Members of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints Are Christians!
General information about the Christianity of the members of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints: (used with the permission of Bruce Barton)
1. A problem of definitions —
. “There is no definitive statement of what constitutes Christianity to be found in the Bible. If there were, there wouldn’t be so many church, some believing
. baptism to be essential, others saying it is not, some saying worship must be done on Saturday, others on Sunday, for example. What it boils down to
. is that many non-members exclude us from Christianity because we don’t believe exactly what they believe. The problem in this instance is the assumption
. on which they base their definition. By their definition, we aren’t Christian; conversely, we could say they aren’t Christian because they don’t believe exactly
. as we do. There is no way to convince such people we are Christian without attacking their basic beliefs, and that usually results only in antagonism. All words
. are subject to definition. Some have a variety of meanings, even seemingly contradictory at times, making it necessary to exercise discretion with regard to
. the context in which they are used. The word ‘Christian’ is one of them. People of many denominations regard themselves Christians, even though their creeds
. vary widely. The Latter-day Saints have a definition by which they establish their Christian status.” Church News, June 1983.
2. The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints
. “For thus shall my church be called in the last days, even The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints.” (Doctrine and Covenants 115:4)
. “One of the reasons some people who don’t know us think we don’t believe in Jesus Christ is that they know us only by a nickname originally given us by our
. enemies — Mormons. How could we not be Christians when the Savior’s name is in the name of our church? Our leaders have often asked us to use the right
. name of the Church in our references to it rather than to continue to call it the Mormon church.” Charles D. Tate
3. . “If being a Christian means…”
. “If being a Christian mean believing in Christ and accepting Him as the Son of God in the full and complete sense; if it means having the true gospel in its
. everlasting fulness’ if it means believing what Peter and Paul believed and finding fellowship in the same Church to which they belonged’ if it means feeding the
. hungry, and clothing the naked, and loving our fellowmen, and keeping ourselves unspotted from the world (Doctrine and Covenants 59:9) — where else shall
. we find true Christians except among the Latter-day Saints? Let me say as soberly, as plainly, and as clearly as the English tongue permits that we believe
. in Christ and strive with all our power to keep His commandments. He is our Lord, our God, and our King. It is his gospel we have received. ‘We talk of
. Christ, we rejoice in Christ, we preach of Christ, and we prophesy…’ in His name, and we know that His is the only name given under heaven whereby man can
. be saved. (see Acts 4:12) We teach and testify that He is the Firstborn of the Father, that He is the one like unto God, that He Himself is the Lord Omnipotent,
. the great Jehovah, the Creator of this earth and of all forms of life. We know that He is the God of Israel, the promised Messiah, the Only Begotten of the
. Father. We know that the Lord Jesus made flesh His tabernacle, that Mary was His mother and God was His Father, and that He inherited from His mother the
. power of mortality and from His Father the power of immortality. It was this dual nature, this mortal yet divine sonship, that enabled Him to work out the infinite
. and eternal Atonement and to ransom men from the temporal and spiritual deaths brought into the world by the fall of Adam.” Elder Bruce R. McConkie, October
. 1981.
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