caffeine and mormons

"On Wednesday, the LDS Church posted a statement on its website saying that "the church does not prohibit the use of caffeine" and that the faith’s health-code reference to "hot drinks" "does not go beyond [tea and coffee]. ... A day later, the website wording was slightly softened, saying only that "the church revelation spelling out health practices ... does not mention the use of caffeine." (http://www.sltrib.com/sltrib/news/54797595-78/church-drinks-caffeine-lds.html.csp)

Finally, it has been said. May I just add my 2¢.

Before I served my mission I really wanted to figure this whole thing out, I wanted to understand "why do I not feel bad at all drinking soda, but I feel so strongly against drinking tea and coffee?" So I busted out my scriptures and started reading and what I found is that it's true, the scriptures don't claim anything about caffeine and as I read I started to understand that it's simply obedience. There are probably a million things in coffee and tea that are good for me, but I don't drink them because God asked me not to, and that's all the reason I need. I also know that it's not the caffeine because when I think about it logically that would mean we can't eat chocolate... that would be impossible for me. I'm glad that the church released this statement because it was such a silly thing that people thought we couldn't drink any caffeine at all.

I will never forget going to a member's house and the member stopped me and said, pointing at my coca-cola "Elder! We can't drink that!" So we sat down and had a nice talk about how the missionary that taught her that was, in my thoughts, teaching his own doctrine.

God could say to stop using Aspirin or Ibuprofen but does that mean we should start doing chemical tests to find out why? No, it means we should just do what God asks us. There were times that I did things on my mission just to be obedient, not for any other reason. We shouldn't be so quick to ask why, but just ask how if we need help.

I'll never forget what my companion told me "if the prophet told me to walk off of a cliff I'd do it, because in the end, God would bless me for following the prophet, whether that was the right thing or not."

It's nice to see this type of development, it shows insiders and outsiders that we aren't supposed to be picking apart coffee and tea chemically and finding what's good or bad. Just do what God said and you'll be happy. We were splitting hairs, wasting time on things that don't really matter. I'm sure there's a great scripture to go along with this, but my brain might explode if I don't go to bed soon.

To finish up, I will say that the word of wisdom does tell us to be careful about addictions in any form. So I completely agree with not drinking caffeine or eating sugar or something else if it's an addiction. We're here to become masters of our own domain!