Category: Jesus Christ

Where Do Babies Come From?

Our birth is but a sleep and a forgetting:
The Soul that rises with us, our life’s Star,
Hath had elsewhere its setting,
And cometh from afar:
Not in entire forgetfulness,
And not in utter nakedness,
But trailing clouds of glory do we come
From God, who is our home:

-William Wordsworth

We lived as spirits before we were born. This is one of those truths that many people accept and believe when they hear it, yet very few Christian ministers will teach it. It surprises me.

What was it like to live as a spirit? We don’t have all the details, but we do know that we had a Father who loved us. In His hopes for our futures he saw us growing up in integrity and character. To help us in our education and progression, he created the world and offered each of us the chance to live on it in physical, mortal bodies.

The physical realm was a step up for us. It meant becoming a bit more like Father, since his body was physical, immortal, and perfect. Of course, mortality, as we’ve all found out, has its pitfalls. Disease, poverty, hunger, death, and other misfortunes of many kinds are the tests we’ve been given to help us grow, both collectively and individually.

Central to Father’s plan was a Savior, a person who would not only mitigate the challenges of mortal living, but also vanquish death itself. Permanently. He would also bridge the chasm of sin…the chasm we help dig by our own poor decisions.

Jesus Christ, then known as Jehovah, was the first-born of the Father, and the obvious candidate for the job. We shouted for joy at the thought of our eldest brother leading us into this new frontier. We knew we would be fine if He was our Savior. We already had faith in him.

Another of Father’s most clever sons also came, vying for the position. Lucifer’s campaign promises included saving all people from sin and death (by removing their free will). He must have been persuasive, because he drew a third of all spirits with him, but rather than getting their demands, they were denied entrance into physical bodies of their own.

We know that since we are here, we made the right choice. Before we were born we had faith in Jesus Christ, and we can have faith in him still. He will do everything he set out to do, and we can make the choice every day to be on His side.

See “The Plan of Salvation“

What Do Mormons Believe? – Baptism

I met a man once who thought that baptism was a good idea, but not necessary for salvation. He suggested it was sufficient just to “believe in Jesus,” and you’ll be fine. And then there are some others who say that once you’re baptized you’re good to go (to heaven, that is).

Mere belief (which is a much smaller thing than faith), is like believing that a college can make you an attorney. It can. Your belief is right, but there’s still the matter of being accepted. Getting baptized, and baptized properly, is like the ACT or the SAT. And as any attorney can tell you, getting into college is not the same thing as getting out.

The purpose of college, like the purpose of life, is to emerge from the struggle a different, better person. Sure, you could theoretically learn everything a lawyer or a doctor knows through diligent, independent study at a local library. But there are at least two problems with this:

1) Do you really think you’ll study as hard if you never commit to it? Will you push yourself to learn the integumentary system if you aren’t in classes and there are no final exams?

2) Who will hire you? Your knowledge and experience may be high, but your sheepskin is still unofficial and unauthorized.

Now, this is just a simple analogy, but it helps get the point across. Baptism is a rebirth; a new starting point, and for most people it is the disposal of a sinful life in favor of one devoted to God and to godly living. It exhibits your commitment to Jesus Christ, both in His eyes and in yours.

jesusbaptizedJust like in the SATs, you aren’t allowed to cheat, either. The exam must be proctored by a testing official appointed by the head of the testing organization. Similarly, baptism must be administered by a person who holds the authority to act in behalf of God. This is why people went to John the Baptist. He had the Levitical priesthood.

Baptism is a requirement for salvation. Consider the baptism of Jesus Himself. He was not turning from a life of sin, nor committing Himself to follow His own path. He had two reasons for doing it: 1) because it is a required step to salvation for all people and 2) to show us how important it is. (see Book of Mormon: 2 Nephi 31:9)

Who are the Trinity?

I just finished teaching an Intro to Philosophy class with the University of Phoenix and the section on metaphysics spent a lot of time on the idea of proving God’s existence. What struck me was that all of the European philosophy about God and spirit was based on the concepts outlined in the Nicene Creed.

In the King Follett lectures Joseph Smith makes the comment that you need to start right! If you don’t start right you can never expect to find the truth. The main argument dealt with at Nicaea was the nature of God…which is a pretty good starting point. After many months of argument most of those attending agreed to the concept that God, Jesus, and the Holy Spirit are the “Trinity” which is this mystical mixture of spirit and material that isn’t affected by passion. It is large enough to cover the whole earth and small enough to dwell in your heart. Part of the dignitaries left the convention and went back to the Eastern church where they proposed that God, Jesus, and the Holy Spirit were separate beings, laying the groundwork for the Orthodox Greek and Russian churches.

For over 1,000 years most Europeans were taught the ideas agreed to at Nicaea, therefore all the philosophers who were trying to prove the existence of God were trying to prove the existence of the Trinity. Joseph Smith at age 14 gained a greater insight into the nature of God than all those scholars in AD 325. He saw God and Jesus as two separate, physical beings. Now by having the truth to start from, the restoration of the gospel could begin. The first Article of Faith is an answer to the false beliefs perpetrated since the council of Nicaea, “We believe in God the Eternal Father, and in his Son Jesus Christ, and in the Holy Ghost” Articles of Faith 1:1

Entropy

The Second Law of Thermodynamics states that isolated systems must go in the direction of greater disorder. But an individual component of the system may become more ordered if a separate component or components increase even more in disorder.

Mortal living tends toward sin. The entire world is steadily becoming worse in this respect. It would be hopeless, except for the Savior who has taken all “sin entropy” on himself. An infinite amount of it. This permits us ~ an infinite number of us ~ to increase in order and goodness and glory, but only if we rely on His payment.

Thermodynamics is a tough subject to get your head around. So is the gospel’s idea of atonement, but luckily we have some great teachers.

What Do Mormons Believe? – The Restoration

What is it that makes us different? Why do Mormon missionaries knock on the doors of Christians if they preach the gospel of Christ? It is more than a desire to gather sheep into our flavor of worship.

Since the Garden of Eden the Lord has given us instructions on what we ought to spend our time doing in life. His pattern is to choose a mortal man, call him a prophet, and dispense the information through him. He needs two things: access to truth and authority (priesthood) to preach it. It’s simple and efficient. At least, it is when the people listen to him.

Invariably, the backlash against the prophet leads to a revolt against him and against God. When the prophet is killed, the dispensing of gospel truth is thwarted and the people are left in the dark. We Mormons call this “apostasy.” Fortunately, the Lord has always followed apostasy with a new prophet and a new dispensation, beginning with Adam, then Noah, Abraham, Moses, and Elijah, etc.

Case in point: John the Baptist was called as a prophet to prepare the way for Jesus’ ministry. He and Jesus taught the gospel truth, restored the priesthood power, and organized the Church of Jesus Christ. Jesus called Peter and the other apostles to lead the flock after His departure.

Up to this point you probably feel comfortable. Here comes the primary theological difference between Mormons and most other Christians:

John the Baptist was beheaded, Christ was crucified, and the apostles were rejected and murdered. They who held the authority of the Lord were eliminated and the world became apostate again. This time it lasted for over a millennium, allowing a smattering of false teachings from non-prophet church leaders to creep in.

Reformers such as Martin Luther, John Wycliffe, Roger Williams, and others saw problems in the religions of their days; they did their best to correct them, but lacked the capacity (and the authority) to fully revert to Christ’s original church. They could not authoritatively speak for God, since he had not spoken to them or given them permission, and many of these reformers recognized that fact.

This dark apostasy came to its end when a young man of 14 years prayed in seclusion in a grove of trees in 1820. Joseph Smith was looking for the true church. Not a nice church, or a charismatic church, or a ceremonial church, but the church that God himself directed. As he searched the Bible he read,

“If any of you lack wisdom, let him ask of God, that giveth to all men liberally, and upbraideth not; and it shall be given him.” James 1:5

He felt that if anyone lacked wisdom he did, for what to do he did not know. And unless he could gain more wisdom he would never know. In a grove of trees near his country farmhouse, he knelt and prayed. In his words:

“I saw a pillar of light exactly over my head, above the brightness of the sun, which descended gradually until it fell upon me…Joseph Smith's first vision

“When the light rested upon me I saw two Personages, whose brightness and glory defy all description, standing above me in the air. One of them spake unto me, calling me by name and said, pointing to the other—This is My Beloved Son. Hear Him!

“My object in going to inquire of the Lord was to know which of all the sects was right, that I might know which to join. No sooner, therefore, did I get possession of myself, so as to be able to speak, than I asked the Personages who stood above me in the light, which of all the sects was right…—and which I should join.” Joseph Smith-History 1:16-18

Joseph received an answer from the lips of the Savior himself: That his Church was in apostasy. There were no prophets on the earth and there hadn’t been for over a thousand years.

However, even in these demoralizing words was a message of hope: the apostasy was now broken, and Joseph was receiving direct communication from God. Over the course of Joseph’s life, he was visited by the Lord, and also by other angelic messengers, many more times. He was chosen to be a prophet and through these visitations the priesthood authority was restored. The church was reorganized upon the foundation of apostles and prophets.

Now, we carry this amazing message of hope to all nations of the earth. We are honest in our desire for others to know that the Lord’s work is restored. His successor, Thomas Monson, is the living prophet today. We know it, and we want you to know it too.

How? It’s simple. Pray.

God knows whether this is all true, and I daresay he has an opinion on the matter. Ask him yourself. I have, and so have millions of now-Mormons. You may not receive as glorious a visitation as Joseph did, but he will answer you. Often it comes as a feeling from the Holy Ghost, or an idea you hadn’t thought of. Maybe in a word from a neighbor. Ask and ye shall receive. If you won’t ask, you don’t receive.