The idea of a Restoration of Christ’s New Testament “church” was unoriginal

[bill4long]

Yes, there are churches that carry the name of Jesus Christ. How many of them are carrying the gospel message throughout the whole world in a similar manner as the CofJCofLDS?

Jehovah's Witnesses, Seventh Day Adventists and the New Apostolic Church have large numbers of missionaries and cross-cultural mission workers. So do several other denominations.

[malkie]

Regardless of whether Jesus is dead or alive, if the name of the church is important there's plenty of choice.

May I recommend https://thechurchofjesuschrist.ca/

Clearly, just about any organization can "carry [Jesus Christ's] name throughout the world doing so in His name[] And that a church claiming to be His would carry His name".

The field is wider if you also accept Church of Christ (the original name under which the church was organized), without requiring the word "Jesus" to appear.

By the way, from your criterion concerning the name, I'm sure that you are aware that for about four years (1834-38) the church did not "carry [Jesus Christ's] name throughout the world". Was it apostate during that time?

Yes, there are churches that carry the name of Jesus Christ. How many of them are carrying the gospel message throughout the whole world in a similar manner as the CofJCofLDS?

Does that matter scripturally?

By the way, the link you’ve provided to this Bible based church in Canada is one I haven’t heard of before. There are a LOT of churches professing Jesus Christ.

Regards,
MG

Why does it have to be "in a similar manner as the CofJCofLDS"? Your bias is blinding you.

I have no idea "[h]ow many of them are carrying the gospel message throughout the whole world", but your church didn't always do so - in fact, are there not still some countries where it still isn't?

[huckelberry]

Again, to repeat, I'm more interested in what came out of the seed that Jesus planted and how that seed matured and evolved.

Regards,
MG

I'd argue that all of Christianity is basically the formalized ignoring of most of what Jesus taught, and focusing instead on what his followers later interpreted as the meaning behind his death. The term is vampire Christianity - Christianity is only interested in Jesus for his blood.

Now in fairness some traditions are better than others at least at remembering PART of what Jesus taught. But on the whole I'd have to think if Jesus were alive today he would be scandalized at the religion that has been created in his name.

vampire christianity,,, well the phrase gives me pause. I first reject it as just obnoxious then find myself thinking of leaders getting absurdly rich promising people God wants to make them rich. Vampire achristianity is right. People feeling powerful and in control of others because of Jesus name, vampire Christianity.

On the other hand many ordinary folks are imperfectly trying to be decent honest and helpful may not fill the perfect expectation but may be honest followers of Jesus direction trying to live inside his life.
I do not see a map for the correct follow Jesus but I see actual people trying to follow the words of Jesus and finding hope in what he said.I think It persists and grows despite uncertainty and being pushed around by vampire Christianity.

[Physics Guy]

I agree that the basic Christian doctrine of the Atonement seems like a non sequitur to most of the teachings that have been attributed to Jesus. This struck me years ago in a Bible study that went very slowly through the Sermon on the Mount. We tried to pay attention to all the contexts and connection words, so we noticed that the frame of the Sermon says that Jesus is preaching the gospel. Today that means proclaiming that Jesus died for our sins. Yet that wasn’t what Jesus said. His headline item was some stuff about the poor being blessed.

It does seem probable that the Atonement became this foundational doctrine as a way to rationalize the catastrophe of Jesus’s death. The Gospels do have Jesus say a few things that point toward the Atonement, but they are few enough, and isolated enough, that they could well be later insertions. They wouldn’t have to be deliberate fraud; the nearly inevitable garbling in recopying, and in oral transmission before written copies, can coalesce innocently around things that seem to make sense.

I still wonder about the Eucharist, though. It’s a weird tradition but it seems to have taken hold early as the essential Christian activity. That seems like a more likely outcome if the Eucharist was actually based on something Jesus did say, at a climactic moment, than if it was just invented by an otherwise rather uncreative community. Attributing too much creativity to the post-Jesus Christian community seems like projecting history backwards, as if the cultural behemoth that Christianity later became somehow summoned itself into existence like the plot of a bad time travel movie.

I have always wondered why Jesus got himself crucified. He seems savvy enough to have known the risks he was running. Why didn’t he just retreat to Galilee and let things cool down, go guerilla mode, play the long game? One plausible explanation is that he really did have a messiah complex and really did think that he might have to die as part of some divine plan.

He may not have had that in mind from the start, but it might well have grown on him. So I’m inclined to think of the Atonement, at least in some proto-version, as not a post-Jesus concept, but rather a late-Jesus concept.

[Marcus]

There have been times here when I’ve so much wanted to get even a tid bit of someone’s ideology or belief structure but have been disappointed. It’s more of what is believed rather than what is believed.

The only reason the mental gymnast asks and asks and asks is because his intent is to use any information he can gather to troll people. He has shown his true colors repeatedly over the years.

[Res Ipsa]

I come out at about the same place. Modern Christianity ignores Jesus’s instructions about how his followers should live their lives. I’d never heard the term “vampire Christianity,” but it fits.

I suppose what I find interesting is that non believers will frequently say, “If Jesus were alive/here” and then point out what He would think, what He would do, how He would judge, etc…as though they know the purposes and mind of Jesus from a book that they themselves distrust to give an accurate/complete description of Him and what He taught in its entirety, etc.

This, as THOUGH He were alive and resurrected in the flesh. And yet they don’t hold that belief in many instances. I’m not sure I understand that.

I hear folks saying what he would NOT do. Still, how do they know? It’s easy, I guess, to put words and actions into the mouth/mind of someone you think has been dead for 2000 years or didn’t exist in the first place.

A made up Jesus.

Regards,
MG

We have the words attributed to Jesus. We can all read them. For example, accumulation billions of dollars in wealth is antithetical to Jesus’s own words. Whether Jesus existed or not is a red herring. We can compare and contrast his reported words with the actions of his purported followers. You, on the other hand, seem to feel free to make up excuses for the contradiction based on your own imagination.

[Jersey Girl]

I suppose what I find interesting is that non believers will frequently say, “If Jesus were alive/here” and then point out what He would think, what He would do, how He would judge, etc…as though they know the purposes and mind of Jesus from a book that they themselves distrust to give an accurate/complete description of Him and what He taught in its entirety, etc.

Excuse me, what?

John Chapter 21 (KJV)

24This is the disciple which testifieth of these things, and wrote these things: and we know that his testimony is true.

25And there are also many other things which Jesus did, the which, if they should be written every one, I suppose that even the world itself could not contain the books that should be written. Amen.
.

[I Have Questions]

There are many Christians that are not members of the CofJCofLDS and never will be.

Given that there an estimated 2.4 billion Christians worldwide, members of the SLC LDS Church represent around 0.7% of that. And that's assuming all the names on the membership list are still believing Christians (which is unlikely). So to say "there are many Christians that are not members of CofJofLDS" is a massive understatement.

[I Have Questions]

I suppose what I find interesting is that non believers will frequently say, “If Jesus were alive/here” and then point out what He would think, what He would do, how He would judge, etc…as though they know the purposes and mind of Jesus from a book that they themselves distrust to give an accurate/complete description of Him and what He taught in its entirety, etc.

I'm pretty sure most people, believers and non believers alike, would say that if Jesus were alive today He wouldn't be committing financial reporting fraud and hoarding billions of dollars away in attempted secrecy. Or do you think He would?

[Limnor]

I’ll give you the evidence that is codified in the Book of Mormon that influences my distrust:

Alma 18:22 Now Ammon being wise, yet harmless, he said unto Lamoni: Wilt thou hearken unto my words, if I tell thee by what power I do these things? And this is the thing that I desire of thee.

23 And the king answered him, and said: Yea, I will believe all thy words. And thus he was caught with guile.

According to LDS-oriented commentary sources (though not necessarily official “First Presidency” doctrinal statements), that phrase is explained as follows:

- The word guile historically can mean “deceit or trickery.” However, in this context commentators argue it means an intelligent strategic approach, rather than deception. For example:

Although the word guile is frequently used to mean ‘deceitful cunning’ or ‘treachery,’ it can also denote the use of strategy. It is evidently used in the latter sense in Alma 18:23; in other words, Ammon planned or used strategy in arranging the questions he asked King Lamoni.”

https://Book of Mormon.online/ammon/41

“Guile” is redefined and built in to the previously mentioned “script.”

It occurred to me that this passage explains the mechanical script for Joseph’s proselytizing methodology.

Ammon, read as a stand-in for Joseph, is serving King Lamoni—here representing Reuben Hale—with humility while astonishing him through his “miraculous” acts. I see Alma 18 as representing the period of time that Reuben is acting as Joseph’s scribe.

Like Joseph shielding the Hale family (his flock) from outside influencers, Ammon protects the king’s flocks and wins his trust, while humbly serving the Hale family is spite of Isaac Hale’s disapproval.

When the king’s face—Reuben’s face—reveals his astonishment, Ammon—Joseph—lets him believe he can read his thoughts; an illusion of God-given insight.

The refrain “by the gift and power of God” serves as the standard script: Joseph, like Ammon, explains his abilities—including the ability to backward casts persons into an ancient setting—as occurring through a miraculous power rather than his natural ability to employ guile through observation and imagination.

How is Ammon able to serve King Lamoni in the face of opposition and read minds? Through the gift and power of God.

How was Joseph able to produce the Book of Mormon and provide revelations? Through the gift and power of God.