Greg Trimble 15 Jan 2015
Lots of people think Mormons are weird. I actually agree with them. Let me tell you why.
Mormons are members of the only church on the planet
that attempts to incorporate the structure and ordinances that Jesus
Christ established while he was on the earth. That structure is found in the
New Testament.
The thing is…people thought that members of the New
Testament church were really weird as well…only they didn’t use the word
“weird”. They used the word “peculiar”.
That word “peculiar” is interesting. Interesting because
even Peter (the chief apostle) used the same word to describe the New Testament
Christians he was addressing. Here are a few synonyms from the thesaurus for
the word “peculiar“:
Strange, Unusual, Odd, Funny, Curious, Bizarre, Weird (There’s that word again)
Abnormal, Anomalous, Out of the ordinary…
Peculiar is just a fancy way of saying weird.
If there was ever a time in which I was proud to be
called weird…it is now. If what
I hear in the General Conferences of the church is weird by the world’s
standards…then we’re in some serious trouble. Have you watched a TV show
lately…been to the mall…or hung out on a college campus? And people
think Mormons are weird?
Actually…to quote Peter, he said to those New Testament “weirdos“; “But ye are a chosen
generation, a royal priesthood, an holy nation, [and] a “peculiar” people. (1 Pet 2:9)
Back in the day they used to talk about the “strange” doctrines of the Christians.
They used to say that Christ, “the nobody from Nazareth” was a delusional story
teller that went around tricking people. A 2nd century Greek philosopher by the
name of Celsus wrote with certainty that Jesus’s father wasn’t God…but a Roman
soldier named Pantera. He continued in asserting that “Jesus performed His
miracles by sorcery.”
“You’re telling me that someone walked on water and then
awoke from the dead and then flew into heaven! Bizarre!”
To the world…Christ and His church were always weird. Peter agreed.
Mormons today are weird
because they have prophets and apostles like the New Testament church of old. (Ephesians
2:20)
The peculiarity
continues as you notice that Mormons have the office of “Seventy”, (Luke
10:1) and that they send missionaries “two by two” (Luke 10:1) in order to
“teach all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father, and the Son, and
of the Holy Ghost.” (Matt 28:19)
Those missionaries are oh so weird as they go around in a white shirt and tie…clean cut…and
committed to Christ. Would they be less weird if they spent their days at
the local frat house or bar hopping on weekends?
I’ll bet those missionaries from a couple thousand years
ago were made fun of quite a bit. Loin cloths and robes, locusts and wild
honey…and a message about a carpenter that does magic tricks?
It’s also interesting that Peter referenced the
“priesthood” before calling those early Christians “peculiar”. Who really cares about
the priesthood in these days anyway? Mormons do.
On another note…Paul…what were you thinking when you said
that there was “One Lord, one faith, and one baptism”, or that we could
ever possibly “come in the unity of the faith” (Ephesians 4:5,13) We have over
40,000 Christian denominations on the earth today. Why aren’t they just one
denomination? Was a “restoration” to primitive Christianity needed?
Peter thought so. (Acts 3:19-21)
And Paul…while were looking at your teachings…why did you
say that you met a dude that was in a “third heaven” (2 Corinthians
12:2-4) or that there were three different degrees of glory in heaven? (1 Corinthians
15:40-42)
Jeepers Paul. Did you also teach about baptism
for the dead, while Peter was teaching that the gospel would be preached to
those that were living in the spirit world? (1 Corinthians 15:29) (1 Peter
4:6) That’s crazy talk!
In those early days there were bishops, deacons,
evangelists, elders and others that were tasked with running the local branches
of the church. None of those people had theological degrees or got paid for
what they did. Paul had to build tents and Peter had to catch fish. That’s unusual by today’s standards.
Then there’s that weird
requirement to be baptized by immersion. You have Christ telling Nicodemus
that you must be “born of water and of the Spirit, or you cannot
enter into the kingdom of God.” (John 3:5)
John the Baptist and Jesus both understood that
the word “baptize” in and of itself means to “dip or
immerse”. Mormons actually believe that what took place in the river
Jordan was an important part of salvation!
But it’s not like John the Baptist held the
priesthood authority to baptize did he? Wait. Yeah… he did. He was the son of
Zechariah, a temple priest, and held the priesthood through heredity.
Mormons even believe that Christ still has his
body and that His resurrection was literal. They think He wanted to
actually keep his body when He went to visit His Father and not float into some
kind of ethereal essence in undefined space. (Luke 24:36-39) (Acts 1:11)
(John 20:17) Lunacy!
Those Mormons even believe that when Jesus went to go see
His Father for the first time since being resurrected…that He actually would
have been able to give His Father a hug, and that He wouldn’t have been giving
himself or some kind of manifestation of Himself a hug. That a father and
a son greeting each other in heaven would have looked similar to a father and
son greeting each other here on earth.
Most unbelievable is the fact that Mormons actually
believe that both God and nature have testified that a man should actually
marry and procreate with a woman…and not another man. (1 Corinthians
11:11) (Romans 1:26-27)
They curiously
believe that by being the children of God…it actually gives them the
opportunity to become “gods” or become like God. But then again…C.S. Lewis
agreed with that peculiar
mindset.
“It is a serious thing to live in a society of possible
gods and goddesses, to remember that the dullest and most uninteresting person
you talk to may one day be a creature which, if you saw it now, you would be
strongly tempted to worship” (C.S. Lewis – The Weight of Glory)
C.S. Lewis was probably just paraphrasing Paul when he told
the Romans that “…we are the children of God…And if children, then heirs;
heirs of God, and joint-heirs with Christ.” (Romans 8:16-17)
It’s so abnormal
and downright obnoxious that Mormons would consider their bodies to
be a “temple” and actually want to live by a strict health code like
Paul directed the Corinthians to do. (1 Corinthians 3:16 & 1 Corinthians
6:19)
I’m not sure if I missed it, but was there some sort of a
revelation given to the world that said we should all depart from the original
structure and teachings that Christ established in the New Testament? Maybe
people were sick of being so peculiar over the
last 2,000 years…because as far as I can see, no one has even attempted to
mirror the New Testament church according to the record we have in the Bible.
Weird indeed.
I’m ok with weird…
But there’s a lot more to the word “peculiar” than most
people initially realize. While the things that the early Christians did were
weird to the world, Peter wasn’t calling them weird or odd or any of the other
synonyms that were listed above.
The Hebrew word for “peculiar” is “segullah”
which means “special”. Peter wasn’t labeling the saints derogatorily.
Peter was telling his listeners that the church and organization that
was established by Jesus Christ himself was special!
When I see all of the ways in which The Church of Jesus
Christ of Latter-day Saints mirrors the New Testament church…I can’t think of
any other way to describe it.
It’s special!
No comments:
Post a Comment