The Seventy's Course in Theology, Second Year: Outline History of the Dispensations of the GospelRoberts, B. H. (Brigham Henry)
Religion
The Seventy's Course in Theology, Second Year: Outline History of the Dispensations of the Gospel
Roberts, B. H. (Brigham Henry)
Latter Day Saint churches -- Doctrines
_5. God Revealed in the Person of Jesus Christ:_ "This completes
the survey I intended to make of this field. [Reference is made to a
review of prevailing ideas about God in the world at the advent of
Jesus.] Nowhere have we found a knowledge of the true and living God.
Nowhere a teacher who comes with definite knowledge of this subject of
all subjects;--a subject so closely related to eternal life, that to
know God is said in the scriptures to be life eternal; and of course,
the cor-life. We can form no other conclusion from the survey we
have taken of the world's ideas respecting the existence and nature
of God, than that forced upon us--the world stood in sore need of a
revelation of God. He whom the Egyptians and Indians sought for in
their Pantheism, must be made known. God, whom Confucius would have
men respect, but keep at a distance, must draw near. The "Alfader" of
the Goths, undefined, incomprehensible to them, must be brought out of
the northern darkness into glorious light. The God-idea that prevailed
among the Greek philosophers must be brought from the mists of their
idle speculations and made to stand before the world. He whom the Jews
were seeking to deny and forsake must be revealed again to the children
of men. And lo! when the vail falls from the revelation that God gives
of himself--what form is that which steps forth from the background
of the world's ignorance and mystery? A Man, as God lives! Jesus of
Nazareth--the great Peasant Teacher of Judea. He is God revealed
henceforth to the world. They who thought God impersonal, without form
must know him henceforth as a person in the form of man. They who have
held him to be without quality, must henceforth know him as possessed
of the qualities of Jesus of Nazareth. They who have regarded him
as infinitely terrible, must henceforth know him also as infinitely
gentle. Those who would hold him at a distance, will now permit him to
draw near. This is the world's mystery revealed. This is God manifested
in the flesh. This is the Son of God, who comes to reveal the Father,
for he is the express image and likeness of that Father's person,
and the reflection of that Father's mind. Henceforth when men shall
say, Show us the Father, he shall point to himself as the complete
revelation of the Father, and say, "He that hath seen me, hath seen the
Father also." Henceforth, when men shall dispute about the "being" and
"nature" of God, it shall be a perfect answer to uphold Jesus Christ
as the complete, perfect revelation and manifestation of God, and
through all the ages it shall be so; there shall be no excuse for men
saying they know not God, for all may know him, from the least to the
greatest, so tangible, so real a revelation has God given of himself in
the person and character of Jesus Christ. He lived his life on earth--a
life of sorrow and of gentleness, it's pathway strewn with actions
fraught with mercy, kindness, and love. A man he was, approved of God
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