Astonishing audio of a Christian & Mormon dialogue

The Gospel and the Old Testament

You've been LDS for... You said 40 years?

Would you...

Well, 50 years, I guess.

50 years? OK. I'm Jeff, by the way.

Yeah.

So, when you say it ties it all together...

Well, a lot of people consider the Old Testament, a lot of Christians consider the New Testament completely foreign from the Old Testament, and they have a very difficult time reconciling it. For instance, you start reading Leviticus, you start reading all those other things, and they talk about all this stuff about sacrifice, and God is seen in the Old Testament as a very harsh person, as opposed to a person full of grace and so forth.

In the New Testament, how do you reconcile that?

Oh, yeah. I would say that in the New Testament, both the wrath of God and the love of God are amplified, because you see the cross as a display of the wrath of God poured out on the Son, and you also see the infinite love of God poured out on the Son.

So I don't think there's a conflict there. But what would that have to do with, say, the Book of Mormon being consistent with Scripture? I'll put it in this way. We're Christians. We love you guys. We have a deep love for people who are LDS.

We love your community. We care for you, and I guess our concern is that we believe that Joseph taught a false god and false gospel, and our concern for you would be that...

Why do you say he taught a false god? I think more and more the god that Joseph taught is consistent with a lot of the early Christian teachings. The doctrine of most churches was set in the Council of Nicaea, which was headed by a pagan.

God Without Beginning or End

Do we believe in one God? The Trinity is so contradictory. I don't know how anyone can even believe in it. I can't. All the contradictions of the Trinity.

Well, I mean, it's a lot of issues. I would say, when you ask that question, for instance, no early Christian...

The Bible doesn't even talk about... I mean, the Bible talks about an anthropomorphic god. It doesn't talk about the Trinity. I mean, that's all an invention of a lot of the early church councils.

Well, that's a claim, but I would say I don't think you can back that claim up with Scripture. Here's what I mean by that. There's no early Christian that taught different than the Scriptures teach that God is without beginning, that He's eternal and uncreated.

Every Christian taught that, and that would be a major difference between what Joseph taught about God and what the Bible teaches about God. Christians were committed to...

Now, what did you say again?

That God is without beginning and that He's uncreated. Now, Joseph taught in the King Follett discourse, we've imagined and supposed that God was God from all eternity, but I will refute that idea and take away the veil so that you may see.

He says, you've got to learn to become gods yourselves the same way all gods have done before you. Now, that, I believe, puts Joseph into the category of false prophet and false teacher because he's teaching a different view of God.

Now, the Bible teaches, as an example, and there's many verses like this, Isaiah 43 .10, Before me there was no God formed, neither shall there be after me. How would you, as someone that's LDS, I'm sure that's very zealous and just a sweet man, but how would you respond to God when He tells you there's none before Him and none after Him?

I'd look at that and look at some of the Hebrew words and so forth and I don't see what they all mean. You know, what was that?

43 .10?

43 .10.

Isaiah.

Before me there was no God formed, neither shall there be after me. And he says, continuing, just to give a little more context, he says in Isaiah 44 .6, right after that, I am the first and the last.

Besides me there is no God. Is there a God besides me? Indeed, there is no other God. I know not one.

That's what we write in the first of the Bible, in Genesis. It says, let us go down, man, in our own image. What is that talking about?

The Trinity. God speaking as Father, Son, Holy Spirit. Which is interesting because...

Well, you can say that, but there's no way to absolutely prove that.

Moses, Deuteronomy, and Psalm 82

Well, I can, if you allow me. Moses wrote the first five books of the Bible. Jesus confirmed that. Moses wrote in the Pentateuch, repeatedly, he writes, say, for example, Deuteronomy chapter 4. He says, verses 35 or 39, that he's the only God in the heavens above and on the earth below.

There is no other. He says in Deuteronomy 6 .4...

Well, there's a lot of other passages in the Bible, too, that Christ said he are gods, you know.

Well, in the passage you're referring to, when Jesus says, and that's in John 10, he's quoting from the Psalms. And when he quotes from the Psalms there, that Psalm passage has nothing to do with them being gods.

It has to do with God condemning the corrupt and false judges of Israel and condemning them. So that reference Jesus uses there, of I said ye are gods, is from the Psalms. And it's not a good passage you want to apply to yourself.

Because God condemns those people as he says it to them. It's a rhetorical thing where God's saying, I said ye are gods, you shall die like men, you unjust judges. He condemns the unjust judges of Israel, which Jesus is condemning the unjust judges before him.

In that time, that's not a good psalm to apply to yourself. You don't want that applied to you. It was a condemnation psalm to the unjust judges of Israel. Now, back to Deuteronomy 4, how would you respond to that?

Where God says he's the only God in the heavens above and on the earth below. You don't believe that.

Do you?

Well, he's the only God that we have anything to do with.

Well, right. I know you believe that. But he says he's the only God in the heavens above and on the earth below. There is no other.

And he says... You know, to me, a lot of that is talking about stuff that we know very little or hardly nothing about.

I mean, I...

You know, to me, it's not really... I don't know. I think there's a lot more important and basic things that... I don't think anybody... And anybody can explain the Trinity to me, you know, as far as I understand.

The only thing that could fit that definition of a God that is so contradictory is nothing, as far as I'm concerned. I mean, that he's everywhere present and yet nowhere present, occupies no space. The only thing that can describe that is nothing.

Well, the Bible... The interesting thing is the Bible actually describes God as omnipresent. Psalm 139. The Bible says, where can I flee from your presence? If I go into heaven, you're there.

Omnipresent? Does that mean his power is omnipresent?

You were speaking about... It says him, his presence. It says in Psalm 139, if I go into heaven, you're there. If I go and dwell in Sheol, the grave, you're there. If I dwell in the remotest part of the sea, even there your hand will lead me.

It talks about his presence. And that's about specifically his presence. Jesus says to his people, he says, wherever two or more are gathered in my name, there I am with them. And so there's the omnipresence of God there.

But I would just say this to you. Interesting thing is, there are clear and direct statements in the Bible, where, for example, I gave you about three or four verses already, that God says he's the only one, none before, none after.

And as a person that's LDS, that's a sweet gentleman and a nice guy, you have no response to that. You don't have an answer to it.

Well, that's one isolated scripture. I mean, that's not...

I can give you more. I mean, specifically Isaiah 43 .10, Before me there was no God formed, neither shall there be after me, is pretty definitive. Because you don't believe, and you can correct me if I'm wrong, please don't let me misstate this, you believe that there were gods before God, and you are hoping to go through exaltation to become one.

Now God says already, long before Joseph comes along, that's not a possibility. And as someone that's a Latter-day Saint, that's a sweet and gentle man, you can't answer with your theology what God says there.

There's a lot of things I can't answer. I mean, and a lot of things... I mean, you start looking at the size of the universe, and it's just literally billions of light years, and you're going to tell me everything that's out there,.

And I'm going to call you a liar!

I wouldn't attempt that, but I would say this about that question. I'd be with you on there, it's pretty awesome. Today I was looking at a news site that talked about this massive black hole that's in a distant galaxy.

It's the size of like, I don't even know how many millions or billions of our suns. Holy moly, that's amazing. But this question...

That whole thing, I mean, you even get into... I mean, you get into creationism, and you even get into the organization of all the... even just one multi-celled organism, and it's so incredibly complex...

I agree with you.

...that the probability it would all be created by accident is so...

It's an impossibility.

It's an impossibility. But would you agree that this is a little different, because God has spoken on this issue so that you can have certainty? You see, you and I are asking questions about the universe that God hasn't revealed to us necessarily, but what with this about God is pretty fundamental.

He says he's the only one, the first and the last, none before and none after, and you disagree with that because of Joseph's testimony.

Well, I don't know. I think the only way that you're going to know God is if he's revealed to him.

Would you agree. He's revealed himself in the scriptures?

Well...

Like, there's another big issue there, that the scriptures... I mean, most of the typical Christian belief is to believe that God has spoken in the scriptures, and he hasn't spoken anywhere else, hardly, which is...

Well, I guess what I'm getting at there...

I mean, and you start looking at all the stuff that's out there, all the other things that are coming to light... There's just thousands and thousands of texts that are coming out there. For instance, one of the main things, like Brigham Young, they've got a lot of all the ancient Isaiah texts and everything else that they've been working with a lot of people.

Manuscripts of Isaiah that we have in Isaiah?

No, no, some of the stuff that are originals, like in some of the...

Awesome.

Like, there are a lot of things that they've dug out of the Dead Sea Scrolls and everything that are hundreds and hundreds of years before...

200...

Before anything in the Bible was written.

Well, the Isaiah... Well, no, the Isaiah was written...

But most of it is not that much different, you know.

Well, it's not at all. Matter of fact, the Isaiah... Isaiah wrote around 700 B .C. The scroll that you're referring to in the Dead Sea Scrolls is not owned by BYU.

No, it's not.

But it predates Christ by 200 years.

They've had a project where they've computerized all of it in association with a lot of people in Israel. And they've got it where anybody can go and look at a lot of the scrolls, whether they're LDS or...

No matter who they are.

Yeah, you can do it right now. I can pull it right now back to my thing. I can get a copy of it. But that would be an interesting point because Isaiah, the scroll you're describing, we do have a scroll of Isaiah that predates Christ by 200 years that jives with the Isaiah that we have in our Bibles.

And in that Isaiah, the book of Isaiah, God says that there's none before him, none after him. He's the only one. He doesn't even know of any other gods. Now, I would say that would be another point I would press is that Joseph taught something different.

He says that there's a council of gods and that God was once a man who became a god. You can become one one day. Now, that is in conflict with what God says, and it's said for a long time.

Why do you say that's in conflict with what God said?

It was God once a man who became a god?

I don't know.

Well, Joseph says he was. King Follett discourse. God himself was once as we are now and is an exalted man who sits enthroned in yonder heavens. If you were to see him today, you'd see him in a body as tangible as man's.

And he says you've got to learn to become gods yourselves the same way all gods have done before you. And the famous one, and I would assume you know this. Try this.

That is not official scripture, anyway.

Well, it's his preaching. How about this one? As man is…. Well, there's a lot of things.

I can show you a lot of things.

Would you agree with the Pearl of Great Price?

How about the Pearl of Great Price? In the beginning, the head of the gods. Or in the beginning, the gods created.

Well, no, it's in the beginning.

The Pearl of Great Price. In the beginning, the gods created.

So, see, you do believe….

Well, you could use the same thing that you're talking about, that that was the Trinity. I mean, if you want to….

No, we only believe in one god. We don't believe in three gods.

You do.

You don't believe in three?

You believe in three gods of this earth, right?

What do you mean? You don't believe that…. You believe that there's just one god? You believe they're all one?

One being of God. Three persons.

Well, what about in the…. I mean, if you believe…. You believe there's only one person or three persons?

Three persons, one being.

But what about at the martyrdom of Stephan, where he saw Christ up in the right hand of…. Well, he saw….

He saw God in Christ? He quotes from Daniel 7, where Christ, the Messiah, was told to have been seated at the right hand of the Father, which was not a direct position of right hand, but was speaking about a position of authority and power and of the reigning king.

So, as Stephan's dying, he's telling them, Christ is seated. He is king. He is lord. He is Daniel 7 fulfilled. And it's not speaking about a literal right hand.

Well, Christ said, my father is greater than I.

As a man. When Philippians says that Jesus was….

I mean, so then they're not one person.

Well, no, no, no. We don't believe that. See, that's an interesting thing. Tell me if I'm wrong on this. You're taught in seminary and in your classes, you're taught that Christians believe that Jesus and the Father are the same person.

Well, when you say that, you're covering a whole lot of different grounds. I don't think that there's any general agreement about that among Christians.

Well, there's universal agreement on the Trinity, always has been. There have been aberrant views, like I would say Mormonism is, that have come up throughout the centuries that we've had to come together and collectively….

Well, I think like the Greek Orthodox Church, I'm not sure about that.

Oh, yeah, there's no Christian in history that could be a consistent Christian in violating what the Bible says about God. See, that would be the difference, is that our standard is what God actually says about himself.

And every Christian throughout the centuries, when we've come against error, we've gone back to the Scriptures to refute it and maybe formulated a creed even against it based on the Scriptures.

Yeah, but there's thousands and thousands of different churches, and they have different beliefs. They fight one another.

Well, we have in-house….

They've had wars and killed one another. Christianity, I mean….

So your standard is…. First of all, I'd say Christians have the same God, the same Scriptures, the same Gospel universally, always have. Like, for example, I'm technically a Reformed Baptist minister, but all my heroes are Presbyterian.

We have in-house debates over each other, over non-essentials, but we have the same God, same Gospel, and I would stand here with a Presbyterian, a Baptist, a non-denominational Christian, a denomination, and we'd stand here with the same message with you, same message.

In-house disagreements. But here's a major difference. You bring up a good point. There are over 100 different sects of the LDS church. There's the Reformed LDS community, there's Temple Lot, there's all these different sects, and they would say that you're not Mormon.

As far as numbers goes, those are not….

But they would say that you're not faithful to the LDS teachings. Are you a polygamist?

No.

They would say that you're disobeying the Doctrine and Covenants and Brigham Young. They would say Brigham Young says that the only men who become gods, or even the sons of God, are those who enter into polygamy.

And Joseph says that if you basically are not a polygamist, that you're basically denying this eternal covenant of God to be a polygamist, and you won't become a god without being a polygamist.

Well, I've never heard anything like that.

Well, check out the Doctrine and Covenants.

I've read that many times.

Okay.

There's nothing like that.

Well, can I show you?

No, go ahead.

Okay. As I find it.

Need help?

Yeah, just grab that right there.

Sure.

I will show you this right here. This is a photocopy of a teaching of Brigham Young.

On the Point of the Ocean in D .C.

Just because I think it's important.

Well, as far as I understand it anyway, I mean, there are so many things that Brigham Young said, and Brigham Young was mostly illiterate a lot of times, and he wasn't a very literate man. He had scribes write him, and a lot of the things from him that are written about him, I don't even know that.

That's what he said.

Well, he approved what was printed in England and in Salt Lake City. He first had to... It was both presses, Liverpool and Salt Lake City. Young had to approve them. The Elder Reynolds had to approve it, his secretary, and then Elder Carrington, he double-checked the type before they actually went out.

And here's what Brigham Young said. He said, I have never yet preached a sermon and sent it out to the children of men that they may not call scripture. And he says, let me have the privilege of correcting a sermon, and it is as good a scripture as they deserve.

And so he says his sermons are scripture.

Well, I don't know. That's not the official position of the church.

That was the prophet of your church's official position.

He was the president of the church at that time.

That was your prophet's position.

Again there,.

I've read a lot of stuff from Brigham Young.

Did they believe it as scripture when he said it? When he said that? Did they take it as scripture? I would think so.

Brigham Young says, if any of you deny the plurality of wives and continue to do so, I promise that you will be damned. Journal of Discourse is Volume 3.

What does that mean? Deny that they can't be plural wives or deny that everyone has to be?

If you deny the practice of polygamy, which was considered an eternal covenant, an eternal decree, basically.

Well, that's in the Bible. Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, they all had multiple wives.

And what did God say to them in the law? He said, do not multiply wives. So what were they doing? If God says specifically that was not his command and don't do it, and then they do it,.

What do they violate? Where does that say?

Deuteronomy 17, 17. He tells the king not to multiply wives. Brigham says here,.

He says,.

I mean...

Brigham says the only men who become gods or even the sons of God are those who enter into polygamy. Do you believe you're going to become a god one day?

Well, I don't... That's not the official position of the church.

Well, is he a prophet? Don't you believe that Joseph taught that they restored prophets, priests, and everything else to the church? So is he a prophet?

Well, Joseph...

Do you see, I just want to show you there the inconsistency you're trapped into when you follow a teacher that's contradicting scripture. When you follow a man that teaches you falsely about God, you're caught in a place where you can't come to the text as it is because what you're being taught is in violation to it.

And God says in Deuteronomy 13 that one of the ways you know someone's a false prophet is they lead you after other gods. And I think that what you're seeing here, and I mean this with love and respect to you, that's what's happening right now.

You're brought into a conflict, a fundamental conflict with what God has already said about himself, about you. Let me ask you a question. If God told you that you couldn't become a god one day and Joseph says that you can,.

Who would you believe?

God or Joseph?

I believe God, but I don't believe God's told me that.

What if I can tell you right now, Isaiah 43 .10 says, Before me there was no god formed, neither shall there be after me.

I could go and research it.

And find other passages probably.

Because you're not...

I mean, I'm...

I'd love to listen. Obviously you're...

Well, I care for you. I'm not here because I'm interested in just debate. I'm here because I care for you. I'm here because we love you, we love your community, and our desire is that you come to know the true and living God.

We believe that Joseph was a false prophet. And we can show you that from the scriptures. And our desire is, listen, not to rob you of God and faith, but it's to point you to the true and living God, to come to him for salvation.

It's a free gift through what Christ accomplished, not through your works like Joseph taught.

Grace, Faith, and Works

Well, Joseph, the... Anybody that thinks that they can get to heaven on works is sadly mistaken. All the works you're going to do, if people tries to do it, is just going to show them their own inability to keep the law because everyone's going to fail just about.

I don't care who it is. I don't care if it's you or who else it is. And so, you know, to say that... You know, as far as... But the problem is that a lot of the things that I see a lot of the Christians have swung to is they say, well, grace covers any kind of sinning without you even trying.

And that is obvious.

I don't know what you're saying.

I mean, but... Well, that's a quote by some ministers.

Well, the Bible says...

I mean that he says there are a lot of people that use religion, you know, to...

But what does the Bible say would be the question,.

Not what are people doing,.

But what does the Bible say?

That's the issue, is if the total authority is in the Bible or it is in having a personal relationship with God and getting revelation so you understand it.

I mean...

Would you...

Tell me how you would respond to this. The Bible says in 2 Timothy 3 .16 that all scripture is God breathed from his mouth. Peter says a holy man of God...

Yeah, but it also says that, you know, it's of no personal interpretation, but the holy man of God explained it.

That's just what I was going to quote to you. As a matter of fact, I was just quoting an exact verse. Peter says a holy man of God spoke as they were carried along by the Holy Spirit. We're in the same passage, actually.

It's interesting that you were quoting that. So Peter says that the origin of scripture is the Holy Spirit, right? He carried them along to write what they wrote. And the Bible says in Timothy that it's God's word.

It says it breathed out by God. So with that, what I'm getting at is this. If God the Holy Spirit is the origin of the revelation and it is actual theanoustos, God breathed, is what the word is, then here's my question.

Would God, who gave you that revelation in his word, contradict it by personal revelation with you? In other words, if God... There you go, and that's what I'm getting at.

If, you know, if someone would go out and say that they had a revelation, that there was no Christ or something, obviously they would be...

Why would that be wrong?

Because...

Based on what? Based on what? Why would that be wrong? How would you refute someone that said that to you?

I'll give you...

You shoot at this.

I'll give you something to aim at. Mormon... Not Mormon. Muslim. Muslim says, Jesus is not the son of God. He was not Messiah. He did not die for... Not Messiah.

Sorry.

Not the son of God. He did not die for sins. He did not rise from the dead. How would you refute the Muslim who says that?

What would you go to?

He's not the son of God. He didn't die for sins. He didn't rise from the dead. What's the first thing you would do to show that Muslim he was incorrect?

Where would you go? Well, he's...

He's not going to believe the Bible, so how are you going to... A lot of...

But he's using your terminology. He's saying, Jesus, the Messiah. He says, I believe in Jesus, the Messiah.

Well, it's... You know, like... It's like... Mohammed said. He said that it's an abomination that God should have a son, that he's so far... You know, he's so far above us, it's even... It's even a heresy to consider that he could be anything at all like us.

That's kind of more Mohammed's position,.

As far as I understand it.

Right, right.

You are right about that.

You're right on.

But I think that you and I would do it the same way. I think that you and I would show the Muslim that Jesus says that he was going to die for sins and rise from the dead. The Bible says that he did that.

The Testament of the eyewitness says you would go to the Scriptures. Well, it's...

There's a lot of things that you could show that there were all these thousands of predictions. You could do it mathematically.

Where would you go?

The Scriptures? Yeah, back to the Scriptures.

Now, with that...

That all this stuff was predicted and Christ fulfilled it.

I agree with you.

The probability of anybody ever being able to do that is so astronomical that it's impossible.

You're right.

You and I would totally agree on that. I have the whole message.

I gave on that.

It's good.

So, here's what I'm saying with you is that our loving question to you is... With the Muslim, you would do that. He has a false version of Jesus that's not Jesus. But our statement is that Joseph gave you a false Jesus as well.

One God among many gods. Satan's brother. And then when we want to show you that, we go to the Scriptures to show you this is what he says about himself. But what you have to end up doing is being somewhat in a place as any other religion where you say, but our authority tells us that's wrong.

I have some points, but...

I'll tell you what. My name is Jeff.

Uh-huh. And...

I don't know if... This is a way... Just look at this. Tell me what you think. You got one already? Way to get a hold of me.

Is on the back.

You can get a hold of me and look through that and let's just have a dialogue.

Okay.

Okay?

Okay. Let's see. What is there?

Oh, you can get... I'm Jeff.

So you can go.

Jeff at defendthefaith .org.

Okay.

Okay?

Oh, let me look at it.

Alright, man.

Bless you.

Alright.

Take care.

Bless you.