Happy New Year. I am sitting here bowl gamed out, so I thought I should get back to basics and write. First here is a nice note from the Paris's regarding our recent get-together at Phil's Fish House in Moss Landing. What a great testimony of the power of the Atonement. I surely think our work at the Prison is an earnest attempt to 'rescue the one'.



Next is a wonderful talk Gail Higginbotham gave me several months ago. It resurfaced as I was rummaging through desk papers and 'tidying up' for the New Year. It is self explanatory, "Relativism is Absolutely Wrong", and was given by Rabbi Mike Miller of Southern California for an Interfaith Council Breakfast on the National Day of Prayer in May of 2009. It is an unabashed denouncement of so-called 'new age thinking'. I can almost hear Alma and Korihor in the Book of Mormon arguing their case in front of the Supreme Court of today-same thinking, just disguised in different clothing.

In the Prophet Joseph Smith's First Vision Testimony, The Savior told him to join none of the Churches of the day, "For they were all wrong" and "That all their creeds were an abomination in his sight: that those professors were all corrupt; that: "They draw near to me with their lips, but their hearts are far from me, they teach for the doctrines the commandments of men, having a form of godliness, but they deny the power thereof."

Elsewhere we learn that the history of World Religion has consisted, and does and will yet consist, of "The philosophies of men mingled with Scripture".

Paul declares in Corinthians that "In the last days Man will always be learning but never coming to a knowledge of the truth".

In the most recent Conference, Elder Gong stated that "The world pursues enlightened self-interest. Yet the power is not in us to save ourselves", which I mused a rather interesting statement coming from one whose ancestry was steeped in Far Eastern thought and culture.

There is simply no philosophy of man that has, will, or can save anyone. Well the Lord said, "Physician, heal thyself." We are totally dependent on a living, loving God, even Jesus Christ, for our salvation. There is no other source from which a remission of our most heartfelt sorrows for guilt and sin can be mercifully granted. We must at last, bow at his feet, either in this life, or the next, and acknowledge that he indeed has the power to save us. It is just such a shame that most will not be able to throw off the 'traditions of the fathers' so that their ears can truly hear and their eyes can truly see, and their hearts truly feel. How amazingly grateful I am for being given the testimony that Joseph Smith discarded the 'Ways of Man' and was the instrument in God's hand to bring about the restoration of absolute truth in the latter days. I know I have been made free, and I hope that I am on the eternal path of learning and ever coming to a knowledge of the truth.