Glenn Beck Teaches His Mormonism and False History of Joseph Smith at Liberty University

By Brannon S. Howse

The false global church has gained support in recent years from places and people that would have called it what it is a generation ago. In this chapter, I’ll point out some of these surprising supporters, and even more importantly, I’ll explain exactly why they’re doing this. It involves the three snares that have compromised evangelicalism: pride, pragmatism, and profit. 

Pride Beckons

In April 2014, Glenn Beck spoke at a Liberty University commencement, and it got me to wondering: “How did Liberty University get to the point where it would bring in Glenn Beck as a speaker?” It was his second featured appearance at the school. He had also spoken at the university’s commencement three years earlier. That he would be invited to speak at Liberty University is a shocking compromise in values, given that Beck is a New Age Mormon. Yet what is going on at Liberty University today results from the “sins of the fathers.” Many in the New Religious Right—as distinguished from the Religious Right of the 1970s—learned from the previous generation how to compromise in exchange for profit. 

Glenn Beck used his platform time at Liberty University’s 2014 commencement to legitimize Mormonism by explaining the “martyrdom” of its founder, Joseph Smith:

[quote] Days before Joseph Smith was martyred, he was taken out by the sheriff. They tried to tar and feather him several times. He was taken out by the sheriff, and the last time they took him, they said, “You owe $200.00,” or I think it was $25.00, “You owe him $25.00.”

He said, “I don’t owe a man anything.”

He said, “No, you stole a stove.”

One of the most ridiculous charges I’ve ever heard. At that time, he reached into his pocket and pulled out his pocket watch. This is his pocket watch that he pulled out. He gave it to the sheriff and said, “I owe man nothing.” They let him go, and they killed him. But on the warrant for his arrest, he wrote on the back of his warrant to his people, “Put down your guns. No matter what happens, put down your guns. Put down your guns, and trust in the Lord.” [end quote] 

Despite Beck’s assertion, Joseph Smith was not a martyr. He was a thug and a shyster. According to numerous historical accounts, he was, as the sheriff in Beck’s story claimed, a thief, and he certainly wasn’t a pacifist, as Beck’s “put down your guns” remark suggests. Far from being a martyr, Smith died like many other Old West gunslingers. A friend had smuggled a six-shooter to Smith in jail, and when a group later assembled to confront Smith for his crimes, the Mormon founder began shooting. Smith was killed in the gunfight he started. 

Prior to his death, Joseph Smith founded the cult of Mormonism—the cult that believes God was a man of flesh and bone who evolved to become God and who now lives on a planet near the star of Kolob. There, this god engages in eternal sexual relations with his goddess wives, the offspring of which he sends as spirit babies to earth. Every Mormon man who lives a good Mormon life and has his marriage sealed in the Mormon temple is promised a similar eternal state. In the afterlife, he and his wife can become a god and a goddess, have their own planet, enjoy endless sex, and send spirit babies to another planet of their own. 

So Mormonism believes in many gods—the many gods that we become. It’s a bizarre form of polytheism. Yet Glenn Beck sends Liberty University graduates off to their future, presumably to serve the Christian God, pronouncing his view that he and the graduates follow the same God. Thousands gathered—including leaders from Liberty University, Jerry Falwell, Jr., among them—to hear him say they all worship the same God: “But it is important to understand not what the world has said, that He’s our Creator. He is our Father. He is our Dad.”

His assertion is a favorite claim of ecumenists. It is consistent with Beck’s One Nation Under God rally in August of 2010 in Washington, D. C., where he challenged everyone of all faiths look to one God as he literally locked arms with Muslim imams. 

Liberty University is not the only recipient of the word of Beck. The same year that he delivered the first of his Liberty U commencement addresses, Beck delivered a keynote speech at his Restoring Courage Rally in Jerusalem in which he claimed that God spoke to him personally. Like the founder of Mormonism, Glenn is clearly into mysticism. Joseph Smith claimed to have had a visit from the angel Moroni. Since Smith was involved in the occult, however, the question arises: “Whose angel is Moroni?” Likely not one from heaven. Beck, though, is clear about who he thinks speaks to him:

[quote] I’m walking down the streets of Jerusalem praying, “Lord, what do you want me to say? What do you want me to say?” And unlike anything I have ever felt before, I know the love, I know the gentleness of Christ. I’ve never felt the wrath. “Lord, what do you want me to say?” 

“You tell them I am coming, and I will settle scores.” [end quote]

So God is telling Glenn Beck to tell people that He’s coming back, and He’s going to “settle the scores”? 

Beck’s ecumenism no doubt leads him to think that he should have every right to hear from Jesus. Beck believes he is a Christian who happens to be in the Mormon “denomination.” Again drawing from his Liberty University speech, his position on this is clear: 

[quote] I share your faith. I am from a different denomination. And a denomination, quite honestly, that I’m sure can make many people at Liberty uncomfortable. I’m a Mormon. But I share your faith in the atonement of the Savior Jesus Christ. I ask you now, in my faith, we have a guy who gave his life for what he believed in. You don’t have to believe it. I’m not asking you to. I’m asking you, what is it that you believe? Are you willing to give your life? [end quote] 

Unfortunately, Beck’s acceptance at Liberty U is not especially shocking. Jerry Falwell, Jr., has a history with Glenn Beck and as well as others with whom he wants to “hang together” so as not to “hang separately,” as I point out in other articles and my book Religous Trojan Horse and The Coming Religous Reich. 

The idea that you can set aside theology and work together to save the country is neither biblical nor practical. Glenn Beck calls for people to look to one God, but he’s not setting aside his theology. Only his theology allows that we are actually serving the same God as Beck. We’re not. And yet Jerry Falwell agrees with Beck.

 Romans 1 warns that when unbelievers reject God over and over, God gives over their nation. We don’t need to work together. They need to repent. We also know from 2 Corinthians 6:14-18 that if unbelievers unite in spiritual enterprises with unbelievers, God will not welcome them, bless them, or have favor on them. Instead, they receive judgment. So, for Jerry Falwell, Jr., to say, “We can set aside theology, we can argue about theology later, after we save the country,” is ridiculous. The only way you can redeem a nation is through the preaching of the gospel and the changing of people’s hearts through the power of the Gospel.

Copyright 2015 ©Brannon Howse. This content is for Situation Room members and is not to be duplicated in any form or uploaded to other websites without the express written permission of Brannon Howse or his legally authorized representative.