Prophet Counsels Against Being "Unequally Yoked"

by Sharon

During the Priesthood Session of last September/October's General Conference, LDS President Gordon B. Hinckley spoke to the men and boys of the Church, urging them to be worthy of the LDS priesthood. President Hinckley instructed them to shun unclean thoughts, pornography and abuse of any kind. He told them to watch their language and stop dressing in a "slouchy manner." Then he said,

I call your attention to another matter that gives me great concern. …young women are exceeding young men in pursuing educational programs. And so I say to you young men, rise up and discipline yourself to take advantage of educational opportunities. Do you wish to marry a girl whose education has been far superior to your own? We speak of being "unequally yoked." That applies, I think, to the matter of education. ("Rise Up, O Men of God," Ensign, November 2006, 60)

When President Hinckley said, "We speak of being 'unequally yoked,'" I can only think he was referring to the New Testament passage where the apostle Paul says,

Do not be unequally yoked together with unbelievers. (2 Corinthians 6:14)

Of course President Hinckley was not suggesting that women with higher educations fall under the category of "unbelievers." He must have thought to broaden Paul's teaching on being unequally yoked.

For the sake of argument, let's assume for a moment that President Hinckley is a true prophet and, while speaking in his official capacity as such, was giving prophetic counsel. He said the idea of being unequally yoked applies to the level of education achieved by each individual in a potential "couple." If the biblical command is to not be unequally yoked, and being unequally yoked is defined as being married to someone with a differing level of education, then the prophetic counsel given by President Hinckley boils down to this: Marriage must only take place between partners who are equally educated.

Have I got that right?

In the Priesthood Session of the October 2000 General Conference, President Hinckley gave another bit of prophetic counsel which, while on a different topic, was similar to the counsel on education in that it spoke to what constitutes proper behavior among Church members. On this occasion President Hinckley said,

The First Presidency and the Quorum of the Twelve have declared that we discourage tattoos and also "the piercing of the body for other than medical purposes." We do not, however, take any position "on the minimal piercing of the ears by women for one pair of earrings" -- one pair. ("Great Shall Be the Peace of Thy Children," Ensign, November 2000, 52)

Since President Hinckley gave his counsel against more than one set of pierced earrings per woman, the number of earrings in a Mormon girl's ear has become somewhat of a benchmark of her willingness to obey the prophet. Consider this story related by an LDS apostle in last month's Ensign:

Sister Bednar and I are acquainted with a returned missionary who had dated a special young woman for a period of time. He cared for her very much, and he was desirous of making his relationship with her more serious. He was considering and hoping for engagement and marriage. This relationship was developing during the time that President Hinckley counseled the Relief Society sisters and young women of the Church to wear only one earring in each ear.

The young man waited patiently over a period of time for the young woman to remove her extra earrings, but she did not take them out. This was a valuable piece of information for this young man, and he felt unsettled about her nonresponsiveness to a prophet’s pleading. For this and other reasons, he ultimately stopped dating the young woman, because he was looking for an eternal companion who had the courage to promptly and quietly obey the counsel of the prophet in all things and at all times. The young man was quick to observe that the young woman was not quick to observe. (David A. Bednar, "Quick to Observe," Ensign, December 2006, 31)

I wonder. Did President Hinckley's counsel against young men marrying women with unequal educations result in faithful members being quick to observe? Did the morning of October 1st, 2006 dawn over a Temple Square littered with the broken engagements of people who had planned to marry outside their level of education? If not, I wonder why not, for according to LDS Apostle James Faust,

We have been promised that the President of the Church will receive guidance for all of us as the revelator for the Church. Our safety lies in paying heed to that which he says and following his counsel. (Quoted in "Following the Prophets: A Book of Mormon Perspective," Ensign, July 2000, 22)

Be that as it may, I believe President Hinckley fails in his interpretation of what the Bible means when God tells us not to be "unequally yoked." Putting the passage in its context, Paul is making an impassioned plea to the Corinthian church to be holy.

Do not be unequally yoked together with unbelievers. For what fellowship has righteousness with lawlessness? And what communion has light with darkness? And what accord has Christ with Belial? Or what part has a believer with an unbeliever? And what agreement has the temple of God with idols? For you are the temple of the living God. As God has said: "I will dwell in them and walk among them. I will be their God, and they shall be My people." Therefore, "Come out from among them and be separate, says the Lord. Do not touch what is unclean, and I will receive you." "I will be a Father to you, and you shall be My sons and daughters, says the LORD Almighty." Therefore, having these promises, beloved, let us cleanse ourselves from all filthiness of the flesh and spirit, perfecting holiness in the fear of God. (2 Corinthians 6:14-7:1)

Is this biblical passage really talking about unequal education in marriage? God is telling the Corinthians -- and us -- not to unite with unbelievers,* for they walk in darkness and dishonor God.

What does a college degree have to do with that?



* That is, false apostles (2 Corinthians 11:2-4), and perhaps idolaters (1 Corinthians 10:14)

Addition or Attrition?

by Sharon

As I mentioned in a previous post, LDS President Gordon B. Hinckley is fond of inviting people of other faiths to come to the Mormon Church. He often suggests something like this:

"We recognize the good in all churches. We recognize the value of religion generally. We say to everyone: live the teachings which you have received from your church. We invite you to come and learn from us, to see if we can add to those teachings and enhance your life and your understanding of things sacred and divine." (London News Service 8/28/1995. Also see Ensign, November 2002, page 78 and Ensign, October 2006, page 5 for similar invitations)

Last week I talked about President Hinckley's invitation for people to come to the LDS Church and bring along with them all the "good" they have received from their non-Mormon churches. But in these invitations issued by President Hinckley there is something else that captures my attention. That is, his suggestion that the Mormon Church can add to the teachings people have received from their own churches.

The idea got me thinking. What sorts of things does the LDS Church have to add? Using the example of someone coming from a traditional Christian church, let's look at a few possibilities.

• The Christian church teaches there is one book of sacred Scripture: the Bible. The LDS Church can add to that; it has four books it considers sacred Scripture: the Bible, the Book of Mormon, Doctrine and Covenants, and the Pearl of Great Price.
  
  
• The Christian church teaches there is but one true God. The LDS Church can add to that; it has three true gods for this world and an unknowable number of true gods beyond this world.
  
  
• The Christian church teaches two possible eternal destinations: Heaven and Hell. The LDS Church can add to that; it has four eternal possibilities: the Celestial kingdom, the Terrestrial kingdom, the Telestial kingdom, and Outer Darkness.
  
  
• The Christian church teaches there is one salvation, given freely by God's grace through faith, based on the sufficiency of Christ. The LDS Church can add to that; it has two salvations, one unconditional (i.e., resurrection from the dead) and one conditioned upon obedience (resulting in an eternal home in one of the four previously mentioned destinations).
  

Are these the sorts of things to which President Hinckley was referring? Or might he have been thinking of something more along the lines of adding to revelation?

• The Christian church teaches Exodus 33:20 is complete as it stands in the Bible:

  "But He said, 'You cannot see My face; for no man shall see Me and live.'"

  
  The LDS Church can add to that. The LDS edition of the King James Bible includes an appendix with changes Joseph Smith made to the biblical text. The LDS version of Exodus 33:20 is:

  "And he said unto Moses, Thou canst not see my face at this time, lest mine anger be kindled against thee, and thy people; for there shall no man among them see me at this time, and live, for they are exceedingly sinful. And no sinful man hath at any time, neither shall there be any sinful man at any time, that shall see my face and live."

  
  
• The Christian church teaches John 1, verses 1 and 4, are complete as they stand in the Bible:

  "In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God… In Him was life, and the life was the light of men."

  
  The LDS Church can add to that. The LDS version of these verses according to Joseph Smith's corrections read:

  "In the beginning was the gospel preached through the Son. And the gospel was the word, and the word was with the Son, and the Son was with God, and the Son was of God… In him was the gospel, and the gospel was the life, and the life was the light of men."

  
  
• The Christian church teaches Ephesians 2:8 is complete as it stands in the Bible:

  "For by grace you have been saved through faith, and that not of yourselves; it is the gift of God."

  
  The LDS Church can add to that. It's Book of Mormon says,

  "…for we know that it is by grace that we are saved, after all we can do." (2 Nephi 25:23)

In these few examples I guess we find that the LDS Church has plenty it can add to the beliefs of one who has been nurtured in a Christian church. But more is not necessarily better.

In reality, when someone with a Christian faith background chooses to join the LDS Church she cannot hold on to her previous faith and simply "add to it." She cannot believe the Bible is God's only complete and wholly trustworthy written revelation to mankind, and at the same time believe it is incomplete and corrupt as the LDS Church teaches. She cannot believe there is one true God over all, and at the same time believe God is but one of many true Gods. She cannot believe salvation is by grace alone, not of works, and at the same time believe that the grace of salvation kicks in only after all she can do. She is required to abandon the faith of her fathers in order to embrace Mormonism.

I wish President Hinckley would be more straightforward in his invitations to non-Mormons; tell people up front that Mormonism is an entirely different belief system than found in the "teachings they have received" from their churches. President Hinckley entices people with an offer of "more;" but what they actually get is a complete doctrinal make-over.

Inviting Non-Mormons:Bring the Good With You

by Sharon

LDS President Gordon B. Hinckley is gracious toward people of other faiths. In his October First Presidency Message, written primarily to new members of the LDS Church, President Hinckley wrote:

…there are many good people in other churches. There is much of good in them. Your family and your prior religious traditions may have taught you many good things and established many good habits…Bring the good things with you, keep them, and use them in the Lord's service. (Ensign, October 2006, page 5)

On another occasion President Hinckley said to non-Mormons,

To these we say in a spirit of love, bring with you all that you have of good and truth which you have received from whatever source, and come and let us see if we may add to it. (Ensign, November 2002, page 78)

I have a friend who, when reading statements like these from President Hinckley, asks, "What 'good' could there possibly be in any organization that is classified as an 'abomination' before God that was 'hatched in hell' and is as 'corrupt as hell'?"

At these times my friend is thinking of (and quoting) statements about Christianity made by Joseph Smith, Brigham Young, and John Taylor (respectively), the first three presidents of the LDS Church. My friend has a good point; just what "religious traditions" from these "corrupt" churches would President Hinckley like to see incorporated into the LDS Church?

Shall I bring my understanding of God as Trinity? Or my church's teaching that we are saved by grace apart from all we can do? Or my knowledge that God hates polytheism -- even the very idea of other Gods?

May I bring to the LDS Church the teaching that God created me in my mother's womb--created me out of nothing--and that the natural always comes before the spiritual? Or that Jesus was God from the very beginning? Or that Christ's blood is able to cleanse us from all sin?

Would I be welcome to bring with me the firm belief that the Bible is entirely trustworthy and is all I need in matters of faith and salvation? Or the certainty that the need for the temple was done away through the all-sufficient atonement of Christ? Or my conviction that God the Father has been the only true God for all eternity?

It is not possible to dovetail these biblical Christian teachings -- these truths that have captured the hearts and souls of God's people -- with the teachings of Mormonism. And President Hinckley knows it. So what does he mean when he invites people to come to the LDS Church and bring all the good that they have? Of what good does he speak?

Maybe President Hinckley is thinking of behaviors rather than truths. Maybe he's thinking of things like giving to the poor or helping the elderly or caring for children. The Mormon Church would certainly welcome new members with these values.

But there's a problem with this. The prophet Isaiah said,

You [God] are indeed angry, for we have sinned -- In these ways we continue; and we need to be saved. But we are all like an unclean thing, and all our righteousnesses [righteous deeds] are like filthy rags; we all fade as a leaf, and our iniquities, like the wind, have taken us away. (Isaiah 64:5-6)

If Isaiah spoke the truth, people who embrace corrupt and abominable spiritual teachings are incapable of doing anything pleasing to God. Everything they do is tainted by their sin and is therefore unacceptable to Him, even things that appear good and righteous. The apostle Paul said,

There is none righteous, no, not one. (Romans 3:10, quoting Psalm 14)

Surely President Hinckley is not engaging in a ruse in order to make people comfortable with the prospect of embracing a new faith, but I can't seem to reconcile his attitude and invitation with the Bible, which says,

This I say, therefore, and testify in the Lord, that you should no longer walk as the Gentiles walk, in the futility of their mind, having their understanding darkened, being alienated from the life of God, because of the ignorance that is in them, because of the blindness of their heart;… put off, concerning your former conduct, the old man which grows corrupt… (Ephesians 4:17-22)

The apostle Paul wrote,

One thing I do, forgetting those things which are behind and reaching forward to those things which are ahead, I press toward the goal for the prize of the upward call of God in Christ Jesus. (Philippians 3:13-14)

So while I appreciate President Hinckley's kindness toward those of other faiths, I keep thinking a true prophet of God would sound more like the biblical prophets, calling people to forsake all for Christ. President Hinckley's invitation to hold on to favorite traditions and see if the LDS Church can add a few more just doesn't ring true.

Personal Worthiness Required

by Sharon

At the LDS Church's most recent General Conference held in Salt Lake City a little over a week ago, Elaine Dalton took the stand. Directing her remarks to the general membership of the Church, Mrs. Dalton delivered a talk she entitled, "Look toward Eternity!"

Near the beginning of her talk, Mrs. Dalton asked,

Do you understand why it is so important to remain clean and pure?…

I desire for every young man and woman, every young adult, and indeed each one of us to feel and know the importance of living a worthy and pure life. It is our personal worthiness that will qualify us to fulfill our individual earthly missions.

Mrs. Dalton identified our "earthly mission": making the choices that will enable us to return to Heavenly Father's presence and claim all the blessings He has in store for us.

It is, therefore, our personal worthiness that will qualify us to spend eternity in the presence of God.

In her talk Mrs. Dalton gave a nod to the need for Jesus Christ and faith:

It is through our faith in the Lord Jesus Christ that we can resist temptation. Our faith will enable us to shun evil.

However,

To become unspotted from the world requires not only faith, but repentance and obedience. We must live the standards and do those things which will entitle us to the constant companionship and guidance of the Holy Ghost…

Furthermore,

Personal worthiness is essential to enter His holy temples and to ultimately become heirs to "all [the] Father hath." … we can confidently enter the holy temples of God with a knowledge that we are worthy to go where the Lord Himself goes. When we are worthy, we can not only enter the temple, the temple can enter us. The Lord's promises of salvation and happiness become ours… (emphasis retained from the original)

So the bottom line (for a Mormon) when looking toward eternity is personal worthiness. It is necessary to be clean and pure by one's own merits. Our choices, our obedience, our purity, our worthiness will "qualify" and "entitle" us to go where the Lord goes and receive salvation.

Apparently, though grace through God's mercy is available, it's not a good idea to count on it.

According to Mrs. Dalton, she and her husband were given counsel on their wedding day from LDS President Gordon B. Hinckley:

"Always live in such a way that when you need the Lord's blessings, you can call upon Him and receive them because you are worthy. There will come times in your life when you will need immediate blessings. You will need to live in such a way that they will be granted--not out of mercy but because you are worthy."

President Hinckley's counsel is antithetical to the teachings of the New Testament. There the apostles put God's mercy at the very heart of His blessings and promise of eternal life. Consider these passages:

• It does not, therefore, depend on man's desire or effort, but on God's mercy. (Romans 9:16)
  
  
• When the kindness and the love of God our Savior toward man appeared, not by works or righteousness which we have done, but according to His mercy He saved us, through the washing of regeneration and renewing of the Holy Spirit, whom He poured out on us abundantly through Jesus Christ our Savior, that having been justified by His grace we should become heirs according to the hope of eternal life. (Titus 3:4-7)
  
  
• Keep yourselves in the love of God, looking for the mercy of our Lord Jesus Christ unto eternal life. (Jude 1:21)

Mrs. Dalton expressed her gratitude for the counsel given her by President Hinckley:

Daily, these holy habits and righteous routines have helped steady us on the path that leads back into our Father's presence. And today I say, "We thank thee, O God, for a prophet to guide us in these latter-days."

I, too, am filled with deep gratitude, but not for a prophet who's unbiblical pronouncements place me under the heavy burden of making myself worthy of Heaven. I am thankful for the sure promises of God found in His Holy Word. With King David I wholeheartedly throw myself upon the astonishing mercy of Almighty God:

O LORD, hear my prayer,
listen to my cry for mercy;
in Your faithfulness and righteousness
come to my relief.
Do not bring Your servant into judgment,
for no one living is righteous before You…
Let the morning bring me word
of Your unfailing love,
for I have put my trust in You.
-from Psalm 143-

Mormon Prayer

A news story today from BerkshireEagle.com (Pittsfield, Massachusetts) is headlined "Mormons direct prayers to Christ." The purpose of the story is to "clarify" a story that ran on Sunday which mistakenly indicated Mormons pray to Joseph Smith.

I'm glad to see the error corrected. It would be nice to be able to erase all the false information about Mormonism that is floating around. But that is not to be, and this "clarifying" article from the Berkshire Eagle illustrates that truth.

From "Mormons direct prayers to Christ":

"'I am a devout member of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints and I have never prayed, nor will I ever pray to Joseph Smith,' wrote Chad Francom, a resident of Salt Lake City, Utah. 'I pray to Jesus Christ. The same Jesus Christ spoke of in the New Testament. The same Jesus Christ that my Catholic and Protestant friends pray to for their salvation.'"

Well technically, Mormons do not pray to Christ. As the article points out elsewhere, "Mormons direct all prayers to 'Our Heavenly Father' and close all prayers with 'In the name of Jesus Christ, Amen.'" Since Mormonism's Heavenly Father and Jesus Christ are two Gods, this is an important technicality.

Furthermore, as I noted in yesterday's post, LDS leaders have made it clear that the God of Catholics and Protestants is not the God of Mormonism. To take it a bit further than I did yesterday, let's look at a few additional statements from official LDS sources.

"It is true that many of the Christian churches worship a different Jesus Christ than is worshipped by the Mormons or The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints." (Seventy Bernard P. Brockbank, Ensign, May 1977, page 26)

"In bearing testimony of Jesus Christ, President Hinckley spoke of those outside the [LDS] Church who say Latter-day Saints 'do not believe in the traditional Christ. No, I don't. The traditional Christ of whom they speak is not the Christ of whom I speak.'" (Gordon B. Hinckley quoted in Church News, 20 June 1998, page 7)

"As a Church we have critics, many of them. They say we do not believe in the traditional Christ of Christianity. There is some substance to what they say." (Gordon B. Hinckley, April 2002 General Conference, quoted in Ensign, May 2002, page 90)

"To say that Satan sits in the place of God in Christianity after the time of the Apostles is not to say that all that is in it is satanic." (Kent P. Jackson, Ensign, December 1994, page 9)

And this one bears repeating:

"And virtually all the millions of apostate Christendom have abased themselves before the mythical throne of a mythical Christ…" (Mormon Doctrine, page 269)

So in attempting to correct inaccurate reporting of Mormon doctrine, the newspaper is inaccurately reporting a different Mormon doctrine.

The Berkshire Eagle says:

"Misconceptions about the Mormon church have persisted for decades, said [local LDS resident Scott] Holley. Mormons continue to work hard to spread knowledge about their religion…"

Even so, I suspect there will be no outcry from the LDS community over the misinformation about Mormonism propagated in "Mormons direct prayers to Christ."

The Nature of the Godhead, part II

Yesterday I wrote about the LDS doctrine of deification as taught by Joseph Smith, and how the Church today seems to want to cover up that "basic belief" of Mormonism. There's another aspect of that doctrine I'd like to talk about.

As I wrote yesterday, the LDS Church has begun a new series of articles in the Ensign for the purpose of "explaining the basic beliefs of the restored gospel." The first article, The Nature of the Godhead, appears in the January 2006 issue on pages 50-51.

As with the doctrine on the nature of man that I discussed yesterday, there is something missing from the article regarding the LDS doctrine on the nature of God as well. The Ensign quotes Joseph Smith's King Follett Discourse in order to aid in explaining Mormonism's "basic belief" about the nature of God.

"It is the first principle of the gospel to know for a certainty the character of God,…and that He was once a man like us… When you climb a ladder, you must begin at the bottom, and ascend step by step, until you arrive at the top; and so it is with the principles of the gospel—you must begin with the first, and go on until you learn all the principles of exaltation."

But the author of the Ensign article does not include Joseph's clear teaching "… I am going to tell you how God came to be God. We have imagined and supposed that God was God from all eternity. I will refute that idea…"

In the LDS Sunday School book Gospel Principles the "ladder" portion of Joseph Smith's King Follett Discourse is quoted. Then the book goes on to say, "This is the way our Heavenly Father became God." (p. 305)

[A separate issue, but one that I find interesting, is the fact that older editions of Gospel Principles are a bit different from the current edition. In my 1986 edition, page 293, it says, "This is the way our Heavenly Father became a God." (emphasis mine)]

The reason this captures my attention, apart from the heretical nature of the teaching, is because of some statements made by LDS President Gordon B. Hinckley in 1997.

In April of that year the San Francisco Chronicle's Religion Writer Don Lattin interviewed President Hinckley (13 April 1997). A portion of the interview went like this:

"Q: There are some significant differences in your beliefs. For instance, don't Mormons believe that God was once a man?"

"A: I wouldn't say that. There was a little couplet coined, 'As man is, God once was. As God is, man may become.' Now that's more of a couplet than anything else. That gets into some pretty deep theology that we don't know very much about."

"Q: So you're saying the church is still struggling to understand this?"

"A: Well, as God is, man may become. We believe in eternal progression. Very strongly. We believe that the glory of God is intelligence and whatever principle of intelligence we attain unto in this life, it will rise with us in the Resurrection. Knowledge, learning, is an eternal thing. And for that reason, we stress education. We're trying to do all we can to make of our people the ablest, best, brightest people that we can."

A few months later Time Magazine's cover story was Mormons, Inc., the secrets of America's most prosperous religion (4 August 1997; only a preview of the article, Kingdom Come, is available online from Time Magazine). Time gave this report of its interview with President Hinckley (page 56):

"On whether his Church still holds that God the Father was once a man, [President Hinckley] sounded uncertain, 'I don't know that we teach it. I don't know that we emphasize it…I understand the philosophical background behind it, but I don't know a lot about it, and I don't think others know a lot about it."

Well, it looks to me like President Hinckley was either mistaken or trying to hide a basic LDS belief about the nature of God. Perhaps his appeal to ignorance in stating that he didn't know that the Church taught the doctrine was not a dodge to keep from answering the question asked by Time Magazine. And I suppose it's possible that Mormons just don't believe the doctrine so clearly taught by Joseph Smith.

Whatever the reasons for President Hinckley's statements in 1997, this article in the Ensign should help clear up any confusion. We still don't know if members believe the doctrine, but we do know that the LDS Church still teaches it as a "basic belief of the restored gospel."

For more information on Gordon B. Hinckley's 1997 interviews check out these online articles:
Dodging and Dissembling Prophet?
Lord of the Dance