Scriptural Defense: Those Who Say Mormons Aren'T Christian

[altersteve]

Simply quoting scripture or even using the church name as proof that Mormons are Christians

We don't quote scripture or use the Church's name as proof that we are Christians. We try to act like disciples of Christ and do our best to worship Him in the best way we know how (just as we encourage all people of doing) and let that be our proof.

[Vance]

What would Mormons do if they felt that the candidate for president was the devil incarnate?

Would they create a web site like this one?

http://votingforsatan.com/

[Rob Bowman]

Bukowski,

You wrote:

I suppose I have to read your mind to answer that, right? Why don't you just tell me?

I suppose I could CFR you right back to tell me "what I want" but I actually realize how absurd that is.

I made no claim about what you want. You made such a claim about me. Do you withdraw the claim? By the rules of the forum, you must either provide a reference supporting your claim or withdraw it.

[mfbukowski]

Bukowski,

You wrote:

I made no claim about what you want. You made such a claim about me. Do you withdraw the claim? By the rules of the forum, you must either provide a reference supporting your claim or withdraw it.

I have no idea what you even want a CFR FOR!

I have no clue what "claim" you are even talking about.

Vance's post number 172 I suppose shows how ridiculous this is- if THAT is what you want the CFR for.

I think you are hoping to get the tread closed so you can skulk away into the darkness for a while again without answering the issues I have raised.

[zerinus]

That simply is not so. Acts 20:29 in context teaches a partial apostasy. You cannot combine this passage with others to reach a conclusion contrary to this passage.

Acts 20:29 suggests a partial (but large scale) apostasy of individuals (including, and especially, the local leades), resulting eventually in the total apostasy of the loss of the priesthood and Apostolic authority of the Church.

What I mean by apostasy is the falling away of individuals or groups from the faith. What Mormonism means by apostasy includes what you say here but also asserts that the entirety of Christianity prior to Joseph Smith was mired in spiritual darkness, ignorance of the true gospel, adherence to false and abominable creeds, and so forth. No combination of texts from the Bible proves such an apostasy took place.

That is neither my idea of the Apostasy nor Mormonism’s idea of the Apostasy. That is in fact the Protestant idea of the Apostasy, as attested by the quotations previously given.

Sure, though I will need to refine the question somewhat. The question is why only some of these ministry offices should need to continue being held by living individuals in order for the perfecting of the saints to be accomplished. The question is easily answered by studying Paul's other references to apostles and prophets in the same epistle. Twice he refers to these two groups of people as playing a distinctive role in the church, that of the "foundation" of the church in being the messengers through whom God revealed the foundational truths that constitute the church as the new people of God (Eph. 2:20 and 3:5; see the whole context, Eph. 2:11-3:7). "The apostles and prophets" are separated in this way from evangelists, pastors, and teachers by Paul himself in this very epistle. Paul's teaching on the subject makes it clear that apostles and prophets were never meant to be regular administrative or governing offices in the church; they were special ministries for the foundation of the church in its first generation.

But that does not agree with what the verse itself says. It says all of these offices are necessary for the “perfecting of the saints” etc. That, coupled with other factors already discussed, such as replacement of deceased Apostles with newly ordained successors, their roles as the governing council of the Church, important decisions made by revelation through them (with or without a council meeting), combine to make a strong case for the perpetuation of that council in the government of the Church.

But that's just what you need to show from the Book of Acts and have not shown. Nothing in the account or in the book as a whole supports the claim that the Jerusalem Council was "precedent" for a regulative principle that the church would supposedly always need to be governed by apostles making decisions on the basis of new revelations. This is an idea you are reading into the text, not an idea that comes from the text itself.

You ignored what I said, that the decision of the council was made by revelation, and other important decisions were also made by the Apostles by revelation, even when meeting in council was not practicable under the circumstances. The most important “precedent” they set is that they were able to make important decisions for the Church by revelation (by the exercise of the “keys of the kingdom” which they possessed), which the subsequent generations of Christians were not able to do.

And as I have also already explained, by this reasoning these supposed keys and authority should be lost to you today, because over 99% of the Christian world rejects your apostles and lacks faith in your religious principles (i.e., is still apostate), and the Gentile world is still rather hostile toward Mormons. What's the difference?

Not correct. That was adequately answered, which you are now ignoring.

Once the doors have been opened, the keys no longer need to be used.

The “doors” were doors of revelation. When the keys were lost, the doors were closed, and could not be opened again until the keys were restored.

I don't bind myself to agree in all particulars with the views of all Protestants -- a freedom that is basic to Protestantism -- so there's really no need to keep beating that particular horse.

So you admit that the Mormons were not the first to recognize a universal apostasy, but the Protestant were first. Your own personal views of the Apostasy is not the issue, but who came up with that idea first. I said it had been the Protestants, which you protested against. Now that I have provided you with plenty of evidence, you are trying to dodge the issue by changing the subject. You didn’t think I was going to let you get away with that, did you?

Edited June 6, 2012 by zerinus

[BookofMormonLuvr]

I'm currently working on several projects that tackle a large number of scholarly LDS publications, but I can only do so much at a time.

You will awake someday to find you have utterly wasted precious hours that could've been spent feeding your own flock. I feel sorry for you, Rob. It has to be hard carrrying around so much distain for the LDS people.

[Pahoran]

Would they create a web site like this one?

http://votingforsatan.com/

Now Vance. You know that's just not fair.

Bowman's rhetoric is much less strident than Keller's. His style isn't nearly so abrasive.

Granted, there's not a fleck of daylight between them when it comes to substance, and if you want to hear a chorus of chirping crickets, just ask Rob to outright repudiate Keller's hate propaganda, but you have to admit that Rob is much more tactful about his anti-Mormonism than Keller is.

Regards,

Pahoran

[Saints Alive]

This thread, although good is completely off topic from what it started as.