Mormon Beliefs: Mormon Prophets
Members of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, whose members are sometimes nicknamed Mormons, believe that God has returned prophets to the earth in modern times. This makes them different from most Christian religions.
After Jesus died, was resurrected, and left the earth, Paul taught,
“19 Now therefore ye are no more strangers and foreigners, but fellowcitizens with the saints, and of the household of God;
20And are built upon the foundation of the apostles and prophets, Jesus Christ himself being the chief corner stone;
21In whom all the building fitly framed together groweth unto an holy temple in the Lord: (Ephesians 2:20).
It is important to note he did not say the church used to be built on a foundation of apostles and prophets; he said it still was. In fact, the Bible never says prophets would permanently disappear from the earth.
From the very beginning of time, God has communicated with mankind through prophets. Although individuals always have the right to go to God directly to receive personal guidance and to receive confirmation of the teachings of the prophets, only prophets have ever been authorized to speak directly for God and to set official doctrine for His entire church. “Surely the Lord God will do nothing, but he revealeth his secret unto his servants the prophets (Amos 3:7).”
From time to time, people have chosen to reject God’s prophets in large number and during these times, God often withdrew prophets from the earth. However, in each dispensation he has returned them to help His children understand the specific times in which they live.
Why aren’t the teachings we already have in the Bible enough? If we study the entire Bible, both Old and New Testaments, and read them all the way through in order, we begin to get a sense of how God operates. We notice that all the commandments were not issued at the same time. The Ten Commandments, for instance, didn’t arrive until Moses was the prophet. God teaches His gospel line upon line, gently leading His children to a fullness of the gospel. If one prophet was all the world needed, Adam would have gotten all the revelations and no more would have been needed. Instead, God continued to send prophets who added to the knowledge we had.
In addition, God gave commandments to some generations He did not give to others. Noah was commanded to build an ark and Moses was commanded to lead his people through the wilderness. In each generation, there are unique circumstances that require specific commandments to be obeyed only by the people of those generations. Today, no one expects us to build an ark or head for the wilderness. Without a living prophet during those times, the people would have been in danger, with no way to know what was needed at that time in God’s history. They found safety by getting immediate teachings directly related to their unique circumstances.
Today, we live in a time that is extremely different from Biblical times. There are new challenges and issued the prophets of the past could not have imagined. There was no need for the prophets of those times to seek God’s guidance on these issues because they simply didn’t exist then. For this reason, we need a prophet to help us know how to cope with new moral challenges. We see the wide variation of interpretations the churches, even within the large Protestant movement, for example, give to these issues and realize we need a prophet to tell us what God wants us to know about them.
Another reason prophets are needed today is to help us understand the teachings of the Bible. Studying the history of the Bible shows us it was not written as a single document. It is a collection of many different documents that were collected long after Jesus and the apostles died. A committee determined which documents should be included and not everyone agreed on the choices, leaving the Catholics, for instance, with different books included in their Bible. As we read the Bible, we see references to prophets we no longer have records for and so we know some things are missing.
The Bible was not written in English, and so those of us who must read it in English are relying on the translation choices of others. There are thousands of translations of the Bible and each one differs depending on the choices made by the translators. It is essentially impossible to make a readable word-for-word translation of another language and so interpreters must make choices and those choices can impact how we understand the teachings.
The Bible is a powerful and critical tool for learning God’s gospel, but it is not enough on its own. It requires the help of a prophet to understand what the original authors meant as they wrote the scriptures. The many churches that exist today in the Christian world use the same Bible but translate it in very different ways, causing denominations to argue and divide into even more denominations.
The Mormon prophets, from the first modern prophet Joseph Smith to the current prophet, Thomas S. Monson, are prophet in the manner of the Biblical prophets. Mormons do not worship their prophets any more than Christians in other religions worship Moses or Abraham. Their primary task is to testify of Jesus Christ, to help us understand who God is, and to help us learn what He wants us to do. They denounce sin and teach us the consequences of our choices. From time to time, they may be called on to prophesy of future events. In other words, they do just what ancient prophets did, because this is the pattern God set for His church.
Learn more about Joseph Smith.
Learn more about the current prophet, Thomas S. Monson.
