a gospel book, but this one was fun and actually written for young people. I read it in one sitting! I loved the humor ('Hello, Moroni. My name is Ammoron. You killed my brother. Prepare to die!') as well as the questions to ponder." —Amy, age 15

    Christians and non-Christians alike have joined in praising it as a notable successor in the meditative tradition of St. John of the Cross, The Cloud of Unknowing, and the medieval mystics, while others have compared Merton's reflections with those of Thoreau. New Seeds of Contemplation seeks to awaken the dormant inner depths of the spirit so long neglected by Western man, to nurture a deeply contemplative and mystical dimension in our lives. For Merton, "Every moment and every event of every man's life on earth plants something in his soul. For just as the wind carries thousands of winged seeds, so each moment brings with it germs of spiritual vitality that come to rest imperceptibly in the minds and wills of men. Most of these unnumbered seeds perish and are lost, because men are not prepared to receive them: for such seeds as these cannot spring up anywhere except in the soil of freedom, spontaneity and love."

    In A Witness and a Warning you will find President Benson's counsel, insight, testimony and teachings pertaining to the Book of Mormon.

    This book explores how Christianity began by tracing its earliest texts, including the Gospel of Thomas, rediscovered in Egypt in 1945.When her infant son was diagnosed with fatal pulmonary hypertension, Pagels' spiritual and intellectual quest took on a new urgency, leading her to explore historical and archaeological sources and to investigate what Jesus and his teachings meant to his followers before the invention of Christianity. The discovery of the Gospel of Thomas, along with more than 50 other early Christian texts, some unknown since antiquity, offers clues. She compares such sources as Thomas' gospel (which claims to give Jesus' secret teaching and finds its closest affinities with kabbalah) with the canon to show how Christian leaders chose to include some gospels and exclude others from the collection many call the New Testament. To stabilize the emerging church in times of persecution, church fathers constructed the canon, creed and hierarchy - and, in the process, suppressed many of its spiritual resources.Drawing on new scholarship - her own and that of an international group of scholars - that has come to light since the 1979 publication of The Gnostic Gospels, she shows that what matters about Christianity involves much more than any one set of beliefs. Traditions embodied in Judaism and Christianity can powerfully affect us in heart, mind and spirit, inspire visions of a new society based on practising justice and love, even heal and transform us.Provocative and moving, Beyond Belief, the most personal of her books to date, shows how the impulse to seek god overflows the narrow banks of a single tradition. She writes, "What I have come to love in the wealth and diversity of our religious traditions - and the communities that sustain them - is that they offer the testimony of innumerable people to spiritual discovery, encouraging us, in Jesus' words, to 'seek, and you shall find.'"CONTENTSFrom the feast of Agape to the Nicene CreedGospels in conflict: John and Thomas God's word or human words?The canon of truth and the triumph of JohnConstantine and the Catholic Church AcknowledgementsNotesIndex

    Book by Facione, Mario

    Some were people of rank and influence. Some were ordinary folk. Some were even his friends. Four centuries later, these deeply moving accounts of faith and courage mark a path for modern Christians to measure the depth of their commitment.

    . . combined. A man who believed from a blessing he received from Joseph Smith that if he never cut his hair he could never die in a fight. Assassins ambushed him, but no one could kill him, as confirmed by the Deseret News in 1918, stating he had passed through dangers "unscathed, as numerous as those recorded in the most lurid fiction" after it had interviewed numerous settlers who had known him. Gunfighters traveled hundreds of miles to "get him" - none succeeded. Outlaws actually sang compfire ballads about him. Latter-day Saints are proud to view him as a folk hero. Reading this book allows us to see what a real hero is. Famed British journalist Jules Remy wrote in 1861, "He is the stuff from which heroes are wrought. It is he who is ever at hand where there is a sacrifice to be made which can be of advantage to the oppressed." Richard Lloyd Dewey quotes hundreds of original sources - journals, letters, and court records - some from sources never before tapped - and weaves them all together in fascinating form. In the process he clarifies the controversies, dispels the shadows, and melts away the myriads of anti-Mormon myths. Journalistic, fast-flowing writing sweeps you through explosive early Mormon history with charm and style. He reports little known events and unravels a bizarre yet faith-promoting tale. The Deseret News of 1986 reports, "The writing is slick and the pace is fast. Dewey has done his homework." It's a story told with breadth and feeling . . . the most intriguing, ACCURATE account yet of Orrin Porter Rockwell. Also the most comprehensive, by far. As the definitive work on him, this fascinating, epic biography is as exciting to read as a first-rate novel. Beautifully illustrated by western artist Clark Kelley Price.

    Richard Lloyd Anderson, wherein he presents evidence from original sources on each of the eleven witnesses of the metal plates from which the Prophet Joseph Smith translated the ancient scriptural account known as the Book of Mormon.

    She teaches us how we can ask for angels to help us and those we love; how our premortal covenants can help us make meaning out of the anguishing experiences of this mortal life; how the covenant of sacrifice and the covenant of service, and even the very words of our covenants, can give us access to power we may have been overlooking.Encouraging us to participate in a 21-day experiment that changed the lives of stressed-out young mothers, Sister Nelson takes us behind the scenes into a most unexpected journey she personally has been on, sharing three truths that now compel her life.

    Many of the three thousand hardy souls who trudged across thirteen hundred miles of prairie, desert, and mountain from 1856 to 1860 were European converts to the Mormon faith. Without funds for wagons and oxen, they carried their possessions in two-wheeled carts powered and aided by their own muscle and blood. Some of the weary travelers would finally be welcomed by their brethren in Salt Lake City; others would go to wayside graves or get caught in early winter storms in the Rockies and hope to be rescued by the parties sent out by Brigham Young. The migration is described in Handcarts to Zion, which draws on diaries and reports of the participants, rosters of the ten companies, and a collection of the songs sung on the trail and at "The Gathering." LeRoy R. Hafen and Ann W. Hafen dedicated the book to his mother, Mary Ann Hafen, who wrote about the long journey in Recollections of a Handcart Pioneer of 1860: A Woman’s Life on the Mormon Frontier, also a Bison Book.

    While his body was being kept alive by medical support equipment, his spirit passed into the world beyond. In "The Message," Lance describes his experience in the world of spirits and delivers to us a message giving a greater understanding of the importance of families and the future of America. He was also taught concerning a most important principle of their society of peace, which, if followed by the people of this great nation, would rescue us from self-destruction.