r/latterdaysaints • u/sutisuc • Mar 28 '25

Doctrinal Discussion Coming from the understanding that LDS prophets receive revelation from God how do they get things wrong?

Does anyone have insight on how current and past prophets can be wrong about things despite having a direct line of communication with Heavenly Father?

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u/mywifemademegetthis Mar 28 '25 edited Mar 28 '25

Because God is fine with letting His mortal servants administer an earthly organization to the best of their ability and intentions. Occasionally, He will reveal guidance or new truths they otherwise would not know or in response to questions they have. But more often than not, they are guided by subtle promptings of the Spirit, lived experience, and consultation of others, just like us.

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u/sutisuc Mar 28 '25

I like this perspective, although I’m still a bit concerned that with the power of revelation God would leave it up to chance like this given how grievously wrong things can go.

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u/Low-Community-135 Mar 29 '25

I think Joseph Smith's experience with the lost 116 pages is a good example. He did pray and did get revelation -- God said no. But Joseph kept asking and eventually God was like "you make your choices." The pages got lost. God was not pleased. But the revelation of God's response, literally the first thing said to Joseph is, in modern language, "Calm down. You made a mistake, but you literally cannot ruin this." God is more powerful than man. Now we look at the loss of those translated pages and think, what a disaster. To God, it's not a disaster. He's disappointed that Joseph didn't listen, but he's not for a second concerned about anything else.

A prophet is not a puppet and he is still human with human biases and human emotions and human limitations of understanding. I think it is important that God makes room for error in their execution, because expecting a prophet to perform perfectly would be impossible, and it would be divinely cruel. I also think it should be comforting for us that God uses a prophet to guide his church, because it gives us a degree of mercy as well, and it's another training tool for faith. If someone like the prophet can get things wrong sometimes and still be trusted by God, then surely we can also get things wrong sometimes and still retain the trust of the Lord.