Heart of the Matter

Welcome to Heart of the MatterTGNN’s original show where Shawn McCraney deconstructed religion and developed fulfilled theology.! Shawn McCraneyFounder of TGNN and developer of the fulfilled perspective—calling people to faith outside of religion. your host. This is a live call-in show (give numbers later).

Outreach Programs

Flyers

Show SAMPLE. Explain volunteer program. Email: flyers@bornagainmormon.com

Heart in the Home

(Explain it: grassroots approach.) You open your home to neighbors and friends. I come over, eat your food, drink your punch, and talk. We do a Q and A. Everyone goes home happy.

Email: shawn@bornagainmormon.com

Church Scouts

So far we have recommended ________ number of Churches on the show. There are many more to follow. Where are the recommended churches listed? WWW.BORNAGAINMORMON.COM of course!

Understanding Grace

GAMA! (Get a Mormon Answer)

Last week we asked LDS to respond to: What is Grace?

Had a few very interesting responses. What makes the responses interesting is that the people go to great labors and detail to explain the LDS view and those views are often in opposition to what the Bible says!

Listen to Carrie T. in WVC: “Grace is a gift given as a reward for choosing the right!” Or how about this one from J. Allen: “Grace is granted to men proportionately as they conform to the standards of personal righteousness that are part of the Gospel plan.”

What does the Bible say about Grace:

6. Romans 11:6 And if by grace, then is it no more of works: otherwise grace is no more grace. But if it be of works, then is it no more grace: otherwise work is no more work.

To say that grace is anyway dependent on you and/or your works, righteousness, effort, or condition is akin to saying, “I want to give you a gift that is absolutely free and without obligation . . . but it’s going to cost you a few hundred dollars.” . . .OR its like saying . . . “She’s a little bit pregnant.”

You're either pregnant or you're not. Grace is either grace or it is something else. Works, righteousness, personal contributions are a completely different animal relative to grace. It is grace, but it cannot be grace AND anything else. “And” of any sort destroys grace!”

Read your Bible, folks! And throw out those commentaries. This being said, we had a very well thought out position on Grace presented by an LDS man – a brother Draney – but his explanation did not represent common LDS beliefs on the subject.

Next Week's GAMA Question

“Does a person have to accept Joseph Smith in order to be saved?” This is a yes or no question. Okay . . .

Show Resources and Support

Did you know you can get the notes for every show right there on our website? Did you know that you can get audio recordings of every show there too? Did you know that you can watch past Heart of the Matter Show on our website? (www.bornagainmormon.com) Also, did you know you can watch it for free on audio and/or video podcasts? (iTunes)

The website has an active message board, ways to order our book, and a pretty solid recommended resources list. Keep praying for us! The Lord is literally smashing through areas we never dreamed possible. YOUR PRAYERS ARE KEY!

Speaking of Prayer . . .

Reflections on Hiding

Remember last week, we spoke about the Fall of Adam. Remember all those non-biblical ideas we discussed? Well, we left Adam and Eve there in the Garden having just sinned.

Let me speak for a minute on the subject of hiding. Rarely a day goes by where I don’t get one communication or another telling me I am going to be exposed for what I am – a lying, sinful charlatan who couldn’t live up to the standards of the LDS Church and has now chosen to attack it out of bitterness and spite.

I want you to understand a few things. First, I do not fear being exposed by any facts or accusations about my life. I was a sinful, proud man. If you have something to say, say it. I fear nothing anyone has to say about my behaviors. WHY? Because I have born-again. Forgiven. Altered. Changed by Jesus instead of trying to change myself through religion dedication. And pretending.

It was only when I was LDS did I feel the need to hide and be secretive. Only when I was LDS did I experience the pressure to “appear” as something I was not. A cult of personality. A honorable priesthood holder. A portrait of authority.

In Mormonism, it is vital to appear as if you have it all together. As if you are “worthy.” “Hide your sinMissing the mark of faith and love—no punishment, just lost growth or peace. nature behind a suit and tie of fig leaves!” “Hide your disbelief in all the incomprehensible stories and doctrines.”

Understanding Religious Symbolism and Beliefs

"When you come to the Lord, you come out into the light." And you are liberated by the blood, fearing nothing or no one thereafter. Listen to this email I received just the other day: (Read email from Roger L.) Does this email help this man legitimize the value of the information I give out on Mormonism? Does it make the writer feel like now he has reason not to believe the things I say? Listen, my past sin nature has nothing to do with the facts of your religion. And I don’t hide any more from anything.

As a result of their actions, Adam and Eve, made aprons out of fig leaves, then tried to hide themselves in the garden from God. The Lord called to Adam, asking, “Where are you?” In response to his actions, Adam never confesses his sins, never pleads for forgiveness, never openly stands up and admits himself a sinner. What did he do? He consulted his own methods, crafted a covering out of fig leaves, then hid so as not to be seen by God, then passes the buck to Eve.

The Significance of Fig Leaves

Fig leaves are very important here as they represent Man’s unwillingness to admit his lost and fallen condition. Think about it. The fig leaves were a response to his lost and sinful condition. And they were used to hide and camouflage Adam and Eve in their exposed sinful state. Fig leaves are representative of human excuses. They are representative of man's philosophies in place of God’s will. Fig leaves are representative of man's religious attempts to appear whole. Fig leaves are exercises, rituals, and church memberships which serve as much as an appearance for people as anything else.

There are two forms of hiding going on at this point of the story – Adam and Eve hiding behind their own hand-made apparel of fig leaves, and Adam and Eve hiding amongst the trees of the Garden. Hiding, secrecy is always related to darkness and the Father of Lies. Satan says to hide. Satan says to pretend. And while the fig leaves are representative of man’s organized attempts to conceal himself from God, their hiding amongst the trees is representative of man’s attempts to seek refuge behind the things of this world.

Alright, so Adam and Eve fell, and the world has fell into the hands of Satan. Now, let’s move forward – thousands of years forward – to the birth of the Savior from sin, even Jesus Christ.

This is a fascinating subject because the doctrines regarding the conception and birth of Jesus a religion supports are actually a microcosm of the spiritual world-view they maintain. Tonight, I’m going to address views of the Virgin Birth relative to Catholicism, Mormonism, and Christianity, in an effort to compare and contrast each religion's doctrine on the Fall, Mary, and Salvation through Jesus Christ.

Views on the Virgin Birth

Let’s begin with the Catholic view. Catholics teach that Mary was conceived immaculately. The immaculate conception was when Mary was conceived, not when Jesus was conceived! It is important in their doctrine that Mary was a holy vessel wherein she could then carry the Christ child. Therefore she could not have been born under sin from Adam’s fall.

To Catholics, Mary was a virgin before she conceived Jesus, she was a virgin during the gestation of Jesus, and she remained a virgin forever after the birth of Jesus. This makes sense relative to their continued views of Mary. She was and is the vestige of Holy Femininity. Always remaining a virgin is vital to her mystical place in the religion. In light of the fact they believe she was immaculately conceived and remained a bastion of virtue her entire life it is no wonder they believe prayer to her is warranted and acceptable. Okay, that is the Catholic view.

Protestant Perspective on the Virgin Birth

Now Protestant doctrine teaches that Jesus was conceived immaculately. That Mary was a chosen vessel (but still under condemnation due to Adam’s fall) and that the Holy Spirit overcame her and she conceived. Listen to this passage in Matthew 1:

18. Now the birth of Jesus Christ was on this wise: When as his mother Mary was espoused to Joseph, before they came together, she was found with child of the Holy Ghost. Then Joseph her husband, being a just man, and not willing to make her a public example, was minded to put her away privily. But while he thought on these things, behold, the angel of the Lord appeared unto him in a dream, saying, Joseph, thou son of David, fear not to take unto

The Hypostatic Union of Christ

The passage is significant: "thee Mary thy wife: for that which is conceived in her is of the Holy Ghost." In Protestant theology, Mary was a virgin prior to and after the gestation and birth of the Lord. However, Protestants generally agree that she then went on to have a family with Joseph, giving Jesus half brothers and sisters while He was on the earth.

This view of the Lord’s conception makes sense in light of the Biblical view of the hypostatic union of Christ, which teaches that Jesus was 100% Man and 100% God.

Recall Galatians 4:4: "But when the fulness of the time was come, God sent forth his Son, made of a woman, made under the law."

Recall John 1:14: "And the Word (who was God) was made flesh, and dwelt among us."

Jesus was both The Son of God and The Son of Man.

Philippians 2:5-8: "Let this mind be in you, which was also in Christ Jesus: Who, being in the form of God, thought it not robbery to be equal with God: But made himself of no reputation, and took upon him the form of a servant, and was made in the likeness of men: And being found in fashion as a man, he humbled himself, and became obedient unto deathSeparation from God—now overcome. Physical death remains, but it no longer separates us from life with God., even the death of the cross."

Jesus as Both God and Man

From "Born-Again Mormon: Moving Toward Christian Authenticity," we learn: “Whatever a man could feel and experience, Jesus could feel and experience. And whatever God is, Jesus was. With these attributes, He becomes both our empathetic mediator before our all-good and holy God, and also All God, able to carry the weight of the world successfully, righteously, and as a manifestation of God in the flesh."

In His humanity, he faced trials, persecution, and mockery; as God He loved those who rejected Him and carried their evil ways upon His sinless frame. As man, He knew temptation, desire, hunger, and thirst; as God He resisted evil, rebuked the Devil, and overcame the demands of the flesh. As man he ate and drank with friends and disciples, wept at the tomb of Lazarus, and accepted invitations to sit with sinners; as God he turned water into wine, multiplied fishes and loaves, raised Lazarus from the dead, and forgave the sinners’ crimes. As man he was slapped, beaten, crowned with thorns, and rejected by His friends. He sweated in blood, was pierced through his hands and feet, was tortured as a reject, a criminal, a Sabbath-breaker, and a blasphemer. As God, He endured the incomprehensible demands of justice, offered Himself in undefiled innocence, held Himself to the cross out of perfect and pure love for the sinner, and willingly accepted the full and furious wrath of our all just God for every single sin, sickness, wrong-doing, failure, and transgression that has ever occurred or ever will occur in or out of the heart of Man.

The Virgin Birth and LDS Perspective

To Christians, in order for Jesus to be the perfect sacrifice, he had to come to this earth untainted by original sin. Hence the reality of the Virgin Birth. Jesus, though 100% Man, came as the innocent Lamb, without blemish, without sin, and not under the condemnation of the Fall.

In LDS theology, Mary was a virgin UP UNTIL she had relations with the Father. When you take LDS theology into account, it is consistent that Mary would have an actual physical relationship with God because: God the Father has a body of flesh and bones. God operates by eternal laws and principles, and therefore even He would create a son in the flesh the way all children are created in this world. And God has wives, not a wife.

Additionally, because the Fall was not a bad event to Mormons, and man is not under condemnation the way the Bible says he is, Jesus did not need to come into the world through miraculous means in order to avoid the stain of Adam’s imputed sin. The “elder brother” Jesus could be conceived just like everybody else – through sexual relations between God the Father and young Mary.

Listen to the wisdom of some LDS leaders regarding this issue. Orson Pratt said (in The Seer, pg. 159): “If He were begotten by the Holy Ghost, He would have called Him his father.”

In the Journal of Discourses (1:50-51) Brigham Young said: “When the virgin Mary conceived the child Jesus, the Father had begotten Him in His own likeness.”

Mormon Perspectives on the Conception of Jesus

"He was not begotten by the Holy Ghost.” To quote the angel in Matthew: “…for that which is conceived in her is of The Holy Ghost.” To quote Brigham Young again: “He was not begotten by the Holy Ghost.” Are you going to believe Brigham Young or the Bible? This is almost always the question in the Mormon debate.

Brigham Young also included the idea that Mary was one of God the Father’s wives: (From the Deseret News, October 10th 1866) “The man Joseph, the husband of Mary, did not, that we know of, have more than one wife, but Mary the wife of Joseph had another husband.” Apostle Orson Pratt taught in the Seer that it would have been unlawful for God the Father to have “overshadowed” Mary, begetting Jesus unlawfully. Therefore, they had their association in the capacity of husband and wife.

LDS Leaders' Teachings on Jesus' Conception

President Joseph Fielding Smith said in Doctrines of Salvation (vol. 1 page 18): “Christ was begotten of God. He was not born without the aid of Man, and that Man was God.” Bruce R McConkie, in the only way Bruce McConkie can, clarified the matter even more (Mormon Doctrine 1979, pp 546-547): “Christ was begotten by an Immortal Father in the same way mortal men are begotten by mortal fathers.” He continues later in the book: (pg. 742) “There is nothing figurative about His paternity; he was begotten, conceived, and born in the normal and natural course of events. Christ is the Son of Man, meaning that His Father (The Eternal God) is a Holy Man.”

Affirmation by LDS Prophets

As late as 1988, President and Prophet Ezra Taft Benson affirmed the LDS position on this matter (The Teachings of Ezra Taft Benson, 1988, pages 6-7): “The body in which he (Jesus) performed his mission in the flesh was sired by that same Holy Being we worship as God, our eternal Father. Jesus was not the son of Joseph, nor was He begotten of the Holy Ghost.” So there it is. Where the Bible says Jesus was conceived of a virgin and was begotten of the Holy Ghost, Mormonism maintains that God the Father, a glorified man with a physical penis, made young virtuous Mary one of His wives, had intimate sexual relations with her, and sired Jesus as the result.

If you are an LDS defender and you want to maintain there is no difference between the Jesus you admire and appreciate and the Jesus Christians worship and adore, I think you need to review the past three shows.

Alright, let’s open up the phone lines.

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