Man without limbs testifies of Christ

Vujicic, a 26-year-old man born without arms or legs, spoke about hope and faith in Jesus Christ to approximately 5,000 people at the Salt Palace Convention Center on Saturday night.

Vujicic is using his unique situation to spread the message of being born again in Christ. An Australian native, Vujicic now resides in California where he runs his Christian ministry Life Without Limbs.

“The world sees something special in a man without arms and legs,” Vujicic said. “I love being able to be used by God.”

People’s reasons for attending Vujicic’s speech were varied, but all hoped to be touched by his message.

“I have arms and legs and still complain. He has no arms and legs and lives life to the fullest,” said Dr. Joel Becker, a “spiritual Christian” from Clinton.

Vujicic called for people to build their lives on the foundation of Christ. “If you don’t have your security in knowing who your Lord is and what you’re building on, it could all fall.”

Vujicic also mentioned Christ and the Bible as a remedy for many of life’s troubles, including depression and addictions. In fact, part of Vujicic’s message mirrored what apostles of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints have told its members for years. “Addiction to pornography is worse than having no arms, no legs,” Vujicic said.

For people who are suffering from depression, Vujicic said to, “Get a dose of the Bible instead of a dose of Prozac.”

Vujicic went to a typical school when he was younger. He rode around in an electric wheelchair and was sometimes teased. People would even chase him, but “they were gonna get tired before my battery [ran] out.”

At the end of Vujicic’s speech, he asked people in the audience who had been touched and wanted to dedicate their lives to Christ to come forward to the stage. Several hundred did so.

Kara Anderson, an LDS student at UVU majoring in nursing, didn’t know what to expect from Vujicic’s speech, but what she took away was “a lot of hope for life.”

“It’s all about being selfless,” Anderson said. “(Nick’s story) encourages us to be grateful for what [we] have.”

The event was sponsored by Standing Together, a Christian organization that strives to unite the Christian community in Utah. It also supports conversations between Evangelicals and the LDS church. Vujicic was scheduled to bear his testimony on Sunday at the Tabernacle on Temple Square

From the article: At the end of Vujicic’s speech, he asked people in the audience who had been touched and wanted to dedicate their lives to Christ to come forward to the stage. Several hundred did so.

What a difference 27.5 years make. Here we have an Evangelical evangelist on campus @ BYU, making an open appeal for mostly Mormon students to come forward and dedicate their lives to the true Christ.

27.5 years ago, an Lds apostle (Bruce McConkie) came on that same BYU campus and advised Mormon students NOT to seek a personal relationship with Jesus Christ. Not very long ago, it used to be that a person could still go to the BYU online speech area -- specifically http://speeches.byu.edu/reader/reader.php?id=6843 -- and click on McConkie's speech. Obviously, somebody @ BYU has elected to deactivate it. (The title of that anti-Christ devotional was "Our Relationship With the Lord." -- you can easily still find excerpts from that devotional online)

I would hope and pray the Lds students who came forward would investigate and come to fully know the Jesus who is Lord and Savior of Nick Vujicic.

From the article: The event was sponsored by Standing Together, a Christian organization that strives to unite the Christian community in Utah. It also supports conversations between Evangelicals and the LDS church. Vujicic was scheduled to bear his testimony on Sunday at the Tabernacle on Temple Square.

Vujicic will become only the third evangelical to present a message @ the Mormon Tabernacle in the past century.

I think it’s unfair to refer to McConkie’s speech as an anti-Christ devotional. I remember the speech a little

Well, I found another posting of it -- OurRelationshipWiththeLord

Here's some excerpts: There are yet others who have an excessive zeal which causes them to go beyond the mark. Their desire for excellence is inordinate. In an effort to be truer than true they devote themselves to gaining a special, personal relationship with Christ that is both improper and perilous. I say perilous because this course, particularly in the lives of some who are spiritually immature, is a gospel hobby which creates an unwholesome holier-than-thou attitude. In other instances it leads to despondency because the seeker after perfection knows he is not living the way he supposed he should.

Jesus himself told us to pray to the Father, and I think McConkie was reminding church members to pray to the Father in the name of the Son, not to pray directly to the Son. [TT]

Well, you're right in your recall that McConkie focused on this -- here's the excerpt of that: Another peril is that those so involved often begin to pray directly to Christ because of some special friendship they feel has been developed. In this connection a current and unwise book, which advocates gaining a special relationship with Jesus, contains this sentence--quote: "Because the Savior is our mediator, our prayers go through Christ to the Father, and the Father answers our prayers through his Son." Unquote. This is plain, sectarian non-sense. Our prayers are addressed to the Father and to him only. They do not go through Christ.

But you're wrong on not praying directly to Jesus. If praying directly to Jesus was indeed "perilous" as McConkie claimed, then please tell me why Stephen, when in peril of death, prayed directly to Jesus? ...saying, Lord Jesus, receive my spirit. (Acts 7:59)

If praying directly to Jesus was indeed "plain sectarian nonsense" as McConkie claimed, then why did Book of Mormon disciples repeatedly directly pray to Jesus?
3 Nephi 19:7
Then again in 3 Nephi 19:18
Then again in 3 Nephi 19:24
Then they thought that wasn't enough direct prayer to Jesus. So "he came unto his disciples, and behold, they did still continue, without ceasing, to pray unto him." (3 Nephi 19:24)

And what? The Mormon Jesus condemned them for praying directly unto him? (No!) "And it came to pass that Jesus blessed them as they did pray unto him" (3 Nephi 19:25)

Did the Mormon Jesus tell them it was "plain sectarian nonsense" to keep praying directly to Him? (No!) "And Jesus said unto them: Pray on; nevertheless they not cease to pray." (3 Nephi 19:26)

So, these Nephite disciples apparently "prayed without ceasing" to the Mormon Jesus. Yet McConkie didn't like that some BYU students were emulating that, and told them in 1982:

I am well aware that some who have prayed for endless hours feel they have a special and personal relationship with Christ that they never had before. I wonder if this is any or much different, however, from the feelings of fanatical sectarians who with glassy eyes and fiery tongues assure us they have been saved by grace and are assured of a place with the Lord in a heavenly abode, when in fact they have never even received the fullness of the gospel. I wonder if it is not part of Lucifer's system to make people feel they are special friends of Jesus when in fact they are not following the normal and usual pattern of worship found in the true Church. Let me remind you to stay in the course charted by the Church. It is the Lord's Church, and he will not permit it to be led astray. If we take the counsel that comes from the prophets and seers we will pursue the course that is pleasing to the Lord. Would it be amiss if I reminded you that Jesus maintained a reserve between him and his disciples and that he did not allow them the same intimacy with him that they had with each other.

I think it’s unfair to refer to McConkie’s speech as an anti-Christ devotional. I remember the speech a little, and I think the point he was trying to make is that some members were neglecting to worship the Father by focusing almost exclusively on the Son.

Listen, McConkie, in his book, Mormon Doctrine, couldn't even do simple math about how many gods LDS are to worship!

How many (true) gods are worshiped in the Bible? (One according to Jews & Christians)

How many (true) gods are worshiped in the Book of Mormon? (Two according to the Mormon definition of Heavenly Father and Jesus being two separate gods).

How many (true) gods are worshiped according to their LDS apostle's "Mormon Doctrine" 1966 book? (Three according to the Mormon definition of Heavenly Father and Jesus and the Holy Ghost being three separate gods): "Three separate personages--the Father, Son and Holy Ghost--comprise the Godhead...To us, speaking in the proper finite sense, these three are the only gods we worship." (Mormon Doctrine, pp. 567-577, 1966 edition)

Oh, wait a minute. (I should have kept reading). McConkie, on p. 848, only emphasizes worshiping two gods: "The Father and the Son are the objects of all true worship....No one can worship the Father without also worshiping the Son....It is proper to worship the Father, in the name of the Son, and also to worship the Son" (McConkie, Mormon Doctrine, p. 848).

Oh, wait. McConkie changes his mind by 1982, when he gave that special devo @ BYU 27.5 years ago (March 2, 1982, "Our Relationship with the Lord.") Essentially, McConkie wasn't happy with either his "3" god or "2" god worship. So he came up with a kind of 1 1/2-god worship to present to BYU students:

We do not worship the Son, and we do not worship the Holy Ghost. I know perfectly well what the scriptures say about worshipping Christ and Jehovah, but they are speaking in an entirely different sense--the sense of standing in awe and being reverentially grateful to him who has redeemed us. Worship in the true and saving sense is reserved for God the first, the Creator.

His -- and yours, TT -- "only" problem is that neither the Bible (example God tells the angels to worship Him in Heb. 1:6; the disciples worshiped Him in Matt. 28:16-17; women worshiped Him in Mat. 28:8-9; the wisemen worshiped Him in Mt. 2::2-11; a blind man worshiped Him in John 9:38) and even the Book of Mormon know of either a reserved for-the-Father-only worship. From the Book of Mormon:

4 Nephi 4:37: Therefore the true believers in Christ, and the true worshipers of Christ, (among whom were the three disciples of Jesus who should tarry) were called Nephites, and Jacobites, and Josephites, and Zoramites.

2 Nephi 25:29 And now behold, I say unto you that the right way is to believe in Christ, and deny him not; and Christ is the Holy One of Israel; wherefore ye must bow down before him, and worship him with all your might, mind, and strength, and your whole soul; and if ye do this ye shall in nowise be cast out.

3 Nephi 11:17 Hosanna! Blessed be the name of the Most High God! And they did fall down at the feet of Jesus, and did worship him.

3 Nephi 17:10 And they did all, both they who had been healed and they who were whole, bow down at his feet, and did worship him;

Mormon 7:7 The redeemed will dwell in the presence of God in his kingdom, to sing ceaseless praises with the choirs above, unto the Father, and unto the Son, and unto the Holy Ghost, which is ["is" is in original 1830 Book of Mormon -- changed later to "are" by Book of Mormon nameless "editors"] one God, in a state of happiness which hath no end.

(You didn't know Mormon the character was trinitarian, did you?)

Back to the BYU 1982 devo. Note how McConkie wrapped up his 1982 devo in which he told folks NOT to seek a special intimate relationship with Jesus:

"Now I sincerely hope that no one will imagine that I have in the slightest degree downgraded the Lord Jesus in the scheme of things. I have not done so. As far as I know there is not a man on earth who thinks more highly of him than I do. It just may be that I have preached more sermons, taught more doctrine, and written more words about the Lord Jesus Christ than any man now living. I have ten large volumes in print, seven of which deal almost entirely with Christ, and the other three with him and his doctrines."

Translation of McConkie: "Let's see, now. We worship the Father only...we pray to the Father only...we don't seek a special relationship with Jesus...Nope, no 'downgrade' of Christ in my mind, right? Why, in my humble opinion, I think more of Christ than any man alive! In fact, if I may be so modest, 'It just may be that I have preached more sermons, taught more doctrine, and written more words about the Lord Jesus Christ than any man now living.' Obviously, I've exported a lot of commentary on the man!"

“You didn’t know Mormon the character was trinitarian, did you?”

Au contraire mon frere, I knew what he said about the Father, the Son and the Holy Ghost being one God.

You’ve made some very good points here, I just didn’t think it was fair to characterize McConkie’s speech as being anti-Christ. I think he was simply trying to get members to have a more balanced view of the members of the Godhead so that they will worship the Father and not only the Son. My speculation as to why he gave the speech at that time is that a lot of the church members were starting to get heavily influenced by the ideas and language of the born-again christian movement, and he felt that some members were starting to worship only the Son, and were losing focus on worshipping the Father.

You’re also right that the Book of Mormon shows some exceptions when the people prayed directly to Christ. I remember reading somewhere that this may have something to do with the fact that Christ was physically present with the people who prayed to him, but I don’t really know if that’s why, I’ve not seen a good explanation for this.

Based on my very limited knowledge of the scriptures, my thinking is that Christ prefers that we pray to the Father, but there are also scriptural instances where people pray directly to Christ, so if people want to pray directly to Christ, I’m not criticizing.

McConkie wasn’t my favorite apostle by any means, he was a hellfire and brimstone sort of guy, and from time-to-time he said and wrote things that were controversial, but notwithstanding all that, I believe he always had a sincere love for Jesus Christ.

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