The Restoration is a video that retells the story of Joseph Smith from his early boyhood until he sets out to spread his new gospel and establish his new church.
The story of his family life portrays his family as farmers and does not mention their preoccupation with treasure hunting. This would be an important detail to mention since it is in connection with treasure hunting that Joseph learns certain arts of divination.
These practices will later play a part in his finding the golden plates and his translation of them. Joseph states that his parents “Spared no pains in instructing me in the Christian religion.” However, we find out that his father did not attend church services with the family and when Joseph’s mother is asked by one of the children why he did not attend she explains that, “Father has a lot of faith,” but that, “He shows it differently than some folks.”
There are two main things to point out about this video one is what it states and the other is what it does not state.
Joseph states that there was confusion and strife amongst the various denominations and that,
“The teachers understood the same scriptures so differently as to destroy all confidence in settling the question by an appeal to the Bible.”
We must empathize with this state of affairs and must acknowledge that it has always been so. However, Joseph’s conclusion is tantamount to an appeal to absolute relativism since what he stated is like saying that if one person says that the sky is blue and another person says that it is brown we could never really know the sky’s color. Keep in mind that not all interpretations are created equal, some are based on honest ignorance, some on manipulation of the texts and some on the best possible attempts to determine what the text is telling us.
Note also what Joseph accomplished in the end, he simply became yet another voice who added to the confusion and strife. The only thing that he had going for him is that he somehow talked people into believing that they were to pray and rely on a feeling and not to test all things and test the spirits (1st Thessalonians 5:21 & 1st John 4:1).
After some days of personally meeting with Mormon missionaries I noticed that their answer to everything seemed to be pray about it-ultimately pray about whether Mormonism is true or not. I explained that they were getting ahead of themselves since I first wanted to know and understand what Mormonism was and only then would I consider praying about it. I explained that there were certain things that I did not have to pray about. For instance, if a Hindu came to my door and invited me to an ashram to worship idols I would not have to say, “Let me pray about it and see how I feel.” The Bible is perfectly clear about worshipping idols and so I would simply say no. Thus, if once Mormonism was fully explained to me I determined that it violated scripture I would not have to pray about it.
Now to what the video did not state. Joseph’s life story is followed to its pinnacle, which is the revelation in the forest where he had gone to inquire of the Lord as to which denomination he should join. The video presents this awesome and most important moment and has Joseph narrating as follows:
“My object in going to inquire of the Lord was to know which of all the sects was right….I was answered that I must join none of them. And many other things did He say unto me.” [the ellipsis points appear in the video’s subtitles]
This revelation is watered-down and we are left with knowing that many other things did He say unto me but we do not know what these things were. Yet, we do know based on further research that one of the things that he was told was not merely to join none of them but the reason for not joining them. As quoted more fully in our article Mormonism is an Offensive Religion he was dissuaded from joining them because God told Joseph,
“…that I must join none of them, for they were all wrong…all their creeds were an abomination…those professors were all corrupt…’they draw near to me with their lips, but their hearts are far from me, they teach for doctrines the commandments of men, having a form of godliness, but they deny the power thereof.’ He again forbade me to join with any of them…”
Certainly, such as video is meant to be succinct but anyone who has studied Mormonism knows that this is the manner in which modern day Mormonism functions. They have become very watered-down, at least on the surface, and brush over vast contradictions by stating that they merely have certain little differences-at least upon their initial missionary endeavors.
A Newsweek article made the following observations preceding the 2002 Olympics that took place in Salt Lake City, Utah (the center of the Mormon universe):
“the church now insists it be regarded as a Christian church…the church’s hierarchy recently advised the media that the term Mormon Church is no longer acceptable. Henceforth, officials declared, short references to the church should read: ‘The Church of Jesus Christ.’ In this way the church hopes to emphasize what Mormons share with historic Christianity, not what makes them different…In 1971, images of Jesus appeared only five times in the church’s official monthly publication, the Ensign; in 1999, the Ensign published 119 of them…Jan Shipps, who has studied the Saints for 40 years. [states] ‘After a century of cultivating their separate identity as a religious people, Mormons now want to stress their affinities with traditional Christianity yet highlight their uniqueness.”1
We must be ever vigilant to note what Mormonism is stating and what it is not and must research both areas in order to ascertain the facts of the matter. Mormonism’s lack of confidence in settling the question by an appeal to the Bible and their opposition to orthodox-biblical doctrine has lead them to concoct various and strange doctrines.