The Fullness of the Gospel

by Gay N. Blanchard – Fall 2014

“Which is the true church – which one should I join?” This simple prayer was the beginning of God’s revelations, through Joseph Smith, which restored the fulness of the gospel of Jesus Christ. “ And for this cause, that men might be made partakers of the glories which were to be revealed, the Lord sent forth the fulness of his gospel, his everlasting covenant”. ( D.&C.133:57)

I was born into a family that belonged to the resultant Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day-Saints, with a heritage on both sides of the family of pioneers who crossed oceans, dusty plains, and sacrificed much in their quest for Zion. I inherited some of their zeal. Even as a child, I was more spiritually oriented than most people in the church, where all of us lived in the law of obedience and sacrifice, or the telestial law of justice. I first learned about this law when I went to the temple to be married at age 20. As the temple ceremony proceeded through different rooms, I learned about other progressively important laws, and I took the whole ritual seriously. I needed to understand what all those strange symbols meant.

I tried diligently to keep all the commandments and obey all the lessons that were taught in church classes and sermons which I attended regularly. I eagerly accepted all church callings made by the bishop, and in each one I endeavored to go “the second mile” in living and preaching the gospel as I understood it. At this time in my life, the only relationship I had with Christ was the fear that I wasn’t good enough yet to have a relationship with Him. Still, I was wholeheartedly committed in my desire to get back home to God. I asked the hard questions.

THE MYSTERIES

Don’t delve into the mysteries,

thy counseled.

I tried to be obedient,

but questions kept popping into my mind --

questions that didn’t seem

mysterious at all,

but simply necessary

to one’s progress

in the eternal plan.

Don’t delve into the mysteries,

they warned.

Why not?

What are the mysteries?

popped into my mind.

Isn’t every question a mystery

until one has studied out the answer?

And then isn’t that mystery

transformed into knowledge?

And they counseled me to

seek knowledge.

One of the things my teachers kept reiterating was the need to work hard enough to make myself worthy of promised blessings; to work hard enough to earn the Lord’s grace. Many long years into this struggle I faced the fact that no matter how hard I worked, no matter how hard I tried to make myself worthy, I still didn’t feel any closer to God (depression in Mormon women?). It was a losing battle. I was a failure.

“I can’t do it!” I said to God. “Help me!”

Soon after that, as I was simply going about my daily housework, a miracle happened.I heard a voice say, “You are worthy! You are worth my life!” I knew it was Jesus Christ, and suddenly I felt his love wash through me and quicken me with light. I felt worthy. I felt how much Christ loves me as an individual; in return I felt an overwhelming love for Him. It changed my life. (“We love him, because he first loved us).” (I John 4:19)

One insight which came to me was that I had finally received the gift of grace that Jesus Christ had been offering me all my life, but which I had been taught I had to work to attain. Part of the miracle of this experience was to understand that you can’t earn a gift. You can earn wages, good grades, reputations. But gifts must be received. Faith, hope, forgiveness, grace, love -- all the gifts of God -- must be received first; then we can give purely. It was a revelation to me that the whole purpose of the law of obedience is to prove to us that we can’t keep all of it. Realizing this, after years of struggle, will bring us to our knees with a broken heart and a contrite spirit. Only then can the Lord lift us into His higher law.

I was so filled with joy and enthusiasm at learning these things that I wanted to share my new insights with others. Surely all my Mormon friends would want to hear this good news. The whole world would want to hear it. In 1973 I had a book published with the hope that it would appeal to what we then called the hippie generation; the gist of it was that if they seriously wanted the peace, freedom, and love their banners proclaimed, they should turn to Christ. There they would find the truths they sought. The book was marketed by the LDS publisher Bookcraft. The first edition quickly sold out. I received a letter from the publisher saying that they wanted to print another edition and put it as an alternate on their Book Club list.

This never happened. Instead, the bishop called in my husband and told him I was writing “Fawn-Brodie-type books. When my husband asked, “Have you read any of the things my wife has written?” the bishop answered, “No.” I’m sure he had never read Ms. Brodie’s books either, or he couldn’t have made such a ridiculous comparison. In this interview my husband told the bishop that it would be unnecessary and wrong to discipline me.

This was the first clue I had that General Authorities were aware of my existence, since they are the ones who control what church-oriented presses, even theoretically independent companies like Bookcraft are allowed to publish. I deduced that they had given Bookcraftinstructions not to reprint my book, and notified my stake president to keep an eye on me. He would have delegated that job to my bishop.

The second clue I had was when an influential (but manic-depressive) friend told me that she had gone to Apostle Mark E. Petersen to repent of her sins, and at his request had given him the names and writings of her close friends.

The bishop called me in a couple of times and asked me about a “group” I belonged to. I told him I didn’t know what he was talking about, which was the truth. In these interviews I fervently bore my testimony of Jesus Christ; the bishop repeatedly told me I was deceived.

When my father, who lived in the same ward as my husband and me, learned that the bishop was investigating me, he requested an interview to inform the bishop of my loyalty to the church and tell him that to convene a court would be a mistake. He came away from that meeting assured that the bishop had valued his reasoning and would not hold a court.

However, when Christ lifted me from the law of obedience and sacrifice into the law of His gospel, the sacrifice I had to make was my good standing in the church. The bishop sent me a summons to a bishop’s court on the grounds of (1) not sustaining the Brethren, (2) preaching false doctrine, and (3) claiming revelation for others -- three things that were listed in the bishop’s manual as excommunicable offenses. The court, however, did not directly address any of the three charges. Instead the bishop brought in ward members to testify that I had upset them in one way or another. He also read a paper I had written about our love for Christ,and asked me if I had written it. I said, “Yes.” He didn’t pursue it any further. But I knew he must have gotten the paper from Mark E. Petersen, since my manic-depressive friend was one of the only two people I had given it to.

I received the verdict in another letter: excommunication. It was not really a surprise, since my accuser was also my judge. My father was the church’s landscape architect, had served as a bishop, as a stake president, and was then a stake patriarch. At the time of this court he was in Washington D.C. landscaping the grounds of the new temple. He flew home immediately, and along with my husband, whose callings had included bishop and stake high councilman, wrote an appeal, which they gave to the bishop.

When the bishop ignored the counsel of these two faithful experienced men, both of them were bitterly disappointed. I, myself, would never have appealed the bishop’s decision, since I believed that he investigated me at the request of at least one witch-hunting apostle, so an appeal would be fruitless. When I questioned the bishop and stake president about where their instructions came from, they always protected their higher-in-authority priesthood brethren with the reply, “That’s confidential.”

In those days excommunications were announced in priesthood meeting, but not if an appeal was pending. Nevertheless, the following Sunday the bishop got up and announced that I had been excommunicated, “for behavior unbecoming a member of the church.” That announcement activated the Mormon grapevine. By that afternoon the whole stake was buzzing with speculation about what I might have said or done. Some of the ridiculous gossip that got back to me was that I had started my own church; that I belonged to a polygamist cult; that I was telling the apostles how to run the church; and of course, that I had committed adultery.

The bishop’s handbook of instructions specified that the high council court should be held within two weeks to hear the appeal. In fact it was not held for six months. The stake president seemed unsure of how to proceed, but tried to pay attention to my complaints about how the bishop’s court had been handled.

The appeal court lasted three tense nights. At this court I gave a long impassioned defense of myself, refuting the bishop’s accusations. Many relatives testified on my behalf. My husband, who felt that his priesthood authority was as valid as anyone’s, was sure his brothers in the priesthood would believe his testimony that I was innocent, and would exonerate me. My father gave a lengthy diatribe against the bishop, and praised me. My daughter reminded the court of Joseph Smith’s warning that it would be better to let ten guilty men go free than to convict one innocent one. My cousin recalled that one of his ancestors had quarreled with Brigham Young and been excommunicated, and how a large posterity had fallen away from the church in consequence; he urged the court not to do that to my family. My unstable friend, who had testified against me at the bishop’s court, testified for me at this one. The stake president, of course, called witnesses of his own, who told their own stories.

Ultimately my sentence was changed from excommunication to disfellowshipment. This change in the verdict was never announced. I am still shunned by people who gloated over rumors they had gladly shared and passed on, often with embellishments, in 1976.

My father, whose personal identity depended on the integrity of the General Authorities, still believed that only the bishop was to blame. Taking the position “he doesn’t deserve to be called by that sacred name,” my father refused to attend our same ward. Until his death ten years later, he, as a widower, attended a Single’s Ward that met in the same building. My husband, a practical man who had never before questioned that it was right and safe to follow his priesthood leaders, was so shaken by what had happened that, until his death 28 years later, he never paid another cent of tithing, and gradually became almost inactive.

I had moved into the terrestrial room, not symbolically but actually, in real life. I gratefully found myself serving under the law of the gospel of Jesus Christ, the law of mercy. It was a wonderful place to be, but lonely at first, since my familiar life of church activity was gone. After awhile though, the empty places were filled, as I learned more about this new law.

Jesus said that He didn’t come to destroy the law, but to fulfill it. Fulfillment means to come to fruition. The letter of the law comes to fruition in the spirit of the law; the hard seed ripens into sweet, mellow fruit. Where the letter is harsh, the spirit is kind. Where the letter is demanding, the spirit is generous. Where the letter is condemning, the spirit is forgiving. Where the letter insists on works, the spirit understands faith. Where the letter is controlled by fear(obey or you won’t go to heaven), the spirit is sustained by love (you are free to be your beautiful self). In letter-of-the-law actions we try hard to follow Christ’s example, but always fail. In the spirit it becomes our nature to be merciful, and that is as close as mortals can come to following Christ’s example.

After about a year had passed, and my youngest son was preparing to go on a mission, I asked to be reinstated, because I wanted to go to the temple with him. Perhaps some of the people involved were ashamed of what they had done to me, because I was reinstated without question and given a temple recommend by the new bishop. That is the last time I was in the temple. I understand the ceremony has been changed some since then, but I believe it still symbolically includes progress through several kingdoms, each with its own laws.

After this experience I tried a few times to go back to church, but found it extremely difficult to sit through letter-of-the-law sermons, when I understood a higher law. I tried to keep my thoughts to myself, but couldn’t always succeed. A friend told me that one of the Relief Society teachers had said, “Every time that --------raises her hand, I am just terrified!” At that point I withdrew from activity, because I am not the kind of person who likes to terrify others. I continued to ask the hard questions and to pray that the mysteries would become knowledge for me.

BLIND OBEDIENCE

I find something

frightening

in the admonition to

Follow the prophet!

If he leads you astray,

he’ll be accountable

not you.

Maybe he’d be accountable.

But I’d be

a                         a

      s     t                    y

                    r                     

That’s not where I want to be.

And another thing:

Since the Prophet admits he is not infallible,

how can we know when to separate

the Prophet

from

the arm of flesh

in whom we are

not

supposed to put our trust?

If to follow blindly were good advice,

where would be agency?

How would a virgin get any

oil in her lamp?

I couldn’t now say that I whole-heartedly sustained the brethren. I sustained them in righteousness, but I believed it to be my responsibility to determine what of their counsel was right or wrong for me. I wanted oil in my lamp. I could love them, as good men trying to do the best they knew how. But I could not sustain their behavior in insisting that all acceptable members of the church remain, literally, in the telestial room, when I knew from experience that there was so much more to the gospel of Jesus Christ than that. Remembering how eager I was to share my spiritual experiences with others, I decided that the men who ruled the church must all be stuck in the law of obedience; otherwise, they would surely preach sermons on how to let Christ lift us into higher law.

I would never knowingly teach false doctrine. But it now felt false to have taught that church ordinances are necessary to seal blessings – since I had experienced that those physical ordinances are only symbolic of actual spiritual happenings, which are sealed only by the pure love of Christ. Many of the other things I had believed and taught when in the law of obedience now felt less than true. It frightened me that the brethren saw the wonderful new things I had learned as false doctrine.

I have never been an active “feminist,” but I am a thinking, feeling, questioning woman. This is what I learned about women and the priesthood: There are two kinds of priesthood power; the first is temporal letter-of-the-law authority, which is corruptible; the second is spiritual love-energy, which is not. In this world it is easier for men to obtain (and corrupt) the former, but it is easier for women to receive the latter. The priesthood power I have received is sacred to me.

TO ADAM

Adam, Adam,

you left the garden in too much haste,

shamed, looking down,

in too much dread and fear.

You left too quickly, guiltily,

not noticing that shades of Eden still were near.

By the sweat of thy face

all the days of thy life!

was ringing in your ear,

so when in tenderness God spoke

you’d gone too far to hear.

But Eve,

lingering to smell one rose

to touch with love one soft-nosed deer

and listen to the singing voices one last time

heard the voice clear . . .

heard the anguished cry a Father breathes,

sending His beloved children forth

to learn of joy through learning trials.

Eve felt the shudder sob through Eden’s aisles

as God cried out His promise of reprieve,

Here is the key. Oh, use it, please receive

the pure love that will bring you home.

Lo, I am with you ‘til the end of time.

Oh Adam,

if only you had heard.

If even now you’d listen to His word,

and stop your sweat-stained labors to look up,

perhaps you’d dare to drink from His full cup,

and use the key He tenders to your hand,

to open by His love the Promised Land.

At this time in my life I knew myself to be a true follower of Christ (not the pretend follower I had been under the law of obedience), and Mormon’s words, where he elaborated on Paul’s sermon about faith, hope and charity, became vital to me.

“But charity is the pure love of Christ, and it endureth forever; and whoso is found possessed of it at the last day, it shall be well with him. Wherefore, my beloved . . .
pray unto the Father with all the energy of heart, that ye may be filled with this love,
which He hath bestowed upon all who are true followers of His son, Jesus Christ . . .”
(Moroni 7:47-48)


I did pray with all the energy of my heart to be filled with the pure love of Christ, and true to His word, the Father bestowed it upon me. Now I live in the celestial law of love. My home is a holy place where God’s love radiates. As of this writing, I have 53 direct descendants. Only eleven of them are active in the Mormon church, (my cousin’s prediction came true) but every one of them knows what it feels like to be loved unconditionally!

For me, this is experiencing the fullness of the Gospel of Jesus Christ. I have reached the Zion which my forebears sought.

SACRAMENT

In remembrance of thy love, oh Lord,

all bread is holy bread of life to me.

Each sip of wine becomes a vein of light

flowing into my being, part of Thee.

Always remembering Thee is more than thought;

becomes a vital force, a living breath,

a joyous source of infinite energy,

embracing life, denying death.