Oh, gosh, here I go again taking a big fat risk. But I’ll do it anyway because it was so interesting. At least to me. It may put you to sleep (no pun intended) but here goes: A few nights ago I had a very strange dream. Actually, all my dreams are strange, but this was one of the stranger ones. Understand I’ve had my fill of hearing about visions, “spiritual” dreams, revelations, voices and presences. This was just one of those REM moments, nothing more.

I was in a village which was inhabited primarily by Joseph Smith followers. I don’t think they were Mormons; more likely they were Restorationist types. While I was there an enormous ball rolled into town. As dreams go, it came from nowhere. It was probably fifty feet in diameter, maybe larger. Large enough to get everyone’s attention. It seemed to be made of a buff-colored, exceptionally heavy plastic, and it was covered with what appeared to be thousands of indecipherable markings.

Immediately everyone became excited, claiming that this was a sign from God, a message from Joseph Smith, a warning of the end of the world, or all three. The whole town hurled itself into a huge revival, with prayer meetings, impromptu church services, singing, chanting, you name it. I, of course, wasn’t quite so excited. After half-heartedly attending one or two of the sessions I found myself alone in the street. I approached the ball and found that a small strip of the material had come loose. I tore it off (Don’t ask me where I got the strength to do that but, hey, it was a dream.) and discovered written on the other side the name of a town in California, and the group of children who had constructed the monstrosity.

Armed with this piece of information I found an acquaintance sitting in a small diner with some of her friends. I gave her the scrap of plastic to read. Immediately she put it in her mouth and started to swallow it. I reached down her throat and managed to drag it out.

The rest of the dream is, thankfully, rather fuzzy. I awoke and said, “Huh,” or something like that. Then, as the day progressed, I thought about it. The woman in my dream was willing to suppress a vital piece of information simply to perpetuate the lie. How often has this type of stifling taken place through the years? Countless times. I was reminded of a dear friend of mine who has been in the church his whole life and believes that Smith was martyred. Even after being shown evidence that he died in a gunfight, killing two men before he was shot dead, my friend continues to maintain that Smith was a “sacrificial lamb.” In fairness to my friend that was the way Smith described himself on more than one occasion.

I found The History of the RLDS on the top shelf of a bookcase, dusted it off and looked for the gunfight. Therein was murder, martyrdom and sacrifice, but no gunfight. How can a multi-volume history exist with no mention of what really happened in Carthage that day? It’s possible I overlooked it because part of the answer was provided when I Googled the death of Joseph Smith.(The LDS history apparently contains the firearm information.)

Hits #1 & 2 (Wikipedia) got it wrong. Big surprise there. Hit #3 (PBS) has no mention of Smith having a gun. Hit #4 (Light Planet)has this to say: “On June 27, 1844, they were mobbed and shot while confined at Carthage Jail in Hancock County, in western Illinois. Climaxing more than two decades of persecution across several states, this event gave them an enduring place as martyrs in the hearts of Latter-day Saints.”

Next are a couple of You Tube videos. The first is a dramatization produced by the Mormons. It’s a short segment—about 6.5 minutes and portrays Smith as the sacrificial lamb. The comments are very telling. The second is a narrative by Bill McKeever of Mormon Research Ministry, in which he gives stunning descriptions of outright smothering of the truth by followers of Joseph Smith. For those of you who have visited the Carthage jail, you have no doubt heard the same “information” from your tour guides. But if you listen to McKeever, you’ll hear outrageous omissions, suppressions, distortions, concealments and lies told by these Latter Day Saints.

The Joseph Smith church is a lie, founded by a lying, conniving charlatan, perpetrated by those seeking their own self aggrandizement and perpetuated by a continuation of deception, fraud, intimidation, and ignorance. Again, for those of you who are seeking or questioning, please know that we here at Refiner’s Fire and Lifeline are praying for you to find your way to the truth of the Lord Jesus Christ.

I’m glad I had that dream, silly as it was. It let me know this is a huge undertaking and that we need to keep on fighting the fight.

Love and Prayers

Jan