19 Evidences in Support of the Godhead

The Godhead is the LDS view that the Father, Son, and Holy Ghost are three separate Gods who operate in perfect harmony.  We believe the Father and Son possess tangible bodies of flesh and bone resembling (in fact the blueprint of) our own bodies, while the Holy Ghost is a Personage of Spirit.

1.  Matthew 12:31-32 states that all manner of blasphemy (even words spoken against Jesus) will be forgiven, except for blasphemy against the Holy Ghost.  Accordingly the members of the Godhead must be separate, otherwise how can be blaspheme against one without blaspheming them all?

2.  During the creation God made man in His own image.  Hebrews 1:3 says Jesus is in the express image of the Father's person.  If we and Christ are made in the image of God, and Jesus was so similar to us that the Pharisees thought he was a regular man, doesn't it follow that we were made to physically resemble deity?

3.  While on the cross Jesus cried out to the Father, "My God, my God, why hast thou forsaken me?"  It would be impossible for the Father to forsake the Son in any way unless the Father and Son were separate beings.

 4.  God has been seen several times by men such as Abraham, Moses, Isaiah, and Stephen.

5.  In the New Testament, Stephen sees the Son standing to the Father's right, accentuating their separation and proving the Father is not a shapeless spirit that permeates the universe, but actually has physical dimensions.

6.  The scriptures say it's the Holy Ghost who dwells inside us.  In Matthew 10:19-20 Jesus tells his disciples it's "the Spirit of [their] Father that dwelleth in [them]" which gives them utterance.  However, in Mark 11:13 the phrase "Spirit of your Father" is replaced with "the Holy Ghost".  Nowhere is there any clear indication that the Father or Son ever physically inhabit our bodies.

7.  In 1 Kings 19 Elijah goes to commune with the Lord.  A plethora of natural disasters occur including strong winds, an earthquake, and a fire, but in each case the Lord is not in the wind, earthquake, or fire.  If God were omnipresent He would be in these natural disasters, but He is absent.

8.  Holy writ describes God as having hands, feet, a face, and back parts.

9.  In John 10:30 Jesus says, "I and my Father are one."  This means the Father and Son are one in their goals and actions, in much the same way those who were building the tower of Babel were described as being one.  It was divine unity, and not physical oneness, that inspired Christ to say in his great intercessory prayer, "Holy Father, keep through thine own name those whom thou hast given me that they may be one, as we are."

10.  God speaks with someone during the creation.  Genesis 1:26 says: And God said, Let us make man in our image, after our likeness...  Whoever God was speaking to, it had to be a being capable of creating man.  Not only that, but this being must have had the same image and likeness of God in order for us to be made in the image and likeness of both.  God could have been speaking to no one else but God.  Furthermore, the Hebrew word used for God is Elohim, which is a plural noun.  The use of Elohim, along with plural pronouns, confirms that more than one God was involved in the creation.

11.  In John 8:54 Jesus says, "If I honor myself, my honor is nothing: it is my Father that honoreth me; of whom ye say that he is your God."  By rejecting self honor while accepting the honor of his Father, Christ highlights their separation.

12.  Collossians 1:15 calls Jesus the firstborn of every creature, and both words: firstborn and creature denote something created.  Furthermore, Proverbs chapter 8 teaches about wisdom, saying in verse 22 that the Lord possessed wisdom "in the beginning of his way".  This supports the LDS view that the Father created all our spirits, even Christ's.

13.  In Isaiah 43:10 Jehovah (who is Christ according to LDS doctrine) says, "Ye are my witnesses, saith the LORD, and my servant whom I have chosen: that ye may know and believe me, and understand that I am he: before me there was no God formed, neither shall there be after me."  By specifying that no Gods will be formed before or after him, Jehovah seems to admit that He was in fact formed.

14.  Isaiah the prophet wrote: In the year that King Uzziah died I saw also the Lord sitting upon a throne, high and lifted up, and his train filled the temple.  According to this vision God inhabits a specific place, on the throne, and His train fills the temple.  By differentiating between God and His train, Isaiah supports the LDS view that it's God's influence, rather than His person that permeates the universe.

15.  The Father and the Son have their own respective wills, as revealed by Christ's plea in the Garden of Gethsemane in Mark 14:36, "Abba, Father, all things are possible unto thee; take away this cup from me: nevertheless not what I will, but what thou wilt."

16.  The New Testament depicts a clear line of authority where the Father presides over the Son and the Holy Ghost.  In John 20:17 Christ refers to the Father as his God, and says in John 14:28, "The Father is greater than I."  Furthermore, the Father sends the Son (John 3:16-17) and the Holy Ghost (John 14:26) to do things, but these roles are never reversed in scripture.

17.  In Deuteronomy 4:27-28 Moses tells the Israelites, "And the LORD shall scatter you among the nations, and ye shall be left few in number among the heathen, wither the LORD shall lead you.  And there ye shall serve gods, the work of men's hands, wood and stone, which neither see, nor hear, nor eat, nor smell."  Moses implies that these false gods are inferior to the true God because they cannot conduct these physical functions.  Latter-day Saints, however, believe in an embodied God who has no trouble with any of these physical feats.

18.  For Christ to truly die and rise resurrected, he had to be a separate entity from the Father because He never ceased living.

19.  God is celebrated as Lord of Lords, King of Kings, and God of Gods.  One of His titles is The Most High God.  This title alone denotes the presence of other Gods (the Son and Holy Ghost) in the Godhead.