Wednesday, May 12, 2010

Latter-Day Scripture: Doctrine and Covenants 82:10

Doctrine and Covenants 82:10

I, the Lord, am bound when ye do what I say; but when ye do not what I say, ye have no promise.
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5 comments:

Looney said...

Presumably this is in some context involving a specific promise? I have been raised to view God's promises as unconditional - they derive from His nature, rather than our behavior ...

May 12, 2010 at 11:21 AM
Delirious said...

Looney, the principle behind this scripture is that God cannot lie. He promises blessings if we keep His commandments, and if we do in fact keep those commandments, He is bound by His promise to bless us. But if we do not obey, we have no guarantee of receiving those blessings.
For example, in Malachi the Lord promises that He will open the windows of heaven and pour out a blessing upon us if we pay our tithes. "Bring ye all the tithes into the storehouse, that there may be meat in mine house, and prove me now herewith, saith the Lord of hosts, if I will not open you the windows of heaven, and pour you out a blessing, that there shall not be room enough to receive it." Malachi 3:10 That blessing is conditional upon our obedience to the law of tithing.

Another example is found in the 10 commandments where the Lord said, "Honour thy father and thy mother: that thy days may be long upon the land which the Lord thy God giveth thee." Exodus 20:12. The blessing, "that thy days may be long upon the land", is conditional upon our honoring our father and mother.

We have further latter day scripture that says, "20 There is a law, irrevocably decreed in heaven before the foundations of this world, upon which all blessings are predicated—
21 And when we obtain any blessing from God, it is by obedience to that law upon which it is predicated." Doctrine and Covenants 130:20,21
Does that make sense?

May 12, 2010 at 11:37 AM
Looney said...

It may just be a language point-of-view issue. I tend to view Biblical promises of being in the "if A, then B" form as in Malachi, or "if nothing, then B" as God made to Abraham. The condition is built into the promise, rather than external to the promise.

Thus, our failure bring the whole tithe into the storehouse has no effect on the promise: The promise remains equally valid and unchanged. We simply didn't meet the conditions in the promise.

May 12, 2010 at 4:29 PM
Delirious said...

I'm not sure if I'm understanding what you said. Like you said, we may be using different words to say the same thing. lol

My view in the case of Abraham was that it wasn't a "if nothing, then b" situation. The Lord made the covenant with him, but the blessings he would receive were still conditional upon Abraham's faithfulness. As it was, Abraham was faithful, and the blessings promised did come to pass. But I don't believe he would have received the blessings if he had not lived up to his part of the covenant.

In the case of tithing, I also don't believe that we receive the blessings if we hold back part. We may receive blessings for other things we do, but those specific blessings from paying tithing are held from us if we don't obey that law. But the promise is still in effect, and if we repent, and obey that law, then the blessings are still promised to us. I think that was what you were saying, but I might have misread. lol

May 12, 2010 at 7:31 PM
Looney said...

I think we are saying the same thing with regard to the tithing. The promise/covenant of Genesis 15 is what I am told is a promise without conditions regarding Abraham. It isn't "the land will be given to your descendants unless ....".

Anyway, the passage you quoted sounded to me like a promise can be revoked, rather than the promise is irrevocable, but the conditions specified in the promise might not be met.

May 12, 2010 at 7:41 PM

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