Someone wrote me with the following information, which I've stripped into bullets in order to protect anonymity while keeping them in first-person phrasing.
- I have studied the gospel my whole life.
- I have come to realize that I don't know nearly as much about God as I thought.
- Who is God? Is he one, or two, or three beings?
- I've watched and read some of your things.
- I keep asking God about this, and I hate asking someone else, but I feel God has told me to ask you.
This is a topic I've heard many questions about, typically including a lot more about the Holy Ghost specifically, and there are lessons for many in the response I wrote to her. I share it here for whoever it might benefit:
It seems to make sense to me that if you wanted to know more about someone after getting to know everything you can from books about them, you would ask someone who knew them personally. Everything we know about God began through the eye witness of Adam and Eve, and at all times since, there has always been people on the earth who knew God better than others. This was only ever not the case with the one person who knew him the most. Only this person would have to rely solely on what could be obtained through direct interactions with God. Everyone else would have the tremendous resource of the experience of others to expedite their getting to know him. This is somewhat like the difference between using oil sitting in a giant tank above ground vs. what it would take to discover and remove that same oil from deep in the ground, typically without the assistance of already-made tools. This is an interesting and important idea for another time, but suffice it to say that finding someone who knows (or at least purports to know) the Lord better than you makes total sense. It's anything else that doesn't make much sense.
I was spending some time thinking through and writing up the answer to your question. That answer exists, it is very important, and is one of those things that can be plainly laid out by citing scriptures (including Ether 3:14-15) that you've read and quoted 1,000 times without actually understanding.
In the midst of this, the Lord stopped me and took me a different way.
This is an important question, and you should hold to it. I recognize the labor you have invested to figure it out, but you have to realize that while the evidence you have that you should ask me about this is not just sufficient reason to ask me this. If you believe that I know something worth hearing about such an important question, it also implies that you ought to consume everything I've published before asking me. You may find the answer to your question, but you also have every reason to believe you will find many more things of great value, including many things you would not know to ask about.
As far as pointing you towards the answer, if it already exists, amidst all of that: One thing God has taught me clearly is that the questions we seek the answers to never exist on their own. They are coupled to the "sphere" they "exist in."
All truth is independent in that sphere in which God has placed it, to act for itself, as all intelligence also; otherwise there is no existence. (D&C 93:30)
Very often, the answer to our question requires us to ascend to the level of awareness where it is found.
When the angel visited Samson's father to announce his birth, Manoah asked him what his name was. The angel's response was interesting.
17 And Manoah said unto the angel of the Lord, What is thy name, that when thy sayings come to pass we may do thee honour?
18 And the angel of the Lord said unto him, Why askest thou thus after my name, seeing it is secret? (Judges 13)
A better way of phrasing verse 18 is:And the angel of the Lord answered, Why do you ask my name? You are incapable of comprehending it. (Judges 13:18)
Our way is to ask God to send down what we want from heaven. God's way is inviting us to climb higher in his mountain.
Your question is a good one. Hold to it while looking everywhere you can. If you get through your current book and "Repentance" and "Through Faith" and "Men Are That They Might Have Joy" and "The Glory of God is Intelligence" and the videos you have not watched and whatever I publish in the meantime and still have your question, ask me again. If you don't, I could tell you, but it would not do you any good. You would find what you are asking, which will satisfy the symptom, but not what you need, which is the root cause of the problem.
-Rob