Section 38: The God Question

The LDS Statement

Our Heavenly Father is a perfected, glorified being with a body of flesh and bones. He loves us as his literal spirit-children. He was once as we are, and we can become as he is.

The Response Range

If I say God is spirit without a body, they will say: Jesus has a resurrected body, and he said "I and the Father are one," so the Father must also be embodied. They will cite D&C 130:22 as direct revelation. They may say the idea of an incorporeal God is Greek philosophy imposed on Hebrew Scripture.

How to Address

"God is spirit, and his worshipers must worship in the Spirit and in truth."

— John 4:24

"No one has ever seen God, but the one and only Son, who is himself God and is in closest relationship with the Father, has made him known."

— John 1:18

John 4:24 is direct, unqualified, and unambiguous. Jesus himself says God is spirit. John 1:18 says no one has ever seen God — not that God has not been visible yet, but that He is not the kind of being who is seen. A being with a body of flesh and bones as tangible as a man's is precisely the kind of being who can be seen.

The "Greek philosophy" objection deserves a direct answer. The classical doctrine of God's incorporeality does not come primarily from Greek philosophy. It comes from the Hebrew understanding of God as Creator, which requires Him to be categorically different from what He created. Matter is what He made. He is not what He made.

★ Disciple Tip: Ask: "If God the Father has a body of flesh and bones as tangible as a man's, what does John 4:24 mean? Jesus himself said it. If D&C 130:22 is right, Jesus was wrong." This is not a rhetorical trick. It is the actual conflict in the texts. Let the conflict sit.