Is Mark Thomase the One Mighty and Strong?

----- Original Message -----

To: sterlingda@greaterthings.com ***

Sent: Wednesday, March 19, 2003 8:29 AM

Subject: Is Mark Thomase the One Mighty and Strong?

Am I “The One Mighty and Strong”?

I assure you, first of all, that I mean that question facetiously. Facetiously, but not
disrespectfully.

Here’s how this question came up:

Most of you are familiar with the Elizabeth Smart case -- the Utah girl who had been
kidnapped and was missing for nine months before being miraculously discovered and
returned to her family. The apparent kidnappers were a homeless couple who regarded themselves as prophets.

The alleged kidnapper, Brian David Mitchell -- AKA Emmanuel David Isaiah -- regarded
himself as “The One Mighty and Strong”. It’s little known inside as well as outside the
Mormon Church, but the Church’s scriptures themselves teach that the Church will go
into apostasy and will need to be put right by this figure, “The One Mighty and Strong.” Mitchell is not the first person who has claimed to be the One Mighty and Strong. I personally have met two or three, and have heard of many others.

What interests me about the Mitchell case, aside from the kidnapping, is a report in the Salt Lake Tribune that Mitchell believed in seven books as inspired Scripture: The Bible, the Book of Mormon, the writings of the modern prophets, a work by a Dr. West that I am unfamiliar with, The Literary Message of Isaiah by Dr. Avraham Gileadi, Betty Eadie’s Embraced by the Light, and Rick Joyner’s The Final Quest.

This list caught my eye. Some of the books on the list are standard for would-be Mormon prophets. Betty Eadie is herself a Mormon and her books are popular in the LDS community. Including the work by Gileadi, a Jewish Mormon scholar, shows a certain degree of intellectual sophistication; Gileadi interprets Isaiah to prophesy of a latter-day “Davidic Servant” which Mitchell apparently believes to be one and the same with The One Mighty and Strong. Joyner is not a Mormon. He is a charismatic Christian prophet from North Carolina, and his inclusion on this list surprised me.

A number of years ago now, while I was in the process of coming out of Mormonism, I
belonged to a small group that was actually more of a house church. At its peak, we had some twenty people meeting together, the vast majority of whom had come out of the LDS Church, the RLDS Church, or both. I had some background in the charismatic movement of the RLDS Church, so our meetings had a decidedly charismatic flair to them, with worship and prophesying and healings. We discussed what we accepted as scriptures. We all agreed to accept the Bible as Scripture. Most of us still believed in the Book of Mormon and various editions of the Doctrine and Covenants. We had all read “Embraced by the Light” and argued about whether it was a true revelation or a deception. A few of us were familiar with Gileadi and we wondered if we, as a group, were Davidic Servant material. Other than the Bible, though, the one book we all agreed as being a revelation from God was Joyner’s “The Final Quest”. So to see these same books on Mitchell’s list was surprising and gave me pause, to say the least.

My friend Sterling D. Allan helped clear up the mystery. Sterling is a rather prophetic
figure himself, although I think he would avoid calling himself a prophet, because the
word has a certain connotation about it in Mormon circles. Sterling is a person of some influence in the circles of conservative Mormonism. He has written books, had his own TV show, and sponsored study groups of several thousand people in Utah and
surrounding states. He has taught for years that the leadership of the LDS Church is in apostasy as prophesied in their own scriptures. Needless to say, the leadership disagrees and has excommunicated him, but Sterling still speaks out. About the time Sterling was being excommunicated, I began corresponding with him and sent him a box of books from a charismatic Christan perspective, including The Final Quest and other books by Rick Joyner. Sterling really liked Joyner and started promoting his works among to everyone he could. And now we find out that Brian David Mitchell was a member of one of Sterling’s “American Study Groups”. (Sterling also promoted the little-known works of the Dr. West that Mitchell regards as scripture.)

It is therefore demonstrated that I indirectly have had some influence on this notorious
figure. “The Final Quest” appears on his canon of scripture because of me.

I have to say that this caused a few moments panic. The Final Quest is a controversial book, although I really don’t understand why. Some people, including myself, regard it as the greatest book we’ve read outside of Scripture. Others regard it as an evil book although, again, I can’t fathom why. It is an allegory, much like The Pilgrim’s Progress. There is certainly nothing sinister about it. But a lot of the self-appointed cult-watchers have labeled Joyner a false prophet on account of it. The self-styled “Bible Answer Man”, Hank Hanegraaff, has even called Joyner the most dangerous false prophet since the days of the New Testament -- thereby ranking ahead of Muhammad, Brigham Young, Jim Jones, Rasputin, David Koresh, and even Hank Hanegraaff himself. Not bad for a guy who, as far as I know, is responsible for no one’s death and whose major offense is writing down the account of a vision he had.

Of course, the news media are having a heyday talking about the dangers of religious
mania. No doubt Mitchell was driven by his religious beliefs in the kidnapping of
Elizabeth Smart; I’ve seen any number of lists of people who have committed crimes
because of their religious beliefs, not the least of whom is Osama bin Laden. It’s amazing how the acts of one mentally ill person with highly unorthodox beliefs can be used to discredit persons of faith anywhere, as if faith itself is the enemy. Do you believe that Jesus Christ is the only way to salvation? Do you go to church or read the Bible? Not only are you intolerant, you are potentially dangerous, a terrorist in the making, kidnapper of little girls, a menace to society. Oh, puh-leeeze.

This morning Sterling emailed me a copy of an article he’s working on for Peggy Fletcher Stack of the Deseret News in Salt Lake City. He includes a list of traits of the people who believe that there will be a Davidic Servant or One Mighty and Strong. This goes on for six pages, but I was struck by how many of them point to me as the One Who Is To Come:

Percentage who believe he will be a former Mormon: 50%.
Percentage who see acts of violence as wholly inconsistent with his role: 85%.
Percentage who are politically ultra-conservative: 90%.
Percentage who would be ready to die for the cause of the kingdom of God: 90%.
Percentage who are in favor of home schooling: 90%
Percentage who prefer third party candidates rather than Republicans or Democrats: 60%.
Percentage who vote mosty Republican anyway: 80%.
Percentage who do not agree with socialist principles of redistribution of wealth by force
of government: 90%.
Percentage who are in favor a voluntary program for taking care of the poor: 98%.
Percentage who are in favor of being ecologically minded: 85%.
Percentage who study alternative modes of healing: 90%.
Percentage who sympathetic with Mitchell’s kidnapping of Elizabeth Smart: 0.01%.
Percentage who would be in agreement with most of Mitchell’s ‘Manifesto’: 90%
Percentage who have read and admire Avraham Gileadi’s work on Isaiah: 80%.
Percentage who admire Ezra Taft Benson: 95%.
Percentage who revere Jesus Christ as the Saviour of mankind: 99%.
Percentage who believe Jesus will come again, this time in glory: 99%.
Percentage who could say they have received personal revelation from God: 99.9%.

And so forth.

So you see, the numbers prove, I am obviously The One Mighty and Strong.

I say that with my tongue planted firmly in my cheek. I’m saying that only to make a
point. Believing in something unpopular does not make you a danger to society in the
criminal sense. In any belief system -- ANY belief system -- there are certain things that if taken to extremes by a deranged mind, could lead to criminal activity. Even a secular materialist could start burning churches, an atheist could plot to assassinate the pope.

A few months ago I wrote an article on the next move of God, based on a study of
previous moves of God. I wrote that the leader of the next move of God, the person who might correspond to a “Davidic Servant,” would likely come out of the previous move of God, the Vineyard movement. He would be of Quaker or Mormon background, and be acquainted, for good or bad, with the works of the previous “false prophets”-- the ones who in fact were true prophets not received by the Church, such as George Fox, Joseph Smith, and William Branham. When I wrote that I was more than a little startled to realize that all those signs were fulfilled in me. But that doesn’t make me the Davidic Servant.

No, I’m not The One Mighty and Strong. But I could be. So could you. God uses
unlikely vessels to do his work. He used a bastard shepherd like David, a pregnant
teenager like Mary, a self-righteous Pharisee like Paul.

God is raising up a class of men and women in these latter days who will serve God
without reservation, and who will manifest his presence with power and might, even to the
overthrowing of kingdoms and inaugurating the personal reign of King Jesus upon the
earth. They will be known not for kidnappings and acts of violence, but for their love for God, for each other, and for those who they have come to serve. One of these Davidic Servants could be you!

I want to be one of THESE Ones Mighty and Strong -- don’t you?

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All truth passes through three stages:
   First, it is ridiculed;
   Second, it is violently opposed; and
   Third, it is accepted as self-evident.

-- Arthur Schopenhauer (1788-1860)

Is Mark Thomase the One Mighty and Strong?

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