Glenn Beck – politics and theology, Mormonism and Christianity

I have been contemplating issues Glenn Beck related as of late, particularly with regards to his recent Washington DC gathering.
Gregg, of the blog Gospel-Driven Disciples, recently posted Glenn Beck: The Usurping of the Christian Agenda and this seemed a good opportunity to play off of his musing, some of which follows:

Church – What is wrong with this picture?

“A Mormon television star stands in front of the Lincoln Memorial and calls American Christians to revival. He assembles some evangelical celebrities to give testimonies, and then preaches a God and country revivalism that leaves the evangelicals cheering that they’ve heard the gospel, right there in the nation’s capital. The news media pronounces him the new leader of America’s Christian conservative movement, and a flock of America’s Christian conservatives have no problem with that.”
--Russell Moore

Just how naive is evangelical Christianity today? In a great show of patriotic conservatism and the spirit of ecumenism “Christianity” and the "evangelical church" demonstrated its depth of nativity and foolishness this past weekend in Washington D. C.

I am not going to question Glenn Beck or the conservative “right’s” motives or patriotism. Beck and anyone else for that matter has the right to stand for their political party and agenda. My problem is not with Beck but with the so called “Christian” right…

as of yet, I have not read nor heard of an explanation that would biblically convince me that Beck is a Christian. He is a baptized Mormon in good standing with the theological position of that organization…

It is my prayer that men like Glenn Beck become true believers.

I wanted to focus on all of the buzz about Mormonism (aka The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints) and Christianity—the correlation or disparity. The buzz is actually 180 years old and raises its head periodically such as when Mitt Romney ran for president.
For some the issue is as simple as, “Well, Mormons use the words and believe in ‘God’ and ‘Jesus’ and read the Bible so obviously they are Christians.”
For others, the more discerning, the issue is, “Well, Mormons use the words and believe in ‘God’ and ‘Jesus’ and read the Bible but what do they mean when they say ‘God’ and ‘Jesus’? How do they define their terms? When they read the Bible what do they take it to mean? (this is not merely about interpretation, mind you), etc.”

Glenn Beck has stated that Tim LaHaye, of Left Behind fame, attempted to preach the gospel to him at which time Beck offered LaHaye his witness. Essentially, that once he accepted Jesus through Mormonism his life got turned around, no more drunkenness, etc. That was, essentially, the end of the discussion: he must really have something there. Well, what he had was a dose of Jesus. What he needs to do now is to develop a close relationship with the one true Jesus of history and the Bible and compare Mormon doctrines to the Bible’s.
Otherwise, it is reminiscent, to some extent, of when God sent Jeremiah to preach to Shiloh in order to instruct them to cease worshipping the Queen of Heaven. What was their response?

We will not listen to the message you have spoken to us in the name of the LORD!
We will certainly do everything we said we would:
We will burn incense to the Queen of Heaven and will pour out drink offerings to her just as we and our fathers, our kings and our officials did in the towns of Judah and in the streets of Jerusalem. At that time we had plenty of food and were well off and suffered no harm.

In other words; things go well when we worship that which God called an abominable idol and so we will not stop. Glenn Beck has a similar outlook; things go well when he worships that which God called an abominable idol and so he does not stop.
See Roman Catholic Maryology: Mary in Roman Catholicism, part 14 - Queen of Heaven? for details.

But just what abominable idol does Glenn Beck worship? After all he believes in and uses the words “God” and “Jesus,” reads the Bible and calls himself a Christians.

Let us succinctly consider three issues: “Christian,” “God” and “Bible”:

Christians:
The reason that Mormons want to be known as “Christians” is in order to fit in to the mainstream. They could be said to either be claiming to Christians with only some slight doctrinal differences or, perhaps more likely, claiming to be the real true Christians.
This is because during his first vision, his initial revelation, Joseph Smith claimed the following—although there are different accounts of his first vision this one is taken from Pearl of Great Price - Joseph Smith - History - 2:18-20:

My object in going to inquire of the Lord was to know which of all the sects was right, that I might know which to join.
No sooner, therefore, did I get possession of myself, so as to be able to speak, than I asked the Personages who stood above me in the light, which of all the sects was right-and which I should join.
I was answered that I must join none of them, for they were all wrong; and the Personage who addressed me said that all their creeds were an abomination in his sight; that those professors were all corrupt; that: “they draw near to me with their lips, but their hearts are far from me, they teach for doctrines the commandments of men, having a form of godliness, but they deny the power thereof.” He again forbade me to join with any of them.

Thus, according to Joseph Smith, God declared that the Christian sects were all wrong, all their creeds abominations and all their professors corrupt.
Some Mormon apologists claim that “all” does not mean “all” of Christianity but only “all” sects that were available to Joseph Smith. Granting this we must note that these Christian sects held to good old fashioned traditional biblical Christian doctrines—on the main issues, the essentials. Moreover, if there was any uncorrupted Christianity anywhere on Earth, God could certainly have revealed that to Joseph Smith rather than having him start his own church which would claim to have another testament of Jesus Christ which, as it turns out, was . a testament of another Jesus Christ.
In any regard, for nearly two centuries Mormons sought to differentiate themselves from the corrupt sects. Yet, now they seek unity with those corrupt sects.
See my essay Mormonism is an Offensive Religion for an elucidation of why they are offensive: meaning that they, from the get go, have been on the offence against Christianity.

God:
Glenn Beck made an interesting remark about his recent gathering; that it was about the one God. Firstly, this leaves out various American non-monotheists. Ironically, this would include Mormons. I cannot tell whether Glenn Beck simply does not know Mormon theology very well, if he is playing to the mainstream who does not know Mormon theology very well or what have you. What I do know is that Mormonism is not monotheistic.
Mormonism is often described as polytheistic but it may be more accurate to describe them as henotheistic, basically; belief in many gods but that only one of them should be worshipped.
Actually, the Bible is monotheistic, the Book of Mormon is monotheistic, and other Mormon scriptures are monotheistic. I pointed this out to a Mormon missionary and he agreed. I then asked why, since this is the case, is Mormonism now henotheistic. His answer was all too simple: since Mormon prophets have since revealed that there are many gods, so be it.
This is what happens when the biblical parameters are breached: anything goes.
In my post Jeff Durbin debates two Mormon missionaries you can hear Jeff Durbin ask what the context is of a text that is up for discussion. One Mormon asks, “Does it matter?” and continued, whilst pounding on the desk, with “Joseph Smith was prophet” and later, “the most important thing…I don’t need to know everything in the Bible…most important thing to know is truth; Joseph Smith is a prophet of God.”
Mormon theology asserts that created beings, such as humans, can become gods who copulate and give birth to created beings who can become gods who copulate and give birth to created beings who can become gods, etc. Thus, there is no knowing how many gods there are.

Bible:
Mormons affirms that the Bible is the word of God, period! Period? Well, not quite.
Mormon article of faith number eighth states “We believe the Bible to be the word of God as far as it is translated correctly; we also believe the Book of Mormon to be the word of God.”
How do we know when the Bible has been accurately translated? Textual criticism, manuscript evidence, study of ancient languages, etc.? No. The issue is very simple, given the Mormon worldview: if it deviates from Mormon doctrine then it is considered not to be translated correctly with absolutely no regard to any other considerations.
Also, while they “believe the Bible to be the word of God” and “the Book of Mormon to be the word of God” Joseph Smith stated this about the Book of Mormon, “A man would get nearer to God by abiding by its precepts than by any other book.”

Certainly much, much more could be said of these and various other theological issues. Glenn Beck may be of interest to those whose political leanings are conservative, he may be a good source for getting to know a bit about history and the founding fathers yet, when it comes to theology Christians are not to let themselves be taken in by generic references to “God.”

This juxtoposing of Mormon versus Christian/Biblical theology extends far beyond “Christian,” “God” and “Bible”; consider any Christian/Biblical doctrine and Mormonism opposes it and has their own version.

For more information about Mormon theology, the Book of Mormon and much more please see my section on Mormonism as well as the Mormonism section of my Links page

Lastly, here is a link to an interesting discussion of this issue by Issues, etc.