Christmas Book Citations Jesus the Christ Part 2

When one examines the teachings of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints from a biblical perspective view .1 Mormonism sponsored by Mormonism research ministry since 1979 Mormonism research ministry has been dedicated to equipping the body of Christ with answers regarding the Christian faith in a manner that expresses gentleness and respect. And now, your host for today's viewpoint on Mormonism are things that a program for that musical introduction welcome to this edition of viewpoint on Mormonism on your host, Bill McKeever, founder and director Mormonism research ministry and with me today is Eric Johnson. My colleague at MRM we continue looking at books that were given away as Christmas gifts. Between the years 1981 and 2017 by the first presidency of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints before we get in today's topic Eric.

How can someone find not only the quotes that we are going to be citing today, but also many other quotations that we have covered in the series.

Just go to MRM.org and in the search engine and type in Christmas book and the first article to come up contains links to all of the books in the Christmas series that we been doing today. We are using quotations from Jesus the Christ by James Talmage that can be found on that books link and in addition there are other quotes that we don't have time to get to. So to do further research. We invite you to go to MRM.org. This book was published in 1915, Jesus the Christ was also given away as a gift for Christmas in 1983 and the yen in 2009. What makes it a little bit unique from a lot of the other books is that this is a soft brown leather addition that looks kind of like a Bible. Obviously, that would be something very special.

You would think to a Latter Day Saints if they were to receive one in these books were given to other general authorities in the church as well as some selected employees of the church such as BYU professors yesterday. We were looking at a topic within this book that deals with the great apostasy I want to revisit this because we didn't get to finish our point and so let's go back Eric to the quotation that we cited yesterday that was found on page 754 having to do with this great apostasy throughout the period of apostasy. The windows of heaven had been shut toward the world so as to preclude all direct revelation from God, and particularly any person ministration or theophany of the Christ. Mankind had ceased to know God and had invested the utterances of prophets and apostles of old who had known him with a pall of mystery and fancy so that the true and the living God was no longer believed to exist, but in his place. The secretaries had tried to conceive of an incomprehensible being devoid of body parts or passions and immaterial, nothing immaterial, nothing okay but that's not the point I want to focus on yesterday I was zeroing in on the phrase mankind had ceased to know God and then later on so that the true and the living God was no longer believed to exist and the reason why I personally have a problem with this whole concept of the great apostasy as it's taught in the LDS church is because there's section 7 in the doctrine and covenants that speak specifically where Jesus promises John his apostle would remain alive to bring souls unto me according to section 7, verse four and this supposedly comes from some kind of parchment that Joseph Smith had revealed to him and they mention this parchment in the doctrine and covenants commentary that was published in 1973 and I find this to be quite telling.

Because where did this come from.

We don't know but it sounds like it's another imaginative invention on the part of Joseph Smith to throw something in there by using an argument that no one can really verify where is this parchment that is mentioned in the heading of section 7 will these commentators talk about that on page 40 of this book it says the prophet Joseph Smith and Oliver Cowdrey one day discuss this passage of the Scriptures and express different views on the meaning of it in order to come unity of faith on that question the prophet inquired of the Lord and received this revelation that would be section 7. The commentary goes on and says the question might be asked whether the prophet had actually seen the parchment written and hidden by John R copy of it. If so where and when did he obtain it and what became of it, the history of the prophet does not furnish information on the subjects but it is not necessary to suppose that the prophet had St. John's parchment or a copy of it before him when he received this revelation. It was the contents of the document that were revealed. It's not so much whether or not there was an actual parchment available to Joseph Smith.

What we would call today a hard copy that's not necessary. According to these commentators. It's just that it was revealed to him but again it becomes very convenient we don't have any evidence of this. But Joseph Smith throws this into the mix. But what's important is is what he said John was supposed to remain alive and bring souls unto Christ. If that is a fact, and John did remain alive and bring souls unto Christ. You would think that he would've had the proper authority and the proper message to preach in other words, he would be converting people to what Mormons would call the restored gospel of Jesus Christ.

In other words, they would have a true understanding as taught by the LDS church today. They would not have apostatized version of the gospel and you would think that they would also be a part of the true church know where their meeting, we don't know because again there's no details that are furnished with this story that's found in section 7 of the doctrine and covenants. Another point that needs to be brought out. It's almost as if Brigham Young anticipates this whole notion of what would happen if all the leaders in the church disappeared but say they were persecuted or actually killed, but Brigham Young talks about something like this on May 7, 1861, and this is found in the Journal of discourses, volume 9, beginning with page 88 and this is what Brigham Young said suppose that 11 of the 12 had been taken away by the power of the adversary that one apostle has the same power that Joseph had and could preach, baptize and set in order the whole kingdom of God upon the earth as much so as the 12 were they altogether again if, in the providence of God. He should permit the enemy to destroy these two first quorums and then destroy the quorum of the 70 all but one man, what is his power. It would be to go and preach, baptize, confirm laying on of hands or Dane set in order build up and establish the whole kingdom of God as it is now one guy could do this folks. According to Brigham Young get rid of all of them, but if there's one left. He has the authority and the power to keep the church going and and especially Bill because this is one of Jesus 12 apostles John so you would think there's a lot of authority.

A man who wrote a gospel in the way Brigham Young puts it in this portion of his speech is that there needs to be revelation. But he goes on to say I can go still further, whoever is ordained to the office of an elder to a certain degree possesses the keys of the Melchizedek priesthood and suppose only one elder should be left on the earth could he go and set in order the kingdom of God. Yes, by revelation, yet we find the doctrine and covenants section 7 it says very clear, I say unto the speaking to John, because thou desire wrist. This thou shalt tarry until I come in my glory, and shall prophesy before nations kindreds tones and people every single one of them disappeared as far as having true faith. We know that even some of the most strangest heresies continue for many centuries later. For instance, the heresy of moralism still exists today in the United Pentecostal.

That's not an Orthodox teaching. It was refuted years ago, but that still goes on today. We still have people holding onto the Arian heresy that Jesus is not God that still goes on today doesn't really make sense that all these converts of the apostle John, who we assume were being taught true doctrines and given true authority because John you would think would be laying his hands upon those converts and passing that authority on and they in turn would pass that authority on to someone else because that's how the Mormon church explains it. They all just all of a sudden disappeared.

It seems to be another great conspiracy theory that just doesn't seem to work out and John would be giving this message to his converts and as you said they would be passing on to the next and the next in the next so why shouldn't they have Orthodox belief in, and who God is and who Jesus says I would think that the story of the great apostasy would carry a lot more weight if you got rid of doctrine and covenants section 7, but I also think it would carry more weight if you got rid of another passage of Mormon scripture found in third Nephi chapter 28 talking about the three neophytes because here's another example where Jesus promises mortals that they would live to preach the gospel were knocking I have time to finish our thought today, but James Talmage mentions the three neophytes on page 738 of Jesus the Christ, the same book that was given away as a Christmas gift to general authorities in the church and employees of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints. This is what third Nephi 28, starting with verse six as starting on page 738 and talent is book in loving compassion.

The Lord spoke unto the 12 disciples one by one, asking, what is it that ye desire of me. After that I am God of the father. All but three express the desire that they might continue in the ministry until they had reached a goodly age and then in due time be received by the Lord into his kingdom to them. Jesus gave blessed assurance saying after that ye are 70 and two years old, ye shall come unto me in my kingdom, and with me, ye shall find rest. He turned to the three who had reserved the request. They ventured not to express and he said unto them, behold, I know your thoughts and ye have desired, the thing which John, my beloved, who was with me in my ministry. Before that I was lifted up by the Jews desired of me. Therefore, more blessed are ye, for ye shall never taste of death, but ye shall live to behold all the doings of the father unto the children of men, even until all things shall be fulfilled.

According to the will of the father, when I shall come in my glory with the powers of heaven and ye shall never endure the pains of death, but when I shall come in my glory, he shall be changed in the twinkling of an eye for mortality to immortality and then shall ye be blessed in the kingdom of my father. Tomorrow were going to put some flesh on the bones of these verses that Eric just read. But here's the point I want to leave you with doctrine and covenants section 7 says the apostle John would remain alive to bring souls unto Christ also James Talmage, page 738 and 739 speaks not only of John, but he also speaks of the three neophytes that are mentioned in third Nephi chapter 28 combined.

The apostle John. With these three neophytes.

That's for people that would remain alive on the earth till Jesus return who we assume would be preaching what Mormonism understands to be the restored gospel of Jesus Christ. Thank you for listening you would like more information when guarding this research ministry. We encourage you to visit our website www.mrm.org you can request our free newsletter Mormonism research. We hope you'll join us again as we look at another viewpoint is