A lifetime study on religions of the world.
Mormon Premise Examined
Critical issues as I see it through Biblical perspective and personal experience;
1- The original vision Joseph Smith asks the wrong question “Which is the true church?” This is a continual war over who holds human authority as in pope vs. prophet vs. king. A true search for God would ask “Who is God?”
2- Original vision; speaker claims that none of the churches are true and that “all of their creeds are an abomination to me”. This is a judgment upon all of Christianity and separates all of Mormonism as a cult outside of and superior to Christians. Mormons consistent with this vision should consider it an insult to be called Christian but now they want to insist that they really are Christian. Crazy, can’t have it both ways.
3-Preisthood; the premise of the Joseph Smith vision and the LDS church is a need for the restoration of the priesthood because the Christian church had lost the priesthood. It is a false premise. Christian priesthood is the priesthood of all believers and is based on worthiness of Jesus our perfect Priest. It is not about man’s worthiness.
4- Jesus says to know prophets by their fruit Matthew 7. LDS claim they have good fruit but they are referring to human works and institutions built by man. Fruit from God should first of all provide a connection to God, salvation and forgiveness, which should result in displaying the character traits of God. We can identify the character of one’s god by the character of the person. An angry unforgiving god will result in anger, violence, self justification, self-made religion.
5- Common sense revelation from nature; even those who do not believe the Bible can see from observing nature that our Creator is far above all mankind. Our purpose in this life as humans is to take our place as creatures before our Creator. The LDS claim that our purpose is exaltation to become gods and that God the Creator was once a man like us. This is called “eternal progression”. It is an offense to nature and to scripture.
Basically I see the LDS religion as one of arrogance rather than humility. It is not about the glory of God it is about the glory of man’s religion. It is man’s efforts to save himself and glorify himself. I know this is very blunt but it may sometimes be the last approach.
I was LDS when young. I was raised and still live in Salt Lake City, the capital of Mormonism.
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