Mormonism

[Garland-Green]

Souijji

Garland-Green

I am saying that Mormonism tells of a different Christ, which is not the Christ of the Bible so hence he can't save anyone. I am not calling you evil. Just lost and deceived. That is speaking as I see it, not putting anything in between, or speaking with a cleft tongue. If I didn't that would be speaking with a cleft tongue. He didn't beat down the sinner, but he did tell them to turn from their sins and we are told to follow his example. I don't feel it is beating someone down trying to make them see their errors.

James 5:19-20
My brothers, if one of you should wander from the truth and someone should bring him back, remember this: Whoever turns a sinner from the error of his way will save him from death and cover over a multitude of sins.

The Mormon Jesus

1. The literal son of god and his goddess wife begotten in the pre-existence.
2. The brother of all spirits born in heaven in the premortal existence.
3. One of 3 gods in the godhead.
4. The Trinity is three separate gods.
5. First one to receive a spirit body.
6. Atoned for sin on the cross and in the garden of Gethsemane.

The Christian Jesus

1. Not the literal son of god and his goddess wife.
2. Not the brother of all spirits born in heaven in a premortal existence.
3. Not one of 3 gods in the godhead.
4. The Trinity is 3 persons in one God.
5. Was always spirit from eternity.
6. Atoned for sin on the cross alone.

"In bearing testimony of Jesus Christ, President Hinckley spoke of those outside the Church who say Latter-day Saints 'do not believe in the traditional Christ.' 'No, I don't. The traditional Christ of whom they speak is not the Christ of whom I speak. For the Christ of whom I speak has been revealed in this the Dispensation of the Fullness of Times. He together with His Father, appeared to the boy Joseph Smith in the year 1820, and when Joseph left the grove that day, he knew more of the nature of God than all the learned ministers of the gospel of the ages.'" (LDS Church News Week ending June 20, 1998, p. 7)

If I may take up a bit where Shadows-shine left off for a moment.

1-If Christ is not the literal Son of God then who is he and why should we believe in him?

2- If we were not all brothers and sisters in heaven then where did we come from?

3-You speak of the Godhead. The Father, The Son, and the Holy Ghost. Is this not three separate beings? If it's not then why list three titles?

4-See three for the question

5-Jesus Christ was not the first one born, therefore He could not be the first spirit to receive a body

6-In the garden of Gethsemane, Christ wept and prayed for all mankind, he bled at every pore with the pain of the sins of the world that he took upon himself. He was nailed to the cross by his enemies and frankly forgave them, asking His father to do the same (Luke 23:34). His resurrection promised that all who believed in him would see the resurrection themselves.


Now if I may add a few points here.

If you believe in the bible then you read over and over again that Christ spoke to his Father. This means that God the Father and Jesus Christ can't be the same person, unless you say that Christ was praying to himself, which would be silly.

Take that one step further. If God is a loving Heavenly Father, which so many are taught then why would he stop speaking to his"children"? Us being His children. That would point to the fact that either we are not his children, or that he is powerless to do so, or possibly that even he doesn't want to, (which would be opposite of Him being a loving Father.) This leads me to conclude that either he still does or that people are too blind to hear or see Him speaking.

I know a lot of people don't understand The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, but I get very tired of seeing so much bashing of it and having people call it evil

1. Jesus is not God’s Son in the sense of a human father and a son. God did not get married and have a son. God did not mate with Mary and, together with her, produce a son. Jesus is God’s Son in the sense that He is God made manifest in human form (John 1:1, 14). Jesus is God's Son in that He was conceived in Mary by the Holy Spirit. Luke 1:35 declares, “The angel answered, 'The Holy Spirit will come upon you, and the power of the Most High will overshadow you. So the holy one to be born will be called the Son of God.’”

2. No. We are not preexistent in heaven before we are born.. 1 Cor. 15:46-47 says, "However, the spiritual is not first, but the natural; then the spiritual. The first man is from the earth, earthy; the second is man is from heaven" (All bible quotes are from the NASB). The context is dealing with the resurrection of the body. Beginning with verse 35, Paul asks the question "How then are the dead raised?" Then Paul goes on to explain the resurrection of the believer and how the natural body must die before the spiritual one is raised. Paul is simply describing the proper order of existence. First comes the natural body, then comes the spiritual or the resurrected body. If we lived in a previous existence, then Paul could have said something like, "First comes our spiritual body, then our natural body, then our resurrected body." 1 Cor. 15:46-47 alone should be sufficient to put the argument to rest.

God says to Jeremiah, “Before I formed you in the womb I knew you, before you were born I set you apart; I appointed you as a prophet to the nations” (Jeremiah 1:5). It means that God had a purpose for his life before he even existed... God thought of him before his parents conceived him. God said, "I’m going to use these parents. I'm going to use them because I want to bless the world through this man. I know who he will be, and I have plans for him."

Psalm 139:13
13 For you created my inmost being;
you knit me together in my mother’s womb.

You were knit together and your inmost being was created by God in your mothers womb.

3. You and I live in a three-dimensional world. All physical objects have a certain height, width, and depth. One person can look like someone else, or behave like someone else, or even sound like someone else. But a person cannot actually be the same as another person. They are distinct individuals.

God, however, lives without the limitations of a three-dimensional universe. He is spirit. And he is infinitely more complex than we are.

That is why Jesus the Son can be different from the Father. And, yet the same.

The Bible clearly speaks of: God the Son, God the Father, and God the Holy Spirit. But emphasizes that there is only ONE God.

If we were to use math, it would not be, 1+1+1=3. It would be 1x1x1=1. God is a triune God.

Thus the term: "Tri" meaning three, and "Unity" meaning one, Tri+Unity = Trinity. It is a way of acknowledging what the Bible reveals to us about God, that God is yet three "Persons" who have the same essence of deity. Some have tried to give human illustrations for the Trinity, such as H2O being water, ice and steam (all different forms, but all are H2O). Another illustration is an egg having a shell, egg yolk and egg white, but this egg illustration shows that there would be "parts" to God, which isn't the case.

God the Son (Jesus) is fully, completely God. God the Father is fully, completely God. And God the Holy Spirit is fully, completely God. Yet there is only one God. In our world, with our limited human experience, it's tough to understand the Trinity. But from the beginning we see God this way in Scripture. Notice the plural pronouns "us" and "our" in Genesis 1:26 -- Then God said, "Let us make man in our image, in our likeness, and let them rule over the fish of the sea and the birds of the air, over the livestock, over all the earth, and over all the creatures that move along the ground."

Though not a complete list, here is some other Scripture that shows God is one, in Trinity:

"Hear, O Israel! The LORD is our God, the LORD is one!" (Deut. 6:4)

"I am the LORD, and there is no other; Besides Me there is no God." (Isa. 45:5)

There is no God but one. (1Cor. 8:4)

And after being baptized, Jesus went up immediately from the water; and behold, the heavens were opened, and he saw the Spirit of God descending as a dove, and coming upon Him, and behold, a voice out of the heavens, saying, "This is My beloved Son, in whom I am well-pleased." (Matt. 3:16-17)

"Go therefore and make disciples of all the nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit." (Matt. 28:19)

Jesus said: "I and the Father are one." (John 10:30)

"He who has seen Me has seen the Father." (John 14:9)

"He who beholds Me beholds the One who sent Me." (John 12:45)

If anyone does not have the Spirit of Christ, he does not belong to Him. (Rom. 8:9)

"Joseph, son of David, do not be afraid to take Mary as your wife; for that which has been conceived in her is of the Holy Spirit." (Matt. 1:20)

And the angel answered and said to her [Mary], "The Holy Spirit will come upon you, and the power of the Most High will overshadow you; and for that reason the holy offspring shall be called the Son of God." (Luke 1:35)

[Jesus speaking to His disciples] "And I will ask the Father, and He will give you another Helper, that He may be with you forever; the Spirit of truth, whom the world cannot receive, because it does not behold Him or know Him, but you know Him because He abides with you, and will be in you." ... "If anyone loves Me, he will keep My word; and My Father will love him, and We will come to him, and make Our abode with him." (John 14:16-17, 23)

4. ^

5.
John 1:1-3
In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. 2He was in the beginning with God.

If God is eternal, so is Jesus, being his son and sharing his nature. He has no beginning, and shares God's characteristics. See also question 2 to see why Jesus is different than you and I when it comes to preexistence.

6. There is no biblical record of Jesus atoning for our sins in the Garden of Gethsemane. The Garden is where He suffered greatly in prayer because He did not want to go through the coming ordeal of His beating and crucifixion. The agony of the Garden was so intense for Him that He apparently sweat blood (Luke 22:44). But, the only references in the Bible dealing with Christ and the atonement are in reference to the cross, not the Garden of Gethsemane.

Heb. 2:9:
“But we see Jesus, who was made a little lower than the angels, for the suffering of death crowned with glory and honor, that He, by the grace of God, might taste death for everyone.”

Colossians 2:14
having canceled the charge of our legal indebtedness, which stood against us and condemned us; he has taken it away, nailing it to the cross.

1 Peter 2:24
"He himself bore our sins" in his body on the cross, so that we might die to sins and live for righteousness; "by his wounds you have been healed.

A propitiation is a sacrifice that turns away wrath. Jesus' sacrifice on the cross was just such a propitiation. It was on the cross where Jesus bore our sins (1 Pet. 2:24) where he became a propitiation, the sacrifice for our sins. Notice that the sacrifice on the cross is a public event and it is this public display where propitiation occurred: "whom God displayed publicly as a propitiation in His blood through faith," (Rom. 3:25). When Jesus sweat drops of blood in the Garden of Gethsemane, that was not a public display. Therefore, the sacrifice of redemption, where Jesus bore our sins as the propitiation, did not occur in the Garden of Gethsemane, but in the public display of the cross. Thus, when we see the term propitiation referred to in Scripture, we know it is referring to the sacrifice on the cross. Let's take a look at more Scriptures dealing with this:

"Therefore, He had to be made like His brethren in all things, that He might become a merciful and faithful high priest in things pertaining to God, to make propitiation for the sins of the people," (Heb. 2:17).

"And He Himself is the propitiation for our sins; and not for ours only, but also for those of the whole world," (1 John 2:2).

"In this is love, not that we loved God, but that He loved us and sent His Son to be the propitiation for our sins," (1 John 4:10).

Notice that Jesus, the high priest, was the propitiation for our sins. This means that He bore our sins in His body on the cross (1 Pet. 2:24), as a publicly displayed sacrifice (Rom. 3:25) by which we are cleansed from our sins (1 John 1:7). It is not the blood that He sweat in the Garden that cleanses us of our sins, but the blood that was shed in the public display of the propitiatory sacrifice on the cross that cleanses us. This is why the scripture says, "and might reconcile them both in one body to God through the cross, by it having put to death the enmity," (Eph. 2:16).  

[Souijji]

Garland-Green

Okay, you say God, Jesus, and the Holy Ghost are one and the same. Explain me this then:

St. Matthew 3:16-17
And Jesus, when he was baptized, went up straightway out of the water: and, lo, the heavens were opened unto him, and he saw the Spirit of God descending like a dove, and lighting upon him:

And lo a voice from heaven, saying, This is my beloved Son, in whom I am well pleased.


Now if the three are indeed one then how does He step from the water, have Himself descend from heaven, then have His voice come from heaven saying that He is His own Son?  

[Garland-Green]

Souijji

Garland-Green

Okay, you say God, Jesus, and the Holy Ghost are one and the same. Explain me this then:

St. Matthew 3:16-17
And Jesus, when he was baptized, went up straightway out of the water: and, lo, the heavens were opened unto him, and he saw the Spirit of God descending like a dove, and lighting upon him:

And lo a voice from heaven, saying, This is my beloved Son, in whom I am well pleased.


Now if the three are indeed one then how does He step from the water, have Himself descend from heaven, then have His voice come from heaven saying that He is His own Son?

I said earlier that God, lives without the limitations of a three-dimensional universe. He is spirit. And he is infinitely more complex than we are.

That is why Jesus the Son can be different from the Father. And, yet the same.

God the Son (Jesus) is fully, completely God. God the Father is fully, completely God. And God the Holy Spirit is fully, completely God. Yet there is only one God. In our world, with our limited human experience, it's tough to understand the Trinity it is non the less the only possibility that leaves us with One God, and not the worship of several.

Isaiah 44:6-8
6 Thus saith the LORD the King of Israel, and his redeemer the LORD of hosts; I [am] the first, and I [am] the last; and beside me [there is] no God.

Any other God than God the almighty is an idol, and designed to steal worship from the true Creator.

Isaiah 43:10
Ye [are] my witnesses, saith the LORD, and my servant whom I have chosen: that ye may know and believe me, and understand that I [am] he: before me there was no God formed, neither shall there be after me.

Hebrews 1:8
But unto the Son [he saith], Thy throne, O God, [is] for ever and ever: a sceptre of righteousness [is] the sceptre of thy kingdom.

^
God addressing Jesus as God. It can't get any clearer than this.
I am limited in my understanding on how it is possible because I don't know anything like it by example of nature, but I know that with God all things are possible. Comprehending how, I would have to be God, and I am not. Therefore I can only conclude based on his Word that it is how it is, and that because of the trustworthiness of His word I believe it.

Jesus had two natures - both human and deity. Jesus as a man that was approved by God and so it was done publicly by both man and God.
Matt 3:16-17: “When He had been baptized, Jesus came up immediately from the water; and behold, the heavens were opened to Him, and He saw the Spirit of God descending like a dove and alighting upon Him. And suddenly a voice came from heaven, saying, "This is My beloved Son, in whom I am well pleased."

The Levitical Law required that all priests to be consecrated when they began their ministry at about 30 years of age (Num. 4:3). This encompassed washing and then anointing (Exod. 29:4-7; Lev. 8:6-30). Jesus had both done to him at the same time. One by the appointed man, John who was the forerunner and the other by the Father who is in heaven. John washed him and the Father anointed him by sending the Holy Spirit upon him.

Acts 10:38 "how God anointed Jesus of Nazareth with the Holy Spirit and with power, who went about doing good and healing all who were oppressed by the devil, for God was with Him.”

He as a man was anointed with the Holy Spirit who did miracles in greater number and nature than any other prophet. As a human, He was in complete submission to God the Father and was anointed for His ministry work that would last approx. 3 years. Because he came as a man in submission the Father He as a man needed to be anointed like the prophets of old. The difference was that He had the fullness of the Spirit (Isa.11:2)

When he returns it will not be in the same office as before, but as the King of Kings, The Lord of Lord, The Alpha and the Omega.

Revelation 22:12-14

Jesus is Coming
…12"Behold, I am coming quickly, and My reward is with Me, to render to every man according to what he has done. 13"I am the Alpha and the Omega, the first and the last, the beginning and the end." 14Blessed are those who wash their robes, so that they may have the right to the tree of life, and may enter by the gates into the city

Emphasis mine.

Isaiah 48:12
12 “Listen to me, O Jacob, and Israel, whom I called! I am he; I am the first, and I am the last.  

[kesuke uchiha]

oh goodness...this topic.....I personally love this topic....I had a girl friend....who was very special to me...to the point as to where I wanted to marry her.....but....mormonism got in the way....
I am christian and I failed to lead her to the truth...despite even taking her own book and proving her wrong...I know things about mormonism that would make any mormon who does not blindly follow mormonisim withou no thoughts as to why drop the religion faster than if it were on fire.
hell...journal of discourses ALONE should be enough to make any modern mormon drop Mormonism  

[kesuke uchiha]

Shadows-shine

When I have alittle more time I would be happy to reply to your post. But let me point out that the Journal of Discourses is not doctrine and should not be used when you are trying to dispute Church beliefs. Also wikipedia is not a good source to use either.

um....so the second leader of the church or mormon is not valid?
...he was a "holy prophet" that lead the mormons and his words mean nothing?  

[kesuke uchiha]

"there is but only ONE God and no others beside him."
"I am the way the truth and the light NO ONE goes to my father but through me"

the teachings of Joseph Smith directly says quite a few things that are VERY wrong and against the bible FIRST.
that not ONLY are there trillions upon trillions of Gods and yes I can prove that this is a mormon belief
but that a mormon man would become a God. what does man do for a God? worship
so right off the bat....Mormon's according to their own religion have to worship and knowledge their ancestors, their leaders all as Gods. and in turn they must be worshiped.


white supremacy within the church.
the mormons cant seem to make up their mind on how EVERYONE how is not white is evil.
first they decided that darkened skin was from Sins commited by the native americans. then they straight up said that it was the curse of Able. Adam's son who killed his brother.
then they went with simply as Bringham young said within his wrightings as why they still exist after noahs flood
"Satan needs a human body to represent his will on this earth just as the white man represents God"
then finally to my knowedge they settled with people who did not side with Jesus or Satan when the earth was created. such was a sin so they were cursed with dark skin. or "skin black like the devil"
either way even if you take out the journal of discourses you still have the book of mormon which straight up says that black skin is a punishment from God for sins Alma chapter three verses 6-10

6 And the skins of the Lamanites were dark, according to the mark which was set upon their fathers, which was a acurse upon them because of their transgression and their rebellion against their brethren, who consisted of Nephi, Jacob, and Joseph, and Sam, who were just and holy men.

7 And their brethren sought to destroy them, therefore they were cursed; and the Lord God set a amark upon them, yea, upon Laman and Lemuel, and also the sons of Ishmael, and Ishmaelitish women.

8 And this was done that their seed might be distinguished from the seed of their brethren, that thereby the Lord God might preserve his people, that they might not amix and believe in incorrect btraditions which would prove their destruction.

9 And it came to pass that whosoever did mingle his seed with that of the Lamanites did bring the same curse upon his seed.

10 Therefore, whosoever suffered himself to be led away by the Lamanites was called under that head, and there was a mark set upon him.



whew I am tiring myself out here.
but on we go
Satanism within the church of Mormon.
it is a well known fact that Joseph Smith joined the free masons. it can be seen in his church through the secret hand shakes the outfits and even the Navu temple itself has pentagrams on it and in it.
go ahead and watch this all the way through

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=25D-gKm1Kts

not the best but it gives you the general idea

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gOW1qGbMFps

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WC1qbatURCc


hope your getting the point here.
and also
if God doesnt "hate black people" and it was its not a part of a misunderstanding.....who was wrong?
did Joseph smith lie to the world because he was a racist and try to tell the world that God hated black people?.....or was God wrong? did he hate black people and suddenly just stop for some reason?
OR....the third choice?.....is it you who are wrong and black people are evil abominations that need to be destroyed in the name of God?  

[kesuke uchiha]

oh...one of my favorites....I was having this same discussion with a mormon who told me straight out
"its the truth...when he was young Joseph Smith was visited by and angel of light and became the prophet of the one and only true church"
I opened the bible and showed him the ONLY mention of an "angel of light" which is a direct reference to satan DIRECTLY followed by the phrase "BEWARE THE FALSE PROPHET"  

[Garland-Green]

Understanding Mormonism  

[real eyes realize]

Garland-Green

Understanding Mormonism

Oh wow, I knew about them trying to become gods; what I didn't know was their belief that our Heavenly Father didn't create us eek (I'm only at the 22 minute mark; still have more to listen to).  

[Garland-Green]

real eyes realize

Garland-Green

Understanding Mormonism

Oh wow, I knew about them trying to become gods; what I didn't know was their belief that our Heavenly Father didn't create us eek (I'm only at the 22 minute mark; still have more to listen to).

What I reacted to was when he said that Muslims have more in common with Christians, than Mormons do. When I think about how much different the Koran is from the Bible that speaks volumes of the Book of Mormon, and the Pearl of Great Price. As someone who used to attempt self-realization I can say that it that to me it seems to fall more in line with Esotericism and that sort of thinking than it does Christianity.