If you believe what you like in the gospels, and reject what you don’t like, it is not the gospel you believe, but yourself. – Augustine of Hippo, Sermons

If you thought you misread the title of our post, it’s okay, you’re not alone. The first thing that came to my mind was the quote listed above.

The shameless applause for Joe Smith makes it difficult to believe they don’t venerate that man; everything they do revolves around their founder, Joseph Smith. Case in point is our subject matter today.

As an aside –

The image above was part of the chapter we’ve highlighted here. You’ll take notice of the occultic markings of the Nauvoo Temple behind Joe Smith. This type of imagery, along with their doctrines, are saturated with demonic influence everywhere Mormons look.

Now before I move forward with this, I pray it’s understood my intent isn’t to be malicious to any Mormon. I’m so in love with Jesus, and what He’s done for me that I can’t imagine anyone wanting to spend eternity separated from Him, including Mormons.

Whenever I see leaders of this church lead members to anything or anyone, other than Christ and Him crucified, I cringe just thinking of it. One of the first pastors I had when I was saved always asked the question ‘does this lead you to, or away from Jesus’. Because I was a ‘baby Christian’ (23 yrs ago), his words stuck with me.

The LDS Church has numerous teaching manuals, one of which is called

TEACHINGS OF PRESIDENTS OF THE CHURCH: JOSEPH SMITH. We’ll be looking at a few of the comments they made about Smith to compare them with the word of God, and historical reality.

In the last chapter of this manual (Praise to the Man, chapter #47), students are instructed to read over several testimonies from all the Mormon prophets, and answer the following question about Smith’s 1st vision –

What makes this event “the greatest event that has ever occurred in the world since the resurrection of the Son of God”?

That comment alone earns the skepticism people have about Mormonism, and their misplaced worship of Smith.

Each testimony was something of a slobber-fest on how awesome Joe Smith was, and how vitally important he is to the testimony of every Latter-day Saint. Strangely absent was Monson’s testimony, but Gordon Hinckley went so far as to quote Tertullian by stating ‘the blood of the martyrs has become the seed of the Church’.

Two other prophets made the following comments causing us great concern –

Ezra Taft Benson –

“The First Vision of the Prophet Joseph Smith is bedrock theology to the Church.… You should always bear testimony to the truth of the First Vision.

Joseph Fielding Smith –

…Joseph Smith is the one to whom all men must look in this day to learn the truth about Christ and his gospel…

…the honest in heart will accept him as a prophet…

…I revere and honor his holy name… [emp. mine]

Now we ask…was Smith’s vision really the greatest event in history since the resurrection of our Lord? After performing a very brief internet search, I found countless  events that changed the way the world operated. The following list is but a few of the things I found.

All dates are from the AD era –

60 First Gospel published (often thought to be that written by Mark).

85-165 Claudius Ptolemy devises a framework of Astronomy which will last for 1400 years. He calculates pi as 3+8/60+30/602 which in decimals is “3.1416666…”, an amazing feat for the time.

313 Edict of Milan is issued. Christians are now tolerated in the Roman Empire.

405 The Christian Gospel is translated into Latin.[1]

455 Fall of Rome

550 Persians use windmills to power irrigation pumps.

1024 The Chinese issue the first paper money.

1187 Although invented probably in 880, the magnetic compass now becomes common for ocean going ships in the Far East.

1285 Spectacles for the farsighted are invented in Italy.

1382-1395 Wycliffe’s Bible translated into Middle English, 1st complete translation to Middle English, includes deuterocanonical books.

1415 Jan Hus  tried, condemned, and burned at the stake for his writings, and for agreeing with John Wycliffe.

1428 Wycliffe’s body is exhumed, and  burned at the stake. His writings were deemed heretical in 1415.

1455 German inventor Johann Gutenberg invents the movable printing press which was ‘regarded as the most important invention of the second millennium, the seminal event which ushered in the modern period of human history’. His invention helped spur the Renaissance, Reformation, Age of Englightenment, and the Scientific Revolution.

1517 An Augustinian monk, Martin Luther, nails his 95 theses to the church door in Wittenberg; unknowingly initiating the Protestant revolution.

1526 William Tyndale, scholar and speaker of eight languages, publishes the first translation of the New Testament in English. For his efforts he is imprisoned for 500 days in horrible conditions and then strangled and his body burned ten years later.

References:

Wikipedia

Fincher.org