(Entire letter is found at http://www.alphamin.org/LETTERS/MAINPAGE.htm  I will try to keep as much relevent material from James as possible but remove filler stuff to keep reading as short as possible but one can go to the link cited to get all of James comments so nobody can say I am taking things out of context nor not giving access to read the entire context--Something few LDS critics do.)

"Basically, given all I said in the previous letter, you had three questions:
(1) If God can actually stop someone from sinning, why doesn't He?"

The real reason God does not stop someone from sinning has to do with the law of agency that was established even before the world was made. Under that plan, man would be free to chose for themselves to do good or evil and either be blessed or punished for the decisions they make. God can't violate this law as it would be violating the plan that was authored. Sometimes God does can turn a negative into a postitive but God does not rely or cause a negative (sin) to occur on order for a positive (a certain purpose) to occur. Man cannot rationalize his actions by saying that he is helping God accomplish his purposes by committing a sin as God could still accomplish those purposes without the sin occurring.

(2) If God is really "sovereign" and everything that takes place does so because of His decrees, because of His command, then doesn't this make Him responsible for evil?

"(3) Doesn't the Bible present God as "repenting" of an action, hence showing that He changes His direction according to what happens -- especially in response to men's  actions?

The first two questions are connected in my thinking, and I will address them together before getting to the third.

I'd like to start by laying down a general principle and going from there to a principle that is demonstrated most clearly in the crucifixion of Jesus Christ. The actual act of nailing the sinless Lord Jesus Christ upon the wooden cross was, we would both agree, a horribly sinful one. The men who were responsible -- not just the soldiers, but Herod, Pilate, and the Jewish leaders who falsely accused Jesus were guilty of a tremendous crime, a heinous evil. They sinned in what they did."

"Yet, we also know that no single action in all of history has resulted in such tremendous glory being given to God. I know that many LDS have been taught to view the cross as little more than an instrument of death, yet Paul could write, "but God forbid that I should glory, except in the cross of our Lord Jesus Christ (Galatians 6:14). God's plan of redemption included the cross, and as such it is an action that is holy and right and perfect and just. On the cross sin and death were defeated once and for all, and the way of salvation for God's people was secured."

“Most other Christians use the cross as a symbol of their devotion to Christ, a physical reminder of His crucifixion on Calvary.  So why don’t members of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints follow suit?  We revere Jesus.  He is the Head of our Church, which bears His name.  He is our Savior and our Redeemer.  We love Him.  Through Him we worship and pray to our Heavenly Father.  We are grateful beyond measure for the essential and awesome power His atonement has in each of our lives.  But while thoughts of the blood He shed for us in Gethsemane and on Calvary fill our hearts with profound appreciation, it isn’t just the fact that He died that is so meaningful to us.   Our hope and faith are rooted in the profound understanding that He lives today, and that He continues to lead and guide His Church and His people through His spirit.  We rejoice in the knowledge of a living Christ, and we reverently acknowledge the miracles He continues to work today in the lives of those who have faith in Him.  That is why we choose to place less emphasis on a symbol that can be construed to represent primarily His death.  We believe that only as we focus our attention on the Savior and build our lives upon the strong foundation the Atonement and gospel give us, are we prepared to resist the challenges and temptations so prevalent in today’s world.” (M. Russell Ballard, Our Search for Happiness.  An Invitation to Understand the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints (Deseret Book Company 1993): p. 13-14)

"In the first three centuries A.D. the cross was not openly used as a Christian symbol, for the early believers looked beyond the Crucifixion to the Resurrection, and the emphasis was not on the cross of suffering and humiliation but on the Promise of Life with Christ here in the world and hereafter in the life beyond the grave" (H. Child and D. Colles, Christian Symbols: Ancient and Modern, Bell and Sons, London, 1971, p. 10, as cited by Daniel C. Peterson and Stephen D. Ricks, Offenders for a Word: How Anti-Mormons Play Word Games to Attack the Latter-day Saints, Aspen Books, Salt Lake City, UT, 1992, p. 132). Latter-day Saints and early Christians seem to share the same view on this matter.

Of course, even some modern Protestant writers make the same point. "The power of salvation, Paul says, is not in the cross, as fundamentalist evangelists have claimed, but in the resurrection" (L.J. Averill, Religious Right, Religious Wrong: A Critique of the Fundamentalist Phenomenon,, Pilgrim Books, New York, 1989, p. 88, as cited by Peterson and Ricks, p. 132).

"That which is now called the Christian cross was originally no Christian emblem at all, but the mystic Tau of the Chaldeans and Egyptians...Now, this pagan symbol seems first to have crept into the Christian Church in Egypt, and generally into Africa. A statement of Tertullian, about the middle of the third century, shows how much, by that time, the Church of Carthage was infected with the old leaven. Egypt especially, which was never thoroughly evangelized, appears to have taken the lead in bringing in the Pagan symbol. The first form of that which is called the Christian Cross, found on Christian monuments there, is the unequivocal Pagan Tau, or the Egyptian "Sign of Life."

"A still more curious fact may be mentioned respecting this hieroglyphic character (the tau), that the early Christians of Egypt adopted it in lieu of the cross, which was afterward substituted for it, prefixing it to inscriptions in the same manner as the cross in latter times. For, though Dr. Young has some scruples in believing the statement of Sir A. Edmonstone, that it holds that position in the sepulchers of the great Oasis, I can attest that such is the case, and that numerous inscriptions, headed by the Tau, are preserved to the present day on early Christian monuments." The drift of this statement is evidently this, that in Egypt the earliest form of that which has since been called the cross, was no other than the "Crux Ansata," or "Sign of Life," borne by Osiris and all the Egyptian gods; that the ansa or "handle" was afterwards dispensed with, and that it became the simple Tau, or ordinary cross, as it appears at this day, and that the design of its first employment on the sepulchers, therefore, could have no reference to the crucifixion of the Nazarene, but was simply the result of the attachment to old and long cherished Pagan symbols, which is always strong in those who, with the adoption of the Christian name and profession, are still, to a  large extent, Pagan in heart and feeling. This, and this only, is the origin and the worship of the cross. This, no doubt, will appear all very strange and very incredible to those who have read Church history...even among Protestants..." (Alexander Hislop, The Two Babylons, (Neptune, New Jersey: Loizeaux Brothers, 1916), p. 201)

But I hope you recognize that truth is not determined by "majority vote." Even if there was almost no one who believed that God is absolutely sovereign over all things it would remain true simply because the Bible says that it is true. There are many truths in the Word that men are not terribly fond of, but those truths remain vital all the same. You will see the vast difference a belief in the sovereignty of God makes when we get to the topic of the grace of God and salvation."

"I hope these thoughts have been of assistance to you, Steve. I, too, am looking forward to discussing the Lord Jesus Christ with you. Leave me a message on my recorder if it would be okay to go ahead and move right into that issue.