Is Mormonism a Christian denomination?

Mormonism rejects Essential Christian Doctrine, so it is theologically classified as a cult.

1. Mormons deny Christ’s deity

They believe he was Lucifer’s spirit brother. They believe he is the Son of God. But then they go on to say that Jesus is a God and that all men and women are gods in embryo.

2. Mormons deny the doctrine of original sin

They believe it is not possible to sin until you are eight years old.

3. Mormons deny Christ’s preservation of His church

They believe the true church vanished from the earth after the death of the apostles, and that Joseph Smith had to restore it with his “latter-day saints”

4. Mormons deny the Trinity

They believe God the Father and Jesus have bodies of “flesh and bone,” that the Holy Spirit is “a personage of Spirit,” and that the Trinity is pagan in origin.

5. Mormons deny the inerrancy of Scripture

They believe the Bible can be trusted only as far it is translated correctly

6. Mormons deny Christ was begotten by the Holy Ghost in His incarnation

They believe God the Father had sex with Mary, “instead letting any other man do it”

7. Mormons deny the immutability of God

 They believe God was “perhaps once child, and mortal like we ourselves’’

8. Mormons deny the biblical concept of hell

They believe all can be rescued, except for “sons of perdition” — those who are apostate Mormons. 

The saga of Mormonism began in 1820, when a young man named Joseph Smith, Jr., purportedly experienced a spectacular vision. Two celestial personages appeared to him, claiming all existing churches were wrong, all their creeds were an abomination, and all their professors were corrupt. These beings made it clear to Joseph that he had been chosen to restore, rather thanreform a church that had disappeared from the face of the earth. In 1823 the angel Moroni was said to have visited young Joseph and divulged the location of gold plates containing the “fullness of the ever lasting gospel.” These plates — abridged by Moroni and his father, Mormon, fourteen hundred years earlier — were written in “reformed Egyptian hieroglyphics.”Smith supposedly found, buried along with the plates, a pair of magi cal eyeglasses that he used to trans late the cryptic writing into English. The result was a new revelation called the Book of Mormon and a new religion called Mormonism. Organizationally, Mormonism began when John the Baptist allegedly ordained Smith and Oliver Cowdery (a schoolteacher who assisted Smith by transcribing the inscriptions on the gold plates) to the Aaronic priesthood. Subsequent to the appearance of John the Baptist, the apostles Peter, James, and John were said to have conferred the Melchizedek priesthood and apostle ship on Smith and Cowdery, giving them the authority to act on behalf of Jesus Christ in this last dispensation. On April 6, 1830, the Mormon church was officially launched. Revelations in Mormonism are not relegated to personal appearances by angels like Moroni or apostles like Peter. However, the Mormon church claims three volumes of Scripture, or “standard works,” in addition to the Bible. The foremost of these revelations is the Book of Mormon, purportedly “the record of God’s dealings with the ancient inhabitants of the Americas” which “contains, as does the Bible, the fullness of the everlasting gospel.” Mormons believe the prophet Ezekiel was talking about the Book of Mormon when he alluded to the stick of Joseph

Ezekiel 37:16

“And you, son of man, take for yourself one stick and write on it, ‘For Judah and for the sons of Israel, his companions’; then take another stick and write on it, ‘For Joseph, the stick of Ephraim and all the house of Israel, his companions.’

How millions can take the Book of Mormon seriously is almost beyond comprehension. Smith referred to it as “the most correct of any book on earth, and the keystone of our religion.

This is modalistic and militates against Trinitarian theology.

Ether 3:14 (Book of Mormon)

 “Behold, I am Jesus Christ, I am the Father and the Son” 

Doctrine and Covenants 

a compilation of alleged divine revelations given to the Mormon church — is equally problematic. Among the far-fetched revelations it has foisted on humanity is the doctrine of polygamy. It was not until the Mormons were threatened with exile that their president, Wilford Woodruff, received a revelation relegating polygamy to the afterlife. He is in disagreement with what Jesus taught about the afterlife.

Matthew 22:30

For in the resurrection they neither marry nor are given in marriage, but are like angels of God in heaven.

The Pearl of Great Price 

This is the third extra-biblical revelation in the Mormon Canon.  It was used for years by Mormons to prevent African-Americans from entering their priest hood and consequently from being exalted to godhood in the system’s celestial kingdom. Mormon prophet Brigham Young went so far as to declare that the reason “Negroes” have a “flat nose and black skin” is because God had put a curse on them.

Cited Sources:  The Book of Mormon by Joseph Smith, The Mormon Mirage by Hank Hanegraaff