LDS Theology for LDS

[Mola Ram Suda Ram]

Seems you should amend your post to say

[epignosis]

Personally, I think the relationship is more adoptive than procreative, even from the very beginning. It's the only thing that makes sense from a 'we're all eternal beings' perspective. We are indeed all literally adopted children of God. When we sin, we disinherit ourselves. When we enter into the covenant of Christ, we are re-adopted through Him. It's all about adoption.

I have the view that we are indeed adopted in that sense. However, I also believe that our spirit bodies are literally "born" as are our physical bodies. After that occurrence we are fused into our respective "body", be it the spiritual instance, or later the physical instance. So, I believe that God has a wife, well more than one actually, and she is the heavenly mother of our spirit bodies. Then we have an earthly mother and father as well, which parallels the spiritual.

I firmly believe that we are "literal" spirit sons and daughters of loving heavenly parents.

[LDSToronto]

I want to get beyond the obvious LDS missionary talking points

[TAO]

Well things that make me happy about the LDS church... there are many of them.

1) A perfectly just God

We Mormons believe in a God who, to my delight, is perfectly just. He doesn't care about what type of mind you have, nor does he care about what church your in, etc. Instead, he bases your judgment precisely on what you did, and what was fair, in your life. Furthermore, there is no arbitrary line between heaven and hell - indeed, there are degrees - it isn't a 'sin a little and it's ok' attitude, it's a 'do your best' attitude. Furthermore, this God cares about you no matter what position you are in life, no matter what your trials are, no matter how far you have strayed - he cares. And he tries to help you. He's specifically designed a life for you so that you can be capable of having all he has to offer (life is designed to improve you), and everyone is capable of reaching it. Furthermore, he doesn't blame you for opportunities you didn't have, nor for things you were not able to control - but instead, he bases his judgment on your choices, be they thoughts OR actions, and from that you receive a perfectly just judgment, and from that alone.

2) A God who has a Plan/Purpose for Us

I have always wanted something to strive for in life, and indeed, if there be no God, there be nothing to strive for in life save it be personal pleasure - and that is too painful to strive for, indeed, it is awful, I'd rather die. Instead, in Mormonism, we have something to strive for; something to hope for. Indeed, and it is brilliant indeed. Furthermore, in heaven, we still have responsibilities, life does not end there, we do not sit lazily in bliss doing nothing, indeed, heaven is not boring.

3) A God who will bring Understanding

One of the main things about Mormonism that is significant to me is the ability to ask God about any question I desire, and if I am worthy enough, and show enough faith, I will receive an answer. Indeed, I have already received many answers, about many mysteries I have asked about. And those mysteries bring about a greater understanding of how the world works, and how it is organized, and why it is organized the way it is. Indeed, the parallels are huge, and so the answers are world-shattering to me. And the funny thing is, though I may discover the same answer later in church books, I discovered it first on my own through asking God about it =D.

4) Dedication to Ideals

Ideals represent a big part of me, and similarly, they represent a big part of Mormonism. We strive towards the ideal, trying to make ourselves more closely match it. We develop our own ideals, about how life should be. We see the bigger picture, and the bigger reason behind things, and become dedicated to that, which sure enough, God said to do. I haven't found him wrong yet - indeed, I have found his ideals to be more perfect than my own. And Mormonism suggests embracing this - dedicating yourself to ideals of service, love, justice, truth, and humility. And when we become dedicated to those things, we rise to a whole new level.

5) Service

Part of 4 I guess, but Service is a huge part of being LDS. Not only service to other people, but service to your family, service to your spouse. Your life becomes not based on you anymore, but based on others. You live for your family and your spouse and the church. You have truly become one with them. This is part of the reason why picking a good partner for a celestial mairrage is important - you are dedicating your life to that person, for eternity. Similarly, service to others is hugely important, to help others is twice the good; it betters you and it betters them. To see the joy off of their faces is glorious indeed. Service has always been golden. And being with your loved ones, serving them forever is indescribably.... happy.

[Robert F. Smith]

391 Behind the disobedient choice of our first parents lurks a seductive voice, opposed to God, which makes them fall into death out of envy. Scripture and the Church's Tradition see in this being a fallen angel, called "Satan" or the "devil". The Church teaches that Satan was at first a good angel, made by God: "The devil and the other demons were indeed created naturally good by God, but they became evil by their own doing."

392 Scripture speaks of a sin of these angels. This "fall" consists in the free choice of these created spirits, who radically and irrevocably rejected God and his reign. We find a reflection of that rebellion in the tempter's words to our first parents: "You will be like God." The devil "has sinned from the beginning"; he is "a liar and the father of lies".

SDG

I have always enjoyed attending Roman Catholic mass; the music is wonderful, the homilies great, and the people very warm and personable. I have also greatly enjoyed attending (and participating directly in) Orthodox Jewish sabbath services: I could feel the unmistakable presence of God among his chosen people, even on a day like Yom Kippur which is so exhausting and hard to take with no food or water. However, all of that and even the Grand Catechism which I participate in each time I go to the LDS Temple are not the same as theology. Nor do I consider being part of the Saints of God of the Last Days a theological concept. Mormons are simply a people, an ethnicity, a way of life rather than a religion.

I'm just not sure that theology is "fun," even though I recall greatly enjoying reading Sterling McMurrin's works on LDS theology, and look forward to reading Blake Ostler's more systematic, multi-volumed treatment of the same subject. However, there are aspects of LDS theology which I find very satisfying, partly because they are logically coherent, and partly because they honor human dignity.

Free will: Normative "christianity" and even Judaism sometimes claim it (though the Presbyterians and some evangelicals systematically reject it as contrary to the sovereignty of God), but mistakenly since their fundamental theology insists that God is the uncaused Cause and that all of creation (including humans) is contingent, leading inevitably to the problem of evil being attributable to God (theodicy), along with a lack of free choice. I have heard Chuck Smith of the Calvary Chapel movement speak of this problem quite frankly and honestly.

I like knowing that my theology or understanding of God includes true free agency for non-contingent beings, leaving me responsible for my own sins and not for Adam's transgressions. Leaving me responsible for my own acceptance or rejection of God. If we accept and believe on him, repent, and are baptized, we can then receive the gift of the Holy Spirit, which will guide us as we wend our way through life. The fairness of it appeals to me, as does the great mercy and love of God in sending his only Son to sacrifice himself for me and the remainder of humanity. Now there is something truly godly!! The Atonement.

Moses 1:39 states God's selflessness and deep commitment: "this is my work and my glory--to bring to pass the immortality and eternal life of man." I like being coeternal with God.

[todd520]

"As man is, God once was; as God is, man may become" has to be my favorite. I was always proud to teach this to Christians and be hated for having a more loving God than they did.

I like to educate them on how this teaching was hardly invented by LDS,

That it is a present teaching of the Catholic faith.

[ELF1024]

My Mother-In-Law

[Pahoran]

Hi Dr. Peterson. Appreciate your taking time to respond to me--and on LDS family night, of all nights. You reject the term "creature"--but then you seem to suggest the term fits in your very next sentence. By "creature"--I merely mean "anything created" per Dictionary.com's 2nd listed definition. Yes, I understand LDS don't really think anything is created in an ex nihilo sense, merely formed/organized from pre-existent matter/intelligences. And Jesus was/is an "organized intelligence," right? It may appear to your readers that you would "quibble over a word"--as you have accused others on this board...

Actually it's more fundamental than that. We have never embraced systematic theology as an academic discpline relating to our faith. Thus, a lot of the categories that other (educated) Christians think in simply aren't meaningful to Latter-day Saints; and to those who do understand them, they are not really relevant to any of our doctrines.

So the radical "creator/creature" dichotomy that undergirds a lot of normative Christian theology doesn't apply to us. It's not so much that we dispute the assertion as that it's talking about something else.

I recently had a little foray onto the Catholic Answers Forum. While I was there, one of the regulars ripped into Elder Boyd K. Packer, saying that he just didn't know what he was talking about, because "natural law" has nothing to do with gravity. "Natural law" being a technical term in Catholic theology. Well, I've heard Elder Packer's talk, and while he uses words like law, laws, nature and natural, he never uses the phrase "natural law." Yet that Catholic listener somehow assumed that that phrase was present, probably because that's what she expected, given her own theological views, and having perceived it where it was not, proceeded to draw conclusions that were not true.

The moral of the story being: it is not possible to understand someone else's theology in terms of your own.

And again, it appears your next sentence undoes the previous. If it is a "wonderful doctrine" now--how could it be any less wonderful then when it first appeared in Scripture?

SDG

Satan's lie was not that Adam and Eve could become like God; that was the truthful portion of the half truth, and thus made the hook upon which the success of the deception depended. His lie was that they could become like God in any way other than God's way.

And, as Dan said, your "innocent" attribution of an LDS doctrine to Satan is a little bit "cute." But the cuteness wears off after a while.

Regards,

Pahoran

[Soli Deo Gloria]

Ok, I stand corrected in who I thought had this argument. I have only seen this come from the EV crowd in my past. So this is a new one to me.

What do you think about the main thrust of my argument? That is that God seem to think that Adam and Eve did indeed "become as one of us."

Regarding your main thrust, I hadn't considered that someone would use v. 22 in Genesis 3 to make an argument that Satan's lie in v. 5 was really truth. If we didn't have the rest of Scripture and only had Genesis 3 available to us--I think your argument might have some merit. But good exegesis takes into account the entirety of God's revealed Word when working through a difficult passage or a seeming inconsistency in Scripture.

When you look at the reduced condition of Adam and Eve in the passage, one might reasonably suppose God was being ironic in v. 22. But I don't think that's a completely satisfying explanation, and I have to admit I don't have a better one.

SDG

[Mola Ram Suda Ram]

Regarding your main thrust, I hadn't considered that someone would use v. 22 in Genesis 3 to make an argument that Satan's lie in v. 5 was really truth. If we didn't have the rest of Scripture and only had Genesis 3 available to us--I think your argument might have some merit. But good exegesis takes into account the entirety of God's revealed Word when working through a difficult passage or a seeming inconsistency in Scripture.

I hear ya. The one thing I have learned over my years is that 2 people can look at the same passages and walk away with 2 very valid interpretations.

When you look at the reduced condition of Adam and Eve in the passage, one might reasonably suppose God was being ironic in v. 22. But I don't think that's a completely satisfying explanation, and I have to admit I don't have a better one.

SDG

By all means, you don't need to accept what I believe. If you find something compelling it is ok to change your point of view. But you don't even need to do that. If nothing else you at least see our point of view.

Take care.

[Cold Steel]

As a former Protestant, the greatest hurdle for me was the First Vision. It's one reason I think the prophet held back on it awhile, while promoting the angelic appearance associated with the Book of Mormon.

The greatest things about the church were:

• reestablishment of apostles and prophets
  
• reestablishment of spiritual gifts
  
• three degrees of glory and hell having remedial qualities
  
• authority in the ministry
  
• an open canon
  
• salvation for the dead
  

I don't think creation from nothing played that much of a factor. Whether it did or didn't took a back seat to the others. I just couldn't understand how that pretentious little pastor

[Ceeboo]

I like to educate them on how this teaching was hardly invented by LDS,

That it is a present teaching of the Catholic faith.

Perhaps the one who likes to educate should spend a little more time being a student.

Just a thought

Peace,

Ceeboo

[Nathair/|\]

Here are some of my favorites that I don't think have been covered here.I'm quoting others because as a Celt, I value beauty in language.

For behold, the Spirit of Christ is given to every man, that he may know good from evil; wherefore, I show unto you the way to judge; for every thing which inviteth to do good, and to persuade to believe in Christ, is sent forth by the power and gift of Christ; wherefore ye may know with a perfect knowledge it is of God. But whatsoever thing persuadeth men to do evil, and believe not in Christ, and deny him, and serve not God, then ye may know with a perfect knowledge it is of the devil; for after this manner doth the devil work, for he persuadeth no man to do good, no, not one; neither do his angels; neither do they who subject themselves unto him.

God hath not revealed anything to Joseph, but what He will make known unto the Twelve, and even the least Saint may know all things as fast as he is able to bear them.

History of the Church, 3:380

Moroni 7:35-37

And now, my beloved brethren, if this be the case that these things are true which I have spoken unto you, and God will show unto you, with power and great glory at the last day, that they are true, and if they are true has the day of miracles ceased? Or have angels ceased to appear unto the children of men? Or has he withheld the power of the Holy Ghost from them? Or will he, so long as time shall last, or the earth shall stand, or there shall be one man upon the face thereof to be saved? Behold I say unto you, Nay; for it is by faith that miracles are wrought; and it is by faith that angels appear and minister unto men; wherefore, if these things have ceased wo be unto the children of men, for it is because of unbelief, and all is vain.

Yours under the awen-filled oaks

,Nathair /|\

[Soli Deo Gloria]

Let me see....

http://scriptures.ld.../en/abr/3/23#23

http://scriptures.ld.../en/moses/1/7#7

OOOOOhhh..... gigantor list here:

http://scriptures.lds.org/en/tg/m/24

BTW, I wouldn't recommend diving into adv. theology until you understand the importance of the simple stuff, for by small and simple means does God bring to past the salvation of many souls.

Hey TAO--

Your enthusiasm (and your condescension) notwithstanding, none of your references actually mention "birth of spirits." In fact, there's no usage of birth/birthing (or any variant thereof) in anything you listed. So I'll ask again, what is meant by this, and where can it be found in the LDS canon?

SDG

[zerinus]

Appreciate the response, Lehi. And I assume by your words, "actually my Father"--you don't mean your biological father. The Christian is adopted into the family of God, as Paul writes to the Ephesians--"He predestined us to be adopted as his sons through Jesus Christ, in accordance with his pleasure and will" (Ephesians 1:5).

Well that isn

[David T]

Hey TAO--

Your enthusiasm (and your condescension) notwithstanding, none of your references actually mention "birth of spirits." In fact, there's no usage of birth/birthing (or any variant thereof) in anything you listed. So I'll ask again, what is meant by this, and where can it be found in the LDS canon?

SDG

The notion of a literal spirit-birth is not canonical - the quoting of a popular greek poem using the word 'offspring' notwithstanding.

[thesometimesaint]

nackhadlow:

I don't know as that is strictly true.

...for I have not yet ascended to the Father; but go to my brethren (disciples), and say to them, 'I ascend to my Father and your Father, and my God and your God.' (John 20: 17).

The Apostles clearly did not have the same mortal father. So Jesus must be referring our other Father(in Heaven).

[JDave]

I think the official doctrine is that we are literally children of our Heavenly Father. The only process we know of to father a child is birth, so that could be a reasonable term or analogy. I don't think, however, that it has been described as a literal spiritual birth by church leaders. I suppose that we don't really know the process, and we would have no idea what a 'spiritual birth' would even entail anyway.

[David T]

nackhadlow:

I don't know as that is strictly true.

...for I have not yet ascended to the Father; but go to my brethren (disciples), and say to them, 'I ascend to my Father and your Father, and my God and your God.' (John 20: 17).

The Apostles clearly did not have the same mortal father. So Jesus must be referring our other Father(in Heaven).

I don't see how that needs to be different from Paul's theology of adoption. The disciples had become of the New Covenant and, as had King Benjamin's people, become Christ's 'seed', re-adopted as Sons of God. In fact, this is where the term 'spiritually begotten' is defined!

Mosiah 5:7, " And now, because of the covenant which ye have made ye shall be called the children of Christ, his sons, and his daughters; for behold, this day he hath spiritually begotten you; for ye say that your hearts are changed through faith on his name; therefore, ye are born of him and have become his sons andhis daughters."

the same principle is taught later on in Mosiah 27:24-25, "For, said he, I have repented of my sins, and have been redeemed of the Lord; behold I am born of the Spirit. And the Lord said unto me: Marvel not that all mankind, yea, men and women, all nations, kindreds, tongues and people, must be born again; yea, born of God, changed from their carnal and fallen state, to a state of righteousness, being redeemed of God, becoming his sons and daughters";

Those who are born again as a Covenant disciple of Christ become joined again to the Eternal Family, from which we were disinherited by sin. This is the only scriptural usage of 'spirit birth' I see in the scriptures.

[David T]

I think the official doctrine is that we are literally children of our Heavenly Father. The only process we know of to father a child is birth, so that could be a reasonable term or analogy. I don't think, however, that it has been described as a literal spiritual birth by church leaders. I suppose that we don't really know the process, and we would have no idea what a 'spiritual birth' would even entail anyway.

If I were to adopt a child, and have them sealed to me in the Temple, they would, in regards to where it matters, be literally my children, and an heir to all the blessings and benefits of one as if they had been born into the covenant. They would be no less my children than those who shared my DNA.

[JDave]

If I were to adopt a child, and have them sealed to me in the Temple, they would, in regards to where it matters, be literally my children, and an heir to all the blessings and benefits of one as if they had been born into the covenant. They would be no less my children than those who shared my DNA.

Within the LDS worldview of pre-existing spirits who are sent here to earth, through birth, I don't see much of a difference. Sharing DNA does not mean that we have created a child ex nihilo. We have an eternal being that is joined to the physical body that was created in the womb. In effect we are adopting that spirit into our family. If I am not married in the temple at the time of my child's birth, then the child still must be sealed to me in the temple to fully 'adopt' that child into my eternal family.

[David T]

Within the LDS worldview of pre-existing spirits who are sent here to earth, through birth, I don't see much of a difference. Sharing DNA does not mean that we have created a child ex nihilo. We have an eternal being that is joined to the physical body that was created in the womb. In effect we are adopting that spirit into our family. If I am not married in the temple at the time of my child's birth, then the child still must be sealed to me in the temple to fully 'adopt' that child into my eternal family.

I think we agree

[JDave]

I think we agree

We gotta stop doing that...

[Ahab]

Within the LDS worldview of pre-existing spirits who are sent here to earth, through birth, I don't see much of a difference.

The question, as I see it, is what we were before we were children of our Father in heaven.

Some people say we were nothing at all.

Some people say we were already mortals and then some of us became children of the person we now refer to as our Father in heaven, with all of us being the children of somebody else before then.

And, still, some other people say we were part of our Father in heaven who created us from himself and from others like himself who were already the same kind of being he is as they reproduced and brought others of their own kind into... not existence, since we already existed in some form within them and others of that same kind of being, but into... an independent entity, independent of our Father and Mother and their parents before them existing within them only as something like their DNA.

I'm one of those who accepts the latter version, more or less, and thus in my view I see that life doesn't begin at conception, because life doesn't begin. Life continues as each kind of being reproduces however that kind of being reproduces, and we (all men and women and boys and girls born on this Earth) are the children of our Father in heaven, with Jesus Christ being the first one who was reproduced by our Father in heaven, in the spirit.

[epignosis]

The question, as I see it, is what we were before we were children of our Father in heaven.

Some people say we were nothing at all.

Some people say we were already mortals and then some of us became children of the person we now refer to as our Father in heaven, with all of us being the children of somebody else before then.

And, still, some other people say we were part of our Father in heaven who created us from himself and from others like himself who were already the same kind of being he is as they reproduced and brought others of their own kind into... not existence, since we already existed in some form within them and others of that same kind of being, but into... an independent entity, independent of our Father and Mother and their parents before them existing within them only as something like their DNA.

I'm one of those who accepts the latter version, more or less, and thus in my view I see that life doesn't begin at conception, because life doesn't begin. Life continues as each kind of being reproduces however that kind of being reproduces, and we (all men and women and boys and girls born this Earth) are the children of our Father in heaven, with Jesus Christ being the first one who was reproduced by our Father in heaven, in the spirit.

I find this theory interesting... that at some point in time we were naked intelligences, then were fused with matter (an electron maybe), then eventually graduated to becoming a live cell, plant, animal, etc. After each graduation, we move up to become the "I Am" of a new being, cell, insect, animal, human, etc. As the "I Am" of each new being, we are the master or leader of the intelligences that are our makeup (skin, eyes, hair, organs, etc.). We can influence those intelligences that are our makeup, but they have agency to do their own will.

Whatever the truth, I feel that it must include an infinitely repeatable pattern but am comfortable with whatever plays out.

I also believe that Jesus Christ was the first reproduced by Father in Heaven, not only spiritually in pre-mortal life but physically through copulation with Mary. Many think that is blasphemous but I see it as pragmatic and beautiful.