Question
Gramps,
I have never been able to reconcile the contradictions between this doctrine taught in every book of scripture, and what Joseph Smith taught in the King Follett Sermon. What insight can you give to make it make sense?
Moroni 8:18 – “God… is unchangeable from all eternity to all eternity.”
Hebrews 13:8 – “Jesus Christ the same yesterday today and forever.”
King Follett Sermon, Joseph Smith – “We have imagined and supposed that God was God from all eternity. I will refute that idea…”
Adrianne
Answer
Hi Adrianne,
Thank you for your question.
Let’s look at the scriptures you quoted a little further.
God… is unchangeable from all eternity to all eternity.
Jesus Christ is the same yesterday, today, and forever.
That sure seems peculiar since we know that he has changed at least his physical form through all of the scriptural record.
- He was a disembodied spirit before he was born.
- He appeared as a burning bush to Moses.
- He had a miraculous finger by which he could write the Law of Moses on stone tablets.
- Then we also recognize that he was essentially a mortal man who was capable of dying.
- He was born as a baby. He grew in wisdom, and stature, and favor with God and man.
- Then he was crucified, and died by giving up the Ghost voluntarily.
- Then we saw him resurrected in an immortal state, but he was not yet glorified or else Mary would have noticed something more than a man whom she could mistake as the gardener.
- And now we know that he is fully exalted and glorified.
That certainly seems to cast doubt on the validity of the scriptures. But fear not, the scriptures are valid. How can this be when the scriptures say he never changes, yet we know he changed? The constancy that the scriptures refer to is the knowledge and understanding of what is right and wrong. His consistency is the application of justice and mercy by which he will judge all mankind.
In those things that truly matter, He is, indeed, constant and unchanging.
Gramps
