Austin Graham

Christian, Programmer, TTRPG Game Master, Love Star Wars, Star Trek, Star Gate, LotR, HP, DW
Jesus is Lord! (Eph. 2:8-10; 1 Corinth. 6:9-11; Romans 5:8, 6:23)

[Austin Graham @Austin_Graham24]

For this is how God loved the world, He sent His only Son to live the perfect life we could not, be crucified, buried, and raised to life: that anyone who turns from their sin and trusts in Him alone will not perish but have eternal life. (John 3:16)

In Christ alone by grace alone through faith alone can we be saved from the wrath of God that we deserve because of our rebellion against God (Romans 5:9-10).

3/4

[Austin Graham @Austin_Graham24]

Living prophets and apostles are apparently super important until they say things that make modern audiences uncomfortable so all of the sudden it can be demoted from official teaching and belief everyone knew to “just their opinion”

If nothing the prophets say is considered authoritative and just their opinion…. Then what’s the point? The vast majority of the sources are from the prophets and apostles of the LDS church and claimed their teaching was revelation from God.

By this logic: the more recent commands of an LDS prophet to repent and stop using “mormonism” cannot actually be authoritative since there is no standard of which to say it is or isn’t. Just because he said it is and it is agreed to by a quorum means apparently nothing since these last teachings were claimed to be revelation and approved not just by a quorum but the whole church.

Appeals to “well it is / isn’t in our scriptures” neither are the rites and rituals of the temple ceremonies or the command to repent of using the term Mormon. If the temple ceremonies and rituals are required for exaltation: the literal process that is REQUIRED for exaltation exists nowhere in the LDS scriptures. That’s a pretty big gap….

[Austin Graham @Austin_Graham24]

The hilarious part is even in the replies of this post and on the original: you can literally quote their sources and they will keep calling you a liar and say they will not read anything you cite.

I only had 1 person try to reconcile the quotes of their “prophets”: but even then I was still called a liar for quoting the sources.

Mormonism is not an intellectually honest religion. Its own teachers teach the people NOT to test things by prior revelation and in so doing bake in the idea that they can contradict themselves while calling it “more accurate revelation”. They literally tell people to violate the command of scripture (1 Thess. 5:21 & 1 John 4:1).

“Brothers and sisters, unlike vintage comic books and classic cars, prophetic teachings do not become more valuable with age. That is why we should not seek to use the words of past prophets to dismiss the teachings of living prophets.” - Elder Allen D. Haynie (2023 General Council Talk)

[WWUTT? @WWUTTcom]

Well, you asked for it. You got it.

According to Mormon theology, God committed adultery and incest with his own daughter to beget Jesus Christ. And here it is from Mormon sources.
https://t.co/s76V6njvPx

[Austin Graham @Austin_Graham24]

I find it interesting across multiple dialogues with LDS that the claim that the first command was “to be fruitful and multiply”: but it wasn’t.

The first command given to man by God was not to eat of the tree of knowledge of good and evil.

“And the Lord God commanded the man, saying, “You may surely eat of every tree of the garden, but of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil you shall not eat, for in the day that you eat of it you shall surely die.””
Genesis 2:16-17

Why I find this interesting is that, while family is absolutely important, when what the Bible actually says is bypassed to treat having children as the “first” command actually betrays the underlying theology of the LDS church: they don’t think it was bad (some don’t even believe it was sin) for Adam and Eve to break the very first and only command given to them. They do not believe what the Bible says that by this sin death both physically and spiritually entered the world and utterly separated mankind from God.

Why do they not think it is wrong? Because in LDS theology Adam and Eve would have never had children unless they broke this command. Essentially (and crudely): breaking God’s command taught them about sex in the LDS view, and only now would they understand how to “be fruitful and multiply”. Innocence in the LDS view is not about legal status but naivety.

And reproduction is critical in LDS thought in order to bring down the waiting spirit children to give them bodies so that they might be exalted to godhood like their Heavenly Father was before them.

None of this, by the way, was included in the Book of Mormon but was a result of Joseph Smiths rapidly evolving theology especially as justification for polygamy which he had been keeping a secret from his own wife and growing followers. So anyone saying to just read the Book of Mormon as if it actually represents the majority of LDS beliefs is being dishonest, even if only because they have been deceived themselves and not out of maliciousness.

Children are indeed a blessing from God, and the family unit is a foundational pillar of community by God’s design. But when we elevate it beyond what God has said, even making it a requirement for salvation (many LDS prophets made such claims as unless one affirms and partakes in polygamy he cannot be exalted which is eternal life in the LDS faith) so that we can give others a chance at exaltation…. That’s not just losing the plot, but staring from a completely broken and failing place to start from.

The LDS faith has continually minimized the severity of sin, even going to far as to say God commands sin. (See the Book of Abraham where it justifies Abrahams sin of Genesis 12:10-20 and actually places God as the one who commands it. Many LDS of the new “progressive” group that have no problem picking and choosing whatever they want to believe and rejecting whatever they don’t want to believe even blasphemous say God can lie and even has lied (pointing to the very command I have brought up) as well as his prophets giving false prophecies (Ezekiel and the fall of Tyre is just one they attempt to claim).

But God is clear: sin deserves death. Eternal death. To be utterly cut off from the source of Life and completely under His wrath forever and ever. And this is entirely just, and it is what we all deserve for our sin.

Repent and trust in Christ alone for salvation: not to be exalted to divinity to be like God as Satan tempted in the garden: but to be a sinner who is washed and cleaned and reconciled to God in order to have a right relationship with Him and dwell in His presence forever alongside everyone who believes.

[Kirk Rollins @nicoraytruth]

This is my last post on X, and I wanted the last word to be one that matters.

The very first commandment God gave in Eden was to multiply and replenish the earth, and the Restoration placed the family at the burning center of the whole plan: the unit of the celestial kingdom, the reason for the temple, the very shape of God's own life.

So when a covenant people quietly stop bearing the next generation, they have not merely made the reasonable lifestyle choice the world applauds. They have begun to set down the first and oldest commandment ever given, and a people who set down the foundation should not wonder why the house begins to sink beneath them.

The Book of Mormon shows you how it happens, and it shows you in slow motion, over and over, until no honest reader can miss it. A people are delivered and made prosperous.

Prosperity breeds comfort. Comfort breeds forgetting. And the forgetting always wears the same face: they come to love the world and its ease more than the covenant and its cost.

They set their hearts on riches and on the praise of men, they grow quietly ashamed of the strict and demanding ways of their fathers, and they trade the weight of the covenant for the lightness of the age.

The empty cradle belongs to that same trade.

Children are heavy, and faith is heavy, and sacrifice is heavy, and everything the covenant has ever asked is heavy, and a people who have fallen in love with their own comfort will not carry what is heavy for long.

So do not mistake what the numbers are telling you. The collapsing birthrate of the Saints is not a sociological curiosity to be smoothed over with better messaging. It is the scriptural pattern arriving on schedule, the visible fever of a covenant people grown too comfortable to bear the weight of their own future.

A people who will not have numerous children have, at the deepest level, stopped believing the future is worth filling with their faith, and a people who no longer believe in their own future are already in the early stages of not having one.

This is the warning the scriptures have been shouting across the centuries, and we have been too soothed to hear it.

And yet the warning has always carried its mercy folded inside it. Every cycle in the Book of Mormon that ended in destruction could have ended in repentance instead, and some did, and the difference was never circumstance. It was never the size of the threat or the strength of the enemy or the hardness of the times.

The difference was always one thing only: whether a people, warned, would humble themselves before the comfort finished its work.

We have been warned.

Your prophets at general conference warned you time and time again. Do not forget their words.

The cradle is the warning made visible. The only question left is the one the scriptures have put to every people who ever stood where we now stand. Will we turn, and take up the weight again, and build a future worth being born into.

Or will we stay comfortable, and go the way of every comfortable people the record has ever buried.

That is my last word.

[Chris Hohnholz @Chris_Hohnholz]

Pro tip: if you want to take issue with someone’s post on X, thoughtfully engage the points made and offer your own counterpoints.

This is how mature, adult conversations work, and you might be surprised how willingly someone will engage you.

However, if you utterly ignore the points being made and intentionally deflect to an entirely unrelated topic just so you can go an a rant about your pet topic du jour, expect to be called a troll and summarily dismissed.

Have a blessed day.

[Austin Graham @Austin_Graham24]

Does the very thing the original post points out and then proceeds to still call me a liar.

I appreciate you going through them all and giving your perspective on it: but it’s objectively known and agreed that what was meant at the time was physical acts. It’s because of that most of this was scrubbed from the site and context.

The fact that the LDS church upholds the authority of living prophets and apostles but only until it gets too controversial and then they get relegated to “opinions” is the actual issue here.

You can refuse to engage and call me a liar all you want: but even your own church has acknowledge this and it is why they have scrubbed the references of it and changed the language to be “a mystery”.

Burying your head in the sand is in violation of what God commands us in His word to test all things. Many of the prophets stated anytime they taught it had the authority of scripture. Their teachings cannot be relegated to opinions by the very standards of the LDS church. Either they have to break their beliefs that these men were prophets and or they have to break the belief that modern prophets have any actual authority.

If a prophet spoke in God’s name and gave a word the Lord did not say: per God’s own rules that prophet is false and nothing they say should be listened to. In fact, in the Old Testament they would have been put to death.

[Austin Graham @Austin_Graham24]

The absolute saddest part: this comes from their own apostles and prophets and yet modern day Mormons will call you a liar and flee to “where is that in our scriptures?!” when literally the majority of their doctrines and practices cannot be found in their scriptures. It’s the epitome of making one’s self the sole and ultimate authority on what is true.

Where are the temple ceremonies outlined in their scriptures? Where is the first vision account in their scriptures: heck which version of the first vision account is even the real first vision account?

Why is it that they will so quickly flee the very words of their prophets and apostles, even the modern church to change the narrative? Why would anyone trust an institution that has openly admitted it lied to its members and covered up the truth about its entire history (the treasure digging, polygamy, the seer stone, not real translations).

[WWUTT? @WWUTTcom]

According to Mormon teaching, Elohim (God the Father) had sex twice to produce Jehovah (God the Son).

First, he had sex with Heavenly Mother to produce Jehovah with a spirit body. Then he had sex with Mary to give Jehovah a human body named Jesus.

Sheer anti-biblical heresy.

[Austin Graham @Austin_Graham24]

Again, I never said he brings them to Christ after death. Also, you asked me for a verse defending a claim I didn’t make.

At this point you’ve proven you are incapable of actually representing anything I say fairly and you have shown your hand again and again that you have no interest in engaging in actual honest dialogue but want to keep inventing claims I never made to tear them down.

I have you clear boundaries that would constitute further engagement, and you chose to misrepresent the facts again. We’re done.

[Austin Graham @Austin_Graham24]

But since you refuse to look at the list I linked: I’ll just copy and paste.

As to the sources of the original post (keep in mind: these are supposed to be the prophets and apostles who hear from God which is why LDS do not use only scripture quotes because they claim to have living prophets and apostles):

LDS Apostle Orson Pratt said: “We have now clearly shown that God the Father had a plurality of wives, one or more being in eternity, by whom He begat our spirits as well as the spirit of Jesus His First Born, and another being upon the earth by whom He begat the tabernacle of Jesus, as His Only Begotten in this world.” (The Seer, 1853, p. 172)

Same on page 158: ““The fleshly body of Jesus required a Mother as well as a Father. Therefore, the Father and Mother of Jesus, according to the flesh, must have been associated together in the capacity of Husband and Wife; hence the Virgin Mary must have been, for the time being, the lawful wife of God the Father… He had a lawful right to overshadow the Virgin Mary in the capacity of a husband, and beget a Son, although she was espoused to another… It would have been unlawful for any man to have interfered with Mary… But God having created all men and women, had the most perfect right to do with His own creation, according to His holy will and pleasure… in the capacity of a husband… after having thus dealt with Mary, to give Mary to Joseph her espoused husband.”

LDS prophet and President Brigham Young: “The birth of the Saviour was as natural as are the births of our children; it was the result of natural action. He partook of flesh and blood—was begotten of his Father, as we were of our fathers.” (Journal of Discourses 8:115)

And more (JD 4:218; JD 1:238; JD 11:268) saying the Father came down physically to beget Jesus’ physical body.

LDS Prophet and President Joseph F. Smith (The Box Elder News, January 28, 1915): “Jesus Christ is the only begotten Son of God in the flesh… how are children begotten? I answer just as Jesus Christ was begotten of his father… God Almighty was the Father of His Son Jesus Christ. Mary, the virgin girl, who had never known mortal man, was his mother. God by her begot His son Jesus Christ…”

LDS Apostle Bruce R. McConkie (Mormon Doctrine, 2nd ed.): Jesus “was born into the world as the literal Son of this Holy Being… in the same personal, real, and literal sense that any mortal son is born to a mortal father. There is nothing figurative about his paternity; he was begotten, conceived and born in the normal and natural course of events.”

LDS Prophet and President Ezra Taft Benson (The Teachings of Ezra Taft Benson, 1988): “The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints proclaims that Jesus Christ is the Son of God in the most literal sense. The body in which he performed his mission in the flesh was sired by that same Holy Being we worship as God, as Eternal Father. Jesus was not the son of Joseph, nor was he begotten by the Holy Ghost. He is the Son of the Eternal Father.”

[Austin Graham @Austin_Graham24]

@BebopJosh That post literal has the quotes from your prophets and apostles and the sources they come from, even the very page numbers.

[Austin Graham @Austin_Graham24]

@powerlock9502 https://t.co/sor6DmOdzS

Please try something original and actually prove how what I have said is objectively false.

You're doing the very thing I called out.

[Austin Graham @Austin_Graham24]

“Based on how much you make up out of nowhere”

Me specifically? I’d be curious to know what you think I have lied about and manufactured.

As to the sources of the original post (keep in mind: these are supposed to be the prophets and apostles who hear from God which is why LDS do not use only scripture quotes because they claim to have living prophets and apostles):

LDS Apostle Orson Pratt said: “We have now clearly shown that God the Father had a plurality of wives, one or more being in eternity, by whom He begat our spirits as well as the spirit of Jesus His First Born, and another being upon the earth by whom He begat the tabernacle of Jesus, as His Only Begotten in this world.” (The Seer, 1853, p. 172)

Same on page 158: ““The fleshly body of Jesus required a Mother as well as a Father. Therefore, the Father and Mother of Jesus, according to the flesh, must have been associated together in the capacity of Husband and Wife; hence the Virgin Mary must have been, for the time being, the lawful wife of God the Father… He had a lawful right to overshadow the Virgin Mary in the capacity of a husband, and beget a Son, although she was espoused to another… It would have been unlawful for any man to have interfered with Mary… But God having created all men and women, had the most perfect right to do with His own creation, according to His holy will and pleasure… in the capacity of a husband… after having thus dealt with Mary, to give Mary to Joseph her espoused husband.”

LDS prophet and President Brigham Young: “The birth of the Saviour was as natural as are the births of our children; it was the result of natural action. He partook of flesh and blood—was begotten of his Father, as we were of our fathers.” (Journal of Discourses 8:115)

And more (JD 4:218; JD 1:238; JD 11:268) saying the Father came down physically to beget Jesus’ physical body.

LDS Prophet and President Joseph F. Smith (The Box Elder News, January 28, 1915): “Jesus Christ is the only begotten Son of God in the flesh… how are children begotten? I answer just as Jesus Christ was begotten of his father… God Almighty was the Father of His Son Jesus Christ. Mary, the virgin girl, who had never known mortal man, was his mother. God by her begot His son Jesus Christ…”

LDS Apostle Bruce R. McConkie (Mormon Doctrine, 2nd ed.): Jesus “was born into the world as the literal Son of this Holy Being… in the same personal, real, and literal sense that any mortal son is born to a mortal father. There is nothing figurative about his paternity; he was begotten, conceived and born in the normal and natural course of events.”

LDS Prophet and President Ezra Taft Benson (The Teachings of Ezra Taft Benson, 1988): “The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints proclaims that Jesus Christ is the Son of God in the most literal sense. The body in which he performed his mission in the flesh was sired by that same Holy Being we worship as God, as Eternal Father. Jesus was not the son of Joseph, nor was he begotten by the Holy Ghost. He is the Son of the Eternal Father.”

[Austin Graham @Austin_Graham24]

I literally quoted LDS prophets and Apostles. Those aren't fringe: that's supposed to be the source of God's revelation to the modern man.

You're literally proving my point by refusing to acknowledge that yes your prophets and apostles did actually teach this, and that nowadays no one wants to admit it or be associated with it.

[Austin Graham @Austin_Graham24]

@BebopJosh https://t.co/sor6DmOdzS

Also, you can look just through the replies here to see the evidence for yourself.

[Austin Graham @Austin_Graham24]

“Based on how much you make up out of nowhere”

Me specifically? I’d be curious to know what you think I have lied about and manufactured.

As to the sources of the original post (keep in mind: these are supposed to be the prophets and apostles who hear from God which is why LDS do not use only scripture quotes because they claim to have living prophets and apostles):

LDS Apostle Orson Pratt said: “We have now clearly shown that God the Father had a plurality of wives, one or more being in eternity, by whom He begat our spirits as well as the spirit of Jesus His First Born, and another being upon the earth by whom He begat the tabernacle of Jesus, as His Only Begotten in this world.” (The Seer, 1853, p. 172)

Same on page 158: ““The fleshly body of Jesus required a Mother as well as a Father. Therefore, the Father and Mother of Jesus, according to the flesh, must have been associated together in the capacity of Husband and Wife; hence the Virgin Mary must have been, for the time being, the lawful wife of God the Father… He had a lawful right to overshadow the Virgin Mary in the capacity of a husband, and beget a Son, although she was espoused to another… It would have been unlawful for any man to have interfered with Mary… But God having created all men and women, had the most perfect right to do with His own creation, according to His holy will and pleasure… in the capacity of a husband… after having thus dealt with Mary, to give Mary to Joseph her espoused husband.”

LDS prophet and President Brigham Young: “The birth of the Saviour was as natural as are the births of our children; it was the result of natural action. He partook of flesh and blood—was begotten of his Father, as we were of our fathers.” (Journal of Discourses 8:115)

And more (JD 4:218; JD 1:238; JD 11:268) saying the Father came down physically to beget Jesus’ physical body.

LDS Prophet and President Joseph F. Smith (The Box Elder News, January 28, 1915): “Jesus Christ is the only begotten Son of God in the flesh… how are children begotten? I answer just as Jesus Christ was begotten of his father… God Almighty was the Father of His Son Jesus Christ. Mary, the virgin girl, who had never known mortal man, was his mother. God by her begot His son Jesus Christ…”

LDS Apostle Bruce R. McConkie (Mormon Doctrine, 2nd ed.): Jesus “was born into the world as the literal Son of this Holy Being… in the same personal, real, and literal sense that any mortal son is born to a mortal father. There is nothing figurative about his paternity; he was begotten, conceived and born in the normal and natural course of events.”

LDS Prophet and President Ezra Taft Benson (The Teachings of Ezra Taft Benson, 1988): “The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints proclaims that Jesus Christ is the Son of God in the most literal sense. The body in which he performed his mission in the flesh was sired by that same Holy Being we worship as God, as Eternal Father. Jesus was not the son of Joseph, nor was he begotten by the Holy Ghost. He is the Son of the Eternal Father.”

[Austin Graham @Austin_Graham24]

I didn’t add the last part you added. Again, you are quick to put words in my mouth and attempt to make it sound like I am saying things I didn’t.

I said he can save anyone. I believe since He is in control of all things, He can bring anyone to saving faith in Christ. No one is beyond His power to save.

If you’re going to say I’m wrong: why don’t you actually challenge it clearly with the exact points and form the text how it does not mean what I said? This actually goes back to my other points that you, and others I have engaged with seem very averse to engaging with the text but will stay in hypotheticals or vague questions rather than making arguments grounded in a book you claim is authoritative.

You can’t just say “wrong: next question”. Are you able to actually critique and exegete the text to show how I am in error?

At this point: that is my condition for continuing. From the texts I quoted or referenced: please show me something of the following:

- how God is not glorified in the display of His wrath.
- That those who suffer judgement do not display His righteousness or mercy.
- That God is somehow unrighteous, unjust, or not good for doing this
- that God does not know the eternal end of a person from the beginning

[Austin Graham @Austin_Graham24]

No, and your framing leaves much to be desired to be in any way charitable.

“The He will burn them in hell” is a crude and childish way of framing the Biblical doctrine of God’s wrath.

The Lake of Fire is a place where all of God’s enemies go to suffer under His righteous wrath against sin. Those who go there are cast out BECAUSE of their sin. God didn’t make them sin nor does He delight in the death of the wicked (Ezekiel 33:11). Yet He does receive glory and praise for upholding justice and righteousness. This is the consistent theme of scripture and especially evident in Revelation.

You have the exact same problem about people “not consenting to exist” unless you would like to argue eternal intelligences can will themselves into existence.

My answer as to why God knowing created people who He leaves in their sins to face His judgement for all eternity is the same as the words of scripture: He does so for His glory and to display the fullness of His power, mercy, and holiness.

God neither makes or tempts anyone to sin, nor is God in anyway obligated to show mercy on every last person ever. Those in hell go their willingly by choosing rebellion and sin first. God is not obligated in any way to extend mercy to anyone, otherwise it would no longer be grace and mercy if it is owed.

Your challenge of the person who never hears the gospel is a common to which I have replied to other many times in the same way: God is utterly sovereign and in control of all things. He can save anyone He wished, and it is in fact an act of God for anyone to be regenerate and given eternal life by grace through faith.

Scripture is clear that every person knows God for He has made Himself known and yet we suppress the truth and rebel against Him (Romans 1: 18-23).

Your issue with this doctrine is not an issue with me: you have to reconcile what the Bible is saying about God’s wrath and how His grace and mercy is owed to no one. You keep asking me if my answer is just “for his glory” when that is directly in the Bible you claim to believe if you are LDS.

If you have an issue with the text of scripture: admit that. If you think I have exegeted it incorrectly and you can prove that God is not glorified at all by displaying His wrath and that all people are owed salvation and mercy by God from the texts clearly presented to you: you are free to do so.

The fact you continue avoid it is telling. You know what I have been saying this whole time and you know it is a quote of the Bible itself.

You have to now defend your faith:
- prove my answer false and invalidate my source.
- prove how your own framing of “against their will” or “who did not ask to be made” does not exist in either the eternal intelligences or spirit children of a Heavenly Father and mother(s)
- or that you do in fact not agree with the Bible and you cannot reconcile the answer you have been given.

If you continue to refuse to engage honestly, this is my final response.

[Austin Graham @Austin_Graham24]

I have no obligation to continue engaging with you if you continue to act like this and refuse to act like I have you an answer.

You’re wanting to restrict me to only answering in a way you will either accept or can easily reject and tear down.

You been given the answer. I’m not going to engage with you while you tap dance around my response calling it incoherent and dodging. You have proven there is nothing I can say that will get you to relent.

For the last time: yes. His has perfect knowledge and knows when He creates people whether they will be saved or if He will pass over them and leave them in their sins. This is directly answered in my response as to why mankind is created and why He creates knowing they will suffer judgement for eternity: for His glory and to display His righteousness and mercy to those who are saved.

That is straight out of the Bible which you have refused to acknowledge or answer for. If you don’t like that, it is incumbent upon you to reconcile what the Bible says with your believe of a universal atonement where all but the Sons of Perdition get some form of heaven.

If you cannot acknowledge that the answer is given, and was clearly based on the Biblical text and you cannot humble yourself to acknowledge that and either address the answer I have given and prove me wrong from the texts listed: then we’re not going to make any progress here.

For points of consideration:
Not only have I answered you, but you have the exact same problem in LDS doctrine that if Heavenly Father knows all things and all of time and begets children he knows will be sons of perdition and under wrath: why does he beget them if he knows they will be under wrath forever?

You either have to say that the Father:
- does not know everything, the past, present, and future
- that He is incapable of complete control and the people exist and are begotten outside the Father’s control
- or that the Father can’t actually beget anyone in any true sense under the “intelligences are eternal” argument. If intelligences always existed alongside Heavenly Father and heavenly mother(s) then it would kinda invalidate the doctrines of us being spiritual children of Heavenly Father.

You can’t have it both ways that we are all children of a Heavenly Father and heavenly mother but not actually because we existed before that alongside them somehow. Either we come into existence through the begetting or we always existed and therefore intelligence that existed through no choice of their own are begotten and subjected to wrath for their choices to rebel against the Father… oh wait…. Then what gives Heavenly Father the right to punish these intelligences that he didn’t create or have any influence in bringing into existence? Why should they be punished?

[Austin Graham @Austin_Graham24]

So… this is your definition of being polite? I didn’t ask you to concede defeat: I asked before I added to my answer to address the version you keep changing it to that you would at least acknowledge that I did in fact answer you.

I have clearly given you a direct answer with a full quote from scripture which is God’s own Word as well as 2 other references not fully quoted. I even repeated it and pointed out that the answer is clear for everyone to see.

You continue to maintain that I have dodged and refused to answer while also maintain it’s just a “vague copy paste”. This is now the 3rd or 4th time you have accused me of this and reframed or modified the question graven though my answer still holds for every version).

I believe you are an intelligent person so I can only assume you are acting like this because you dislike me or my belief so much you will not even acknowledge that your accusations against me are unfounded.

It’s not me you have an issue with: it’s God and His word. The fact you haven’t even attempted to address the text shows me you either can’t, are unwilling for some unknown reason, or you just don’t believe the Bible is true and authoritative.

It is actually intellectually dishonest and violates your own scriptures to behave how you are. There cannot be any honest engagement if you continue to refuse to engage what I am saying or even the text I cited.

You may not like my answer. You may not like what the Bible says, or you may even reject it outright. But you and I both know how you are acting is neither genuinely polite or honest.

If you were, you’d actually act charitably and humbly and acknowledge I did answer you and you don’t agree and engaged with the Bible and the text cited.

[Austin Graham @Austin_Graham24]

@lifewinder Hold on before we continue: do you concede I actually did answer you and that I was not dodging or evading the question? Or are you just trying to build straw men you can knock down without actually engaging in dialogue?

[Austin Graham @Austin_Graham24]

@lifewinder That’s actually in the post and in the verse I quoted. Are you just not reading what I say?

[Austin Graham @Austin_Graham24]

You: “your absurd belief that God creates people out of nothing just so he can burn them in hell. why?”

Me: “God created mankind to reflect Him and worship Him. Man rebelled and rejected God, therefore God gives them over to their sin and as a good, holy, and just God: He punishes the wicked for their rebellion. We by nature reject God and will never submit to Him.”

I then quote scripture as the evidence.

To say I didn’t answer you is dishonest. You can just admit you don’t like or believe what the Bible says: at least then you’d be honest about it.

[Austin Graham @Austin_Graham24]

@Sunburnz1 And before anyone tries to point to theologians in church history that we disagree with today: Christians never elevated them to the office of Prophet or Apostle to hear directly from God and declare revelation. The standard to test was the Bible.

[Austin Graham @Austin_Graham24]

“Based on how much you make up out of nowhere”

Me specifically? I’d be curious to know what you think I have lied about and manufactured.

As to the sources of the original post (keep in mind: these are supposed to be the prophets and apostles who hear from God which is why LDS do not use only scripture quotes because they claim to have living prophets and apostles):

LDS Apostle Orson Pratt said: “We have now clearly shown that God the Father had a plurality of wives, one or more being in eternity, by whom He begat our spirits as well as the spirit of Jesus His First Born, and another being upon the earth by whom He begat the tabernacle of Jesus, as His Only Begotten in this world.” (The Seer, 1853, p. 172)

Same on page 158: ““The fleshly body of Jesus required a Mother as well as a Father. Therefore, the Father and Mother of Jesus, according to the flesh, must have been associated together in the capacity of Husband and Wife; hence the Virgin Mary must have been, for the time being, the lawful wife of God the Father… He had a lawful right to overshadow the Virgin Mary in the capacity of a husband, and beget a Son, although she was espoused to another… It would have been unlawful for any man to have interfered with Mary… But God having created all men and women, had the most perfect right to do with His own creation, according to His holy will and pleasure… in the capacity of a husband… after having thus dealt with Mary, to give Mary to Joseph her espoused husband.”

LDS prophet and President Brigham Young: “The birth of the Saviour was as natural as are the births of our children; it was the result of natural action. He partook of flesh and blood—was begotten of his Father, as we were of our fathers.” (Journal of Discourses 8:115)

And more (JD 4:218; JD 1:238; JD 11:268) saying the Father came down physically to beget Jesus’ physical body.

LDS Prophet and President Joseph F. Smith (The Box Elder News, January 28, 1915): “Jesus Christ is the only begotten Son of God in the flesh… how are children begotten? I answer just as Jesus Christ was begotten of his father… God Almighty was the Father of His Son Jesus Christ. Mary, the virgin girl, who had never known mortal man, was his mother. God by her begot His son Jesus Christ…”

LDS Apostle Bruce R. McConkie (Mormon Doctrine, 2nd ed.): Jesus “was born into the world as the literal Son of this Holy Being… in the same personal, real, and literal sense that any mortal son is born to a mortal father. There is nothing figurative about his paternity; he was begotten, conceived and born in the normal and natural course of events.”

LDS Prophet and President Ezra Taft Benson (The Teachings of Ezra Taft Benson, 1988): “The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints proclaims that Jesus Christ is the Son of God in the most literal sense. The body in which he performed his mission in the flesh was sired by that same Holy Being we worship as God, as Eternal Father. Jesus was not the son of Joseph, nor was he begotten by the Holy Ghost. He is the Son of the Eternal Father.”

[Austin Graham @Austin_Graham24]

God created mankind to reflect Him and worship Him. Man rebelled and rejected God, therefore God gives them over to their sin and as a good, holy, and just God: He punishes the wicked for their rebellion. We by nature reject God and will never submit to Him.

“Thou wilt say then unto me, Why doth he yet find fault? For who hath resisted his will? Nay but, O man, who art thou that repliest against God? Shall the thing formed say to him that formed it, Why hast thou made me thus? Hath not the potter power over the clay, of the same lump to make one vessel unto honour, and another unto dishonour? What if God, willing to shew his wrath, and to make his power known, endured with much longsuffering the vessels of wrath fitted to destruction: and that he might make known the riches of his glory on the vessels of mercy, which he had afore prepared unto glory, even us, whom he hath called, not of the Jews only, but also of the Gentiles?”
Romans 9:19-24 KJV

Mankind is sent to hell by his own will because he hates God and will not submit to Him. (Romans 1: 18-32 & 8:6-8).