By Lauralee Budd
Jessie Warner grew up reading the Book of Mormon and learning about Joseph Smith, but in elementary school he realized he was different.
His mother was the second of three wives married to one man. He had 29 brothers and sisters. His family belonged to the Apostolic United Brethren, a polygamist group based in Bluffdale. The practice of a man marrying more than one wife was a teaching Warner accepted and lived with all his life. After all, Warner”s grandfather, Rulon Allred, had been the group”s prophet for a time. Warner anticipated that when the time came, he, too, would live the practice of plural marriage like his 73-year-old father.
Not even Warner”s closest friends outside of AUB knew about his situation. He attended seminary at Lehi High School and told his friends he was part of a ward. He put on the fa?ade of a typical Latter-day Saint youth.
“It”s so close, but it”s just so different,” said Warner, now a BYU student. “I was a believing Mormon, but not a member of the church.”
Warner”s journey away from the AUB began when he was 17 and read a single line from Joseph Smith”s Lectures on Faith: “Unless a man knows that his life is pleasing to God he won”t have the faith needed to gain salvation.”
Warner was inspired and decided he didn”t just want to believe what he lived, but he wanted to know for himself.
“What I was searching for wasn”t to know if the [LDS] church was true; it was to prove I was right,” Warner said.
For more than three months he studied and prayed. He made lists of questions and doctrine, reviewing over and over the histories of AUB and the LDS church.
All he found was confusion.
Some of the confusion resulted from the similarity of AUB”s teachings to those of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. AUB even accepts Gordon B. Hinckley as the president of the church. They do not, however, accept him as a prophet, a position they believe belongs to the current AUB leader, Laimoine Jensen, said Warner”s friend and current AUB member Taylor Baker.
President Joseph F. Smith was the last president of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints that AUB members accept as a prophet.
AUB adherents believe there cannot be any changes made to revelations received by Joseph Smith and Brigham Young concerning plural marriage and the priesthood, Warner said.
Because doctrine about the priesthood is one of the key differences between the church and the polygamist group, the priesthood was a key interest to Warner in his religious research.
“The biggest issue for me in deciding whether to join the church or not was priesthood authority,” Warner said.
In mid-October 2001, after an especially frustrating study session, Warner walked to a bridge near his home, a favorite place of his to think. He decided to stay where he was at and not join the LDS church.
Warner said he had not walked more then 10 steps toward home when a question crossed his mind. What if the church were true? What if that”s what God wanted him to do? If it were true, would he be willing to join it? He said he realized he wasn”t willing.
He was afraid to ask God, he said, but two weeks later he kneeled down to pray.
“It all comes down to you kneeling down and being humble enough to say I don”t know; show me the way. Not my will, but thine be done,” Warner said.
Eight months later on June 26, 2002, after a final interview with Elder Joseph B. Wirthlin of the Quorum of the Twelve Apostles, Warner was baptized. He was 18.
“I have lost a lot of friends and been questioned many times about my decision,” Warner said in a letter to Elder Wirthlin. “My good name was taken away and many family members look down at me. For four months I couldn”t talk with my dad. But I have never looked back.”
“It wasn”t an easy thing,” Baker said of his friend”s decision. “The way he changed I admired a lot more than other people. With Jessie he wasn”t mad. This is the path [he] wanted.”
Warner served a mission in the Argentina Buenos Aires South mission, something he always wanted to do. He currently attends BYU and is engaged to be married to Cami Lundstrom on Tuesady, Nov. 21, 2006, in the Salt Lake Temple.
“The biggest change is the vision of who I was and who I can become,” Warner said. “It was like I was unlocked.”
About the Apostolic United Brethren:
Members believe a man must be called of God to practice plural marriage. The prophet of AUB must approve the marriage, and all parties must consent to the marriage.
The Law of Consecration is practiced. The united order is a group of people living the Law of Consecration.
An estimated 5,000 members live in the United States and the Mexico Colonies.
Blacks do not have the opportunity to hold the priesthood at this time, but will someday.
Members believe Joseph Smith restored the fullness of the gospel, and the Book of Mormon is the word of God.
AUB has one temple and many endowment houses.
Source: Taylor Baker, member of AUB, and “We Believe,” a pamphlet produced by AUB.
