But let us examine these premises and arguments of Thom in detail. I always like to go to the Bible. We can only hope that Aquinas may have on occasion, though we know he was instructed not to.

●Wrong, as usual, no one ever instructed Aquinas to not study and use the Bible. He remains a renowned expositor of Scripture. Aquinas was a gifted exegete whose Bible commentaries are still available. A number of them can be read online. Here is the address for his commentary on the Psalms:

http://www4.desales.edu/~philtheo/loughlin/ATP/imgs/church.jpg

You wrote: These reflections will demonstrate that these definitions of God, together with the one with which Thom commences his argument, "God is invisible," need scriptural light brought to them for the truth to be known.

●Okay, cool, let’s bring some “scriptural light” on the subject of the invisibility of God.

Colossians 1:15-17 He is the image of the invisible God, the firstborn over all creation. 16 For by him all things were created: things in heaven and on earth, visible and invisible, whether thrones or powers or rulers or authorities; all things were created by him and for him. 17 He is before all things, and in him all things hold together.
1 Timothy 1:17 Now to the King eternal, immortal, invisible, the only God, be honor and glory for ever and ever. Amen.
Hebrews 11:27 By faith he (Moses) left Egypt, not fearing the king's anger; he persevered because he saw him who is invisible.

●Sorry, the Bible does not support the LDS notions that God the Father has a body of “flesh and bones” and that He lives on Kolob.

He is the Firstborn as in the LITERAL (BORN) Son of God the Father.

●There, of course, are many, many problems with the notion that the Son was literally born of the Father. I will list a few here; but, let me also note that there is no problem with understanding the Colossians word “firstborn” to signify preeminence and not chronology or natural generation. I will explain this after I list reasons why the Son cannot be literally “born” of the Father.

1. To be born implies chronology. Therefore, if the Son was literally born then he was born sequentially in time. He must then be subject to time—or a temporal being. This means he cannot be the Supreme Being and must be a created being. If so, there can be no efficacious salvation for all of humanity through his sacrificial death.
2. To be born implies the existence of a goddess deity. This, of course, is what the LDS propagates. The notion of a goddess deity is an anathema to both Christians and Jews. Additionally, the belief in anything other than one Supreme Being is polytheistic and also anathema to both Christians and Jews.
3. To be born implies temporal creation. If the divine nature of Christ is in any way part of the temporal creation then he cannot be fully God as understood by Christians, Jews and Muslims. Only the fully divine nature of Christ is efficacious for the salvation of mankind.
4. If the Son was literally born then the witness of Scripture is wrong. For example John 1:1-14 would be a false witness of the full deity of Christ.

Regarding Colossians 1:15:

●What is important here is not the exact word used, but the meaning poured into the word “firstborn.” The biblical meaning poured into “firstborn” does not necessitate the meaning of someone born sequentially in time. This is particularly true in regard to messianic allusions. In the messianic use of the word “firstborn” it means preeminence and not chronology. In fact, the messianic use of “firstborn” strikingly goes against the concept of the preeminence of the one chronologically born first. The biblical motif used throughout the Bible is of the “first shall be last” and the “last shall be first.” And this is exactly how the “firstborn” is used in these passages. For example:

1. Ephraim and Manasseh: Manasseh was the oldest son but Ephraim (the younger) received the blessing from Jacob (Israel) and is called the “firstborn”—meaning having preeminence over all the other brothers. Note this Scripture:

Jeremiah 31:9 For I am a Father to Israel, And Ephraim is My firstborn.

2. David and his brothers: David was the youngest son of Jesse, but was anointed king over Israel. His throne was also anointed preeminent over all other thrones. David and his throne (messianic) are deemed the “firstborn.” Note this Scripture:

Psalm 89:20 and 26-29 I have found My servant David; With My holy oil I have anointed him, 26 He shall cry to Me, ‘You are my Father, My God, and the rock of my salvation.’ 27 Also I will make him My firstborn, The highest of the kings of the earth. 28 My mercy I will keep for him forever, And My covenant shall stand firm with him. 29 His seed also I will make to endure forever, And his throne as the days of heaven.

●The problem for the LDS, as usual, is that Joseph Smith did not have a solid biblical education and, therefore, did not understand biblical motifs and imagery—particularly those rooted in OT history. The Psalm 89 passage is a coronation text that declares the preeminence of the messiah over all other kingdoms. However, David—to whom it was first addressed—was the last born son of Jesse. To rectify this, the LDS must now insist that David was actually and “literally” born first to Jesse. This, however, would completely destroy the biblical motif of the “last shall be first.” But, what the heck, at all costs, for the LDS, Joseph Smith must be right.

Please explain under what pretense, Jesus Christ prayed to His Father in the Garden of Gethsemanee?

●Webster’s defines “pretense” as “an inadequate or insincere attempt to attain a certain condition or quality” or a “professed rather than real intention or purpose…” In other words, you are begging the question. Your question assumes that there is something insincere about Jesus praying to the Father in the Garden. Of course, this is completely fallacious and represents a continued and studied refusal on your part to define categories. See, it is one thing to disagree with someone, it is quite another to misrepresent their position or beliefs. For example, as I have stated many times, I disagree with the Muslim view of God. However, my disagreement is based upon an intellectually honest representation of their actual beliefs. You, on the other hand, steadfastly and mendaciously refuse to represent Christian beliefs for what they actually are.

●I could do the same thing with Mormonism. I could continuously insist that the LDS propagates polygamy. Every time you post a comment even remotely touching on marriage I could imply that Mormons are polygamous. You, of course, would strongly object to this and insist that I am misrepresenting the LDS. Furthermore, you would insist that I do not know what I am “talking about” and that I should stop misrepresenting LDS beliefs. If, however, I was of a mind to act like you, I would simply ignore the protests and march ahead with my mendacious misrepresentations.

●Here of course is the obvious problem—which you are clearly aware of but refuse to admit to. The Triune nature of God and the Incarnation are two separate theological categories and doctrines. They are perfectly compatible. When we are talking about God’s invisibility we are speaking of the eternal Triune nature of God. On the other hand, when Jesus Christ prayed to the Father we are looking at the doctrine of the Incarnation. In Christ’s human nature he suffered and did things as any human might—including crying out to the Father during his hour of temptation. While one can disagree with the doctrine of the Incarnation (as do Muslims and Jews); yet, it is not hard to grasp. You insist on confusing the categories of the Trinity with the Incarnation. All the while you know better. This says a lot about your religion.

If I were to explain this using grades, then I would say that the "A" and "B" grades makeup about 15-20% of the over all group which fits with the expected norm, and the "F" range makes up about 15-20% of the group, once again within the normal range. Now the remaining 60% should peak at 75% on a grading scale with steep fall off to either side, but it seems to peek at about 60% which is much closer to the failing end.

It seems like there is something I could do to help motivate the group into a highly level of involvement so we at least reflect normal group dynamics, though I wouldn't be opposed to having the curve break on the high end.

●Hey, this is a very interesting comment, Puri—a fascinating Bell Curve computation. Probably without being able to do any kind of in-depth study, my guess is that most pastors would intuitively agree with your math. Short of using cult techniques, the question is: what can be done to move the peak up? Persecution, of course, is nearly a surefire solution to apathy. However, persecution is not something we have control over.
●Something that seems to be producing good fruit for us is a renewed emphasis on evangelism. What I mean by this, though, might come under the heading of a “full court press.” For us this includes prayer teams that pray and fast, very frequent and powerful personal testimonies of God’s life-changing power, consistent teaching on the importance of evangelism, equipping ministries, and leaders that are willing to actively engage themselves in evangelism. In my view, all of this (and more) must be unrelenting for a congregation to become infected with a spirit of “living beyond themselves.” We have been working on this intensively for several months and I think that we are just now beginning to see a few sparks of spontaneous combustion in the congregation. I’m praying that a fire breaks out.

The Orthodox view of god needs to ignore the actual life of Jesus Christ. This view is no more propogated by Joseph Smith than the truths in the Bible are propogated by King James.

●Again, you are mixing categories (apples and oranges). How many times is it necessary to repeat that the orthodox belief is that Christ had two natures—one fully human and one fully divine?

●One more time: when the Bible refers to the invisibility of God it is referring to the Triune eternal nature of the infinite and unapproachable Supreme Being, Creator of all things—Father, Son and Holy Spirit—one God in three persons. On the other hand, Jesus Christ is the Incarnate Son of God having two natures. Therefore, as Colossians states, “For in Christ all the fullness of the Deity lives in bodily form,” (Col 2:9). This verse by itself should be enough for you to understand the orthodox biblical view of Christ. Implied in the statement, “in Christ all the fullness of the Deity lives in bodily form” is the concept that outside of Christ, all of the fullness of Deity does not live in “bodily form.” This seems so obvious to the normal reading of the text and the overall message of Colossians one finds it hard to understand why people like you cannot grasp it.
●Try doing this. Every Christian here at TFD is willing to posit that in the bodily incarnation of Christ all of the Deity of God exists. Additionally, all Christians here would be willing to posit that Christ’s bodily (human) nature is visible. Okay, fine, we all agree on this. Now, please argue your case for the visibility of the eternal Supreme Being of God—separate from the Incarnation. This is what the Bible is referring to and what we are talking about. Stay in one category, please. Apples please and not an appleorange.

So Christ because of pain was deluded into believing there was, ah, some other God out there called his Father that He should pray to. (We both know you believe Christ knew there was no other God.) Is this what you are saying, that He fwas unaware He was talking to Himself?

●Your statement, “We both know you (Thom) believe Christ knew there was no other God” seems to indicate that you have a misapprehension of the doctrine of the Incarnation. You note: “Is this what you are saying, that He fwas unaware He was talking to Himself?”

Remember the doctrine of the Incarnation posits that Jesus was fully divine and fully human. Therefore, the prayer of Jesus in the Garden arose from the genuineness of his human nature and not the genuineness of his divine nature. This also means that Jesus had a complete human nature including a rational soul. The divine nature did not supply or supplant the intellect of the human nature. The Chalcedonian Creed puts it this way:

…(O)ur Lord Jesus Christ, the same perfect in Godhead and also perfect in manhood; truly God and truly man, of a reasonable [rational] soul and body; consubstantial [co-essential] with the Father according to the Godhead, and consubstantial with us according to the Manhood;

●The point is that if Christ’s divine nature supplied the rational soul of Jesus then—as Peter often says—that would make Jesus simply a “sock puppet” operated by the divine nature. Therefore, in Christ Jesus there existed consubstantially both a divine and human intellect. This does not mean that Jesus only prayed as a man or only prayed in his human nature. What this means is that Jesus only had need to pray because of his human nature. The Son, as viewed apart from the Incarnation would have no need to pray. God does not need to pray. Only the fact that God (in the Son) limited Himself by assuming a genuine human existence leads to the prayer in the Garden. Therefore, we do not need to understand the prayer in the Garden as God praying to Himself—this would make no sense. Additionally, biblically it is appropriate to address prayer to the Father because in it is from the Father that all things logically proceed (with the understanding that this is not a chronological procession).

●In the Garden we see a Jesus as fully human and not exercising the full prerogatives of deity. He was willing to limit himself to the life shared by all humanity. Consequently, he was relying on the Holy Spirit for his every word and for every miracle that he performed. Therefore, in the Garden, Jesus was praying to the divine source of his human strength, namely, Abba, the Father. In fact, we might add that he was praying to the Father (in his human nature) through the power of the Holy Spirit. This would be very similar to the Holy Spirit praying and interceding through the believer to God the Father.

Romans 8:26-27 In the same way, the Spirit helps us in our weakness. We do not know what we ought to pray for, but the Spirit himself intercedes for us with groans that words cannot express. 27 And he who searches our hearts knows the mind of the Spirit, because the Spirit intercedes for the saints in accordance with God's will.

That's cool with that math and all. So in order to make the temporarily mortal Jesus Christ work, we should think of God as filling the immensity of, well, everything! That is one huge God. (I hesitate to even place an exclamation point, given that doesn't begin to express the astonishment associated with writing it).

●Of course you must realize that God filling the immensity of everything is not astonishing in the least to Jews, Muslims or Christians. It is, however, completely astonishing to Mormons whose deity is on Kolob.
●Secondarily, the idea of “one huge God” shows again your lack of understanding of Christian and biblical theology. The word “huge” is a spatial term that implies measurement. God is without dimension. He cannot be measured because He is without spatial dimension. Spatial terminology is appropriate to those things that have height, width and depth but not to spiritual beings. Things that have spatial dimension are limited to place and time. You can check with the BYU philosophy department on this. Yes, and again, we know the Mormon deity is limited to spatial dimensions and cannot fill the immensity of everything because he is in one place at a time--mostly Kolob.

Fig. 1. Kolob, signifying the first creation, nearest to the celestial, or the residence of God. First in government, the last pertaining to the measurement of time. The measurement according to celestial time, which celestial time signifies one day to a cubit. One day in Kolob is equal to a thousand years according to the measurement of this earth, which is called by the Egyptians Jah-oh-eh.

Fig. 2. Stands next to Kolob, called by the Egyptians Oliblish, which is the next grand governing creation near to the celestial or the place where God resides; holding the key of power also, pertaining to other planets; as revealed from God to Abraham, as he offered sacrifice upon an altar, which he had built unto the Lord. (Book of Abraham, Facsimile 2, Figure #1 explanation.)

"And where these two facts exist, there shall be another fact above them, that is, there shall be another planet whose reckoning of time shall be longer still; and thus there shall be the reckoning of the time of one planet above another, until thou come nigh unto Kolob, which Kolob is after the reckoning of the Lord’s time; which Kolob is set nigh unto the throne of God, to govern all those planets which belong to the same order as that upon which thou standest." (Book of Abraham 3:4-9; Facsimile #2, explanation to Figure #2.)

Hymns, If You Could Hie to Kolob, no. 284

1. If you could hie to Kolob
In the twinkling of an eye,
And then continue onward
With that same speed to fly,
Do you think that you could ever,
Through all eternity,
Find out the generation
Where Gods began to be?

something noteworthy; The singularity theorum asserts that all theories that attribute more than three spatial dimensions and one temporal dimension to the world of experience are unstable. The instabilities that exist in systems of such extra dimensions would result in their rapid collapse into a singularity. That would be bad.

●What in the world does your comment have to do with the notion that God lives on Kolob and has spatial dimensions that limit him to a specific place and time? By the way, how many light years is it to Kolob? How many light years does it take for a message to get to the “Father” and return back again?

●Here are some questions for you as a fancier of “If You Could Hie to Kolob.” Okay, how many generations of gods are we talking about that go back in time to “Where the Gods began to be?” I’ll accept a ballpark number just so we have a rough estimate how many deities we are dealing with here. 600 trillion? 900 trillion? A quadrillion? Also, was there a beginning for the Gods when they “began?” If so, then what was before them? If not, how could the present Mormon deity ever arrive at “now?” If there was an infinitely eternal number of Gods stretching back endlessly; how could they ever move forward to now? If, for instance, there are a quattuordecillion number of Mormon deities wouldn’t that exceed the number of stars in the universe (estimated to be 10 to the 21st power)? If, though, there are an infinite number of deities stretching back endlessly in time, doesn’t that mean that there must be at least a quattuordecillion Mormon deities for every single planet and star in the universe? How can a Mormon possibly worship a quattuordecillion deities and their goddess “Mother” wives? And, finally, how many deities are on Kolob?

●I will look forward to your erudite answers.

●If we could “hie” (hasten) to Kolob, how fast would we need to go?

It is illogical, don't you agree, to define god's existance in a manner that cannot be tested?

So Christ because of pain was deluded into believing there was, ah, some other God out there called his Father that He should pray to. (We both know you believe Christ knew there was no other God.) Is this what you are saying, that He fwas unaware He was talking to Himself?

Please explain under what pretense, Jesus Christ prayed to His Father in the Garden of Gethsemanee?

Gecko’s response when asked questions:

Answers are dispersed on a need to know basis by God. There you have it. Go to Him.

●First of all, I thought you were a god-in-the-making so why can’t you answer even one of my questions? As John well stated: “Gecko has no answer, because there is no answer.” You cannot answer even one of my questions with a coherent response because you know that Mormonism is a completely incoherent, jumbled, and rambling set of ideas that are not only self-defeating but stultifyingly illogical. Additionally, the notion of Kolob as God’s “residence” was created by Joseph Smith from his supposed “translations” of Egyptian papyri that don’t have the foggiest connection to the actual hieroglyphics of the papyri.

●You have only two choices in regard to the hymn “hie” to Kolob—both of which are self-defeating to the coherence of your religion.

Option 1. Either there was a beginning of the “Gods” which means that there must be a being that created the first “God” and this being must be able to create from nothing. Additionally this being must be self-existent, immutable, and infinite. Ergo, we are describing the Christian God. Or…

Option 2. There is no beginning to the “Gods” and they stretch back to an eternally infinite past. Therefore, at a minimum there must be quattuordecillion Mormon deities for every single planet and star in the universe. If you are wondering, the number quattudordecillion is “hugely” beyond the number of stars in the universe. Therefore, a good Mormon such as yourself could not even count the number of deities for Earth even if you lived many, many lifetimes. This does not, of course, count the number of goddess “Mothers” and all of their “spirit children.” If the “Father” and goddess “Mother” are any indication of how prolific the average Mormon deity is (billions so far), there must be an unimaginable number of “spirit children” for Earth and every other planet and star in the universe.

●Bottom line: If Option 1 is correct, then Mormonism is clearly wrong and Christianity is obviously true in its theology. If Option 2 is correct, Mormons have an insanely incoherent theology which no one could possibly believe in unless they refused to think about it. Obviously, both Option 1 and Option 2 are correct.