But sanctify the Lord God in your hearts: and
be ready always to give an answer to every man that asketh you a reason of the
hope that is in you with meekness and fear (1 Pet 3:15)
When it
comes to defending the faith, one thing that irks me is how so many Latter-day
Saints naively think that simply bearing their testimony is enough. It is not
enough, and even modern Scripture supports this. When the Lord commands Joseph
Smith and Sidney Rigdon (and other LDS) to discuss/debate our opponents, we are
to bring forth our “strong reasons,” not “bear testimony merely” (see D&C 71). Furthermore, many other faiths rely on,
albeit in varying degrees, the internal witness of the Holy Spirit, such as
various Reformed confessions vis-à-vis the self-authentication of the Bible (See
the discussion in the section A Self-Attesting, Self-Authenticating, Formally
Sufficient Bible? in Not
By Scripture Alone: A Latter-day Saint Refutation of Sola Scriptura).
Indeed, without meaningful arguments such as sound exegesis, a Latter-day Saint
will be unable to effectively work with someone who himself has their own
spiritual convictions. The following “testimony” from a member of a
Fundamentalist (not FLDS, I will note) group shows this to be the case:
I decided at 16 that I was ready for marriage
because I wanted children. I remember reading in the scriptures that if you ask
God for a witness of the Spirit to help you make a choice, you would get a
burning in your bosom as a witness of truth. When I asked God—during a
three-day fast—if this principle of plural marriage was right for me, I
received an incredible and unforgettable witness in the very center of my soul
that sent me reeling with the power of it. It was an overwhelming affirmative.
I knew then it didn’t matter which wife I was, I would definitely live plural
marriage. (“LBK”, “An Undeniable Witness of the Spirit” in Voices in Harmony: Contemporary Women Celebrate Plural Marriage [comp.
Mary Batchelor, Marianne Watson, and Anne Wilde; Salt Lake City: Principle
Voices, 2000], 121)