Are Mormons and Jehovah's Witnesses Christian?

[Stephen168]

I sure can provide scripture that says that, but then you will say “that doesn’t count- there is no scripture outside of the Bible, because revelation ceased after the Apostolic age”. Then I will ask “where in the Bible does it say that an unchanged God stops giving revelation?” And then you will not be able to do so, and change the subject.

Mormons are not Christian because they are not monotheists. You have not proved otherwise.
You will NEVER provide Christian scripture that says the Father has a body of skin and bone.

 

[jane_doe]

You cannot prove your point using only the Bible, you must use “those other books”

is this a sola scriptura argument from a Catholic???
Is so, please show me where in the Bible it says “all Truth is contained in the Bible”.

Paul refers to the gospel he preached, that was revealed to him by Jesus himself, as being sufficient:

1 Cor. 15:

1
Now I am reminding you, brothers, of the gospel I preached to you, which you indeed received and in which you also stand.
2
Through it you are also being saved, if you hold fast to the word I preached to you, unless you believed in vain.
3
For I handed on to you as of first importance what I also received: that Christ died for our sins in accordance with the scriptures;
4
that he was buried; that he was raised on the third day in accordance with the scriptures

Yes, and I very much agree with Paul.

The point is, jane doe, that it matters not, whether you personally believe divine revelation continued after the Apostolic age. The fact is, Paul taught that the gospel he preached was sufficient for one’s salvation. Nothing more was needed to gain eternal life if the message of the gospel of Jesus Christ that he preached was believed and adhered to. Why was Paul’s preaching of the gospel not good enough, that it needed to be “restored”?

Paul did not preach that God is a Spirit, or Mary was perpetually a virgin, or that revelation stopped. Do you view these things as false?

 

[Stephen168]

is this a sola scriptura argument from a Catholic???
Is so, please show me where in the Bible it says “all Truth is contained in the Bible”.

You proved my point

 

[LutheranScholar]

If the litmus test is acceptance of the Three Ecumenical Creeds, or the consensus of most Christian Churches, then I would say no. Of course, the Watchtower Society and the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints may consider themselves extremely Christian indeed.

 

[RebeccaJ]

Something which is real, but not visible and does not have flesh and bones could be:
Love or any other emotion
Oxygen or any other gas
Wind
Radiation / Non-visable light
Time
Etc.

You have no logic for eliminating any of these.

Mormons are very confused about God.

 

[TOmNossor]

Thank you for that thorough summary. Now it is my turn.

Arians, Mormons and Catholics agree that the Father and the Son are different persons, but they differ in their respective beliefs about how many beings they are and about their nature. Let us see:

• Arians: The Father and the Son are different beings and have different natures.
• Mormons: The Father and the Son are different beings and have the same nature.
• Catholics: The Father and the Son are the same being and have the same nature.

We know by Apostolic Tradition that there exists only one God (for example 1 Tim 2,5):

Let me start by saying that 1 Tim 2:5 says, “For there is one God, and one mediator between God and man, the man Christ Jesus.”
This passage does not teach that God the Father and God the Son are the single God. It IN ISOLATION teaches that God the Son is in a different class than God the Father. God the Son is the mediator between God and man and God the Son is a man.
There are other passages in scripture that claim there is One God. The most clear are in the Old Testament and these of course are pre-Christ in their conception.
In addition to this there are Old and New Testament passages that speak of gods. Some “gods” are clearly false gods not “the God,” but some texts do not fit with the idea that the “gods” being spoken about are anything but “other lesser gods” not “false gods.” Most Biblical scholars recognize the “Council of gods” in the Old Testament. Only by neglecting to deal with PARTS of scripture can we claim that the Biblical witness is absolutely “One God.”

Now, you offer the term “Ontological Unity(OU).” I usually talk about “Metaphysical Monotheism(MM).” These concepts are not in scripture. In your post the “touchstone” for monotheism is OU/MM. Scripture does not witness that ANY inspired author believed in OM/MM. In addition to this it is absent in much (if not all) of pre-Nicene ECF writing. Some prominent authors who cannot believe that God the Father and God the Son are ONE GOD via OU/MM are below.
St. Justin (another God, in the second place):

Then I replied, “I shall attempt to persuade you, since you have understood the Scriptures, [of the truth] of what I say, that there is, and that there is said to be, another God and Lord subject to the Maker of all things; who is also called an Angel, because He announces to men whatsoever the Maker of all things — above whom there is no other God — wishes to announce to them.” (Dialogue With Trypho, ch. 56 – ANF 1.223.)

And

Our teacher of these things is Jesus Christ, who also was born for this purpose, and was crucified under Pontius Pilate, procurator of Judaea, in the times of Tiberius Caesar; and that we reasonably worship Him, having learned that He is the Son of the true God Himself, and holding Him in the second place, and the prophetic Spirit in the third, we will prove. For they proclaim our madness to consist in this, that we give to a crucified man a place second to the unchangeable and eternal God, the Creator of all; for they do not discern the mystery that is herein, to which, as we make it plain to you, we pray you to give heed. (First Apology, ch. 13 – ANF 1.166, 167; see also ch. 60.)

Tertullian (Christ is made before all, He is formed, He is begotten, The Father is OLDER, Christ is second. There are two. The Monarchy of the Father is not lessened by the divinity of the Son):

Let Hermogenes then confess that the very Wisdom of God is declared to be born and created, for the especial reason that we should not suppose that there is any other being than God alone who is unbegotten and uncreated. For if that, which from its being inherent in the Lord was of Him and in Him, was yet not without a beginning, — I mean His wisdom, which was then born and created, when in the thought of God It began to assume motion for the arrangement of His creative works, — how much more impossible is it that anything should have been without a beginning which was extrinsic to the Lord! But if this same Wisdom is the Word of God, in the capacity of Wisdom, and (as being He) without whom nothing was made, just as also (nothing) was set in order without Wisdom, how can it be that anything, except the Father, should be older, and on this account indeed nobler, than the Son of God, the only-begotten and first-begotten Word? (Against Hermogenes, ch. 18 – ANF 3.487.)

I confess that I call God and His Word — the Father and His Son — two. For the root and the tree are distinctly two things, but correlatively joined; the fountain and the river are also two forms, but indivisible; so likewise the sun and the ray are two forms, but coherent ones.Everything which proceeds from something else must needs be second to that from which it proceeds, without being on that account separated: Where, however, there is a second, there must be two; and where there is a third, there must be three. Now the Spirit indeed is third from God and the Son; just as the fruit of the tree is third from the root, or as the stream out of the river is third from the fountain, or as the apex of the ray is third from the sun. Nothing, however, is alien from that original source whence it derives its own properties. In like manner the Trinity, flowing down from the Father through intertwined and connected steps, does not at all disturb theMonarchy, whilst it at the same time guards the state of the Economy. (Against Praxeas, ch. 8 – ANF 3.603.)

And let me just state the Origin is famous for calling Christ “duetro theos” or “second God.” I can pull quotes, but only if you DOUBT this to be true.
As I have offered from 2-4 scholars in other threads, “Pre-Nicene Orthodoxy was subordinationism.” The Son was subordinate to the Father. There was a distinction that would make Modern Catholics uncomfortable.
cont…

 

[TOmNossor]

So, I submit that the Bible in no way and Pre-Nicene Tradition in general, teach a MM/OM. Instead, they assert that God is one. The idea that this ONENESS is only one being-ness (or Homoousian in the Numeric sense) is a false development.

LDS are Monotheist like the authors of the New Testament and like many of the pre-Nicene ECF.

MODERN Catholics are not monotheists if the standard is Islamic Monotheism, Modern Jewish Monotheism, or even Modalistic Monotheism (like Modern Oneness Pentecostals).
MODERN Catholics are not monotheists if the standard is Arianistic Monotheism or Jehovah’s Witness Monotheism either.

I reject your simple construct and I submit that the evidence indicates that LDS monotheism (at least the LDS monotheism that I embrace and is outlined in Exploring Mormon Thought by Ostler) fits solidly within pre-Nicene orthodoxy.

• Catholics pass this test as well, because for us the Father is the unique God, and the Son, although a different person, is also this unique God. They are not two gods, but the same one.
• But Mormons do not pass it, because for you, The Father and the Son have the same nature and at the same time they are different beings. Then, they are two gods. Even more, counting the Holy Spirit, the wife/s of the Father (goddesses) and multiple other gods, the father of the Father, and other relatives, the next generation of gods, and so on; there are many more. So Mormons do not pass it.

First, you can say that Father and the Son are different persons and unique, but are one being. I can say this also as long as I am allowed to use the word “being” to mean something totally foreign to all human understanding. There is ZERO human understanding of what it is to be two persons and one being. We have no way of understanding it (and just because a dog is a single being and zero persons does not make sense of God being a single being and three persons).
The word Homoousian in the GENERIC sense does not connote two persons who are one being.
The word Homoousian in the NUMERIC sense does connote two persons who are one being, but you reject that there two meanings of the word being used. To me this means that when you say God the Father and God the Son are one being you mean something different than Augustine did, as such I have no idea what you mean, but I strongly suspect it is a neo-modalism defined as not-modalism which again will not make sense to me. See Haranack labeling Augustine a “neo-modalist” who merely asserts he is not a modalist.

And about John 17,20ff, was also used by Arians to say that the union of the Father and the Son does not imply same nature. You use it nowadays to say it does not imply same being (contradicting the unicity of God), but only on purpose. Saint Augustine, among other saint fathers, who debated against Arians, explained the true sense of that passage. I have read some of them in the “Catena Aurea” (compiled by saint Thomas Aquinas) and in debates between Augustine and some Arians, but in Spanish (and it is too long).

Perhaps you can offer some of these arguments (though I think some of it is already here).

Before I can address the passage I have to stablish some terms:

• Ontological unity: to describe a union of nature and being.
• Operative unity: to describe a union of purpose, will, doctrine.

Mormons consider the Triune Godhead as having an operative unity, composed by the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit, … The ontological unity implies the operative one, but not vice-versa.

I agree with most of what is said here. “Ontological unity” does imply “Operative unity.” LDS absolutely focus on “Operative unity” and generally reject “Ontological unity.” I myself believe that the unity of God is associated with what Catholic and Protestant scholars call the “Social Trinity.” I also add to this Monarchical unity as God the Father is the fount of divinity, but that is not associate with now Father, Son, and Holy Spirit are one.
I myself never use the term “three Gods” but I think if it is properly qualified with numerous “one God” statements in LDS scritpures (Bible and Book of Mormon), it is not the horror that it is for modern Christians.

I think you interpret the passage as if it says that the unity wished by Jesus for his disciples were of the same type as the one among the Father and the Son. And that this one must be an operative unity, since human beings cannot fuse together to be one being.

If that were the case, it would not have been a problem for Jesus to ask: “That they and us may be one”, and “they in you, you in them”. On the contrary, he said “that they may be one as we are one” …

“To be one as we are one” is to be one in the same way as we are one.
That Christ is in the Father and … is Social Trinitarian language not OU/MM language.
This passage witnesses against OM/MM just as Jane indicated it did to start this whole conversation. I do not see anything in your post to indicate it means something different. It could say all sorts of things that might allow the Bible to be a systematic theology, but it does not. What we have is that Jesus prays that the disciples become ONE as that Father and Son are one. Some other “one God” passages in Bible are compatible with “Operational Unity,” the more detailed and fleshed out “Social Trinitarian Unity,” and OM/MM, but this one is not compatible with OM/MM. The other “one God” passages also do not speak to How God is one. So when we ask “How God is one,” we can INVENT post Biblical OM/MM or we can look to the Bible (and most/much of pre-Nicene Fathers) and reject OM/MM.
cont…

 

[TOmNossor]

And we have here a third kind of unity, communion, which is a union by grace in which God lives in the soul, and the soul in God, and the soul with all the souls who are in God, and God in them. This includes the operative union (Acts 2,44; 4,32) and it reflects the ontological one, by the grace of God, since it is a participation in his Divine Nature (2 Peter 1,3-4). This is also related with being in the image of Christ (2 Corinthians 3,18) and being part of his Mystical Body.

LDS recognize “union by grace.” We are invited into full communion with God the Father into the Social Trinity.

Let me ask you, when the ECF say that Christ became man, did they mean that he became man “by grace?” This is another place where MODERN Catholicism makes the ECF schizophrenic. This happens because the OM/MM was so important to Arians and Athanasians that they abandoned their Biblical roots.

Stephen168 has explained about the meaning of consubstantial when applied to two different natures!

Thank you brother!

But Stephen precisely defined against what Catholic (and Protestant) scholars have been discussing for years. And he even witnessed against his own “they are the same” by using different qualifiers to define them as “not the same.” The “Generic” and “Numeric” sense are not the same. Surely you would not have me believe an internally contradictive post on CA rather than the scholars I have already mentioned and/or quoted.

It is remarkable to me how the witness of the Bible and the earliest ECF supports the rejection of OM/MM. It is remarkable to me how the witness of the Bible and the ECF supports the idea that “Christ became what we are so we can become what He is.” It is remarkable to me the difficulties aligning developed Christianity with the acceptance of OM/MM and the rejection of the exchange formula (rejected through defining “become/became” differently). These are problems caused by DEVELOPING Christianity to a place it NEVER was intended to be.
It is remarkable to me that Joseph Smith who by all accounts of those who knew him was simple (even ignorant/stupid) found SOMEWHERE (I say he was inspired) enough to reject OM/MM and enough to restore our divine potential.

You can have your DEVELOPED theology. I do not think it was the theology of the Bible or even the earliest of the ECF.

Charity, TOm

 

[JMM1957]

is this a sola scriptura argument from a Catholic???
Is so, please show me where in the Bible it says “all Truth is contained in the Bible”.

The LDS are unique from the rest of Christianity in that they believe the BOM, D&C, and PGP are inspired scripture equal to the Bible. All of Christianity rejects that, and as far as Catholics, we believe that only Sacred Scripture and Tradition contain the deposit of divine truth. So, when I asked you to show me where in the “Bible” it says that God has an actual flesh and bone human body, I didn’t expect you to produce it.

As Catholics, we follow what the Bible says below for our Truth:

13
But we ought to give thanks to God for you always, brothers loved by the Lord, because God chose you as the firstfruits for salvation through sanctification by the Spirit and belief in truth.
14
To this end he has [also] called you through our gospel to possess the glory of our Lord Jesus Christ.
15
Therefore, brothers, stand firm and hold fast to the traditions that you were taught, either by an oral statement or by a letter of ours.(2 Thess. 2:13-15)

Nowhere in the Bible will you find a statement that divine revelation would add more new teachings to the gospel of Jesus Christ indefinitely.

 

[JMM1957]

Let me start by saying that 1 Tim 2:5 says, “For there is one God, and one mediator between God and man, the man Christ Jesus.”
This passage does not teach that God the Father and God the Son are the single God. It IN ISOLATION teaches that God the Son is in a different class than God the Father. God the Son is the mediator between God and man and God the Son is a man.

Let’s look at more verses of Scripture:

John 1:1,

In the beginning was the Word,

and the Word was with God,
and the Word was God.

It doesn’t say the Word was “another” God, or “a” God.

John 1:18

“No one has ever seen God. The only Son, God, who is at the Father’s side, has revealed him.”

Jesus has shown us the Father. "…7If you had known Me, you would know My Father as well**. From now you do know Him and have seen Him.**” 8Philip said to Him, “Lord, show us the Father, and that will be enough for us.” 9Jesus replied, “Philip, I have been with you all this time, and still you do not know Me? Anyone who has seen Me has seen the Father. How can you say, ‘Show us the Father’? (John 14:7-9)

Looking at just these few verses tells us that Jesus is not a completely separate being from the Father, or that Jesus is in a “different class” from the Father.

 

[LivingWaters7]

is this a sola scriptura argument from a Catholic???

It seems as if you have been using a sola scriptura argument yourself, when you say/ask where in the Bible it says that revelation is complete/ended.

 

[Stephen168]

But Stephen precisely defined against what Catholic (and Protestant) scholars have been discussing for years. And he even witnessed against his own “they are the same” by using different qualifiers to define them as “not the same.” The “Generic” and “Numeric” sense are not the same. Surely you would not have me believe an internally contradictive post on CA rather than the scholars I have already mentioned and/or quoted.

I was using your terms not mine.

Remember you challenged us to define consubstantial.

As I have said several times and you continue to ignore: There is only one “sense” and meaning to the word consubstantial.

You continue to conflate the words consubstantial and homoousian into some pre-Nicean confusion the word consubstantial never had.

In regard to the word homousian at the Council, Father Davis said and other Catholic posters have said: The word had one meaning at the Council and it was the generic meaning. Its numeric meaning would be modalist which is heresy.

You continue to conflate the words consubstantial and homoousian into some pre-Nicean confusion the word consubstantial never had.

You continue to conflate the words consubstantial and homoousian into some pre-Nicean confusion the word consubstantial never had.

You continue to conflate the words consubstantial and homoousian into some pre-Nicean confusion the word consubstantial never had.

 

[Stephen168]

If the litmus test is acceptance of the Three Ecumenical Creeds, or the consensus of most Christian Churches, then I would say no. Of course, the Watchtower Society and the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints may consider themselves extremely Christian indeed.

Yes, defining Christians by the God they worship as defined at the Councils would be the objective test.

It is common these days for people to declare something true and then demand we all believe it, but that would contrary to reason.

 

[TOmNossor]

I was using your terms not mine.

Remember you challenged us to define consubstantial.

As I have said several times and you continue to ignore: There is only one “sense” and meaning to the word consubstantial.

You continue to conflate the words consubstantial and homoousian into some pre-Nicean confusion the word consubstantial never had.

In regard to the word homousian at the Council, Father Davis said and other Catholic posters have said: The word had one meaning at the Council and it was the generic meaning. Its numeric meaning would be modalist which is heresy.

You continue to conflate the words consubstantial and homoousian into some pre-Nicean confusion the word consubstantial never had.

You continue to conflate the words consubstantial and homoousian into some pre-Nicean confusion the word consubstantial never had.

You continue to conflate the words consubstantial and homoousian into some pre-Nicean confusion the word consubstantial never had.

Before I devote much time to what I think you said, I want to clarify.
You are claiming the Latin “consubstantial” is not used in the “numeric” and “generic” senses that numerous Catholic scholars claim the Greek “homoousian” is used. Is that correct?
If not please tell me what you are claiming?

BTW, there are other things I wish to respond to in the above post, but thought I would ask for that clarification first.

Charity, TOm

 

[jane_doe]

The LDS are unique from the rest of Christianity in that they believe the BOM, D&C, and PGP are inspired scripture equal to the Bible. All of Christianity rejects that, and as far as Catholics, we believe that only Sacred Scripture and Tradition contain the deposit of divine truth. .

Neither you nor I acknowledge the popular opinion of man as being a mechanism for determining Truth, so I’m not sure your point here.

So, when I asked you to show me where in the “Bible” it says that God has an actual flesh and bone human body, I didn’t expect you to produce it.

I likewise did not expect you to produce any verse which says “All Truth is contained in the Bible”. Neither of us believe that.

As Catholics, we follow what the Bible says below for our Truth:

13
But we ought to give thanks to God for you always, brothers loved by the Lord, because God chose you as the firstfruits for salvation through sanctification by the Spirit and belief in truth.
14
To this end he has [also] called you through our gospel to possess the glory of our Lord Jesus Christ.
15
Therefore, brothers, stand firm and hold fast to the traditions that you were taught, either by an oral statement or by a letter of ours.(2 Thess. 2:13-15)

Nowhere in the Bible will you find a statement that divine revelation would add more new teachings to the gospel of Jesus Christ indefinitely.

I very much agree with these verses. However they do not say anything about a ceasing of revelation.

 

[HojaVerde]

Let me start by saying that 1 Tim 2:5 says, “For there is one God, and one mediator between God and man, the man Christ Jesus.”
This passage does not teach …

I quoted that passage to indicate that Christians believe that there is one God, i.e. there exists one God. If there existed two, three, four or more gods the Scripture couldn’t say “there is one God”. It would have been false otherwise.

Don’t you believe that other gods apart from the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit, exist? According to your beliefs, does not the Father have relatives who are gods in the true sense? What about his wife or wives? What about past unknown gods and future new gods? Aren’t they other gods in existence? Then there is a contradiction between what you believe and what the Scripture says.

I have not a single doubt that the Bible teaches about one supreme being, who is alone and unique, eternal, above all, without equal, uncreated. God says he does not know about other gods; no other gods were formed before him, no others will be formed after him:

Is 43,10: 10 Ye are my witnesses, saith the Lord, and my servant whom I have chosen: that ye may know and believe me, and understand that I am he: before me there was no God formed, neither shall there be after me. (I am quoting from lds.org)
Dt 32,39: 39 See now that I, even I, am he, and there is no god with me: I kill, and I make alive; I wound, and I heal: neither is there any that can deliver out of my hand.
Dt 4,39: 39 Know therefore this day, and consider it in thine heart, that the Lord he is God in heaven above, and upon the earth beneath: there is none else.
Why did he say that, if it is not true, if he knew his Father, his wives and the others? How could the Bible teach clearer that there exists one God than to say exactly that and plainly as it does? Otherwise it would be saying just the opposite it would mean. Contradictory and weird, not?
When the bible mentions “gods”, these are idols or false gods (then they are not truly gods). Or they are humans/angels with delegated authority from God or with the divine-filiation grace (then they are not fully what God is by nature). Or are you saying that the wicked people mentioned as gods in the passage of the council of God are truly other gods (Psalm 82)? Besides they are clearly described in a position infinitely inferior to that of God.

The passage of 1 Tim 2:5 doesn’t put Christ in another class respect God. It puts him in the same class of God, and at the same time in the same class of human beings. Only that way he can be the mediator between God and man, because he is God and man, he has the two natures.

TOmNossor:

St. Justin (another God, in the second place):
Tertullian (Christ is made before all, He is formed, He is begotten, The Father is OLDER, Christ is second. There are two…):

Justin also states at the beginning that there is one God (the God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob): “There will be no other God, O Trypho, nor was there from eternity any other existing” and “Nor have we trusted in any other (for there is no other), but in Him in whom you also have trusted, the God of Abraham, and of Isaac, and of Jacob.” (Dialogue with Trypho, chapter 11).
Then he applies to Jesus the “another God and Lord” (chapter 56).

I think he doesn’t mean that he is a distinct God from the Father, but that the Son is “another who is God and Lord”, otherwise he would be in self-contradiction with his previous assertion “there exists no other God”.
More light to this is provided by another place in which he says the following, in chapter 61: “that God begat before all creatures a Beginning, [who was] a certain rational power[proceeding] from Himself, who is called by the Holy Spirit, now the Glory of the Lord, now the Son, again Wisdom, again an Angel, then God, and then Lord and Logos” and “He was begotten of the Father by an act of will” (chapter 61), and then compares this as the fire comes from the fire.
This kind of generation fits much better with the Catholic position than with the Mormon one. I would not bet that he intended to say that the Father and the Son were really two different beings, or in other words, two different gods.

Regarding the “second place”, it is a way he uses to describe the order of the three, in which the Father is unbegotten (he is for that reason the first), the Son is begotten (second), and the Spirit proceeds (third).

The Father is called unbegotten here: “for if you had understood what has been written by the prophets, you would not have denied that He was God, Son of the only, unbegotten, unutterable God” (chapter 126). But we know the LDS couplet which says that the Father was a man as we are now (and following that theology he would have been the literal child from other celestial parents before that), so not unbegotten.

It is precisely the lack of a common, stablished terminology that Justin writings can be somehow imprecise, in the sense that what he means sometimes is not clear, or even wrong.

Again, what I said about the order and position of the Father and the Son (second place, older) when addressing Justin, applies here. What I do not see is Mormon theology. For example, the Spirit is said by Tertullian in your quote as “from the Father and the Son”. In your theology he is another spiritual child of god and not “from them”. Other instances are: the father as unbegotten. The comparison about the river, the tree, the sun, etc. are clear evidences of Tertullian trying to explain (in nowadays terms) that they are different persons but same being.

But I need you to explain to me what you mean when using that of “numeric sense” and the “generic sense” (for the other posts), because I don’t understand that. Next time try to focus on one single “topic”, this posts are too long to address…

See you.

 

[JMM1957]

I likewise did not expect you to produce any verse which says “All Truth is contained in the Bible”. Neither of us believe that. .

Some truth’s are not spelled out word for word the way we would like to see it, such as “all truth is contained in the Bible”, however, as I pointed out in a previous post, we have to use the whole Bible to come to a consensus agreement on whether something is true or not. In the case of “does the Father in heaven have a human body of flesh and bone”, the consensus of the Bible is that God the Father is Spirit, not flesh and bone. If you would like to challenge me on this, produce as many Bible references to back up your position, and I will do likewise. Just one little catch though for you, you can’t use anthropomorphism’s as evidence.

 

[jane_doe]

Some truth’s are not spelled out word for word the way we would like to see it, such as “all truth is contained in the Bible”, however, as I pointed out in a previous post, we have to use the whole Bible to come to a consensus agreement on whether something is true or not. In the case of “does the Father in heaven have a human body of flesh and bone”, the consensus of the Bible is that God the Father is Spirit, not flesh and bone. If you would like to challenge me on this, produce as many Bible references to back up your position, and I will do likewise. Just one little catch though for you, you can’t use anthropomorphism’s as evidence.

A) I am not trying to convince you that the Father has a physical body. I simply answered your questions in that regard.
B) You are trying to convince me that the Father is only a spirit using the Bible. You have been unable to present verses or logic to make your case.

 

[JMM1957]

Originally Posted by JMM1957
As Catholics, we follow what the Bible says below for our Truth:

13
But we ought to give thanks to God for you always, brothers loved by the Lord, because God chose you as the firstfruits for salvation through sanctification by the Spirit and belief in truth.
14
To this end he has [also] called you through our gospel to possess the glory of our Lord Jesus Christ.
15
Therefore, brothers, stand firm and hold fast to the traditions that you were taught, either by an oral statement or by a letter of ours.(2 Thess. 2:13-15)

Nowhere in the Bible will you find a statement that divine revelation would add more new teachings to the gospel of Jesus Christ indefinitely.

jane doe said:
I very much agree with these verses. However they do not say anything about a ceasing of revelation.

Correct, it doesn’t say specifically what you want to see, but the consensus of all Biblical references combined indicate that, for Paul, the gospel message that he preached, and the traditions taught orally, or written, were sufficient for salvation.

jane, this quote can’t be more clear about not adding to the gospel; Galatians 1:6-12

I am amazed that you are so quickly forsaking the one who called you* by [the] grace [of Christ] for a different gospel
7
(not that there is another). But there are some who are disturbing you and wish to pervert the gospel of Christ.
8
But even if we or an angel from heaven should preach [to you] a gospel other than the one that we preached to you, let that one be accursed!
9
As we have said before, and now I say again, if anyone preaches to you a gospel other than the one that you received, let that one be accursed!

Notice I underlined the words “we preached to you”. This is not a future tense, but a past tense. Paul is telling the Galatians that the gospel “already” preached to them is sufficient for salvation. To sum things up, even if someone were to add a different gospel message to what Paul had already preached for salvation, “let that one be accursed.” The LDS have added and continue to add new scripture as revealed to their successive prophets. This is exactly what Paul is warning the Galatians about in the above reference.

 

[JMM1957]

A) I am not trying to convince you that the Father has a physical body. I simply answered your questions in that regard.
B) You are trying to convince me that the Father is only a spirit using the Bible. You have been unable to present verses or logic to make your case.

A)No, you’re not convincing me, because you have not produced any Biblical evidence either to support your claim.

B)No matter what evidence I produce, you will deny it because your belief in the physical body of God the Father is based on so-called scriptural books of LDS that are not accepted by 99.9% of Christianity.