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“What should be different about a Mormon Christmas?” [Why Joseph Smith's birthday! Of course!]
Lds.org: New Era Magazine (official publication of the Lds Church) ^ | December 1976 | Helen K. Richards

Posted on 12/23/2013 4:02:21 AM PST by Colofornian

SNIP

This special season has greater importance for the Latter-day Saints than for others because we not only observe the birthday of the Savior but also the birthday of our Prophet, Joseph Smith.

Joseph Smith, the great Prophet chosen by our Heavenly Father to usher in the last dispensation, was born on December 23, 1805, just two days before December 25, which the world observes as the birthday of Jesus Christ.

December 23 should be a day of great importance in every Latter-day Saint home, a day of remembering and honoring one of the great prophets of God, a day to pay tribute to a man whose life and mission has had a tremendous influence on the lives of every one of us.

SNIP

(Excerpt) Read more at lds.org ...


TOPICS: History; Other non-Christian; Religion & Culture; Worship
KEYWORDS: antichristian; inman; josephsmith; lds; mormonism; smithmas
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To: All
New thread up:
What makes 'Smithmas' 'Smithmas'? [Vanity]
21 posted on 12/23/2013 10:12:59 AM PST by Colofornian
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To: All

Chronological Historical Recap: What makes 'Smithmas' 'Smithmas'?

Every river has its banks. What is the channel forged -- the definition of the river -- that we've come to know as The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints' "Smithmas"?

Every river has its tributaries; and when it comes to "Smithmas" it's the same.

As the Mormons annually celebrate Joseph Smith, his birthday, his advent, the Mormon Church adoration and over-attentiveness to Joseph Smith has openly competed with the focus Jesus Christ receives. The result? This continual cresting onto the banks of "Smithmas" has flooded our nation.

Its headwaters are multi-faceted:

19th century

20th and 21st centuries

And then, finally a KEY primary theological theme running rampant throughout the Mormon Church no matter what decade is discussed is this one discussed here: 'First vision visitation' of LdsIsm trumps Jesus' incarnational visitation via Bethlehem [Vanity]

Defining Smithmas'

  1. The worship or adoration or over-the-top reverence accorded Joseph Smith by both Mormon leaders and many (but not all) grassroots Mormons, leading to the more-than-occasional infringement, usurpation and eclipse of Christmas. This is, in part, due to Joseph Smith's birthday coming on Dec. 23 of each year.
  2. An extended manifestation of claiming for Joseph Smith or his "priesthood" roles, titles, or rights reserved for the Godhead alone.
In other words, 'Smithmas' is but a seasonal outcropping – a mere symptom of a broader Mormon spiritual ailment whereby Jesus Christ and Heavenly Father and the Holy Spirit have been usurped – substituted with Joseph Smith. And this isn't always "worship" and adoration; for example, many Lds leaders talk about... Other times, Lds leaders frame Smith's "restored priesthood" carries these same qualities. The third Lds "prophet," John Taylor was even quoted by the Mormon Church in 2001 book Teachings of Presidents of the Church: John Taylor (p. 119) -- republished from 1943: "What is priesthood?...I shall briefly answer that it is the government of God...It governs all things –it directs all things—it sustains all things..." This type of quote isn't a one-time Mormon Church emphasis: Its publications of impersonalizing God's sustaining/directing power as an "it" has come out in...
...2004, 2001, and 1957 (citing Lds "prophet" Harold B. Lee);
...2002 (citing Lds "apostle" L. Tom Perry)
...2000 (its basic manual for priesthood holders)
...1946 (citing Lds "prophet" Joseph Fielding Smith)
...1941 (citing Lds "prophet' Brigham Young) It's precisely because of these manifestations that Mormons are more accurately described as disciples of Joseph Smith vs. disciples of the Biblical Jesus Christ. Per Lds "apostle" Bruce R. McConkie: "Anyone who believes the doctrine, teachings, or philosophy of another and who follows that teacher is his disciple. He stands as a learner, a devotee of the one whose concept he accepts." (McConkie, Mormon Doctrine, p. 198, also cited by the Mormon Church in its curriculum study guide – "When Thou Art Converted, Strengthren Thy Brethren: 1974-75" published by The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints church in 1974, p. 134) Hence, Mormons believe Smith's doctrine, teachings, concepts and philosophy; they are learners – devotees of Smith more properly than Jesus Christ.
22 posted on 12/23/2013 10:21:51 AM PST by Colofornian
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To: Colofornian

Merry Smithmas to all the Mormons in the threads !!!

Merry Christmas to all the Christians in the threads !!!


23 posted on 12/23/2013 10:59:11 AM PST by Tennessee Nana
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To: StormPrepper; Graybeard58

the account of the first vision tonight where Joseph was visited by God the Father and His Son Jesus Christ
_______________________________________________

Hey kid even Joey Smtih never said it was God the Father and His Son Jesus Christ..

1. Joey Smith just said it was 2 “personages”

2. He never said whether the first one was male or female

3. and he never gave them names

4. and he said that only the first one spoke saying this is my son hear him

5. but the second one was a deaf mute and either didn’t hear his mother or he couldn’t speak or he didn’t like Joey Smith and so he dissed him and gave Joey the ..

FACEPALM


24 posted on 12/23/2013 11:09:21 AM PST by Tennessee Nana
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To: Elsie

PING to #24


25 posted on 12/23/2013 11:11:06 AM PST by Tennessee Nana
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To: Colofornian
I see you're back with another THREE MINUTES' HATE.

. It's unfortunate that pathetic losers such as yourself are so consumed with bigotry and hatred that you post such crap near Christmas.

Und you vill vorship ze vay Colofornian says !!

26 posted on 12/23/2013 12:43:11 PM PST by jimt (Fear is the darkroom where negatives are developed.)
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To: trebb; Colofornian
None of my business - just curious about the devout Christians who seem to spend more time spewing hate than carrying the Love God and your neighbor message that they seem to consider themselves to be "keepers of".

Colofornian and his hate group are no more Christian than I am a refrigerator. It's one thing to post doctrinal disagreements. When it's a constant spew of bile, hate and slander, there's no way it can be called "Christian".

27 posted on 12/23/2013 12:48:28 PM PST by jimt (Fear is the darkroom where negatives are developed.)
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To: Colofornian
“What should be different about a Mormon Christmas?”

I think a pronouncement from the current Living Prophet®, Thomas Monson, revealing that the main GOD of Mormonism has finally relented (like the black thing & polygamy) and decided to inform the world of the REAL birthday of Christ!!!

28 posted on 12/23/2013 1:05:02 PM PST by Elsie (Heck is where people, who don't believe in Gosh, think they are not going...)
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To: hulagirl; teppe; Normandy; restornu; StormPrepper
As Latter-day Saints, we have the responsibility to teach and set an example of the standards, ideals, and values that are pleasing to our Heavenly Father and that will prepare us for an eternal life with him.

Mormonism is failing BIG TIME at this!!!

Only about 15% or so of ALL Mormons have a TR; without which NO Mormon will be in the Fathers presence for eternity!!!


(Right boys and girls??)

29 posted on 12/23/2013 1:08:48 PM PST by Elsie (Heck is where people, who don't believe in Gosh, think they are not going...)
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To: jimt

Merry CHRISTmas!


30 posted on 12/23/2013 1:09:23 PM PST by Colofornian
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To: trebb
Ironic - no?

No...

You are ASSUMING it's the same set.

31 posted on 12/23/2013 1:09:58 PM PST by Elsie (Heck is where people, who don't believe in Gosh, think they are not going...)
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To: jimt

Merry CHRISTmas...and thanks for bumping the thread


32 posted on 12/23/2013 1:10:55 PM PST by Colofornian
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To: trebb
Wow - touched a nerve I see.

And now you are happy.


None of my business - just curious about the devout Christians who seem to spend more time spewing hate than carrying the Love God and your neighbor message that they seem to consider themselves to be "keepers of".

DAMN!!!

I missed the hate AGAIN!

Please point it out for my poor, old eyes; wouldja?

33 posted on 12/23/2013 1:11:56 PM PST by Elsie (Heck is where people, who don't believe in Gosh, think they are not going...)
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To: trebb
Of course, maybe I'm all wet and spewing hate is the way to carry the message of Love...

You just MIGHT be onto something here!!



Questions put to Joseph Smith: "'Do you believe the Bible?' [Smith:]'If we do, we are the only people under heaven that does, for there are none of the religious sects of the day that do'. When asked 'Will everybody be damned, but Mormons'? [Smith replied] 'Yes, and a great portion of them, unless they repent, and work righteousness." (Teachings of the Prophet Joseph Smith, p. 119).
Joseph Smith: "for the teachers of religion of the different sects understood the same passages of scripture so differently as to destroy all confidence in settling the question by an appeal to the Bible" (from Pearl of Great Price 1:12). "What is it that inspires professors of Christianity generally with a hope of salvation? It is that smooth, sophisticated influence of the devil, by which he deceives the whole world" (Teachings of the Prophet Joseph Smith, p.270).
 
 
 
Brigham Young stated this repeatedly: "When the light came to me I saw that all the so-called Christian world was grovelling in darkness" (Journal of Discourses 5:73); "The Christian world, so-called, are heathens as to the knowledge of the salvation of God" (Journal of Discourses 8:171); "With a regard to true theology, a more ignorant people never lived than the present so-called Christian world" (Journal of Discourses 8:199); "And who is there that acknowledges [God's] hand? ...You may wander east, west, north, and south, and you cannot find it in any church or government on the earth, except the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints" (Journal of Discourses , vol. 6, p.24); "Should you ask why we differ from other Christians, as they are called, it is simply because they are not Christians as the New Testament defines Christianity" (Journal of Discourses 10:230).
 
 
 
Orson Pratt proclaimed: "Both Catholics and Protestants are nothing less than the 'whore of Babylon' whom the Lord denounces by the mouth of John the Revelator as having corrupted all the earth by their fornications and wickedness. Any person who shall be so corrupt as to receive a holy ordinance of the Gospel from the ministers of any of these apostate churches will be sent down to hell with them, unless they repent" (The Seer, p. 255).
 
 
 
Orson Pratt also said: "This great apostasy commenced about the close of the first century of the Christian era, and it has been waxing worse and worse from then until now" (Journal of Discourses
, vol.18, p.44) and: "But as there has been no Christian Church on the earth for a great many centuries past, until the present century, the people have lost sight of the pattern that God has given according to which the Christian Church should be established, and they have denominated a great variety of people Christian Churches, because they profess to be ...But there has been a long apostasy, during which the nations have been cursed with apostate churches in great abundance" (Journal of Discourses , 18:172).
 
 
President John Taylor stated: "Christianity...is a perfect pack of nonsense...the devil could not invent a better engine to spread his work than the Christianity of the nineteenth century." (Journal of Discourses , vol. 6, p.167); "Where shall we look for the true order or authority of God? It cannot be found in any nation of Christendom." (Journal of Discourses , 10:127).
 
 
 
James Talmage said: "A self-suggesting interpretation of history indicates that there has been a great departure from the way of salvation as laid down by the Savior, a universal apostasy from the Church of Christ". (A Study of the Articles of Faith, p.182).
 
 
 
President Joseph Fielding Smith said: "Doctrines were corrupted, authority lost, and a false order of religion took the place of the gospel of Jesus Christ, just as it had been the case in former dispensations, and the people were left in spiritual darkness." (Doctrines of Salvation, p.266). "For hundreds of years the world was wrapped in a veil of spiritual darkness, until there was not one fundamental truth belonging to the place of salvation ...Joseph Smith declared that in the year 1820 the Lord revealed to him that all the 'Christian' churches were in error, teaching for commandments the doctrines of men" (Doctrines of Salvation, vol. 3, p.282).
 
 
 
More recent statements by apostle Bruce McConkie are also very clear: "Apostasy was universal...And this darkness still prevails except among those who have come to a knowledge of the restored gospel" (Doctrines of Salvation, vol 3, p.265); "Thus the signs of the times include the prevailing apostate darkness in the sects of Christendom and in the religious world in general" (The Millennial Messiah, p.403); "a perverted Christianity holds sway among the so-called Christians of apostate Christendom" (Mormon Doctrine, p.132); "virtually all the millions of apostate Christendom have abased themselves before the mythical throne of a mythical Christ whom they vainly suppose to be a spirit essence who is incorporeal uncreated, immaterial and three-in-one with the Father and Holy Spirit" (Mormon Doctrine, p.269); "Gnosticism is one of the great pagan philosophies which antedated Christ and the Christian Era and which was later commingled with pure Christianity to form the apostate religion that has prevailed in the world since the early days of that era." (Mormon Doctrine, p.316).
 
 
 
President George Q. Cannon said: "After the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints was organized, there were only two churches upon the earth. They were known respectively as the Church of the Lamb of God and Babylon. The various organizations which are called churches throughout Christendom, though differing in their creeds and organizations, have one common origin. They all belong to Babylon" (Gospel Truth, p.324).
 
 
President Wilford Woodruff stated: "the Gospel of modern Christendom shuts up the Lord, and stops all communication with Him. I want nothing to do with such a Gospel, I would rather prefer the Gospel of the dark ages, so called" (Journal of Discourses , vol. 2, p.196).

34 posted on 12/23/2013 1:13:19 PM PST by Elsie (Heck is where people, who don't believe in Gosh, think they are not going...)
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To: jimt

Bump for that !


35 posted on 12/23/2013 1:13:44 PM PST by martiangohome
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To: laotzu
All those who believe that Jesus was Christ, and that he died for our sins, are Christians. They are our brothers in Christ.

All those that believe Joseph Smith's approval is needed to get into Heaven have been LIED to.

All those that believe Joseph Smith was correct when said that Christ's blood is NOT sufficient to cover some sins have been DECEIVED.

All those that believe Joseph Smith 'restored' Christianity to what it was in the early days are abysmally uninformed.

36 posted on 12/23/2013 1:17:43 PM PST by Elsie (Heck is where people, who don't believe in Gosh, think they are not going...)
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To: laotzu
All those that believe Joseph Smith's approval is needed to get into Heaven have been LIED to.


What Joseph Smith Means to Us  (From: various sources )

 
 
 

"He (Joseph Smith) is the man through whom God has spoken... yet I would not like to call him a savior, though in a certain capacity he was a god to us, and is to the nations of the earth, and will continue to be."
- Brigham Young, Journal of Discourses 8:321
 
 
 
 
"You call us fools; but the day will be, gentlemen and ladies, whether you belong to this Church or not, when you will prize brother Joseph Smith as the Prophet of the Living God, and look upon him as a god..."
- Herber C. Kimball, Journal of Discourses 5:88
 
 
 
 
"If we get our salvation, we shall have to pass by him [Joseph Smith]; if we enter our glory, it will be through the authority he has received. We cannot get around him [Joseph Smith]"
- (as quoted in 1988 Melchizedek Priesthood Study Guide, p. 142)
There is "no salvation without accepting Joseph Smith. If Joseph Smith was verily a prophet, and if he told the truth...no man can reject that testimony without incurring the most dreadful consequences, for he cannot enter the kingdom of God"
- Joseph Fielding Smith, Doctrines of Salvation, vol. 1, p.190
 
 
 
 
"I tell you, Joseph holds the keys, and none of us can get into the celestial kingdom without passing by him. We have not got rid of him, but he stands there as the sentinel, holding the keys of the kingdom of God; and there are many of them beside him. I tell you, if we get past those who have mingled with us, and know us best, and have a right to know us best, probably we can pass all other sentinels as far as it is necessary, or as far as we may desire. But I tell you, the pinch will be with those that have mingled with us, stood next to us, weighed our spirits, tried us, and proven us: there will be a pinch, in my view, to get past them. The others, perhaps, will say, If brother Joseph is satisfied with you, you may pass. If it is all right with him, it is all right with me. Then if Joseph shall say to a man, or if brother Brigham say to a man, I forgive you your sins, "Whosoever sins ye remit they are remitted unto them;" if you who have suffered and felt the weight of transgression—if you have generosity enough to forgive the sinner, I will forgive him: you cannot have more generosity than I have. I have given you power to forgive sins, and when the Lord gives a gift, he does not take it back again."
- Orson Hyde, Journal of Discourses, Vol. 6, p.154-155
 
 
 
 
"It is because the Lord called Joseph Smith that salvation is again available to mortal men.... If it had not been for Joseph Smith and the restoration, there would be no salvation,"
- Bruce McConkie, Mormon Doctrine, p. 396, 670


They succeeded in killing Joseph, but he had finished his work.
He was a servant of God, and gave us the Book of Mormon.
He said the Bible was right in the main, but, through the translators and others, many precious portions were suppressed, and several other portions were wrongly translated; and now his testimony is in force, for he has sealed it with his blood.
As I have frequently told them, no man in this dispensation will enter the courts of heaven, without the approbation of the Prophet Joseph Smith, Jun.
Who has made this so?
Have I?
Have this people?
Have the world?
No; but the Lord Jehovah has decreed it.
If I ever pass into the heavenly courts, it will be by the consent of the Prophet Joseph.
If you ever pass through the gates into the Holy City, you will do so upon his certificate that you are worthy to pass.
Can you pass without his inspection?
No; neither can any person in this dispensation, which is the dispensation of the fulness of times.
In this generation, and in all the generations that are to come, everyone will have to undergo the scrutiny of this Prophet.
They say that they killed Joseph, and they will yet come with their hats under their arms and bend to him; but what good will it do them, unless they repent?
They can come in a certain way and find favor, but will they?
Brigham Young,

--JOURNAL OF DISCOURSES, vol. 8, p. 224


37 posted on 12/23/2013 1:18:25 PM PST by Elsie (Heck is where people, who don't believe in Gosh, think they are not going...)
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To: laotzu; trebb; teppe; StormPrepper; Normandy; restornu
All those that do NOT believe Brigham Young when he said...

"Now if any of you will deny the plurality of wives, and continue to do so, I promise that you will be damned;

and I will go still further and say, take this revelation, or any other revelation that the Lord has given,

and deny it in your feelings, and I promise that you will be damned.

Brigham Young - JoD 3:266 (July 14, 1855)

...better hope they are RIGHT!

38 posted on 12/23/2013 1:20:38 PM PST by Elsie (Heck is where people, who don't believe in Gosh, think they are not going...)
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To: elcid1970; Utah Binger
Of course, everybody know that most Catholics are hopeless drunks but that pious Mormons never touch the stuff. /s

Especially the cheap domestic stuff!

Shiz... everybody know dat stuff'll take yer breath away!

39 posted on 12/23/2013 1:22:24 PM PST by Elsie (Heck is where people, who don't believe in Gosh, think they are not going...)
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To: StormPrepper
I think my family will read the account of the first vision tonight where Joseph was visited by God the Father and His Son Jesus Christ. Good idea Colofornian.

Good!

Be sure to read ALL the various accounts that the church has proclaimed over the years.

Perhaps y'all can have a fun time trying to figger out if the 'official' account is the TRUE account.

40 posted on 12/23/2013 1:24:15 PM PST by Elsie (Heck is where people, who don't believe in Gosh, think they are not going...)
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