Question: Why do so many people that profess Christianity insist that Mormons are not Christian?

There are many underlying and ancillary reasons that people accuse the religion of perjuring its testimony of Christ (which is the basis of being called Christian), all of which cannot be addressed in a single day; but I will address the root cause that affects the religion today.

The real problem that certain people have with acknowledging this particular faith as Christian is that they do not recognize it as Christianity. The practices and doctrine are beyond quirky—way beyond anything the average contemporary church-goer has been taught that Christianity involves. Many accuse the sect of deviating from the "true religion," while the Mormon doctrine claims that it is modern Christianity itself that has deviated from its roots and that the fullness of the gospel has finally been restored. You will read scriptural evidence of this at the end of this explanation.

The analogy I am about to present will no doubt send the offending parties into a tizzy, and they will claim, if you ask them, that I am likening Joseph Smith to Jesus Christ--which is tantamount to blasphemy in their eyes. You will see their folly when I am done.

The reason these people revile this gospel is the very same reason that the Jewish ruling class rejected what Christ preached. They had corrupted the gospel and changed the practices so that when their heir apparent arrived on scene, they did not recognize him as their King. They did not see the signs. They did not understand the scriptures. They did not have the faith that was necessary to "see the kingdom of God." (John 3:3) It did not matter that they were given scriptural evidence. It did not matter that they witnessed miracles. It did not matter that what He said was true. He ultimately died at their hands because the gospel He presented would disrupt their hold on power. Joseph Smith likewise died at the hands of those who accused him of blasphemy.

Now I can already hear the detractors howling, "Where do you get off comparing Joseph Smith to Jesus Christ?" Although there are innumerable verifiable similarities, I will forgo them for now so I can get to the point. It is sufficient to say that it is no crime in Christianity for a prophet to be in the likeness of the Savior. (Matthew 10:25) The real argument is that the violent actions and the vitriol of those that have persecuted the Latter-day Saints is no different than those that did likewise in Biblical times. This is no exaggeration. Though thankfully their persecution nowadays does not typically involve physical violence, the fact that it has in the past is evidenced by the facts that the "Mormon" prophet was assassinated and an actual extermination order was put out against his people.

Many Christians think that the doctrine and organization that Jesus set up were in large part a neologism of his time. Rather Christ restored the fullness of the gospel. Baptism was not new in Jesus' time. Neither was governing the Church by bodies of twelve and of seventy was not unprecedented. (Exodus 24:9) Jesus also restored the higher priesthood. (Hebrew 7:11) He did many other things that may seem to have been without precedent, while in all truth everything that he did and said was after the ancient order and in fulfillment of prophecy. Many of those things are documented Biblically, many more are not. Upon this point I premise my argument that although the Bible is indeed Holy, it does not contain adequate explanation of every last doctrine of Christianity. (Even if it did, it would amount to a mere mound of paper and ink without proper inspiration: 2 Peter 1:20) So claiming that something isn't true merely because it is not spelled out clearly enough in the Bible is argumentum ad ignorantiam.

Even when presented with scriptural evidence of these allegedly heretical points of doctrine that the Latter-day Saints claim but the rest of the “evangelical” community do not, the preferred tactic (other than the one previously noted) is obfuscation based on uninspired interpretation, the credibility of which often devolves again into argumentum ad ignorantiam. The bottom line is that while Mormons are contented to argue their case without resentment of another's' religion, when the other party fallaciously accuses them of denying Christianity in word and deed despite their adamant profession of Jesus as the Christ, they incur the obligation to examine their own religion under the same scrutiny. (Matthew 7:1-2) You can trust that most true Mormons have already studied and pondered the tough doctrinal questions well beyond what the critic can think up, and they consistently find that no other church on this Earth comes close to resembling the truth.

Does it contain anything similar to the original organization?

• Apostles, prophets, pastors, teachers, evangelists

Ephesians 4:11

Ephesians 2:20

• Seventy

Luke 10:1

• Continued revelation

Amos 3:7

What is the true nature of the Godhead? Acts 7:55

Will those that never hear of the gospel be saved without baptism? 1 Corinthians 15:29

Did we exist before we were born? Jeremiah 1:5

What is the nature of heaven? 2 Corinthians 12:2

What is our ultimate potential? Romans 8:16-17

If you want to know in greater depth what the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints believes about these things, I encourage you to invite the missionaries into your home.