I have had many conversations with other Christian believers who disagree with Latter-day Saint teachings. Some of them are actively defending their faith by denigrating my faith by spreading misinformation or inaccurate representations of the teachings of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. I have found that while they promote their version of our doctrines they don't really understand the implications of their own.
One of the great mysteries of life contemplated by contemplative people is where did God come from? Modern Christianity has professed a state of ignorance for about 2000 years. Their position is that God just is and that there is no reason to think about it. It is as if the biblical narrative and canon came and a God must be worked into it.
The scholars and theologians that eventually took over Christian thought and seminary instruction of the clergy after Jesus and his apostles were killed disavowed Latter-day Saint theology. They taught that God is a genderless being with no physical image or body.
Joseph Smith taught that God has a family and came from a family and that God looks like us as we are created in the image and likeness of God. For this teaching he was vehemently disavowed and persecuted and labeled a false prophet based solely on the opinions of those supposed scholars.
The truth is eternal patterns of creation were established on planet Earth. These were not new patterns. This world is not the first and only creation of our Heavenly Father. The thought that God may have been a mortal being at one time and has progressed is true and yet declared as blasphemy by those who would claim to be God's spokespersons. They claim that God is everlasting from all eternity to eternity and yet never created anything prior to the biblical records mention of such beginning about 6000 years ago.
The God formulated from the imaginations of mainstream philosophers has been institutionalized in their theological seminaries. It is an incorporeal genderless force of power that knows no bounds. It invented every thing on a whim and if such creations were not in this deity’s past then they are indeed whimsical action.
Traditional theology claims that God exists as three persons in one deity. It is bodiless and yet can form itself into a human body if necessary. This transformation is based on metaphors so that it takes on the Biblical narrative. There base theology is that mankind is nothing like the being that created them. And yet it transforms itself into one of them in order to save them because It placed the first humans, Adam and Eve in a situation that It knew they would fail to maintain.
This is the case with modern mainstream Christian teachings. God is no more a father than he is a mother or a son or a daughter. For the purposes of their theology, the triune force of God is manifesting temporarily as a male being and a father and a another male being and a son. In other words, God the Father and Jesus the son of God are just temporary metaphors that fit biblical scholars' theological assumptions.
Modern insight from Latter-day revelations from God through the Prophet Joseph Smith has revealed things about the nature of God and godliness that had been lost to the apostate theologians. The true nature of God as an Eternal Father and Jesus as his literal son in the spirit and Only Begotten in the Flesh. Jesus never claims to be anything but the Son of God. Traditional theologians ignore the definition of Son and Father, (and the requirement of a mother) in order to be a child. These are principles established in the creation of the earth. Are these whimsical ideas or eternal principles?
Modern biblical clerics quote various Bible passages to claim that these teachings found in the Bible. The fact is the passages they quote are accurate, especially when speaking of God as Latter-day Saints understand him. When the earth was created He was God. It doesn't matter what his past state of being was. Evangelicals simply claim God appeared on the scene 6000 years ago with no knowledge of the Trinity's past as if any force or power it had was completely inert and non-functioning.
As many believers are aware, traditional theology bases its teachings on the biblical record and the endeavors of generations of clergy, philosophers, and divinity professors that have studied it. They may call their understanding biblical but it is really the teachings of Augustine, Anselm, Martin Luther, and other reformers. Their scholarly conclusions form the basis of mainstream Christian teachings. Third and fourth-century religious councils also heavily influenced teachings and doctrines about who God is and mankind's relationship to him.
Based on the conclusions of these philosophical scholars, the "God of the Bible", has been represented as a sovereign, all-powerful, incorporeal, and yet loving force that has always existed in the universe. The basic conclusion about deity is that at one time this mysterious being was the sole occupant of whatever dimension outside of time and space it had created during its infinite existence.
This world, according to the biblical account only came into existence as a habitable planet about 6000 years ago. There is no inkling of understanding in these theological circles as to what God might have been doing for all of eternity past. Mainstream Christianity has no eternal context for what it teaches other than to induce people to heaven by causing them to fear hell.
Even those few mainstream professors that attempt to discuss this mystery and speculate about it can't come up with a logical thought to explain this earth's creation or the purpose for our existence other than God wanted to do it and willed it to be.
To explain God's past, they claim that he somehow existed outside of time and space, which is simply a non-theological defense for their lack of understanding. I should be fair here and mention that in reality, no human can comprehend the idea of a beginningless existence or an infinite supply of matter and elements of creation.
The church leaders that came to power after the death of Jesus Christ eventually declared that a closed canon of scripture, that the Bible, represents the full measure of knowledge available to humans. Even though a full biblical record hasn't always existed or even been available to the majority of humans that have lived on planet Earth, this teaching became a controlling factor of the Christian belief system. This gave the clergy substantial power and authority over the believers that lived at various times in the past. Some of these ideas continue to this day.
If scripture was available, it may not have been available in the language of every nation, therefore leaving some portion of the human race in ignorance. Even so, the controlling powers of theological academia have decreed that this book contains all we need to know in order to be "saved" or find salvation. Such a conclusion is nonsensical on its face.
The purpose of the Bible in reality is to declare an historical account that demonstrates the pattern that God establishes prophet leaders to represent him on the earth. It does not give unauthorized scholar authority to act for God.
With an authorized prophet spokesman, there is never a debate about who God is speaking to confirm the path of his church or people. These leaders can be rejected or accepted. History confirms and declarations by Jesus Christ himself tell us that rejecting the prophets was a common response by those that sought control of the culture and society in times past.
The message of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints is that God has again established prophet spokesmen in earth. He has restored priesthood authority to lead the church and bless families in an eternal covenant order that is a heavenly pattern of love, individual agency, and learning by which God blesses his children.
From modern revelation and prophetic declarations, we understand more of eternal truth and the mysteries of godliness than ever before. God desires to pour down knowledge into our minds if we are willing to receive it.
One of the truths into which we have been given a small measure of understanding is the nature of God's eternal past. We learn that our personal and individual existence doesn't begin at our birth. A part of our individual soul is eternal and uncreated. We don't know the full measure of this principle.
Our relationship to God is as literal children or spirit offspring. The begetting of our spirit is the work of exalted parents. Eternal intelligence is eternally bonded to individual spirits. Life on earth is also part of an eternal process designed to bring us joy and greater eternal opportunity. Can the claim the God is a father be true if there is no mother? Not according to the principle definition of the these terms.
The pattern of family, of husband and wife and children comes from God. It is a divine heavenly order. Through divine covenant relationships and principles, we develop and grow as we live with the freedom to make choices. The redemption from the fall was prepared ahead of time. We are accountable for our choices, but because of our Redeemer, Jesus Christ, we can be forgiven of our sins and the resurrection will overcome death. This is God's plan for teaching and nurturing his children in eternal principles.
We see this in our earthly families. When a child is conceived in love, its parents are committed to each other and to the nurturing of their offspring. This is a manifestation of the deepest and most committed type of love. We did not invent this process as humans. It is a pattern that we witnessed before we were born. Our Heavenly Parents are the perfect examples of these attributes. Fatherhood and motherhood are divine opportunities that we can magnify or abuse. We can exalt them or debase them. That is the opportunity life on earth as fallen mortal beings give us.
There are billions of fathers and mothers on the earth, but we each have only one father and one mother that is responsible for our existence. While many factors account for the relationships we experience, our DNA is traceable to only two other beings and the generations that directly preceded them.
Our physical body is made of the elements of this earth that are incorporated by natural processes to bring life to the cells that form us. We are literally from the dust of the earth. The food we eat is grown in the ground, and water with minerals and vitamins that we need to live comes into our bodies.
What about our spirit? Does it exist from magic, or from a natural process on a higher spiritual plane of existence? God has a spirit. The great mystery of any religious system has to do with where we came from and why we exist and the powers that brought us to exist.
To bring into focus the title of this article we refer to some references by earlier prophets of the restoration. Joseph Smith taught that God our Heavenly Father is an eternal person. His intelligence and existence have no beginning. He too experienced life on earth as part of this eternal pattern of creation.
We know very little about His life and it isn't important to know, but we can surmise that he is someone's son and is part of a family. Sometime in the past, he attained all power, knowledge, and glory as an exalted resurrected being. This is the Gospel of the Christ. The eternal immutable principles of agency, love, justice, and mercy never end.
As a mortal being, he was sealed to a companion through priesthood covenants. This is a process that has no beginning. Being endowed with all power and righteousness He creates with his Eternal Female companion, ie Wife, the spirits of all men and women. Gender is an eternal part of who we are.
All creation of souls is held as joint creators in the divine union of male and female. That is why we are created in the image of God, male and female. There is no other type of person and there is no power of having offspring outside of the elements and power held by a man and a woman. How they operate in exalted beings versus mortals we do not know.
A common criticism used by detractors of the Latter-day Saint faith is to say that we don't believe in the God of the Bible because it has been taught in the church that our Heavenly Father was once a man. Well, he is still a man and always will be. Jesus was too and he was only doing what he had seen the Father do. This teaching is in the New Testament. That may be a hard concept to grasp when you have been taught all of your life that God has no body or form and is genderless. It made perfect sense to me the first time I heard it.
For this reason, mainstream Christians that hear of this doctrine can't grasp the Father's desire for us to become like him. That is to become exalted beings, even gods, kings, and priests to God forever. They have been taught for centuries that humans are mere creatures not intended for any glorious future but to be captive worshippers to a Triune force that is neither male nor female nor a father and a son to each other except metaphorically.
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