The basis for all that claims to be Christian is that Jesus Christ, the Son of God, lived a perfect life and died a perfect death, arose to bring redemption to all who would call upon God through Him. Yet, one cult teaches that Jesus attained His perfection after His resurrection from the dead. That, of course, means that He was not perfect before He arose from the new tomb of Joseph of Arimathaea. Lest the readers think these folk are being misrepresented, we quote from their leading dignitaries. A contemporary of the founder of this religion wrote:
That Jesus attained perfection following his resurrection is confirmed in the… It records the visit of the resurrected Lord to the people of ancient America. There he repeated the important injunction previously cited, but with one very significant addition. He said, “I would that ye should be perfect even as I, or your Father who is in heaven is perfect” (3 Nephi 12:48). This time he listed himself along with his Father as a perfect personage. Previously, he had not (See Matt. 5:48).
Let it first be noted that the Matthew 5:48 text is used out of context. Look at the theme of our Lord’s statement. He was speaking to His disciples regarding love, and He told them to be perfect in love as our Father is perfect in love. He did not, even remotely, imply that the Father only is perfect, and that He was not. If He had not been perfect before His resurrection, He could not have been the propitiation for our sins, since that required a perfect sacrifice. Time and again the Bible speaks of the perfection of Christ. We are told that He was tempted in all points as we are, yet without sin! One without sin is perfect! He was the Lamb of God who came to take away the sin of the world. As that Lamb, slain for our redemption, He had to be without spot and blemish. That is perfection and nothing less.
John declared that Jesus was God before He came to earth (John 1:1-2). Did He lose His perfection, or is the Father imperfect too? Paul testified that Jesus did not consider His being in the form of God a thing to be clung to, but came in human form, humbled Himself, and became obedient to death, even the death of the cross. John also said after Jesus came to earth, or after the Word became flesh, the disciples beheld His glory, the glory as of the only begotten of the Father, full of grace and truth. Paul declared that in Christ dwelt the fullness of the Godhead bodily. To declare Jesus to be perfect only after His resurrection is to fly into the face of biblical teaching that is so clear as to make us wonder how people ever missed it. Furthermore, such passages as Matthew 10:37; John 5:23; 14:1 and Hebrews 1:6 teach Jesus is worthy to receive honor, love, faith and worship as is the Father. Long before Jesus ever came to this earth, God the Father called him “God” (Psalm 45:6-7; Hebrews 1:8-9). One is simply amazed at the temerity of false prophets and the biblically ignorant pronouncements they make about the Savior of the world! It is so shocking that we wonder how they can deceive anyone into believing these things. Although the fact that they do, speaks of the ignorance of our people of the Christ of the Scriptures and the Scriptures themselves.
Dear reader, Jesus is God. He has always been God. He is the Creator of the universe (Colossians 1:16-18), one of the personalities of Elohim who created all things in the beginning. We do not worship three gods, we worship only one God who is manifested in three personalities. We worship one Deity presented to us in Scripture as the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit. The folk of whom we write worship, or at least have, as one of them said, perhaps millions of gods, but true believers in Yahweh worship only the divine Godhead. Paul said that Godhead was in Christ when he lived in this vale of tears and sin. There is no such thing as God’s being imperfect in any sense.
