Where theologians stumble is about the origins of the body and it's purpose. Whenever the body is interpreted as a natural expression of God, confusion ensues. Confusion also follows whenever one body is made more special than others. Whatever I was, you are also. If I was a dream figure that never really existed in reality...then so you. If I was the Son of God, then so you. If I seemed to die, it is because the Son of God seems to die in his dreams. If I seemed to suffer, it's because the experience of form is one of suffering. In form, the Son of God is a fish out of water. If I rose from the dead, it is because you will also waken from this dream of death. Given enough time, you will choose life. You assume you have one "life" to live. So you cannot understand how, given enough time, you will choose as I chose. But I tell you, death is an illusion whether you believe it or not. And you will either continue sleeping, or you will awaken to the truth. Only the truth will set you free from the birth-death cycle of sleeping. The truth is you are the Son of God, masked, sleeping, dreaming of nightmares, appearing as legion and opposite your true Self. And you have arrived at your experiences through a decision tree that led in confusion deep into a labyrinth. Accept responsibility for your experiences and you begin the path back from which you came. You came from heaven, and you will return. You must. You ARE heaven, and it is not heaven without you. Jesus
Most likely some Mormons are Christians and some are more like Masonics from what I've seen. A friend that was somewhat of a scholar told me once that the similarity of all the cults is that they have problems with the Trinity that essentially center on whether Jesus was God or something else like a very Holy teacher or something... I think he is right and it seems like the Mormons might be the very, very best at masking that problem... The devil has everybody fooled to some extent, whether true Christian or not, so you never really can tell who is what for a certainty but the idea that Jesus was/is God incarnate is the main thing, if you stumble on that then you have to get over it because only God could pay for your sins, no great teacher could do that...
Many are fooled on these points. My legacy is fattened with the fodder of special incarnation. Then it is slaughtered for sins. God-blood is made potent as a form of monetary exchange. Money to buy back your share of the kingdom is apportioned to you if you believe this. Unfortunately, these are myths. This is the shortcut over Donner Pass. It will not save you time. It will waste your time, and you will suffer for it. On that path, you would be lucky to have Mormons help you as you pass through Utah. Jesus
Mormons don't teach that Jesus was merely a great teacher. They teach that he is the literal son of God, and thus a literal heir of God's power and glory. They teach that Christ is the God of the Old Testament. The only differing point is that they claim God the Father and God the Son to be two distinct persons. As Harper's Bible Dictionary states, the idea of the trinity as stated by the creeds is not found in the New Testament. Christ repeatedly refers to His Father and himself as seperate beings. Paul spells it out plain as day. It seems obvious the more I study the history of the early Christian churches, that the idea of the trinity evolved from the mind of man, despite the fact the Christ himself taught the contrary. Mormons don't teach that Christ was less than a God. They teach they he is equal to God the Father, having inherited His glory. Nonetheless, Christ repeatedly stated that he acts according to the example and direction of the Father, who it only makes sense is a seperate being.
The trinity concept. One of the churches more bizarre concoctions. http://home.inu.net/skeptic/trinity.html THE DOCTRINE OF THE HOLY TRINITY1 God found out about the Trinity in 325 AD Rocco A. Errico (more) Finding themselves saddled with a perplexing enigma, the early church leaders concocted the Trinity as a vehicle by which the mythical Jesus could be placed on a par with the equally mythical beings, God and the Holy Spirit, a.k.a., the Holy Ghost. The whole idea of a triune godhead is absurd in the extreme and makes a mockery of logic. In that regard, it might be well to reflect for a moment on the many innocent people, such as Michael Servetus the founder of Unitarianism, who were tortured, imprisoned and/or burnt at the stake for having had the courage to deny this false doctrine. Suffice it to say that the doctrine of the Holy Trinity is a hoax sustained by a forgery. It lacks logic and cannot be confirmed in scripture, as has been clearly shown, therefore it has no credibility.
What it frankly comes down to, is if defining this from a human point of view, religion makes little difference. If you define it from the biblical point of view, then Mormonism is nothing but a cult. The New Testament fulfilled massive amounts of Old Testament prophecy, and in its finality, says very clearly: Revelation 22:18-19 I warn everyone who hears the words of the prophecy of this book: If anyone adds anything to them, God will add to him the plagues described in this book. And if anyone takes words away from this book of prophecy, God will take away from him his share in the tree of life and in the holy city, which are described in this book. If you can explain in any convincing way how the Book of Mormon is anything less than a complete violation of scripture, adding large amounts of new "scripture", then go right ahead. I have read the entire thing, and it has zero place and functionality within the Old-New Testament foundation. The canon was quite finished upon the death of the Messiah and New covenant, clearly foreseen from as far back as Moses and In Jeremiah. Joseph Smith was a known strange individual, who was fascinated with curious things. His peepstones to read the golden plates, which of course, pretty much few others were allowed to view, fits right in with that oddball. Since you appear to want to dance around the evidence and the overwhelming obviousness of Mormon dissonances with scripture, then you will get the chance to try and explain to the most High, why you think He is wrong. I am unimpressed by your juking and jiving, and uninterested in your clear attempts to ignore reality. I have had multiple run-ins with Mormon missionaries (wearing nice clothes and black tags with labels like Elder John, etc.). They are never able to answer my questions on scripture, because they do not grasp what it really says. When you take them outside their memorized evangelic verses and answers, they have little to say, because much of their beliefs do not square with the scripture.
Are you claiming that John held what we now refer to as the Old & New testaments in his hands and wrote the book of revelations; concluding with the verse that you cited from Rev. 22? Any biblical scholar knows that this wasn't the case. The canon that is accepted as complete now, wasn't completed until the 3rd century B.C. There was much debate over what should be included and what should be discarded. Indeed a simple wikipedia search yields the following: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/New_Testament Eusebius, c. 300, gave a detailed list of New Testament writings in his Ecclesiastical History Book 3, Chapter XXV: Do I question the validity of the book of revelation? No I don't, even though it seems that many christians have/do. But I recognize the fact that the King James Bible that I read was never intended to be assembled in chronological order. Neither was it John's intent to make a statement concluding the entire canon. Rather the verses you cited were a conclusion to that specific book. Otherwise those we hold so dear for assembling the modern canon are under condemnation for omitting/including writing that John might have known nothing about. By the way, I'm not impressed by your ability to debate with 19 year-old boys, who have taken it upon themselves to dedicate 2 years of their life to declaring that Jesus is the Christ. Mormon missionaries aren't viewed by the church as being authoritative and all-knowing. The are sent out specifically to teach the plain and simple concepts. But to say that they cannot debate with you because their beliefs don't square with scripture is absurd. They believe and study the same bible that the rest of Christendom accepts.
The more I research it, the more it seems that it was merely a case of one incorrect doctrine requiring the conformation of all others. The original problem was that there was a debate as to whether Christ was eternal and without beginning. If he had a beginning he must have been created by God. If he was created by God, he had to be inferior to god because the created is always supposed to be inferior to the creator. If he was inferior, then he was no longer worthy of worship. So if Christ is worthy of worship, then it must be that he has no beginning and was not created. He must be co-eternal with God. But the only way that is possible is if he and God are the same being. And so it was that a single question developed a completely confusing & incomprehensible God. If it had been accepted that Christ truely was the literal son of God as scripture states, there would have been no confusion. Paul says in Romans 8: 16 The Spirit itself beareth witness with our spirit, that we are the children of God: 17 And if children, then heirs; heirs of God, and joint-heirs with Christ; if so be that we suffer with him, that we may be also glorified together. The glory of Christ is inherited from the Father, and according to Paul we can be joint-heirs.
Since you are such an expert on the Book of Mormon, I welcome you to propose to me, which teachings of that book don't jive with the Old-New Testament, and we can discuss those passages if you'd like. It seems as though the Book of Mormon might have been speaking directly to you in the following verses. http://scriptures.lds.org/2_ne/29/3#3 Personally, I don't want to be the one telling God that he can't communicate with us anymore. Who decided that anyway? Who was it that first decided that God was no longer capable of providing direction to us? Am I really supposed to believe that God provided direction to his children from Adam down to John and then decided that everyone had to figure it out for themselves for the next few thousand years?