Episodios

  • Ten Years – A Retrospective

    Ten Years – A Retrospective
    Dec 29 2024
    In this retrospective, Denver recounts some of the many ways the Lord has labored in His vineyard over the past ten years, following the Ten Talks. We’re reaching the end of another year, and with New Year’s resolutions coming up that are generally looking out to the future, it occurs to me that we ought to take a moment to think about what has happened over the course of the last 10 years since the completion of the Ten Talks that were given (beginning in Boise and ending in the Phoenix area), which has now been a decade. It was in connection with those talks that the declaration was made that the heavens were open and that the Lord had set His hand again a second time to recover His people, Israel. We tend to look at that in a very narrow lens, as if everything that the Lord has been doing to further His work has occurred within our eyesight or within our area of responsibility. But there are many things that the Lord has done that made possible His work (but wasn't done by us). It was made available to us by the work of other people. For example, in the last 10 years, we have been the beneficiaries of collaborative, technological tools that make it possible for people located in very different geographic locations to work together in order to complete projects. Most notably, the Restoration Scripture Project was only possible because we have collaborative tools that have been made available that didn’t exist just a short while ago. We have new digital technology that has been made available, including instant communications and multiple ways to collect and transcribe and preserve, publish, engrave, share, search, and learn from the material that we have that’s sacred and important for us to be able to dispense and disperse. We have live video conferencing and webinar capabilities that we’ve been able to use to bring people together in ways never before possible and that have enabled conversations to take place about/in the study of the gospel to be achieved in a way that didn’t exist before. We have live video and audio streaming technology that’s made it possible for covenants to be administered worldwide at the same time, in fulfillment of prophecy. We’ve been publishing a great deal of material, including: A restoration of the Testimony of St. John. We’ve got many revelations from the Lord that have been added to the Teachings and Commandments, including some very important replacements for corrupted Doctrine and Covenants sections, as well as further teachings and commandments that are addressed specifically to our generation. We have had canonized by a vote of acceptance the Restoration Edition of the Scriptures, including the Book of Mormon and the fullness of the Scriptures. (The Book of Mormon, in the form that it got published by the LDS Church, was really taken from a version that got published in the British Isles that contained many errors and omissions and problems, and the restoration project attempted to recover, correct, and finish up the Book of Mormon in the most correct way that it had ever been printed before.) Joseph Smith also referred to the fullness of the Scriptures as being both the Book of Mormon and the Bible as he had corrected it. We found out in the Scripture project that the Joseph Smith translation of the Bible had never been accurately published, and so the Restoration Edition of the Scriptures includes the fullness of the Scriptures as Joseph Smith described it, with the most complete and accurate Joseph Smith translation of the Bible that has ever been in print. We have been able to publish the Restoration Edition of the Scriptures worldwide, including print-on-demand versions [and] leather, high-quality forms. There are apps that have been prepared that make the Scriptures available for your handheld or your computer. There are online access to the Scriptures in searchable formats. There are audio and podcast versions.
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    20 m
  • Eclipse

    Eclipse
    Dec 23 2024
    In this episode, Denver discusses the meaning of the three historic solar eclipses we have witnessed over the past 7 years. If you look up in the morning sky, right now you can see Orion on the Eastern horizon. And that's been true, twice a year, since the beginning. It's been true that all of the ordinances ordained by God in the heavens above have remained true from the day that He set them there until today. They are so well established, they are so regular, they are so permanent, and they are so far beyond the ability of man to touch, alter, or destroy, that the only way to have an apostasy from those ordinances—from our perspective—is for you to forget what knowledge there is that are written in the heavens. But the Lord wrote it there; it remains there. And it’s still yet part of what is to be restored. Well, the definition of salvation or life eternal, given in John 17, verse 3: This is life eternal, that they might know thee the only true God, and Jesus Christ, whom thou hast sent (John 17:3; see also John 9:19 RE). This is the knowledge of the Lord that he's talking about here. This is the day that Jeremiah prophesies. No one needs to say, Know the Lord—for they shall all know me, from the least of them unto the greatest (Jeremiah 12:9 RE). This is what the Gospel was intended to restore, offer, promise, suggest to each one of us. The ordinances that are referred to here in the heavens… If you go to Genesis chapter 1, verse 14 (and for those that aren’t familiar with their scriptures, Genesis is like page one): And God said [this is verse 14]: And God said, Let there be lights in the firmament of the heaven to divide the day from the night; and let them be for signs, and for seasons, and for days, and [for] years: And let them be for lights in the firmament of the heaven to give light upon the earth: and it was so (Genesis 1:14-15; see also Genesis 2:6 RE). And so, He sets this up, and He sets this up in order to communicate things. If you go back to the book of Abraham chapter 4 (and this is the other end of the four standard works), go to Abraham chapter 4, beginning at verse 14: And the Gods organized the lights in the expanse of the heaven, and caused them to divide the day from the night; and organized them to be for signs and for seasons, and for days and for years; And organized them to be for lights in the expanse of the heaven to give light upon the earth; and it was so. And the Gods organized the two great lights, the greater light to rule the day...the lesser light to rule the night; with the lesser light they set the stars also; And the Gods set them in the expanse of the heavens, to give light upon the earth...to rule over the day and over the night...to cause to divide the light from the darkness. And the Gods watched those things which they had ordered until they obeyed. And it came to pass that it was from evening until morning [and] it was night; and it came to pass that it was from morning until evening [and] it was day; and it was the fourth time. (Abraham 4:19; see also Abraham 7:5 RE) This is not a bunch of gratuitous language. This is describing something that took place with absolutely deliberate intent. Everything that is written in scripture and all of the ordinances that were ordained upon the earth—in the heavens—were reckoned from the position of the earth. It's not that the ancients were ignorant of what’s going on in the heavens. It’s that they viewed the heavens as being a testimony given to us on the earth. It is a geocentric; that it is from the surface of the earth that that testimony is written. From the surface of the earth, the sun occupies a space… Even though the sun is over 100 times larger than the earth, the space that the sun occupies in the firmament of the earth is exactly the same as the space in the firmament that is occupied by the moon—although the moon is 1/6 the size of the earth. From the surface of the earth they are identical in size.
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    50 m
  • Corruption

    Corruption
    Dec 18 2024
    In this podcast, Denver discusses the corruption of church and state, how it happens, why it happens, and what we can do to avoid it and counteract it. There are a lot of prophecies that are requiring fulfillment right now that must precede the return of the Lord in His glory. In addition to everything else that you learn from the Book of Mormon, there are prophecies about a kingdom, an incipient planting, a return of a religious body (small though it may be) that will build what’s called a New Jerusalem—an antecedent to the establishment of Zion—and that the Old Testament prophecies about Zion and Jerusalem at the time of the Lord’s return is not talking about one location. It is talking about two separate locations—because when the Lord returns, the sun will never set on His kingdom: One of them will be on one side of the world, and the other will be on the other side of the world. And He will establish in Jerusalem (that is, at old Jerusalem) a kingdom. And He will establish in the New Jerusalem (that is, in Zion) a second part of His kingdom. And out of Zion and out of Jerusalem will go the law and the teachings that will constitute the effort and the government and the society and the culture that’s gonna finally free itself from the toxic influences and the corrupt traditions that have been passed down from generation to generation, being influenced all the way back to Babylon. That’s why the prophecies of John talk about the fall of Babylon the Great. Because the head of gold is still with us. The Babylonian influence remains with us still in our banking, in our profit motive, in our culture, in our education, in our false ideas about what’s important and what’s not, in our desire for power and wealth and influence. All of those things remain with us still today. And they corrupt everything. They corrupt business. They corrupt governments. They corrupt churches. They corrupt society. Everyone is vying with one another to gain influence, power, and in turn, wealth and the acclamation of this world. And it all goes back to Babylon, which is why John prophecies the fall—not of every one of these components of the great image that Nebuchadnezzar saw, but he goes right to the head, because as soon as you destroy the head, everything else is gonna unravel. And he prophecies about the destruction of Babylon, the head of gold that holds sway over all else. Creating unified people who qualify to worship God in truth (that is, knowing accurately the past, present, and future) is an extraordinary challenge. Only God can do it, and He must have willing people. It will require a new civilization. Prophecy likens that civilization to a stone carved out of a mountain that will roll out to destroy all the corruptions of Babylon, Medes and Persians, Greeks, Romans, and modern societies. The Lord is equal to the challenge. He will establish a new civilization. It will be founded on the fullness of His gospel. Lost truths will be restored; the path of righteousness will be returned. Society is broken. Everywhere we see corrupt cultures based on corrupt laws, corrupt religions, corrupt values, and ultimately, corrupt thought. Beginning again requires re- civilizing people. To be free from corruption requires a change in thinking. If the Lord is to accomplish this, there will need to be a new temple at the center of that new civilization. The Lord talked with Enoch regarding His return and started with a description of His temple: For there shall be my tabernacle, and it shall be called Zion, a New Jerusalem (Genesis 4:22 RE, emphasis added). It can only become Zion and a New Jerusalem if the Lord’s tabernacle is there. His temple will be where He teaches all that must be understood to please God. Then, when people rise up to become what the Lord expects, His risen Tabernacle of glory, and the Lord Himself, will come to dwell there. The temple was founded before and will be needed to be the foundation a...
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    1 h y 18 m
  • Discussing Covenant of Christ

    Discussing Covenant of Christ
    Nov 25 2024
    In this podcast, Denver defends the Covenant of Christ as evidence that our Lord cares for, and is reaching out to our generation just as He has done before. DENVER: I got an email asking about contacting those involved in the Covenant of Christ text, because the writer wanted to pose questions to have the text defended. I responded with the below answer, which I also forwarded to those who worked on the project, as he requested. The answer to his question may be of general interest, so I am putting it up on this website below: While I will pass it on, the accountability is confined to me. During the years of work on moving words into modern meanings, I consulted on choices between variants, but the text remained essentially a restatement of the original with all the difficulties of reading the textual construct of the original. When it was turned over to me, I trusted all of the predecessor work and went through the text originally believing it was only going to be a sort of commentary. But on the winter solstice I learned otherwise, and the revelation of that night has been put into the prayer I read at the conference. That changed things. I worked through the text and made more changes to the content structurally, and condensed things that were redundant because it cleared up the text’s message to say it clearly once. I went through the entire text rearranging, condensing, and clarifying often by using fewer words. Some of the text was particularly difficult and obtuse in meaning, so I highlighted the passage and moved on. As I proceeded I found one place where a sentence was repeated in two different versions. The ones who had it before me had not reached an agreement and one of them rendered the sentence one way and the other rendered it another way. I looked at the original sentence in the Book of Mormon and deleted both of the options and wrote it again plainly. As I went through I also discovered late in Alma that there was a missing sentence. I found the original text in the Book of Mormon and recovered that missing sentence. Please understand that I was “inspired” by another, higher intelligence than mine as I uncovered details, such as those I just mentioned and claim that the Lord guided my poor efforts. After coming to the end I went back and looked at all the highlighted text materials and made the effort to figure out what the text was saying and then put it plainly in English we would understand today. As I did that I looked at the text before and after those places and found that it could be improved still further. The first pass-through shortened the text by over 20 pages in the MS Word format I was using. So I returned to the start and went through the text a second time from beginning to end. Then, after completing it I returned and did it again a third time. Then again a fourth time. Each time through the text was clarified and condensed, and sharpened in the statement the text was conveying. By this time the text was shortened by over another 27 pages in the MS format I was using., reducing the text by over 47 pages total, As I finished, there were still some things that I knew needed to be standardized but I did not want to keep the text from my predecessors and returned it to them with instructions about standardization and asked for their reactions/input. They completed their assignment and returned the text to me. I then went through the text for what I believed would be a final pass through, and made still more changes and corrections as inspired to do, trusting this would be the end of the work. At that point I finalized and presented the prayer to the Lord to get the text approved by Him. Instead of approving I was again directed to go through the text another time from front to back. I did so and made the final changes to the text, again offered the prayer and received the Answer. I made thousands of changes to the text in order to render it in t...
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    1 h y 13 m
  • Family of God, Part 6

    Family of God, Part 6
    Sep 23 2024
    This is part six of a series about the Family of God, what it consists of, and how it is and willbe organized.
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    45 m
  • Family of God, Part 5

    Family of God, Part 5
    Sep 16 2024
    This is part five of a series about the Family of God, what it consists of, and how it is and will be organized.
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    44 m
  • Family of God, Part 4

    Family of God, Part 4
    Sep 9 2024
    This is part four of a series about the Family of God, what it consists of, and how it is and will be organized.
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    43 m
  • Family of God, Part 3

    Family of God, Part 3
    May 27 2024
    This is part three of a series about the Family of God, what it consists of, and how it is and will be organized.
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    50 m
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