Archive for category: Mormonism

   Over the past few years as I have responded to the public statements of Paul Owen my language, and my predictions of his eventual abandonment of any form of evangelical belief, have undoubtedly caused some to wonder. The “behind the scenes” issues, and years of previous private interaction, explain a lot of it. This is not a “I told you

   I guess it fits. With the political situation of Romney running for the presidency, the utter collapse of all meaningful discernment in the culture as a whole in religious matters, we should hardly be surprised that Eerdmans, which broke ground by publishing a work of LDS apologetics (note the discussion here and here), is now putting out a book on

It is funny how things work here. One of the assignments in my current GGBTS class is to write a review of two debates shown in class. After interviewing the students as to where their ministries are and where they think they will be going in the future, I decided a debate on Mormonism, and a debate on Islam, would

   Bill McKeever just forwarded this notice from the Deseret News. Look innocuous? It isn’t. Notice this line, “Along with his wife, Sandra, Mr. Tanner received public criticism after studying the authenticity of the Salamander Letter, which was later determined to be a forgery by Mark Hofmann containing facts about the Mormon prophet Joseph Smith.” I don’t know about you, but

   When you go to www.lds.org today you will find a “First Presidency Message” from Gordon Hinckley, printed in the Ensign magazine, July, 2006. Since this is the current prophet writing, being published in the official church publications, and being recommended for use and discussion by home teachers, there is little ground upon which anyone can question that this is official

By Jeffrey Morse Sun Staff Writer (original article) NORWICH – County historians have rediscovered historical records proving the founder of the Mormon Church was arrested on several occasions while living in Chenango County. The papers turned up after a three decade absence, and may prove to be the most historically significant discovery in the modern history of the area. The

Before continuing our response to Paul Owen’s velvet-glove treatment of his former religion, I found it most humorous that he has now complained about being misrepresented in his views of Baptists. If life were not so short, and time precious, it would be enjoyable to go back through just the archives I have kept of his harangues to put together

Paul Owen, a name well known to anyone who has read this blog with any regularity, has one again demonstrated an incredible double-standard in how he deals with theological issues and movements. We know what the young Dr. Owen thinks of Baptists: his language is as harsh as can be and the accusations, insults, and basic ad-hominem flows freely from

Phil Johnson’s last two blog articles are most interesting not only on the subject of Mormonism and the media-oriented use of meetings by LDS scholars with evangelical leaders but, for those of us who have watched Owen undermining anything and everything that is good and godly for years now, for the insight it gives us into just how long he’s

I just finished a little project that did not take long. I sat down with the McConkie/Millet work, Sustaining and Defending the Faith and tested a little theory. See, old-time Mormons did not strive to look like, and sound like, evangelicals. In fact, they worked hard to differentiate themselves, being members of the one true Church. So, given that this

A few days ago we noted the words of BYU professors Millet and McConkie in a chapter titled “The Bible Fraud” in a book titled Sustaining and Defending the Faith. The chapter began with some incredible statements, including: After the death of the Apostles the Bible was taught by the authority of the whip and the sword. To the Reformers

You may recall a few weeks ago I pointed out the publication by Eerdmans of a book by Robert Millet, A Different Jesus? Today a friend from Salt Lake reminded me of a book I have had on my shelf since 1991, but I had forgotten that it was co-authored by Millet. For some reason I had associated the book

The Principles of Eternal Life    The first principles of man are self-existent with God. God himself, finding he was in the midst of spirits and glory, because he was more intelligent, saw proper to institute laws whereby the rest could have a privilege to advance like himself. The relationship we have with God places us in a situation to advance

Mans Spirit Eternal and Uncreated Smith then goes on to lay the foundation of the LDS denial of creatio ex nihilo, creation out of nothing, the historic Christian belief that God did not create the universe out of pre-existing matter, but solely by His creative power and will.    Now, I ask all who hear me, why the learned men who

The Council of the Gods At this point Smith goes into a fascinating discussion of Genesis 1:1 and how this passage supports his theology, but we move past this to remain focused upon ascertaining the what of his theology more than the how at this point.    Oh, ye lawyers, ye doctors, and ye priests, who have persecuted me, I want

Learning to be a God     Smith’s attempts to defend this doctrine from the Bible are enlightening with reference to his claimed abilities as a Scriptural exegete, but we must pass over them lightly at this point, since we have much material yet to admit into evidence before getting to an evaluation of these claims.    The Scriptures inform us that

God is an Exalted Man God himself was once as we are now, and is an exalted man, and sits enthroned in yonder heavens! That is the great secret. If the veil were rent today, and the great God who holds this world in its orbit, and who upholds all worlds and all things by his power, was to make

The King Follett Discourse     It is quoted hundreds of times by LDS General Authorities in their sermons and books. So often is one section of it cited in Mormon history that even Stephen Robinson, a Mormon scholar who insists that critics of Mormonism stick to a narrow spectrum of official teachings of the Church, admits that this one statement

I have mentioned the fact that the person Paul Owen is in writing an article, for example, is not the person he is in “regular life” when interacting, especially, with those he considers non-scholars. The posting of the previous two articles, which I intended to be the end as far as my time currently allows, has led Owen to correct

But let us look at the specifics of this anti-apologetic, anti-evangelical position. First, Owen says Mormonism “allows” “certain heresies” in its system. No, Mormonism is based upon, and flows from, fundamental, foundational falsehoods, specifically, that God is an exalted man; that men can become Gods, and that God “became” a God through the eternal law of progression. These beliefs are

The letter came to my office via the CRI Journal. I had been asked to write an article for the journal on the apologetic errors of FARMS in the space of about 4800 words as I recall, and I did. The letter was from Paul Owen and Carl Mosser, two students at Talbot. I had never heard of either of

Roger Overton of Ambassadors for Christ received an e-mail this morning from Richard Mouw. Roger had quoted the line from my blog wherein Mouw says he believes Millet is believing in the Christ of the Bible for salvation. Mouw asked him to at least provide the context. Since Roger was quoting me, and then kindly himself provided the context, let’s

The Testimony of the Book of Abraham     Certainly the most unique section of LDS Scripture is found to be the Book of Abraham, contained in the Pearl of Great Price. This work, Translated from the papyrus, by Joseph Smith is allegedly A Translation of some ancient Records, that have fallen into our hands from the catacombs of Egypt.The writings

Michael Thomson, Sales Director of Eerdmans, has responded to Pastor Kinchen and Pastor Curlee regarding the Mouw/Millet LDS apologetics work (here is the blog entry). I would like to provide the response and interact with it.    You are moved to action in your anger but I wanted to state what the case was…from the publisher’s side.    First, the evangelical endorsements

Ironically, Denver Seminary professor Craig L. Blomberg (whose co-authored work with LDS scholar Stephen Robinson, How Wide the Divide? (IVP, 1997) opened the door, I believe, to this new work, but itself was severely flawed on many levels–I wrote the summary review of the work for the CRI Journal) has written the following endorsement for the new Eerdmans LDS apologetics

Mormonism is not Christianity. It is fundamentally different. While it differs in hundreds of minor details, what is most important to us is that it differs in the most definitional and fundamentalaspects from the Christian faith. Christianity worships one God. Christianity knows that there is one God who has eternally been God and is the Creator of all things exhaustively.

As I look around my office I see literally hundreds of volumes produced by the venerable old Christian publishing house, Eerdmans. Many of my best resources bear that name on the spine. And I truly wonder what the founders of that company would think about its newest book. Robert Millet is the Richard L. Evans Professor of Religious Understanding and

I used the term “enclave” instead of “conclave” real late last night, and just got a note from William Hamblin of BYU pointing out my error. It is so nice to know I am kept to such a high standard by so many. He also informed me he read Scripture Alone. Rather random note, to be sure. Glad to hear

I flew back from London last night…I think. Hard to know what time it is, what day it is, etc., at the moment. I took a quick run out to the Mesa Easter Pageant just to say hello. This is the first year since 1984 that I haven’t been there every night (with the exception of those few years where

Gotta give the ol’ KJV credit. It tripped up the leaders of the LDS Church, way back when. Of course, today, modern Mormons might not care too much about how their original leaders were so ignorant of the Bible that they could make truly amazing mistakes, but anyone who seriously thinks these men were prophets of God in any meaningfully

If you do not know the name Hugh Nibley, you are not familiar with Mormonism and Mormon apologetics. He was the father of the modern movement that is today F.A.R.M.S., the Foundation for Ancient Research and Mormon Studies, the chief arm of LDS apologetics out of BYU. Oh, he wasn’t the only source of LDS apologetics: that movement really predated