Recently in Sacrament meeting a new father told of getting inspiration from the Holy Ghost. They had just brought their new daughter home from the hospital, and his mother was there helping out for a few days. It was January and cold in Utah, and they normally didn’t need the heater for their basement apartment, but turned it on because they didn’t want the baby to get cold. The baby was crying all night, keeping everybody awake. His wife said she had a headache, and he did also. Then his mother got sick and vomited. She thought she had the flu, and didn’t want to be around the baby so she went home (they lived nearby). At this point the thought was put in his head “by the holy ghost” that this could be carbon monoxide poisoning. He turned off the heater, opened the windows, and slept with the baby between them in their bead to keep her warm.
The next morning he called landlord who had a heater guy come over immediately, and he confirmed there was a leak. They then went to the emergency room where his wife and daughter were put in a hyperbaric tank for treatment. Everybody was fine.
So my thought was this: Was this just common senses, him having read in the news about carbon monoxide and with all the symptoms he made the call, or did the Holy Ghost inspire him to turn off the heater to save his family?
We hear the above story about an LDS family, and we say it was the Holy Ghost. If we hear the same story about a faithful Catholic family, we would say it was the Spirit of Christ, and if our gay atheist neighbor tells the same story we would label it common senses.
Could it be that God’s spirit is always watching out for us, and has been for all history, and when we didn’t know the gospel, we labeled it common senses or intuition. With the Gospel of Christ we know this is the Spirit of Christ or the Holy Ghost. Are they one in the same? How do you differentiate between intuition and the Holy Ghost?
I believe my gay neighbor can still receive nudges from the Holy Spirit. I do think the spirit nudges our common sense and the two work together. I guess it’s just up to us to act. I can think of a lot of people who lack com one sense and somehow, just somehow they and their families are still alive. LOL
You pose a great question Bishop Bill. I often think common sense is a gift from God, so maybe they are all the same thing.
Seems to me that (via the principle of Occam’s Razor) that attributing billions of instances of intuition (per day, per week?) to an individual entity (Holy Ghost/God) is very much of an overreach. Plus, we are “intelligent” beings with enormous cognitive abilities, not witless “children of God” wholly dependent on a supreme being for our decisions.
Seems to me that (via the principle of Occam’s Razor) attributing billions of instances of intuition (per day, per week?) to an individual entity (Holy Ghost/God) is very much of an overreach. Plus, we are “intelligent” beings with enormous cognitive abilities, not witless “children of God” wholly dependent on a supreme being for our decisions.
It’s obviously common sense and intelligence… You can call it ‘”Magic” or anything else you need/want to call it, but it was the man’s intelligence. How would you explain War, The Terminal Diseases and Death(s) of innocent Kids? Where’s your “Holy Spirit at those times? ~DJJ
That is something that none of us are able to judge since we were not there.
I think the “Holy Ghost” is a cultural construct, a name we give to the collective forces of common sense, reason, intuition, conscience, moral compass, or any number of unseen forces that guide our decisions or warn us of danger. By our doctrine, only confirmed members of the Church are entitled the gift of the Holy Ghost. However, I’ve seen enough instances of bad things happening to Latter-day Saints (whether by their own poor choices or not) as well as non-Mormons escaping death or danger by their intuition (or being “guided” by unseen forces or whatever) to cast doubt on that notion. Its elitist to think that the Holy Ghost only exists to guide and protect Latter-day Saints but not anyone else.
I recommend “The Gift of Fear” by Gavin De Becker to put this in perspective. He argues that humans have evolved strong instincts for self-preservation, and that we can and should listen to our feelings to keep us out of danger; they are a manifestation of our subconscious mind, which continuously calculates all of our sensory input to make threat assessments about our environment. It’s not perfect, but it can be developed with knowledge, experience and maturity.
Perhaps this is overly cynical of me, but my take is that we have a false attribution problem in the church. We often look to the outcome of a situation (here, a family is saved from carbon monoxide poisoning) and infer that since this is a good thing, it must have been by the power of the Holy Ghost. Any bad outcomes are attributed to be from the devil, or natural man, or some non-divine source. We are comfortable saying that personal intuition and promptings of the HG can overlap, because both can point to good things. But once that good thing turns bad, we tend to abandon the claim of HG inspiration, since personal intuition can be wrong but HG cannot be.
I have grown increasingly wary of claims of inspiration from the Holy Ghost (and also interrogated my own history with the Holy Ghost), due to the biased way in which we invoke the Holy Ghost to make sense of the unpredictable world we live in.
“Could it be that God’s spirit is always watching out for us, and has been for all history, and when we didn’t know the gospel, we labeled it common senses or intuition.”
This force toward light and intelligence I believe is indeed a gift given to all humans although it seems to work better in some. I believe it is also why religion arose concurrently with civilization itself. See Gobekli tepe https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/G%C3%B6bekli_Tepe
“With the Gospel of Christ we know this is the Spirit of Christ or the Holy Ghost. Are they one in the same?”
Not quite. There’s a thing called the “Light of Christ” and it is a light or a force that illuminates everyone all the time although it can be shut out or ignored (rather like “The force” in Star Wars). The Holy Ghost is somewhat unique in Mormon theology in that he’s a specific unembodied person; not just one of God’s themes or appearances or whatever. If I were to cite a source it would be Teachings of the Prophet Joseph Smith but it’s been a long time since I read it.
What is likely physically present are large numbers of angels. Mormons don’t seem to talk about it much but they exist in great numbers and it is likely those spirits that do the grunt work of warning you of immediate dangers. Beware they come in both good and evil flavors.
“How do you differentiate between intuition and the Holy Ghost?”
I doubt it is possible most of the time. Inasmuch as it is harmless to give credit to God for something he didn’t do, but rude to fail to give thanks, I believe it is better to go ahead and ascribe remarkable things to God.
God knows the future (or creates it to match prediction!) but these angels or messengers do not. If a warning of danger is immediate then it is probably a messenger that has been watching, looking just over the horizon so to speak, sees what you do not. But where there’s a forecast of danger (or opportunity) that suggests a higher level of spiritual involvement.
I’ve had some remarkable immediate warnings and at least one rather profound forecast of danger. The danger was not to me, but my services would be needed in the rescue operation that would start on the next day.
The recommended behavior is to use your intelligence, knowledge and arrive at a decision and then present your decision to God for a simple yes/no kind of inspiration as otherwise the answer might be Read The Scriptures or Figure It Out.
I’ve read enough books & listen to enough podcasts on the brain to be highly suspicious of claims of the HG. The vast majority of such experiences, when deconstructed by neuro-psychologists can be traced back to basic brain functioning. At the same time, I can’t quite bring myself to deny that there is a divine influence. I don’t tend to think of this as the HG, but I’m fine with that language.
I would like to bear my testimony that I cannot, and never could, disguish the influence of HG from my other thoughts and feelings, so I am skeptical/jealous of those who can. It would have been nice of
God/HG to communicate with me unmistakably. Since that‘s not usually how it works, maybe I just need to be patient and more open minded.
If I can have enough faith I can know the HG is indeed communicating to me through my thoughts and feelings because the HG will confirm this to me through my thoughts and feelings.
Glenn Thigpen writes “That is something that none of us are able to judge since we were not there.”
As you can abundantly see, being not there is no impediment to judgment.