Man of Holiness - The Mormons' God

"Agony in the Garden" by Frans Schwartz, 1898

Perhaps no issue surrounding Mormonism has been as controversial, or at least as talked about, as Mormons' concept of God; who He is, what He does, and what our relationship is to Him.

I need not repeat what other sects of Christianity believe in regards to the Mormon view of the Godhead, the term our faith uses instead of the rest of Christianity's 'Trinity'. But in this discussion, I will contrast the two philosophies and then let Truth speak for itself, allowing the reader to follow as he chooses.

It could be said that no scripture illustrates the Mormon concept of God's personality better than an account written by Moses regarding the prophet Enoch's great vision of the earth. In this passage, Enoch is visited by God, and speaks with Him face to face. Then God gives Enoch a sweeping vision. The passage reads, "And [Enoch] beheld Satan; and he had a great chain in his hand, and it veiled the whole face of the earth with darkness; and he looked up and laughed, and his angels rejoiced.

"And it came to pass that the God of heaven looked upon the residue of the people, and he wept..." (Moses 7:26-28)

At the sight of God weeping, Enoch can't help but wonder, "How is it that the heavens weep, and shed forth their tears as the rain upon the mountains?" (Moses 7:28) Then, directing his words directly to our weeping God, Enoch asks, "How is it that thou canst weep, seeing thou art holy, and from all eternity to all eternity?" (Moses 7:29)

Enoch then lists the great attributes of God, saying, "And were it possible that man could number the particles of the earth, yea, millions of earths like this, it would not be a beginning to the number of thy creations; and thy curtains are stretched out still; and yet thou art there, and thy bosom is there; and also thou art just; thou art merciful and kind forever; And thou hast taken Zion to thine own bosom, from all thy creations, from all eternity to all eternity; and naught but peace, justice, and truth is the habitation of thy throne; and mercy shall go before thy face and have no end; how is it thou canst weep?" (Moses 30-31)

In other words, "You're the master of all creation, the ultimate being in the universe! How can you weep? What could possibly cause someone as inestimably transcendent as you to shed tears of sorrow?"

God explains His heartache to Enoch, saying, "Behold these thy brethren; they are the workmanship of mine own hands, and I gave unto them their knowledge, in the day I created them; and in the Garden of Eden, gave I unto man his agency;

"And unto thy brethren have I said, and also given commandment, that they should love one another, and that they should choose me, their Father; but behold, they are without affection, and they hate their own blood..." (Moses 7:32-33)

That passage paints for Mormons a powerful image of a human God who loves His children so much that when they choose wickedness and violence over His love, he sits on His throne and weeps. He feels sorrow. For us. Later, during the same discourse with Enoch, God describes Himself in further detail:

"Behold," he says, "I am God; Man of Holiness is my name; Man of Counsel is my name; and Endless and Eternal is my name, also...Wherefore, I can stretch forth mine hands and hold all the creations which I have made; and mine eye can pierce them also, and among all the workmanship of mine hands there has not been so great wickedness as among thy brethren.

"...Wherefore, for this shall the heavens weep, yea, and all the workmanship of mine hands." (Moses 7:35-40)

Not only has God revealed Himself to a prophet as one who weeps, but he tells Enoch that one of His titles is, "Man of Holiness", further denoting His human connection to us. He has not approached Enoch as an amorphous, incomprehensible substance without body, parts or passions, as the Catholic creeds have since described Him and His attributes.

No, to the Mormons, God is not an impersonal cloud of stoic nothingness. God reveals himself as quite the opposite. He is a Man, who is emotional, caring, and who calls himself our Father, and who desires that we, His children, should choose Him. As any good father, he weeps when His children abandon Him along with the happiness He works to provide for them.

This view of God is supported in many other scriptures and teachings of modern prophets. The Bible contains the earliest documents we have of a personable God with a body, parts and passions. The creative individual finds that he relates to God in the very first verses of Genesis, in which God undertakes a massive creative project, the formation of the earth, and calls the results "good", which conveys His pleasure in such work.

When God has finished the creation of the earth, water, skies, plants and animals, God says, "Let us make man in our own image, after our likeness..." (Genesis 1:26) This passage indicates two interesting things, which may seem obvious, but which so much of the Christian world rejects. The first is that if God created man in His image, then it means that God looks like a man. The second is that when God uses the word 'our', it indicates that He is conversing with another being or other beings who also look like men, and he is doing so in this passage before man is ever formed on the earth.

That man is created in God's image and that he existed with God in a pre-mortal or pre-earth life condition are two doctrines that help define the Mormon understanding of God. The understanding is that He is our literal Father. It is not a title He uses lightly or figuratively. In time immemorial, before the foundation of this earth, God sired spirit children. He created them "that they might have joy" (2 Nephi 2:25), and progress to become like our Father. Our spirits are those children of God, and when God presented a plan that would allow us to come to a new earth and learn to become as He is, "the sons of God shouted for joy" (Job 38:4-77).

But God the Father knew that on earth we would be subject to the weakness and frailties of mortality. One of those weaknesses would be our tendency to sin against God's statutes, which would spiritually separate us from Him. With such a separation, we would not be able to be like Him, or even return to His presence where only beings of perfect, unspotted glory may reside. Such a permanent separation was, of course, unacceptable. Why send us to test our mettle if there was no way of passing the test? So He lovingly, selflessly provided an alternative to inevitable damnation. He agreed that He would send His greatest and most intelligent spirit child, Jehovah, to be born as Jesus Christ. Jehovah agreed that he would glorify God and support His plan by subjecting himself to mortality. He would live God's will perfectly, keeping himself spotless. He would be the unblemished lamb symbolized by the sacrifices of the Mosaic Law; in that law, only an unblemished lamb was worthy of sacrifice. Likewise was Christ the only one who was pure and able to lay himself down below all things to experience all of mankind's pain to pay for sin and sorrows that we ourselves cannot pay for. He was born of Mary, subject to the pains and temptations of mortality, but was the Son of God, and had the power to lay down His life and take it up again, which no other mortal could do.

When Christ was in the Garden of Gethsemane, He submitted himself to the Father and willingly bore the burden of all mankind's guilt, shame, pain, sorrow, even every form of mortal suffering. He felt it all. He was God's only begotten Son, beloved of the Father; he was the only perfect offspring of God, and He was willing to make the ultimate sacrifice - a sacrifice greater than death, and He bore it. For us. 

How could God be, as the Nicaean and Athanasian creeds dictate, a being without parts or passions? Indeed, he offered up his body to the most excruciating, unfathomable pain ever experienced, and he did so out of passion, out of pure love.

"The Doubting Thomas", Carl Bloch (1834-1890)
Thomas saw and felt Christ's immortal, resurrected body.

Soon afterwards, after being judged of the unworthy politicians of the world, Christ was sentenced to death. He, having the power to avoid such a fate, accepted it. According to the will of His Father, it was time for Him to lay his mortal life down so that He could take it up again and initiate the hopeful doctrine of the resurrection, which He gives to each and every member of God's family freely. That is, every man, woman and child ever born on the earth will again gain their bodies, never to die again. Mormons understand this is a requirement to being like God, for He is in possession of His undying body for eternity.

This story of Christ's willingness to submit to all things, the hardest things, is another example to Mormons of the kind of person God is. He is selfless, willing to let even his beloved Son suffer all things to ensure our access to His glory. But He is not cold - God loves His Son, and did not easily give him up to the wolves.

One apostle of the Mormon church said of Christ's crucifixion, " In that hour I think I can see our dear Father, behind the veil looking upon these dying struggles until even he could not endure it any longer, and, like the mother who bids farewell to her dying child, has to be taken out of the room, so as not to look upon the last struggles, so he bowed his head, and hid in some part of his universe, his great heart almost breaking for the love that he had for his Son. Oh, in that moment when He might have saved his Son, I thank him and praise him that he did not fail us, for he had not only the love of his Son in mind, but he also had love for us. I rejoice that he did not interfere, and that his love for us made it possible for him to endure to look upon the sufferings of his Son and give him finally to us, our Savior and our Redeemer. Without him, without his sacrifice, we would have remained, and we would never have come glorified into his presence. And so this is what it cost, in part, for our Father in Heaven to give the gift of his Son unto men." (Hinckley, Sermon., and Missionary Services of  Melvin J Ballard, pp. 151-55)

On the third day after His death, He rose again, as promised. He visited His faithful followers for a time, commissioned them to do His work, then returned to the presence of His Father.

Before and since that occasion, even for all eternity, God has labored to save His children. Indeed, He has declared, "Behold, it is my work and my glory to bring to pass the eternal life of man" (Moses 1:39). Time and time again, throughout the scriptures and by the works He does, God makes it clear that the center of His work and purpose is us, his children. He does not stop working to lift us above the sins and sorrows of this world. He has not ceased speaking to us. He has not ceased being our friend. He directs a constant work to bring about our happiness, our eternal well-being. He is not a strange life form who enjoys our misery or helplessness or who delights in punishing us. No, He has allowed us to suffer mortality so that we might learn by humility to become great like He is, and when we of ourselves choose to reject Him and His love for us, He weeps.

I rejoice in the simple doctrine God has revealed in modern times to His prophet Joseph Smith that God is understandable, He is human, and He is literally our Father and acts to fulfill His Fatherly responsibilities to care for His children. I rejoice that I can relate to Him and, insofar as I am faithful, I can return to His presence and learn to be as He is. I want to be like my mortal father here on earth. How much greater then to desire to be as our Eternal Father, who is perfect and has all power?

I invite all to come to know this God. He loves all of his children, no matter how much or how little they understand Him. He has revealed who He is, and with Him, members of the Mormon faith invite all to find out for themselves, and to rejoice in the truth that we are His children and we have a purpose beyond the mundane struggles of mortal living.

To find out more, visit www.mormon.org. Talk to missionaries. Contact a Mormon friend. Go to a local LDS church meeting. Order a free copy of The Book of Mormon. Experiment on my words and find out for yourself if God is there, desiring to extend his hands to you and lift you up unto eternal life.