How is mormonism different from Christianity? - Page 7

[Bluegoat]

Originally Posted by CherryBomb

Catholics don't have extra books, Protestants took books out (starting with Martin Luther). (Sorry Shami, never saw your post!) I guess it depends on what you mean by "accept." I don't think the KJV is an accurate translation, neither do most Catholics. And of course, in our view, it's missing books. The language is pretty, so we use it for Scripture memorization, but I would never use it for Bible study or prayer.

I'm not familiar with the NIB. I use the NSV-Catholic Edition.

Martin Luther didn't remove books - it wasn't until some time later that they were no longer included in most editions.

[jeminijad]

Originally Posted by Shami

the fact that Mormons do not believe that Jesus is God and that Christ is the center. If you don't hold these two things to be true, then, according to the Bible, you are missing MAJOR items of the Christian faith. .

There are several smaller Protestant denominations (besides LDS) that do not believe Jesus is God. They do believe that he is the only begotten son of God, and our savior.

What do you call someone who believes this, if not a Christian?

[nicky85]

Part of the controversy over Mormons is that we have a different view of the godhead. We don't believe in the three-in-one godhead that many others do. We believe the Father, Son, and the Holy Ghost to be three separate entities, but one in purpose Because the Christ and the Holy Ghost do only God the Father's will. I've always liked this way of looking at things myself. Being a Christian, (to me) is about following Christ and using His atonement to repent of my sins, not about how others define me. A rose by any other name would smell as sweet! =)

[Shami]

Originally Posted by jeminijad

There are several smaller Protestant denominations (besides LDS) that do not believe Jesus is God. They do believe that he is the only begotten son of God, and our savior.

What do you call someone who believes this, if not a Christian?

I am confused by something.

At the council of Nicea a bunch of church fathers got together and came up with the items of The Faith. I am assuming there was a need to do this because of false teaching and straying away from the apostle's teaching. Also, for the believer's to be one.
One of those items of The Faith is that one must believe that Jesus is God, not A God, but God.
So, all groups who assemble after this creed was established need to believe that Jesus is God in order to be a part of The Faith. It's The Faith common to all believers and passed down by the apostle's teaching.

Here is what baffles me:
Why not just believe what you want and call your self something else. Why try to fit your self into a set of beliefs which you do not hold?

Say a bunch of red, one inch cubes got together and said ok we are defining ourselves as red, one inch cubes. Any one who wants to be a red, one inch cube can call themselves one of us. Then, a green, one in cube comes along and says that he wants to be in the red, one inch cube group. The problem is he wants to stay green rather than become a red cube.
Anyway that is how my elementary logic works and I'm sure many of you can come along and punch some holes in it! LOL

[ancoda]

When someone is defining themselves as a member of a particular religion, what they are trying to do is define their beliefs with the least amount of confusion. There are several religion families that have a specific name that covers a broad category of sects and individual beliefs. Christian, Jew, Muslim, and Hindu are the ones that I am thinking of. There are probably others as well.

So, from a practical standpoint, the difficulty is when someone asks me, "are you a Christian?" Being a Mormon, both answers can cause confusion, so I have to weigh out which answer will cause the least amount of confusion. Saying, "yes, I am a Christian" might cause confusion if the person then thinks that my religious beliefs are equivalent with those of Catholics, Baptists, Quakers, etc. (Although how anyone would think that those religions are equivalent to eachther in the first place is beyond me)

So what confusion would it cause if I instead answered, "no, I am not a Christian"? Most people, when they hear someone say that they are not a Christian immediately thinks that they are defining themselves as someone who does not believe that Jesus Christ is the son of God and is the savior and redeemer of the world. So if someone who thinks that I have defined my beliefs that way opens up my Book of Mormon to somewhere like 2 Nephi 25:26

And we talk of Christ, we rejoice in Christ, we preach of Christ, we prophesy of Christ, and we write according to our prophecies, that our children may know to what source they may look for a remission of their sins.

That person may feel downright decieved.

Now that is from a practical standpoint. From a doctrinal standpoint, we feel that we must take upon ourselves the name of Christ if we are to be saved.

And under this head ye are made free, and there is no other head whereby ye can be made free. There is no other name given whereby salvation cometh; therefore, I would that ye should take upon you the name of Christ, all you that have entered into the covenant with God that ye should be obedient unto the end of your lives.

To try and force my thinking into Shami's analogy, it is like having several red squares of varying shades all piled together. Then some squares get together and decide that only squares of a particular shade are eligible to be called 'red'. All other shades of red must be called by some other name because they decided so. So no matter how red the square looks or acts, unless it has a particular RGB color value, it cannot be called a "red square".

[KoalaMommy]

I would just like to say that "belief in Jesus" does not make a person a Christian. My sister, who is bahai, loves to go around saying she "believes in Jesus", by that she means she believes he lived, had some kind of divine inspiration for his message, was born of a virgin, died on the cross, even was the messiah spoken of in the OT, HOWEVER, she does not believe he was God, nor does she recognize him as her Lord and Savior. My sister is not a Christian

As for the Trinity, there are very few Christian groups who do not recognize the triune nature of God we know as the Trinity: the mystery that the Father, Son and Spirit are distinct persons within the one person of God. The only 2 I know of off hand are the Coptic Christians in Egypt who are not protestant, but predate the Council of Nicea and the Unitarians who were originally a protestant Christian church that rejected the Trinity. The Unitarians no longer identify specifically as a Christian group, it is possible to be Unitarian without being Christian.

[Shami]

If you go back to Acts, the church life was very simple. The believers had all things common, they broke bread from house to house, they met in the temple and they continued steadfastly in the apostles' teaching (Acts 2).
Very soon after the church life began many things came in to degrade the church life, such as, cultures, politics, money, philosophies, their old religion with all of its' ordinances, and heresies (Jesus was not man or Jesus was not God).
Skip forward a few centuries and the church fathers had to sift through it all to come up with the items of the faith, which make all believers one. These items of the faith are based on the apostles' teaching. All those epistles that the aspostles wrote to various churches or regions or to one another are THE APOSTLES' TEACHING.

In the early days, there was one church in one city. Look at the condition today. It is pitiful all of the splits resulting in so many denominations. All of the arguements over practices which divide the body of Christ into who knows how many groups. Paul asked, is Christ divided?
My point is this, if a group of people do not hold to the apostles' teaching, then what is that? What do you call that?

I want to make a distinction between practices and the core commons beliefs passed down from the apostles.

The practices are not something that we believers should argue over although that is the condition of the body today. Practices such as head covering, foot washing, certain clothing, using wine or grape juice, are not reasons to argue over.
However, the Nicene creed are the items of the faith that I will fight for. Paul says to contend for the faith. So, if someone says Jesus is not God then they are veering away from the apostles' teaching. What should I do? Paul charges us to contend for the faith.

Ok. How about believing in Jesus? It seems like some people think that it is okay to have varying degrees of belief in Jesus. It's fine if you want to accept all different types and degrees of believing in Jesus, but what do the apostles' say?

I receive and have fellowship with all believers who hold the common faith (Titus 1:4, Jude 3).
The following are the items of the faith which Paul charges us to contend for.

The Bible is the complete divine revelation inspired word-by-word by God through the Holy Spirit (2 Pet. 1:21 2 Tim. 3:16).

God is uniquely one, yet triune—the Father, the Son, and the Spirit (1 Tim. 2:5a, Matt. 28:19).

The Son of God, even God Himself, was incarnated to be a man by the name of Jesus Christ (Jn. 1:1, Jn. 1:14).

Christ died on the cross for our sins, shedding His blood for our redemption
(1 Pet. 2:24, Eph. 1:7a).

Christ resurrected from among the dead on the third day (1 Cor. 15:4).

Christ ascended to the right hand of God to be Lord of all (Acts 1:9, Acts 2:33, Acts 2:36).

Whenever any person repents to God and believes in the Lord Jesus Christ, he is regenerated (born again) and becomes a living member of the one Body of Christ (Acts 20:21, Jn. 3:3, Eph. 1:22-23, Rom. 12:5).

Christ is coming again to receive His believers to Himself (1 Thes. 2:19)


In my above example of the red, one inch cubes. I guess you could say that there are different shades of red. Let's call these varying shades of red the different practices. (Ex. you like to hold your hands up and worship, i like to kneel, he likes to stand, i cover my head you do not. No problem. Varying shades of red.)
But, if a green, one inch cube wants to be called a red cube then I have to contend for the red cubes. One cannot come to me and say that Jesus is not God. I will not say, okay, no problem. No way. Paul charges us to contend for the faith.

[ancoda]

Originally Posted by Shami

However, the Nicene creed are the items of the faith that I will fight for. Paul says to contend for the faith. So, if someone says Jesus is not God then they are veering away from the apostles' teaching. What should I do? Paul charges us to contend for the faith.

The Son of God, even God Himself, was incarnated to be a man by the name of Jesus Christ (Jn. 1:1, Jn. 1:14).

Christ died on the cross for our sins, shedding His blood for our redemption
(1 Pet. 2:24, Eph. 1:7a).

Christ resurrected from among the dead on the third day (1 Cor. 15:4).

Christ ascended to the right hand of God to be Lord of all (Acts 1:9, Acts 2:33, Acts 2:36).

But, if a green, one inch cube wants to be called a red cube then I have to contend for the red cubes. One cannot come to me and say that Jesus is not God. I will not say, okay, no problem. No way. Paul charges us to contend for the faith.

From some of this it looks like there is still a bit of confusion on the particular points of Mormon doctrine. We do believe that Jesus is God. We just don't believe that He is the same person or entity as God the Father. To demonstrate this, let's go to John 1:1 and I will show you how I read it.

In the beginning was the Word,

We learn from verses 14 and 15 of this chapter that "the Word" is meaning Jesus Christ.

and the Word was with God,

From the very beginning, Jesus was with His father, God the Father (Sometimes called Elohim in the Old Testament).

and the Word was God.

Also from the very beginning Jesus was the rightful God over this earth and led and instructed His people under the name of Jehovah before, as has been said, God himself (Jehovah) was incarnated as a man named Jesus.

For more fun, try reading the words of Abinadi in Mosiah 15.

Does clarifying that make us look more like red squares rather than green? I am aware that tritheism is considered heresy by several of the early councils, but really it isn't all that different from the doctrine of trinity. I consider it to be more of a variation rather than a core difference.

I also tend to use these two scriptures to see how Jesus defines Christianity:

John 14:21
He that hath my commandments, and keepeth them, he it is that loveth me: and he that loveth me shall be loved of my Father, and I will love him, and will manifest myself to him.

Luke 9:49-50
And John answered and said, Master, we saw one casting out devils in thy name; and we forbad him, because he followeth not with us.
And Jesus said unto him, Forbid him not: for he that is not against us is for us.

That is all I can do for tonight.

[Shami]

Thanks Ancoda, for your thoughtful and well organized post. Here's, what you said below:

"From some of this it looks like there is still a bit of confusion on the particular points of Mormon doctrine. We do believe that Jesus is God. We just don't believe that He is the same person or entity as God the Father."

This is really seems to be the whole hang up is this one matter of defining the Trinity. This is the first time I have seen person of the Mormon faith say that Jesus is God. I have seen some say that He is a God, or that He is only the Son of God.

Even in the Mosiah book that you linked, it says that Christ and the Father are one God. I only had time to skim that link, hope I am paraphrasing correctly. I will go back and read more thoroughly.

Somewhere up thread I posted many verses about Christ and the Father and the Spirit being One.

Here is a recap of my understanding:

The three are essentially the same. I mean their essence is divine. They are all divinity. In life, nature, and essence, divinity is divinity is divinity and that never changes from eternity past to eternity future.

However, the three Persons are distinct in their function. Although, their purpose is all the same because they are oneness itself. They always were one and always will be one.

Economically, or, one could say in their functions, they are very distinct, not separate as the Mormon Doctrine teaches. I think the word 'distinct' is better than the word 'separate' because separate implies that they are three separate Gods which is a Tritheistic perspective.

One huge distinction is that the three decided that God should become a man, Jesus Christ, on the earth. So, God in all of His divinity decided to step out of eternity and into time in order to put on humanity.

Now you have Jesus, the God-man. Now God has both humanity and divinity mingled together. And after Jesus Christ resurrected, ascended to the Father, He became a life giving Spirit (1 Cor 15:45?, I think).

Now the Lord is the Spirit so that we can be born of the Spirit to enter into the Kingdom of God.
John 22 Jesus appeared to His disciples and breathed into their nostrils and said, receive the Holy Spirit. With that in mind, do you think that Jesus' breath is in essence the Holy Spirit?

You just can't get much closer to a person then to have them breath into your nostrils. If I breathed on you, you would probably say, Hey, you, Shami, stop breathing on me. LOL Just trying to lighten myself up a bit. My breath is me. My breath is not someone else.
The Trinity is soooo one that to say that they are separate Gods is veering from the apostle's teaching.
If you think about it, anyone who has received Jesus Christ as their Lord and Savior, has had Jesus breath into their nostrils, thus receiving the Holy Spirit. So, what does that make a person when Jesus breaths the Holy Spirit into them?

Persons, who have done this (received JC into them), have divinity added to their own humanity. Persons who have done this just got divinity mingled with their humanity. Persons who have done this, are joined to the Lord and the entire Trinity regardless of what name/label we put on them. All of the names, labels, denominations are divisions from Satan, and in my opinion need to be cast in the lake of fire along with him, but that is another thread.

So, God's divine nature got mingled with the human nature through incarnation. Through His death and resurrection and becoming a life giving Spirit, now we sinful humans can get [B]divinity mingled into our human nature and get transformed into the same image from glory to glory even as from the Lord's Spirit (somewhere in one of the Corinthians). Hallelujah!
The purpose of the mingling of God and man is so that God would have a group of people to express His life and nature on earth and eventually have dominion over it (Gen 1:26).


You may think I am off topic but,
I said all of this because Ancoda said this,
"Does clarifying that make us look more like red squares rather than green? I am aware that tritheism is considered heresy by several of the early councils, but really it isn't all that different from the doctrine of trinity. I consider it to be more of a variation rather than a core difference."

Here is where we may have to agree to disagree.

The matter of the Trinity and His One-Three nature is a core matter. If it was just a variation, why have there been decades and decades of debate over this.

I am in no way challenging you, Ancoda, and whether or not YOU personally are "christian". However, I have done a little research just since this thread and the links which were provided up thread by persons of the Mormon faith did not sound like your statements/Mosiah link. I do challenge the Mormon doctrine, not the individual people of that faith.
BTW, I am confused how to refer to the people of the Mormon faith. I can't remember where I read that Mormons are different than the Church of Latter Day Saints. I'm asking so that I will say it in a respectful way.

Thanks to anyone who stays with my too long posts. I always say I will keep it short, and well, there it is!

[genifer]

The three are essentially the same. I mean their essence is divine. They are all divinity. In life, nature, and essence, divinity is divinity is divinity and that never changes from eternity past to eternity future.

However, the three Persons are distinct in their function. Although, their purpose is all the same because they are oneness itself. They always were one and always will be one.

Im not sure if this is helpful but here is my understanding of the Trinity.

Water comes in three forms: Liquid, Vapour, Frozen.

The Liquid fluid stuff is water.

The Vapour or Steam is still water in evaporated form.

The Frozen stuff is still water too, just a different form.

I liken God, as in His nature being 3 in one, to water, in that it is still water when it is fluid, steamy, or frozen. They are all one in the same being, omnipotent, omnipresent and omniscient.

[Shami]

Genifer,
Hi, yes, that is very helpful! I also have heard this one:

A man can be a father, son, uncle, friend, brother, but are all one person. The same man may function in different ways but in essence he is the same .

It's hard to explain the divine with only physical material things to use.

[ancoda]

Originally Posted by Shami

This is really seems to be the whole hang up is this one matter of defining the Trinity. This is the first time I have seen person of the Mormon faith say that Jesus is God. I have seen some say that He is a God, or that He is only the Son of God.

Even in the Mosiah book that you linked, it says that Christ and the Father are one God.

The matter of the Trinity and His One-Three nature is a core matter. If it was just a variation, why have there been decades and decades of debate over this.

I am in no way challenging you, Ancoda, and whether or not YOU personally are "christian". However, I have done a little research just since this thread and the links which were provided up thread by persons of the Mormon faith did not sound like your statements/Mosiah link. I do challenge the Mormon doctrine, not the individual people of that faith.
BTW, I am confused how to refer to the people of the Mormon faith. I can't remember where I read that Mormons are different than the Church of Latter Day Saints. I'm asking so that I will say it in a respectful way.

The reason that you have not heard any other Mormon people talking about Jesus being God is because we tend to shy away from sounding like we have a trinity type concept of God. Unfortunately that makes us often err from the doctrine the other direction. (It is usually based on snap questions and quick answers. Something like having someone ask us "Do you believe that God and Jesus Christ are the same?" For as complex of a topic as the nature of God, that is really a very poorly worded question. More often than not you would get a "no" answer from us, especially in a fast-paced face-to-face conversation.)

As for naming, that is another can of worms entirely. The official name for the church is 'The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints'. That is quite a mouthful to say to begin with and there really isn't a way to name a member of the church other than to say "I am a member of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints", which is even more of a mouthful. So a couple of nicknames have become popular. One is the acronym style of 'LDS'. That leads to things like "LDS church" and "I am LDS". The other nickname is 'Mormon', which leads to "Mormon church" and "I am Mormon".

Even though "Mormon" was originally a derogatory name coined by enemies of the church, we have gotten over that. You are not likely to offend anyone by using either of those two nicknames.

The only confusion comes in the term "Mormon" and only because there are a couple of split-off religions that sometimes use the same nickname.