Scriptures

Chapter ten of the Teachings of George Albert Smith is about the scriptures and the encouragement to use them.  Whenever the Scriptures are the topic, one of the most visible lines of demarcation between Mormonism and Christianity appears seeing that Mormonism includes three other books as Scripture; namely, the Book of Mormon, Doctrine and Covenants, and the Pearl of Great Price.

This has also been one of the most hotly debated topics between Mormons and Christians.  Understandably so.  Nothing influences people’s beliefs more than what they consider the word of God.

Over the years, many Christians have listed many problems they have with LDS Scriptures. They have cited the lack of archaeology proof for the Book of Mormon; its similarity in many places with the King James Version; the Book of Abraham in reality being a funeral Egyptian text to name just a few.

One thing that I always have found curious is that the books of Abraham and Moses in the Pearl of Great Price are supposedly the correct version of the similar accounts in Genesis.  If that is correct, why didn’t Jesus point that out when he walked the earth?  We know that the Genesis account as is contained in the Bible is the one that the Jews of Jesus’ day used.  We know that from the Dead Sea Scrolls and other sources. If that account was as corrupted as indicated by the Pearl of Great Price, why didn’t Jesus correct it?  I suppose somebody could claim that Jesus’ correction was one of the plain and precious truths that Mormonism claims were taken out of the Bible.  But that is very difficult to believe.  Just think of how Jesus’ Jewish opponents could have used that to incite the crowds!  “He’s changing our Scriptures!”  It’s difficult to believe that all traces of that could be wiped out, not only from the Bible, but from ancient history.

I doubt, however, that this argument will have much effect on most Mormons.  After all, accepting books as Scripture are more a matter of belief than reason.

Over the years I have found a better way of showing the differences between the Bible and LDS Scriptures.  It is emphasizing the unique and glorious message of the Bible that salvation and my living with heavenly Father is entirely, completely, 100% God’s gift.  That we don’t have to do one single thing to receive that – that we can’t do anything to receive it.  When it comes to being accepted by God the only thing that counts is what Jesus did for me. The more I emphasize that, the more I hear from Mormons wanting to learn more.  That shouldn’t surprise me.  Because, as the Bible says, that gospel message is the power of God for the salvation of all who believe.

Covenants

One thing that Lesson 19 of the Gospel Doctrines Class covers is the baptismal covenant described in Mosiah 18 of the Book of Mormon.  In that connection the teacher’s manual contains the following quote from President Joseph Fielding Smith.  “A covenant is a contract and an agreement between at least two parties.  In the case of gospel covenants, the parties are the Lord in heaven and men on earth.  Men agree to keep the commandments and the Lord promises to reward them accordingly.”

Here again is an example of how Mormonism and biblical Christianity not only define words differently, but also view matters differently.  The word gospel literally means good news and in the Bible it refers to the very specific good news that Jesus became our substitute, fulfilled all the commandments for us, died for all our sins so that now eternal life is God’s gift to us.  The Bible, and historic Christianity, has always sharply distinguished between this good news of what God has done for us and his commands telling us what to do.  In short, the biblical gospel has nothing to do with God’s commands.  If it did that would not be good news – in light of verses like James 2:10 that state that even breaking one commandment makes us guilty of all.

Secondly, the way that the Bible describes the gospel covenant is all about what God does.  It describes not an agreement between two parties but rather a unilateral action on the part of God.  For example, Jeremiah 31:33-34 says:  ^“But this shall be the covenant that I will make with the house of Israel; After those days, saith the Lord, I will put my law in their inward parts, and write it in their hearts; and will be their God, and they shall be my people.  ³⁴ And they shall teach no more every man his neighbour, and every man his brother, saying, Know the Lord: for they shall all know me, from the least of them unto the greatest of them, saith the Lord: for I will forgive their iniquity, and I will remember their sin no more.”  There is no mention of keeping the commandments or any other action on the part of man.  God’s gospel covenant is 100% about what God does – especially his forgiving us of our sins.  That deserves the description, “good news”.

Because of that good news I know that I am worthy before God – that I am nothing less than a saint in his eyes.  Because of that good news I am eagerly looking forward to Judgment Day knowing that, solely because of what Jesus did for me, I will be eagerly welcomed by God.  Because of that good news I have no doubts that I will be living in the very presence of Heavenly Father for all eternity.  Thank you, Jesus, for doing everything for me.

The Parable of the Prodigal Son

Of all the parables Jesus told, one of the most familiar is the Parable of the Prodigal Son recorded in Luke 15.  It is a wonderful story of God’s forgiveness as the father rushes out and welcomes home his wayward son.

But, as we place it into its context, we see that the point Jesus was really making was the joy we are to experience whenever we see a lost soul saved.  H makes that emphasis in direct response to the Pharisees’ murmuring against him.  “And the Pharisees and scribes murmured, saying, This man receiveth sinners, and eateth with them.” (Luke 15:2).  In response, Jesus tells three parables about the lost – the parable of the Prodigal Son being the last of the three.  And all three emphasize the joy we are to feel when we see the lost saved.  (See Luke 15:5-7, 9-10, 22-24)

In that setting it is obvious that the complaining elder son in the Parable of the Prodigal Son represents the Pharisees.   His anger over his father throwing a feast for his brother mirrors the murmuring of the Pharisees over Jesus eating with the tax collectors and sinners.  I’m sure that the Pharisees listening to Jesus as he unfolded this parable felt as if he had hit them with a two by four over their heads!  In essence, Jesus was telling them that, instead of murmuring, they should be rejoicing that he was reaching the lost.

Therefore I found it interesting to see how Mormonism interprets this parable.  In the New Testament manual, The Life and Teachings of Jesus & His Apostles, it talks about the mercy and forgiveness of the Father.  But what I found interesting is that it talks more about the two sons than it does the father.  The point it emphasizes is that the father “did not have the younger son restored to all the privileges he had forfeited.”  He was received back but now “the farm” is gone.  “The ‘father’ himself cannot undo the effect of the foregone choice.”

In striking contrast, the older son becomes the role model.  He is described as the “more dutiful” son.  “The father consoled him with the statement: “Son, thou art ever with me, and all that I have is thine.”   In other words, for him “the farm” was not gone.  Unlike the younger son, he did not forfeit his privileges.  There is not one mention made of the Pharisees and their ungodly murmuring against Jesus.

A beautiful story of forgiveness is turned into a story of making choices.  “Every choice one makes either expands or contracts the area in which he can make and implement future decisions.  When one makes a choice, he irrevocably binds himself to accept the consequences of that choice.”  So much so, that “the ‘father’ cannot undo the effect of the foregone choice.”

The Bible teaches about a Heavenly Father who can undo the effects of foregone choices and has done so in Jesus Christ.  Through the saving work of Christ he has restored all the privileges that we have forfeited through sin.  Because of Jesus I’m looking forward to living eternally with Heavenly Father.

What a difference a “not” makes!

One of my favorite Bible passages is Romans 4:5.  “But to him that worketh not, but believeth on him that justifieth the ungodly, his faith is counted for righteousness.”  The whole context is brimming over with comforting statements reassuring us that God forgives us through faith.  For example, the very next verse says, “Even as David also describeth the blessedness of the man, unto whom God imputeth righteousness without works.”  It is obvious that righteousness without works is Paul’s theme in this section.

But that is not how Joseph Smith translated it.  His translation, also called the Inspired Version by theLDSChurch, translates verse 5 this way.  “But to him that seeketh not to be justified by the law of works, but believeth on him who justifieth not the ungodly, his faith is counted for righteousness.”  Besides having no basis for such a translation, it violates Paul’s line of thought.  In the very next chapter, for example, Paul speaks in a similar way about justifying the ungodly when he writes: “For when we were yet without strength, in due time Christ died for the ungodly.”  (Romans 5:6)

This is not the only time Joseph Smith did that either.  Another beautiful example of how quick God is to forgive us is seen when the prophet Nathan comes to King David to confront him about his adultery.  After he laid in on the line and also told David that there would be earthly consequences for his sin, we read:  “And David said unto Nathan, I have sinned against the LORD.  And Nathan said unto David, The LORD also hath put away thy sin; thou shalt not die.”  (2 Samuel 12:13)  It’s striking how quickly Nathan reassures David of forgiveness.

But not according to Joseph Smith.  He translated it, “hath not put away thy sin that thou shalt not die.”  Once again the little word “not” changes the sense completely.  It drains it of comfort for us.  It robs God of great glory.

A lot of Mormons today shy away from statements like the following what Spencer W. Kimball wrote in his classic book, The Miracle of Forgiveness.  “It depends upon you whether or not you are forgiven, and when.  It could be weeks, it could be years, it could be centuries before that happy day when you have the positive assurance that the Lord has forgiven you.  That depends on your humility, your sincerity, your works, your attitudes.”  I don’t know why they shy away from such statements.  To me, such statements are accurately reflecting the way Joseph Smith translated the Bible.

The way Mormonism talks about forgiveness and the way the Bible speaks about it are totally opposite.  I rejoice along withSt. Paulthat God justifies the ungodly, that to the one who doesn’t work, his faith is credited as righteousness.

Beware of Worshiping Logic

 

A common reaction to many biblical doctrines is that they are not logical and thus need to be modified or otherwise rejected.  One doctrine that is often dismissed in that way is the teaching that God grants eternal life freely to people without basing that on any merit on the people involved.  That just doesn’t make any sense to human reason.

But not only is that what the Bible teaches, it also acknowledges that we won’t be able to understand it logically.  “For my thoughts are not your thoughts, neither are your ways my ways, saith the Lord.  For as the heavens are higher than the earth, so are my ways higher than your ways, and my thoughts than your thoughts” (Isaiah 55:8-9).  Significantly the Lord says that in the context of his abundantly pardoning us.  Talk about a wide gap.  God’s thoughts are so far beyond us that it is like the distance between heaven and earth.  Obviously, they are not bound by the limitations of human logic.

Paul says the same thing in his letter to the Romans.  “O the depth of the riches both of the wisdom and knowledge of God!  how unsearchable are his judgments, and his ways past finding out”  (Romans 11:33).  Notice the word “unsearchable”.  His judgments and his ways are again far beyond the puny limitations of human logic.   They just don’t make sense to us.

In his love, he gave us a glimpse of his wonderful ways in the Bible.  Even those glimpses, such as the one he gives us when he tells us that he gives people eternal life freely, are so marvelous that they boggle our minds.  But here’s the important point.  Even though we can’t fathom them, we can believe them.  We can believe them, not because we understand them, but because he has revealed them to us.   In fact, we could go even a step further.  If we describe those high truths in such a way that make sense to us, then we have corrupted them.  That explanation can’t be right because the fact is that they are way beyond us.  They are unsearchable.  Period. As one of my college professors use to say:  “You are beginning to understand when you understand that you can’t understand.”

That is why when people respond to biblical teaching with a logical argument I don’t even bother responding. They are using something that doesn’t apply.  We can’t fit God’s great thoughts into our little minds. The argument that it doesn’t make sense is an invalid argument from the get go.

Yes, I know that the teaching that God is one being but three separate and distinct persons doesn’t make sense.  1+1+1=1 is not the math I learned.  But, when it comes to the nature of God that is what he has revealed.  Therefore I believe it.  More than that.  I rejoice in it.  Because that is just another indicator of how truly awesome God is – how he is vastly superior to me. So much so that I can’t understand him.

The flip side of that equation is also important.  When people reject biblical truths because they aren’t logical, they have placed human reason above divine revelation thus making reason and logic a god.  Making logic the standard for accepting truth is just as much an act of idolatry as the worshipping of Baal in the Old Testament.  It is an affront to the Lord and something he hates.

Many Plain and Precious Things

Just a word of explanation to those of you who are not LDS.  I didn’t blog this week on the next lesson on the teachings of George Albert Smith because it will not be studied this week in the LDS church.  They only study it on the 2^nd and 3^rd Sundays of each month.  On other Sundays there is a little more flexibility on what they will study in Relief Society and priesthood quorum meetings.  For example, for this coming Sunday they will be studying one of the General Conference talks from last October – which specific one is decided on by the local leaders.

But each Sunday, in their Sunday School or Gospel Doctrine classes, they will be studying the Book of Mormon.  The focus this Sunday is on 1 Nephi 12 – 14.  This is the section that repeatedly states that “the great and abominable church” has removed “many plain and precious things” from the Bible.

One interesting note has been how the interpretation of the “great and abominable church” has changed over the years.  Years ago, when I first started witnessing to Mormons, it was not uncommon for them to identify it as the Catholic church of the Middle Ages.  This, however, is not how the teacher’s guide for this course interprets it.  It says:  “Emphasize that the great and abominable church is a symbol of apostasy in all its forms.  It is a representation of all false doctrine, false worship, and irreligious attitudes.  It does not represent any specific church in the world today.” (p. 18)

Much more important is the Book of Mormon’s claim that many plain and precious things were taken away from the Bible.  How should we react to that?  We could bring in evidence from the scholarly discipline known as textual criticism to show how faithfully the Bible was passed down from generation to generation.  Especially pertinent is the fact that the vast majority of variants between the various ancient biblical manuscripts consist of additions to the text rather than subtractions from the text.  But, to be honest, even though Christians see textual criticism strongly supporting the faithful transmission of the Bible, in my experience, its findings don’t seem to faze most Mormons.

I think the same can be said for the comparison between the wealth of archaeological evidence supporting the Bible and the dearth of such evidence supporting the Book of Mormon.  Yes, this concerns some Mormons but not that many.  Many haven’t thought about it, and when it is pointed out to them, many shrug it off as unimportant.

The bottom line is that, even though there is strong evidence of the faithful transmission of the Bible, it is still a matter of faith that we believe that today’s Bible faithfully represents the original.  As it is a matter of faith for Mormons to believe that many plain and precious things have been removed from the Bible.  Because of that, I feel that it is more productive to talk about how the book of Mormon does not complement the Bible, but rather contradicts it.

I realize that many Mormons will vehemently protest that last statement.  But for them to say that it doesn’t contradict the Bible would be similar to me saying that my beliefs complement and don’t contradict Mormonism, even while I reject many of Mormonism’s beliefs.  How many of them would sit still as I proclaimed, “I am a Mormon, even though I don’t think Joseph Smith was a prophet, or that the LDS Church was the only true church, or that heaven doesn’t consist of three kingdoms of glory”?  Similarly, we can’t sit still when the Book of Mormon is referred to as another testament of Jesus Christ even though it states that we are saved by grace after all we can do, or that Adam and Eve’s Fall was a blessing, that there was a great apostasy from 100 AD through 1800 AD (Teacher’s guide, p. 16) and on and on.

The messages of the two books are different!  I am so thankful that the Bible tells me that I am saved solely by grace, without works rather than “after all I can do”.  I am so thankful that it promises that there will always be believers and thus the church on earth until Christ returns.  I am even thankful that it shows just what a tragedy the Fall was because that highlights for me that I was spiritually dead and thus my utter inability to please God and my dire need of Jesus doing it all for me.

It is my hope and prayer that many Mormons will stop and think and see the drastic differences between the Book of Mormon and the Bible.  And that they will listen to the Bible rather than the Book of Mormon.

The Book of Mormon

 

Starting with the near year, members of the LDS Church will be studying the Book of Mormon in their adult Sunday School classes, aka Gospel Doctrine classes.  This is part of a set four-year curriculum.  You can purchase the teacher’s manual for this class for a few dollars at LDS.org.  Look for the Book of Mormon Gospel Doctrine Teacher’s Manual.

The lesson they will be studying this Sunday is entitled, “The Keystone of Our Religion”.  This refers to a statement Joseph Smith made about the Book of Mormon, a statement quoted in the Introduction to the Book of Mormon.  “I told the brethren that the Book of Mormon was the most correct of any book on earth, and the keystone of our religion, and a man would get nearer to God by abiding by its precepts, than by any other book.”  Sunday’s entire lesson explains and expands on this statement.

Calling it “the most correct of any book on earth” coincides with Mormonism’s low view of the Bible. After all the Book of Mormon itself claims that “many plain and precious things” were taken away from the Bible, (1 Nephi 13:28). Mormonism’s low view of the Bible has even been formalized in its Articles of Faith.  “We believe the Bible is to be the word of God as far as it is translated correctly; we also believe the Book of Mormon to be the word of God.” (8^th Article of Faith)

Although many different points could be made, I am going to restrict myself to just a couple.  The first is a reminder to both Mormons and Christians to use the word “scripture” carefully.  When Mormons and Christians talk with each other, confusion can easily arise if they aren’t careful with the term “scripture”. When Christians hear that word, they immediately think of the Bible.  Not so with Mormons.  They think of their four scriptures, only one of which is the Bible.  In fact, it has been my experience that many times the Bible is not what comes to their minds.  That is to be expected if you believe the Bible is faulty.  In fact one LDS manual states that the other scriptures should be given preference. (Life and Teachings of Jesus and His Apostles, p.3)

Secondly, I want to highlight how Mormonism’s high view of the Book of Mormon creates a huge divide in belief between Mormons and biblical Christians. I want to highlight that because so many today are claiming that that divide is quite narrow – sometimes almost to the point of being non-existence.  But how can this not create a wide divide?  On the one side you not only have people relying on multiple scriptures, but viewing as faulty the one that the other side holds dear.  On the other side you have people who rely on only one Scripture – who view it as God’s inerrant word and who, in addition, reject any other book claiming to be scripture.  From these two starting points, this divide in belief can only grow greater as individual doctrines are discussed.

The divide between Mormonism and biblical Christianity is huge.  It has been my experience that it is difficult to have any meaningful discussions between the two until that is openly acknowledged.  But once that is acknowledged, often an open and honest comparison of beliefs can be had.