Posted on 04/04/2009 9:42:42 PM PDT by Alex Murphy
Salt Lake City, Utah Honorable people throughout the world who are open to religious faith are often discouraged, or confused by incorrect doctrine, according to an Apostle who spoke to the 179th Annual General Conference of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints.
One issue has been particularly troubling, according to Elder Quentin L. Cook, a member of the Quorum of Twelve Apostles.
"They have a difficult time reconciling the correct doctrine that we have a loving Father in Heaven and the incorrect doctrine that most of mankind would be doomed to eternal hell," Elder Cook explained to more than 20,000 Latter-day Saints (often referred to as Mormons) gathered in the Conference Center on Temple Square. The conference was broadcast live to the other 13 million members around the world.
He told the story of his great-great-grandfather Phineas Wolcott Cook who was investigating the beliefs of various religions in the early 1800s. He explained that there was one doctrine of concern to him, and that he was often criticized for questioning it.
"I could not believe that the Lord had made a part (of mankind) to be saved and a part to be damned to all eternity," said Phineas in a journal.
Elder Cook pointed out that scholars have the common teachings of many Protestant churches with respect to hell were incorrect. He said the Anglican Church leader and classic scholar, Frederick Farrar, gave lectures at Westminster Abbey and taught that the definition of hell of endless torment and everlasting damnation were wrong because of translation errors from Hebrew and Greek to English in the King James Version of the Bible.
Latter-day Saints believe that the Church of Jesus Christ was restored in 1830 by Joseph Smith, who they believe to be a modern prophet of God.
"At the time Joseph Smith received revelations and organized the Church, the vast majority of churches taught that the Savior´s atonement would not bring about the salvation of most of mankind. The common precept was that a few would be saved and the overwhelming majority would be doomed to endless tortures of the most awful and unspeakable intensity," explained Elder Cook.
"The marvelous doctrine revealed to the Prophet Joseph unveiled to us a plan of salvation that is applicable to all mankind, including those who do not hear of Christ in this life, children who die before the age of accountability and those who have no understanding," he added.
Elder Cook emphasized in his sermon that despite differences with other faiths, the Latter-day Saints refrain from criticism of other Christians who believe differently. "They do much good. They bless mankind. Many help their members learn of the Savior and His teachings," he said.
He also counseled members of the Church to be kind and loving to members of the Church regardless of their level of understanding, level of commitment, or activity. He said that the Savior made it clear that church members are not to judge one another, especially members of their own families. "Our obligation is to love and teach and never give up," he said.
p;acemark
Which Bible is that?
Mormons do believe that most will not go to hell (or Outer Darkness as they call it - which is the ultimate deep freeze), which shows the influence of Universalism on early LDS theology.
However, those of us who are “apostates” are going to be the ones going to hell/outer darkness if anyone is.
Resty, you are correct from a Biblical point of view, but not a Mormon point of view. (You and Mormon "Scripture" contradict).
(BTW...this reminds me...why is it that I'll see FR Christians of different denominations speak the truth to one another when they see another Christian holding a "less-than-Biblical" interpretation of something -- but I can't ever remember a Mormon correcting another Mormon when that Mormon is holding a "less-than-standard works" interpretation of something? Why is it that Restornu made this true Biblical/false Mormon statement -- false from a Mormon point of view -- over 48 hours ago...and no FR Mormon has corrected her? Why does it take a Christian to correct a Mormon on what Mormons believe? Could it be that a pursuit of truth -- even when it's false -- isn't worth elevating in the Mormon church?)
Let's look at one Mormon "Scripture" -- and three Mormon "prophets" on this:
"And now, behold, I speak unto the church. Thou shalt not kill; and he that kills SHALL NOT not have forgiveness in this world, nor in the world to come." (Doctrines & Covenants 42:18).
"...a sin for which there is "no forgiveness" (D&C 42:79), meaning that a murderer can never gain salvation....He cannot join the Church by baptism; he is outside the pale of redeeming grace." (Bruce R. McConkie, Mormon Doctrine, p.520).
LDS have released recent publishings of older "prophets" -- including Brigham Young, who taught that it is "nonsense" to think that someone could repent of "murderous acts." (Brigham Young, Teachings of the Presidents of the Church, page 62)
[There ya have it, Resty...Brigham would have labeled your statement non-sensical]
And then there was the "prophet" Spencer W. Kimball: Perhaps the reason murder is an unforgivable sin is that, once having taken a life whether that life be innocent or reprobate - the life-taker cannot restore it... Those who lose their possessions may be able to recover their wealth. Those defamed may still be able to prove themselves above reproach. Even the loss of chastity leaves the soul in mortality with opportunity to recover and repent and to make amends to some degree. But to take a life...cuts off the victims experiences of mortality and thus his opportunity to repent, to keep Gods commandments in this earth life. (LDS Church News, Feb. 26, 1994, Restitution Part of Repentance).
(BTW...this reminds me...why is it that I’ll see FR Christians of different denominations speak the truth to one another when they see another Christian holding a “less-than-Biblical” interpretation of something — but I can’t ever remember a Mormon correcting another Mormon when that Mormon is holding a “less-than-standard works” interpretation of something? Why is it that Restornu made this true Biblical/false Mormon statement — false from a Mormon point of view — over 48 hours ago...and no FR Mormon has corrected her? Why does it take a Christian to correct a Mormon on what Mormons believe? Could it be that a pursuit of truth — even when it’s false — isn’t worth elevating in the Mormon church?)
***
Do you not realize this is a strawman you have set up here!
This is not accurate of the LDS doctrine!
I respect your to speak form you understanding of the Tradition of Men on doctrine even though I might disagree it is your right to believe according to the dictates of you conscience
Just as there are 3 degrees of glory in my faith there are also degrees of forgivness ones one have received the light, conversion!
Jesus said all would be saved who are not the Sons of Perdition!
Yes saved from hell but accoding to the LDS sinse you brought it up
In The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints recognized three degrees of glory.
King David because of his witness of the Lord will not be saved in the Celestial Kingdom
I care not to argue with you over the degress of glory only that the LDS Apostles were not wrong according to The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints.
According to your faith you will not see it that way as you have stated, but it does not contradict LDS doctrine as you tried to imply!
I'm sorry, but where in this D&C passage does it ever mention glory -- whether it's 3 degrees or not: "And now, behold, I speak unto the church. Thou shalt not kill; and he that kills SHALL NOT not have forgiveness in this world, nor in the world to come." (Doctrines & Covenants 42:18).
What exactly do you interpret "in the world to come" to mean? (doesn't "world to come" cover "all of the above" -- outer darkness, glory, degrees of glory, or salvation?)
I mean? What? Do you think "in the world to come" is some Mormon Twilight Zone outside of this? (Elsie, I think we need your spinning spirals inserted on this thread as a reminder that Restornu is now taking us into the Mormon Twilight Zone)
I don't think there's many more crass examples of looking plain language in the face -- D&C 42:79 -- looking plain Mormon leaders' teachings (Mormon Doctrine, Church News, church-published books on teachings of the prophets), and then concluding, "Nope. I close my eyes. It doesn't teach this. To quote you exactly, "...even though I might disagree it is your right to believe according to the dictates of you conscience."
Resty, listen! My last post I said I actually agreed with your position!!! You were correct in concluding that the only unforgiveable sin is the sin against the Holy Ghost!!! That's a good Biblical position!
What I then went on to point out is that you were wrong from a Mormon teaching perspective. Now why do LDS seem to do tremendous cartwheels to try to scurry away from the implications of D&C 42:79? Because if you do this, then did Moses never receive God's forgiveness? (He was guilty of murder -- if only "2nd degree"). What about David? David was a manslaughterer, was he not? No forgiveness for him, either, "in the world to come" for this Biblical personage?
No wonder LDS have trouble digesting their own "Scripture" and their own general authorities' teachings!
Jesus said all would be saved who are not the Sons of Perdition! Yes saved from hell but accoding to the LDS sinse you brought it up.
Resty, just tell us in plain language, then...stop pretending that you're merely just disagreeing with me. Tell us in plain language (if you so believe), "C, I openly disagree with what LDS apostle McConkie and LDS prophet Young taught on this" -- that being this statement:
"...a sin for which there is "no forgiveness" (D&C 42:79), meaning that a murderer can never gain salvation.
This is McConkie's teaching above. Who taught it? Brigham Young taught it well before him.
What a twilight zone this Mormon maze sets up. When a Mormon can't bring himself or herself to openly disagree with another Mormon, the only target left is the person who quotes the Mormon authority. If there's one lesson LDS have taught me over & over on these threads, that's it!
HEY!!
SOMEone trying to take my TAGLINE??
Of COURSE!!!
How can they top what the Gloriuos Founder had already said???
But...
That didn't stop some of them from trying!!!
Joseph Smith stated that God told him: "they [other churches] were all wrong; and the Personage who addressed me said that their creeds were an abomination in his sight; that those professors were all corrupt" (from Pearl of Great Price, Joseph Smith-History 1:19).Joseph Smith continues: "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, Joseph Smith-History 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).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).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).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).
I'm SO glad that I have access to the words that ACTUALLY came out of MORMONS mouths to post here on FreeRepublic - Battleground for Men's souls.
According to Doctrine and Covenants section 76, those who will inhabit the telestial kingdom include those who "who received not the gospel of Christ, nor the testimony of Jesus."[2] It also includes "liars, and sorcerers, and adulterers, and whoremongers, and whosoever loves and makes a lie."[3] Because of their refusal to accept Jesus as their Savior, these individuals will suffer in hell for their sins for 1000 years during the millennial reign of Christ.[4] After the 1000 years, the individuals in hell will be resurrected and receive an immortal physical body and be assigned to the telestial kingdom.[5]
Smith taught that individuals in the telestial kingdom will be servants of God, but "where God and Christ dwell they cannot come, worlds without end";[6] however, they will receive the ministration of the Holy Ghost and beings from the terrestrial kingdom.[7] Despite these limitations, in LDS theology being resident in the telestial kingdom is not an unpleasant experience: "the glory of the telestial ... surpasses all understanding".[8]
Smith also taught that unlike individuals in the celestial or terrestrial kingdoms, each person resurrected to telestial glory will be of a different glory: "as one star differs from another star in glory, even so differs one from another in the telestial world."[9] Because they accepted Jesus and relied upon his merits, residents of the celestial and terrestrial glory will all receive the same respective glory. However, because residents of the telestial kingdom rejected Jesus as the Savior, they will be rewarded according to their own merits and works; thus each person's glory will vary depending on their works while on the earth.[10]
Smith and Rigdon say that "we saw the glory and the inhabitants of the telestial world, that they were as innumerable as the stars in the firmament of heaven, or as the sand upon the seashore".[11] One Latter-day Saint commentator has suggested that by implication this means that "most of the adult people who have lived from the day of Adam to the present time will go to the telestial kingdom."[12]
In the Doctrine and Covenants, the following explanatory text is given:
A vision given to Joseph Smith the Prophet and Sidney Rigdon, at Hiram, Ohio, February 16, 1832. HC 1: 245252. Prefacing his record of this vision the Prophet wrote: "Upon my return from Amherst conference, I resumed the translation of the Scriptures. From sundry revelations which had been received, it was apparent that many important points touching the salvation of man had been taken from the Bible, or lost before it was compiled. It appeared self-evident from what truths were left, that if God rewarded every one according to the deeds done in the body, the term 'Heaven,' as intended for the Saints' eternal home, must include more kingdoms than one. Accordingly, while translating St. John's Gospel, myself and Elder Rigdon saw the following vision." It was after the Prophet had translated John 5:29 that this vision was given.
Assignment to a particular kingdom in the resurrection is contingent upon an individual's faith and works exhibited during mortal life. The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints teaches that these different kingdoms are what Jesus was referring to when he said, "In my Father's house are many mansions" (John 14:2). [1]
The three degrees of glory are (in descending order):
The few who, through committing the unpardonable sin, do not inherit any degree of glory (though they are resurrected) reside in a state called outer darknesswhich, though not a degree of glory, is often discussed in this context. The only ones who receive no kingdom of glory are known as "sons of perdition".
The Articles of Faith outline 13 basic points of belief of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints.
The Prophet Joseph Smith first wrote them in a letter to John Wentworth, a newspaper editor,
in response to Mr. Wentworth's request to know what members of the Church believed.
They were subsequently published in Church periodicals.
They are now regarded as scripture and included in the Pearl of Great Price.
THE ARTICLES OF FAITH
OF THE CHURCH OF JESUS CHRIST OF LATTER-DAY SAINTS History of the Church, Vol. 4, pp. 535541
Joseph Smith |
The Articles of Faith outline 13 basic points of belief of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints.
The Prophet Joseph Smith first wrote them in a letter to John Wentworth, a newspaper editor,
in response to Mr. Wentworth's request to know what members of the Church believed.
They were subsequently published in Church periodicals.
They are now regarded as scripture and included in the Pearl of Great Price.
THE ARTICLES OF FAITH
OF THE CHURCH OF JESUS CHRIST OF LATTER-DAY SAINTS History of the Church, Vol. 4, pp. 535541
Joseph Smith |
CAn (or WILL) you tell us what is UNTRUE about PRESBYTERIANism?
You used to be one.
The Great & Glorious Joseph Smith said "Presbyterianism is UNTRUE".
There are probably Presbyterian lurkers reading this very thread.
Will you warn them of the ERROR of PRESBYTERIANism?
There might even be one who posted it.
Hey it dosen’t bother me that others do not agree on my faith as all have that freedom to choose according to the dictates of their conscience.
CAN (or WILL) you tell us what is NOT TRUE about PRESBYTERIANism?
NO!
When?
So does that mean you're not willing to tell us what's not true about Presbyterianism, or that you're not capable of telling us what's not true about Presbyterianism?
King David because of his witness of the Lord will not be saved in the Celestial Kingdom
____________________________________________
David will not be saved ???
And yet Davis said he would be going to be with his baby son who had died....
Good thing David is going to The Biblical Heaven ...
and not those so called three dimesional outer space places in the mormon doctrines like Kolob and the Quaker village on the Moon...
But now he is dead, why should I fast? can I bring him back again? I shall go to him, but he shall not return to me. 2 Samuel 12:23
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