Discourses of Brigham Young, pg 7; ““But as many as received him, to them gave he power to continue to be the sons of God.” Instead of receiving the Gospel to become the sons of God, my language would be—to receive the Gospel that we may continue to be the sons of God. Are we not all sons of God when we are born into this world? Old Pharaoh, King of Egypt, was just as much a son of God as Moses and Aaron were his sons, with this difference—he rejected the word of the Lord, the true light, and they received it. For “this is the condemnation, that light is come into the world, and men love darkness rather than light, because their deeds are evil.” Then we receive not the Gospel that we may become the sons of God but that we may remain the sons of God without rebuke. Inasmuch as all had apostatized, they had to become the sons of God by adoption, still, originally, all were the sons of God. We receive the Gospel, not that we may have our names written in the Lamb’s book of life, but that our names may not be blotted out of that book. “For,” saith the Lord, “He that overcometh, the same shall be clothed in white raiment, and I will not blot out his name out of the book of life.””
John 1:12; “But as many as received him, to them gave he power to become the sons of God, even to them that believe on his name.”
John 3:19; “And this is the condemnation, that light is come into the world, and men loved darkness rather than light, because their deeds were evil.”
Revelation 3:5; “He that overcometh, the same shall be clothed in white raiment; and I will not blot out his name out of the book of life, but I will confess his name before my Father, and before his angels.”
Revelation 20:12, 15; “And I saw the dead, small and great, stand before God; and the books were opened: and another book was opened, which is the book of life: and the dead were judged out of those things which were written in the books, according to their works. 15 And whosoever was not found written in the book of life was cast into the lake of fire.”
My, oh my Mr. Young sure had a lot to say. Mr. Young knows just enough of the Bible to be dangerous – it’s funny how people are like that in life. He’s quoted snippets of verses and put them all in one teaching when in fact the verses he used have little to nothing to do with each other.
God did not, and allow me to reiterate, did not have sex with a goddess wife to beget spirit babies who in turn would be born on earth someday. See John 1:12 above.
The pharaoh wasn’t anymore a son of God than my dog is.
Mr. Young was teaching that everyone is already a son of God, but because everyone has apostatized they have to be adopted to become a son again.
You can’t be adopted and be a literal son at the same time – it’s one or the other, but it can’t be both. Basic common sense tells us this is wrong!
The other issue we want to point out so you can share this with the Mormon in your life is about the Lamb’s Book of Life.
Mr. Young said that everyone’s name is already written in the Lamb’s Book of Life, but when you don’t follow God your name is blotted out. Think of that for a moment – God’s book with large sections of black Sharpie pen marks throughout. Would God do this?
If your name is written in the Book of Life it’s because you’re a believer and you held fast to God’s commandments. See the verses listed above.
As an FYI – There are two verses in the Old Testament that mention a book of the living. In the first example found in Exodus we see Moses beseeching God’s mercy on behalf of the Israelites. The other example is found in Psalms when David is referring to his enemies. Both examples were referring to a literal earthly life, not the Lamb’s Book of Life – Exodus 32:32-33, Psalm 69:28.
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