But to answer your question, Mormon understanding of Jesus is actually pretty close to the Biblical one. The Bible teaches somewhat contradictory things about Jesus Christ. There are passages which suggest that He was created and had a beginning:
Colossians 1:
14 In whom we have redemption through his blood, even the forgiveness of sins:
15 Who is the image of the invisible God, the firstborn of every creature:
The Greek term for “firstborn,”
prototokos, need not refer to a literal moment of birth in time. It can be, and in this context is, a legal title designating the son who is heir. For instance, if an eldest son dies, the second son is then called
prototokos, contrary to what we would expect from the word’s literal etymology. On that basis other people besides Christ are called “firstborn,” such as David (Ps 89:27), the tribe of Ephraim (Jer 31:9) and all of Israel (Ex 4:24; Sir 36:12). In the Septuagint, the term
protokos is used in each of these verses.
The doctrine of Colossians centers on Christ’s double role as creator and redeemer. Because the Father created all things through the Son, it is the Son who restores all things to the Father, by taking possession of them in the resurrection. So by virtue of being creator, he ends up also being inheritor, and that is what firstborn means here.
In the verse following the text you quote, Paul continues, “for by him all things were created…and he is before all things, and by him all things consist.” Notice the “for” in this sentence. Paul is interpreting “firstborn” to mean that Jesus is creator. Whereas men are created
in God’s image, Christ himself “
is the image” through which all things are. In the redemption of man, Christ creates his people through his own resurrection as “firstborn from the dead.” On this basis Paul concludes that as redeemer and creator, “It has pleased the Father that in him should all fullness dwell.”
Reading “firstborn” to indicate redeemer/creator under the aspect of Christ’s inheritance of the Kingdom from God makes complete sense of the whole passage, totally agreeable to Trinitarian theology. But what if we take it as “firstborn in the spirit”? If you follow the Mormon view, how much sense does the verse make? Let’s see: “He is the first spirit-child created by Elohim in the preexistence, for by him all things were created…” Is not the incongruity obvious? The whole point of calling Christ “firstborn” is to say that we have an intrinsic relation of dependence on him for our existence, which is precisely what the Mormon reading of this verse denies, because it centers the act of creating upon Elohim by making Christ an object of creation rather than the source. There is nothing unclear about this verse: Christ precedes creation, and hence in uncreated.
14 And unto the angel of the church of the Laodiceans write; These things saith the Amen, the faithful and true witness, the beginning of the creation of God.
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In what sense to you understand “beginning”? Do you mean to say that Christ is the first created being? That is an almost impossible way to read the Greek text. The word rendered here as “beginning” is
arche, which refers to a beginning in the sense of a source or a ruler. Hence, Christ is both the source and ruler of creation, in complete agreement with Colossians.
Both of these texts show that redemption in Christ depends on creation by him. Because of this relation, we do not truly acknowledge him as redeemer if we do not acknowledge him as Creator first. Anything we do that lessens our view of his creatorship is a barrier to accepting him as Redeemer. This shows not only why the Catholic position is true but why it important: your spirit brother cannot save you, but your Creator can.
