The following was first published in the Mormonism Researched in November/December 2025. This is a free publication produced by Mormonism Research Ministry. To get a free subscription of the bimonthly newsletter, visit the website here.
On October 4, 2025, LDS Apostle Jeffrey R. Holland gave a conference message titled “And Now I See.” The subtitle to his talk was “The impact of the Book of Mormon in my life is no less miraculous that was the application of spit and dirt placed on the blind man’s eyes.”
Holland’s text was from John chapter nine, the story of the man who was blind from birth. Jesus sees the man in his pitiful condition, spits onto the ground, takes the moistened dirt and applies it to the eyes of the blind man. Jesus then told the man to wash in the pool of Siloam. He did and was miraculously healed.
After reciting the passages from John’s gospel, Holland stated, “How important evidence is, as opposed to wishes or argument or even malice in opposition to the truth.”
He then proceeded to defend the unique LDS teaching regarding the LDS “priesthood,” reminding his listeners that such authority comes only through those have had “authorized hands laid on him.” Never mind that the teaching of the priesthood, as described in Mormonism, is not mentioned at all in the New Testament.
Holland said his church “understands the gift of mercy.” At face value that may sound like Mormonism is moving closer to what Christians have always believed to be an undeserved blessing. However, neither Holland nor other LDS leader has denounced the teachings of past leaders who insisted that mercy must be merited by keeping all, not some, of the commandments.
Holland himself has made it clear that forgiveness of sin, provided through the atonement comes not by a traditional definition of mercy, but by “obedience to divine commandments” (“Love and Mercy Meet, Ensign (Conference Edition), May, 2015, 106).
Holland spent much of his short message giving a subjective defense of the Book of Mormon. Drawing from the story of the blind man, Holland stated, “In any case, the impact of the Book of Mormon in my life is no less miraculous than was the application of spit and dirt placed on the blind man’s eyes.”
He then closed by singing with an admitted “diminished voice,” the first stanza of the Christian hymn, Amazing Grace.
Again, a Christian hearing a Mormon leader citing such a famous hymn that was never sung in general conference until April 2024 might assume that the LDS Church is embracing a view of grace that those of us in what Mormons call “apostate Christendom” have believed for centuries.
But are they? Amazing Grace was included in the 1841 LDS hymnal compiled by Joseph Smith’s first wife, Emma, but it was removed in the 1851 edition published in Utah.
Recently the LDS Church announced that John Newton’s famous hymn would be included in the new LDS Hymnbook. Though the hymnal has yet to be published, the hymn, as it will appear, is posted on the official church web site. One readily notices that not all six verses are included. For instance, verse two that speaks of this precious grace that relieves fear the hour a person first believes is missing.
Perhaps this is because celestial exaltation, or godhood in Mormonism, is attained only by a “lifetime of righteousness and constancy of purpose” (True to the Faith, 2004, 92).
Or, as stated in the Doctrinal Commentary on the Book of Mormon (1:295), “it is only after a person has so performed a lifetime of works and faithfulness – only after he has come to deny himself of all ungodliness and every worldly lust – that the grace of God, that spiritual increment of power, is efficacious.”
That, my friends, is not New Testament grace.