Patriarichal Blessings

[byu71]

I have come to regard them more as a comfort and guideline rather than prophecy. For me, I have seen a couple of blessings where the person for all I know lived a exemplary life and yet some of the promises were off the mark.

I have heard it explained that, all blessings don't come in this life, perhaps the person did some bad things you aren't aware of or they will put a different spin on the result and then spin it as the promise did come true.

For those who believe they are prophetic, I have no quarrel. I consider it a very personal thing and like many things in the gospel are left up to each individual to deal with through prayer.

[byu71]

Dude! You got to serve in Ohio!!!! Congrats!

I haven't shared this in a long time, so in case some of you have forgotten here goes.

I went to the great lakes mission. They divided it while I was there into the great lakes and ohio missions. Apparently my mission president didn't have me on his great missionary list, because he left me in Ohio.

They eventually divided the Akron Zone and made it the Cleveland Zone and Akron Zone. The Zone Leader of Akron got his choice and he wanted to stay in Akron. I asked him why and he told me you will find out soon enough. I became the Cleveland Zone leader. 8 elders were in the Zone and they shipped in 10 more, 6 of which were greenies.

I really ended up liking Cleveland, but it was tough. In the 4 months I was Zone Leader we only had around 8 baptisms in the whole Zone.

I guess I laid a pretty good foundation though, Cleveland Ohio is now a mission by itself. (It is true about the Cleveland Ohio mission. It being a result of my laying down a solid foundation is of my own thinking and not a result of inspirational confirmation.)

[YOhio]

I haven't shared this in a long time, so in case some of you have forgotten here goes.

I went to the great lakes mission. They divided it while I was there into the great lakes and ohio missions. Apparently my mission president didn't have me on his great missionary list, because he left me in Ohio.

They eventually divided the Akron Zone and made it the Cleveland Zone and Akron Zone. The Zone Leader of Akron got his choice and he wanted to stay in Akron. I asked him why and he told me you will find out soon enough. I became the Cleveland Zone leader. 8 elders were in the Zone and they shipped in 10 more, 6 of which were greenies.

I really ended up liking Cleveland, but it was tough. In the 4 months I was Zone Leader we only had around 8 baptisms in the whole Zone.

I guess I laid a pretty good foundation though, Cleveland Ohio is now a mission by itself. (It is true about the Cleveland Ohio mission. It being a result of my laying down a solid foundation is of my own thinking and not a result of inspirational confirmation.)

Ohio missionaries include:
Swimmer
BYU71
FMCoug
HuskyFreeNorthwest

That's quite the cast of characters.

[Indy Coug]

Ohio missionaries include:
Swimmer
BYU71
FMCoug
HuskyFreeNorthwest

That's quite the cast of characters.

Which explains why the RLDS/Community Of Christ/Consortium of Friendly Well-Wishers for Jesus still controls the Kirtland Temple.

[Fiyero]

Ohio missionaries include:
Swimmer
BYU71
FMCoug
HuskyFreeNorthwest

That's quite the cast of characters.

Don't forget Hyrum Smith and Orson Hyde.

[TripletDaddy]

Ohio missionaries include:
Swimmer
BYU71
FMCoug
HuskyFreeNorthwest

That's quite the cast of characters.

Noticeably absent from that list of people that have spent time sharing the Gospel and doing the Lord's work in Ohio: YOhio.

[Swimmer]

You can ask for another one.....if you showed this one to your patriarch, he might give you a second one....there no policy that says he can't. I know people who have done this.

Yeah, I have heard of that before, but that's not something I am comfortable with doing. I simply do not have a good attitude towards Patriarchal Blessings anymore and going through the steps required to do that is simply not worth the effort. Thanks though.

[happyone]

My comments on PB'ings. My mother got hers when she was 32-33 sometime like that. The patriarch stops in the middle of a sentance starts a new paragraph that says "You will sustain your husband in all of his priesthood callings" end of paragraph. He then goes back to what he was talking about. About six months later my father was called as bishop. This was really unexpected because we had just gotten a new bishop 4 mnths earlier and dad was due to rotate in less than a year. ( in fact we did move 9 months later and the new bishop moved in 3 monthes before we left)

the second point I have is my brother and I got ours on the same day from the same partriach, about 6 minutes apart. When reading them over you wouldn't guess they were from the same man let alone given at the same time. Mine is one of those fairly generic ones, My brothers is far more detailed and the wording is much more flowerly, the phrasing is even different. Mine was about 3/4 of a typed page, his was about 1 3/4 pages

I guess the point of this is to say I believe PB's are inspired and are tailored to people Take it FWIW

All of that said I don't read mine all that often I guess the last time was about 5 yrs ago or so

[CardiacCoug]

My comments on PB'ings. My mother got hers when she was 32-33 sometime like that. The patriarch stops in the middle of a sentance starts a new paragraph that says "You will sustain your husband in all of his priesthood callings" end of paragraph. He then goes back to what he was talking about. About six months later my father was called as bishop. This was really unexpected because we had just gotten a new bishop 4 mnths earlier and dad was due to rotate in less than a year. ( in fact we did move 9 months later and the new bishop moved in 3 monthes before we left)

the second point I have is my brother and I got ours on the same day from the same partriach, about 6 minutes apart. When reading them over you wouldn't guess they were from the same man let alone given at the same time. Mine is one of those fairly generic ones, My brothers is far more detailed and the wording is much more flowerly, the phrasing is even different. Mine was about 3/4 of a typed page, his was about 1 3/4 pages

I guess the point of this is to say I believe PB's are inspired and are tailored to people Take it FWIW

I don't want to be a jerk, but why would you think that advice to your mom about supporting her huband in Priesthood callings (which seems to me like the most generic of advice, since all active LDS men hold Priesthood callings) is some type of evidence that the Patriarch predicted that your Dad would become a Bishop?

If a Patriarch gave two blessings that had very similar wording and used the same phrases, would you consider that to be evidence that Patriarchal Blessings are not inspired? Trust me, there are plenty of examples of unusually similar blessings out there, too.

To me, your post is a great example of how people (myself included) tend to focus only on the evidence that supports the conclusion they have already made rather than objectively analyzing all available evidence before coming to a conclusion.

[Indy Coug]

Good patriarchal Blessings and good horoscopes/fortunes have an illusion of specificity when they actually can apply generally to almost everyone.

I have a hard time believing Patriarchal Blessings are individually inspired. But mine actually says some pretty specific and individual things that have turned out to be right on. It said I would serve a mission where the gospel has been for only a short time. Then I went to a country where missionaries had only been present for about 6 months. There were a few other things, too.

LOL. Nothing like shooting down your own premise with your own personal experience.

[pellegrino]

I don't want to be a jerk, but why would you think that advice to your mom about supporting her huband in Priesthood callings (which seems to me like the most generic of advice, since all active LDS men hold Priesthood callings) is some type of evidence that the Patriarch predicted that your Dad would become a Bishop?

If a Patriarch gave two blessings that had very similar wording and used the same phrases, would you consider that to be evidence that Patriarchal Blessings are not inspired? Trust me, there are plenty of examples of unusually similar blessings out there, too.

To me, your post is a great example of how people (myself included) tend to focus only on the evidence that supports the conclusion they have already made rather than objectively analyzing all available evidence before coming to a conclusion.

I think he's making his conclusion based on the placement and timing of the patriarch's statement. IIRC it was abrupt, and out of place, not within a natural flow of things. That to me suggests that it forced its way to the forefront of his mind while he was thinking of other things.

That said, I do think there are a lot of times when members interpret generalities into the specifics of their lives. That's an entirely human thing to do, and I'm not bothered by it much.

[happyone]

I guess what struck me was that fact that he intrupted the flow of the blessing to make the statement and went right back to the topic he was talking about.

As for the phrasing and stuff my other brother got his from the same paticach a couple of yrs later and it very simaler to mine.

Like I said take it for what is is worth.

[byu71]

I don't want to be a jerk, but why would you think that advice to your mom about supporting her huband in Priesthood callings (which seems to me like the most generic of advice, since all active LDS men hold Priesthood callings) is some type of evidence that the Patriarch predicted that your Dad would become a Bishop?

If a Patriarch gave two blessings that had very similar wording and used the same phrases, would you consider that to be evidence that Patriarchal Blessings are not inspired? Trust me, there are plenty of examples of unusually similar blessings out there, too.

To me, your post is a great example of how people (myself included) tend to focus only on the evidence that supports the conclusion they have already made rather than objectively analyzing all available evidence before coming to a conclusion.

I don't mean to be chastizing or criitical here as I am sure you two can discuss it amongst yourselves. However, it does bring up something that I try to follow for myself. I never discount someone elses spiritual experience and tell them. I may discount it for me, but I don't for them.

There are just some things that do happen and in normal circumstances they seem like coincidences to most, but they might be special to you. I am not a big believer in all things LDS. I believe a great majority of the things are culture. However, a few things have happened in my life that I swear are spiritual and yet I can see how someone else might not. In rare times I share those things, but I don't feel like defended it.

Now if someone uses their spritual experience to try and coerce me into thinking their way, in my opinion the experience is not spiritual anymore but an arguing point and their experience is fair game to be questionned and torn apart.

[Indy Coug]

What I enjoyed about my patriarch/mentalist was his ability to mention specific things about my family, whom he had never met before in his life, nor had the benefit of Google or the internet as a whole to help out to get that kind of background info ahead of time.

[UtahDan]

I don't mean to be chastizing or criitical here as I am sure you two can discuss it amongst yourselves. However, it does bring up something that I try to follow for myself. I never discount someone elses spiritual experience and tell them. I may discount it for me, but I don't for them.

There are just some things that do happen and in normal circumstances they seem like coincidences to most, but they might be special to you. I am not a big believer in all things LDS. I believe a great majority of the things are culture. However, a few things have happened in my life that I swear are spiritual and yet I can see how someone else might not. In rare times I share those things, but I don't feel like defended it.

Now if someone uses their spritual experience to try and coerce me into thinking their way, in my opinion the experience is not spiritual anymore but an arguing point and their experience is fair game to be questionned and torn apart.

I think that is a great approach.