Does the LDS church teach that men can evolve into a God?

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lol... no, something interesting. Like explain how a human can work himself into godhood.
Man doesn’t "work himself into godhood". It is a gift of God that he gives to those who gain salvation and exaltation in his kingdom in heaven.
 
Man doesn’t "work himself into godhood". It is a gift of God that he gives to those who gain salvation and exaltation in his kingdom in heaven.

That's like saying, "Your wage is a gift your employer gives to those who do their job."
 
Man doesn’t "work himself into godhood". It is a gift of God that he gives to those who gain salvation and exaltation in his kingdom in heaven.
That is what your church teaches, that temple works and covenants are necessary for Mormons to DO, IF they want to be exalted to godhood in the CK after death. Mormons must WORK for their salvation. Sad.
 
With the understanding of the Godhead, (not the Trinity) I show consistency in all those statements. What are you looking at?
Don't you even know what your own BoM says? It is PLAINLY AND EXPLICITELY monotheistic and Trinitarian in nature, though it also strays into Modalism. We have proven it on here umpteen times. Certainly Ivahoe/the Prophet has posted those verses on here over and over again! Plus, there is the Testimony of the Three Witnesses in the forepart of the BoM that testified that "Father, Son, and Holy Ghost" are "One God."
 
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Don't you even know what your own BoM says? It is PLAINLY AND EXPLICITELY monotheistic and Trinitarian in nature. We have proven it on here umpteen times. Certainly Ivahoe/the Prophet has posted those verses on here over and over again! Plus, there is the Testimony of the Three Witnesses in the forepart of the BoM that testified that "Father, Son, and Holy Ghost" are "One God."

So let me see if I understand this....

"gods" in Ps. 82 HAS to be taken literally, because you have to take EVERYTHING literally, otherwise you're not believing the Bible.

But the "one God" in the Book of Mormon doesn't LITERALLY mean "one God", it simply means "the godhead".

Am I understanding this correctly? ;)
 
lol... no, something interesting. Like explain how a human can work himself into godhood.
Don't you even know what your own BoM says? It is PLAINLY AND EXPLICITELY monotheistic and Trinitarian in nature. We have proven it on here umpteen times. Certainly Ivahoe/the Prophet has posted those verses on here over and over again! Plus, there is the Testimony of the Three Witnesses in the forepart of the BoM that testified that "Father, Son, and Holy Ghost" are "One God."
Bonnie - the INTERPRETATION of scripture is in dispute, not the verses themselves.
In a murder trial, the prosecuting attorney doesn’t use the dead body as evidence to support the guilt of the accused. Other evidence is required (motive, means, circumstantial evidence) surrounding the dead body wins (or loses) the case.

Yes, I understand the validity of why you would see the verses as monotheistic Or Trinitarian. I get it. But you have to view the Entire Book of Mormon in context.

If The term “one God” could only result in one interpretation, then there would be nothing to debate, but the debate has gone on for centuries. Clearly, there is a second interpretation that is also valid.
 
If The term “one God” could only result in one interpretation, then there would be nothing to debate, but the debate has gone on for centuries. Clearly, there is a second interpretation that is also valid.

Just because other interpretations exist, doesn't mean they are "valid".

Is the view that our system is Geocentric, "valid"?
Is the view of a "flat earth", "valid"?
Is the view that man has never landed on the Moon, "valid"?

I don't think so.
 
Interestingly enough, “evolve” into God supports the unbiblical belief that “God” is a different species.
The question is loaded with a false premise.
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So you’re inferring that Talmage believes God is a different species?
Furthermore, what Mormon believes Jesus divinity not through the word of God transmitted to Him by man?
The title of your image is WAY off.
What gods do you think Mormons will become if not divinely appointed by the Father, being “kings and priests unto the Most High God?”
 
So you’re inferring that Talmage believes God is a different species?
Furthermore, what Mormon believes Jesus divinity not through the word of God transmitted to Him by man?
The title of your image is WAY off.
What gods do you think Mormons will become if not divinely appointed by the Father, being “kings and priests unto the Most High God?”
Gods with a capital “G” is what mormonism has taught. Just like God the Father, creating worlds themselves, and spirit children to fill those worlds. Having the same power and glory. A concept which I find to be exceptionally vain. Especially since it was satan’s plan to take power and glory on himself. And that didn’t work out too well.
 
I agree with you 100%. But, please understand, that not everything taught in Church is doctrine.
Some youth teachers blow off the manual and have taught sensational beliefs based on quotes to keep the the youth engaged, thinking that they need to entertain them, and whatever cost.
And the parents treated the Church like a public school system. So memes printed off by Deseret Book became the teaching tools than the actual scriptures.
I remember being that youth, and at times, I remember (shamefully) being that teacher.
It is, IMO, getting the gospel the completely backwards. Literally “anti-mormon” (not to mention “anti-Christian”) in every sense of the word.
It’s not much different than why things like “word of faith” movements exist in Christianity.
Thanks to the Internet, and forums like this, it forced faithful members (past their youth), to really get to the heart of what they believed and why. Others, who saw and felt the distasteful pressure of Mormon culture (in Utah anyway) left the Church when they realized Jesus can actually be found in the Bible without the aid of the Book of Mormon (Go figure) and had no qualms leaving the church.
IMO - That’s why people who left the church balk at people like me thinking I’m whitewashing Mormonism into mainstream Christianity. I can totally see their viewpoint.
But I think that’s why the Church changed the approach, and started preaching spiritual self-reliance, and progressively moved the Church to “home centered, church supported”, and centered the cirriculum to the scriptures in the “Come Follow Me” program. It’s why the Church doesn’t like to be called “Mormon”, because (as the Sunstone Education Foundation taught) there’s more than one-way to ‘Mormon’.
As the Church moves forward, people that my experience will completely fade out, and “anti-Mormonism” will sound like Greek to many members of the Church.
(See also - “All things gather together”, Bednar -https://www.churchofjesuschrist.org/study/general-conference/2018/10/gather-together-in-one-all-things-in-christ?lang=eng)
 
I agree with you 100%. But, please understand, that not everything taught in Church is doctrine.
Some youth teachers blow off the manual and have taught sensational beliefs based on quotes to keep the the youth engaged, thinking that they need to entertain them, and whatever cost.
And the parents treated the Church like a public school system. So memes printed off by Deseret Book became the teaching tools than the actual scriptures.
I remember being that youth, and at times, I remember (shamefully) being that teacher.
It is, IMO, getting the gospel the completely backwards. Literally “anti-mormon” (not to mention “anti-Christian”) in every sense of the word.
It’s not much different than why things like “word of faith” movements exist in Christianity.
Thanks to the Internet, and forums like this, it forced faithful members (past their youth), to really get to the heart of what they believed and why. Others, who saw and felt the distasteful pressure of Mormon culture (in Utah anyway) left the Church when they realized Jesus can actually be found in the Bible without the aid of the Book of Mormon (Go figure) and had no qualms leaving the church.
IMO - That’s why people who left the church balk at people like me thinking I’m whitewashing Mormonism into mainstream Christianity. I can totally see their viewpoint.
But I think that’s why the Church changed the approach, and started preaching spiritual self-reliance, and progressively moved the Church to “home centered, church supported”, and centered the cirriculum to the scriptures in the “Come Follow Me” program. It’s why the Church doesn’t like to be called “Mormon”, because (as the Sunstone Education Foundation taught) there’s more than one-way to ‘Mormon’.
As the Church moves forward, people that my experience will completely fade out, and “anti-Mormonism” will sound like Greek to many members of the Church.
(See also - “All things gather together”, Bednar -https://www.churchofjesuschrist.org/study/general-conference/2018/10/gather-together-in-one-all-things-in-christ?lang=eng)

I’m pretty tired of the excuse that “not everything that is taught is doctrine.” These things were taught as doctrine by Joseph Smith and everyone after him. Until now, when modern mormons have decided it puts them in a crazy light, too far from mainstream Christianity.

Its all just plausible deniability now. Don’t tie any doctrine down too much, because you might have to deny it when it suits the current trend.

Bottom line is... it was false doctrine from the start, and mormons know that. For your own sake stop trying to rationalize it. The cognitive dissonance can ruin your mind and soul.

Just follow Christ alone.
 
Man doesn’t "work himself into godhood". It is a gift of God that he gives to those who gain salvation and exaltation in his kingdom in heaven.

Joseph Smith taught that it’s like climbing a ladder, working your way up one step at a time, one life at a time, one exaltation at a time, for a very long time, until you reach Godhood.
 
Joseph Smith taught that it’s like climbing a ladder, working your way up one step at a time, one life at a time, one exaltation at a time, for a very long time, until you reach Godhood.
Getting into heaven is a process, I agree. Nobody gets there all at once. But that is not the same as "working your way into heaven".
 
Getting into heaven is a process, I agree. Nobody gets there all at once. But that is not the same as "working your way into heaven".
Sure we do. We either believe in Jesus Christ as Lord and God and savior, and believe He rose from the dead and has forgiven our sins, and go to heaven (or the anteroom to heaven) after we die....or we do NOT believe and go to heaven, but to hell (or the anteroom to hell) after we die, with both awaiting the Second Coming and the Resurrection from the dead.

What did Paul write? He said he longed to be absent from his body and be at home with the Lord (paraphrased). He longed to finish his life in this world, so he could go home to Jesus. Where is Jesus? At the right hand of His Father, in heaven.
 
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I’m pretty tired of the excuse that “not everything that is taught is doctrine.” These things were taught as doctrine by Joseph Smith and everyone after him. Until now, when modern mormons have decided it puts them in a crazy light, too far from mainstream Christianity.

Its all just plausible deniability now. Don’t tie any doctrine down too much, because you might have to deny it when it suits the current trend.

Bottom line is... it was false doctrine from the start, and mormons know that. For your own sake stop trying to rationalize it. The cognitive dissonance can ruin your mind and soul.

Just follow Christ alone.
Exactly. IF it is TAUGHT, then it seems to me that must make it doctrine. Else, why teach it?
 
Bonnie - the INTERPRETATION of scripture is in dispute, not the verses themselves.
In a murder trial, the prosecuting attorney doesn’t use the dead body as evidence to support the guilt of the accused. Other evidence is required (motive, means, circumstantial evidence) surrounding the dead body wins (or loses) the case.

Yes, I understand the validity of why you would see the verses as monotheistic Or Trinitarian. I get it. But you have to view the Entire Book of Mormon in context.

If The term “one God” could only result in one interpretation, then there would be nothing to debate, but the debate has gone on for centuries. Clearly, there is a second interpretation that is also valid.


Sorry, but when the BoM says that "Father, Son, and HG are one God" then that seems pretty clear to me. And it doesn't say that just once, either. However, it also strays into Modalism, an early heresy condemned by the early church. This explains it pretty well:


While the Book of Mormon claims that the Father, the Son, and the Holy Ghost are one God, the definition give is more in line with the heretical doctrine of Modalistic Monarchianism (accepted as true by United Pentecostals today) than it is with the Trinity. According to modalism, the three names for God refer to the three “modes” by which God reveals himself. This view holds that the Father is fully God and is fully eternal as the primal mode of manifestation of the only unique and unitary God. However, Jesus is fully deity only in the sense that he is another mode of God the Father. And in the same way, the Holy Spirit is the manifestation of the one God. Modalistic monarchianists like to use the illustration of a person acting in three different roles in the same play. This view depersonalizes the Godhead.

While the Book of Mormon is modalistic in nature, it certainly does not agree with Mormonism’s view of God. This important LDS scripture never teaches, for example, that God the Father was once a man, as so taught in Mormonism. And it certainly does not teach that men can become gods. This certainly contradicts the words of Mormonism’s founder Joseph Smith:

"I told the brethren that the Book of Mormon was the most correct of any book on earth, and the keystone of our religion, and a man would get nearer to God by abiding by its precepts, than by
any other book” (History of the Church 4:461. See also Teachings of the Prophet Joseph Smith, p. 194).

Nonetheless, despite straying into Modalism--which the Bible NEVER DOES--it STILL says that Father, Son, and HG are ONE GOD. ONE--NOT three, as Smith later on said.
 
Sorry, but when the BoM says that "Father, Son, and HG are one God" then that seems pretty clear to me. And it doesn't say that just once, either. However, it also strays into Modalism, an early heresy condemned by the early church. This explains it pretty well:




Nonetheless, despite straying into Modalism--which the Bible NEVER DOES--it STILL says that Father, Son, and HG are ONE GOD. ONE--NOT three, as Smith later on said.

Words have meaning.

Do Mormons need to have their "Secret Joseph Smith decoder ring" to understand the meaning of words?
 
Words have meaning.

Do Mormons need to have their "Secret Joseph Smith decoder ring" to understand the meaning of words?
Well, we know that the LDS church has changed the meaning of words that true Christianity has used for nearly 2 millennia--like what "salvation" means. And "grace." And "faith" (one Mormon has stated on here that "faith is works). And "died" and "buried" when it comes to Moses. "Died" means "taken out of the way" and the "buried" means, "Not found" or something similar.

The LDS church must have a whole other dictionary, to keep its membership up-to-date on how it has redefined words from the Bible.
 
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