Mormon Dilemma 340
Lying to Deceive
Mosiah 3:19; “For the natural man is an enemy to God, and has been from the fall of Adam, and will be, forever and ever, unless he yields to the enticings of the Holy Spirit, and putteth off the natural man and becometh a saint through the atonement of Christ the Lord, and becometh as a child, submissive, meek, humble, patient, full of love, willing to submit to all things which the Lord seeth fit to inflict upon him, even as a child doth submit to his father.”
Today I’m going to just focus on two items in this statement above; the natural man being an enemy to God and the last sentence that says “…willing to submit to all things which the Lord seeth fit to inflict upon him…”
Romans 3:23; “For all have sinned, and come short of the glory of God.”
Mormons don’t believe this. In Mormonism children are born perfect and without sin.
Romans 5:10; “For if, when we were enemies, we were reconciled to God by the death of his Son, much more, being reconciled, we shall be saved by his life.”
Mormons don’t believe man is reconciled to God based solely on the merits of Jesus, remember 2 Nephi 25:23 says “…we are saved by grace after all we can do.”
Psalm 149:4; “For the LORD taketh pleasure in his people: he will beautify the meek with salvation.”
Eph. 2:10; “For we are his workmanship, created in Christ Jesus unto good works, which God hath before ordained that we should walk in them.”
Why would God look for ways to inflict the people He created? Doesn’t that contradict the Bible verses above? By the way, workmanship in the Greek means poetry. Does that sound vindictive to you?
This is a common complaint of unChristian people- that God ‘inflicts’ all kinds of diseases, tragedies, etc. If they KNEW the Bible and the love that God has for them, they would realize that it is Satan that does this.
Yes, God does correct his children, and sometimes has to punish, but it is done in His way and lovingly, not by ‘inflicting’ them.
For example, David was punished for his adultery with Bathsheeba; he knew why and learned from that. After he repented, he was blessed again.
Conversely, Satan just causes turmoil and hardships; he does this especially to Christians. This is the ‘cost’ of discipleship. We know as Christians that the closer we are get to God, the more Satan will try and get us away by using whatever method he can.
BUT- our faith and trust in God is such that when we put the Whole Armor of God on, we are ready and prepared for his attacks. When a person feels that they are being attacked by Satan, all he has to say is, “Jesus is Victor!” and Satan has to leave them alone.
Therefore, it follows (correctly), that the Mormons in that verse above, are telling their people that God is not loving but a stern watcher of the Law. Mormons can’t ever be sure, then. that they will go to Heaven and have no hope.