January 2004

February 7, 2004

Dear Family and Friends,

I was asked to do a retreat for the youth group of a large church. The youth pastor and I were planning to hold it at a local hotel and then take the teens out witnessing at a mall. But once the pastor caught wind of our plans, he was none too happy. He told the youth pastor that that type of witnessing doesn't work. Christians must build relationships first and not do cold-call witnessing. The youth pastor then decided to take the teens to a retreat center far away from civilization so they could learn how to share their faith. On Sunday afternoon after the retreat, one of the teens decided to go the mall to witness, and got into a conversation with an Iranian man. The man said, 'It's very interesting that you are talking with me. One of the reasons I came to America was to find out more about Christianity. Matter of fact, I just bought a Bible yesterday.' During the conversation, the teenager asked, 'Have you ever been to a Christian church before?' He said no, so the teen asked, 'Would you like to come with me next week to my church?' The man said, 'That would be great.' Isn't it nice to know that that type of witnessing doesn't work! (Mark Cahill, One Thing You Can't do in Heaven, 27-8)

For those of you who have been reading my newsletters for any length of time, you realize how true this is. God does not simply bless friendship evangelism. He blesses all different ways of getting His word out.

Last week while I was street witnessing, I briefly got to talk to a guy named Sid, who is a Christian. He wasn't sure of his salvation, and has been going through a hard time. So I was able to minister to him about the assurance of his salvation in Christ's sufficiency, and then I invited Sid to start going to a nearby church. He seemed real interested and thankful, but had to go.

Recently I heard from my friend Mike Norton, who runs www.JosephLied.com. He said, "JosephLied.com has seen a HUGE increase in traffic over the past 6 months. I have received numerous e-mails from people saying they saw a sign with JosephLied.com on it outside of one temple or another." Mike is one of many former LDS who have come to the Lord via the internet. You can now read his testimony on my web site at http://www.mormoninfo.org/index.php?id=18.

It has been rather cold here in Utah (we set a record for the month of January for 25 days below freezing), so I haven't been able to get out on the streets very much. But I have been doing a lot of ministry from home. In addition to answering e-mails, I wrote a film review on A&E's Inside Polygamy, and it can be viewed on my web site at http://www.mormoninfo.org/index.php?id=21. I also have worked on an article that I hope to get published on our evangelistic approaches to Mormons. I also talked with a friend of mine at church the other day who was so thankful that I was able to talk to her son one day. Her son Andrew called me up to talk philosophy a couple weeks ago. He's taking an Intro to philosophy class, and wanted to talk about a particular subject that they were going to talk about in class the next day. This subject had to do with the basis of morality, and it is often used to belittle belief in God's role for morality. His mom said that Andrew took over the class, and the professor didn't know what to say! This was fantastic to hear, since so many of these professors run down Christianity in their classes.

Thank you for every prayer said on my behalf, and for every check written on my behalf.

Your fellow worker in the kingdom,

Rob
Rob@Mormon Info.org
Mormon Info

****PRAYER LIST****

1. For God to move more people to do street ministry downtown.
2. For Utah churches and individual Christians to support each other's various ministries.
3. For financial provision.
4. For the ability to get my rough draft comprehensive done soon.
5. For God to use my web site.
6. For the article I wrote on evangelistic approaches to Mormons to be published.

****MAILBAG****

Hi Rob, ...Read your newsletter from your new web site, and added the site to my favorites list for easy referencing. Glad I have brothers like you to serve with. God bless!

I haven't seen the [Book of Mormon] movie yet, but if I get a chance to I'll be sure to let you know. As for your comments on it [http://www.mormoninfo.org/index.php?id=30], I thought they were great. It really makes me want to check it out just to see what watered down version of Mormonism they are showing.

Rob, You're certainly welcome for the support. You're doing important work for the Lord in Utah and we feel privileged to contribute. Keep up the good fight. ...Hope all is well. We'll be praying for you and your ministry. ...the web site looks great.

Hey Rob, ...looking at your web page the other day and it seems like you had a lot of fun visiting your friend over here. And your web page is also very impressive--I've never seen it before. I especially enjoyed seeing that bit about you being on the news during the general conference. That was cool. Anyway, I'd like to check that out again sometime soon, because it seems like you have a lot of great info on there. Every time I think of what you are doing there I am amazed because I think that you probably have the toughest job ever... When we get back I'd like to go back to Utah for another mission trip. The thought kinda scares me because I can honestly say that that was the toughest mission trip that I've ever been on. But I know that the work that you are doing and the work done by teams that visit is so very important. Anyway, Rob, I just wanted say a quick hi and that I am really praying for your ministry--may God bless you!

Rob, I'm glad to hear you had a great time with your brother's family. I think my pastor is going to be jealous of those pictures at the gravesite of C.S. Lewis and J.R.R. Tolkien.

...I bought that book "All Truth Is God's Truth" by Arthur Holmes that you had told me to get. It looks really good. It's funny though, right before it came, I saw on the internet an article by Dave Hunt. Have you ever heard of him? In this article, he was indirectly attacking this book by Arthur Holmes. He never directly stated the book, but he kept saying, "All Truth Isn't God's Truth." He was basically saying that there is "spiritual truth" and "natural truth." He said that all men can obtain "natural truth", but only those that are saved can obtain "spiritual truth." He attempted to back up his point by going to 1 Corinthians and some other passages. The way he was reasoning his points seemed very sketchy to me though. Well, I just wanted to see if you heard of the guy.

Rob, I just want you to know that you encourage me. I am amazed at your determination to continue witnessing day in and day out. When I think of you talking to people about their beliefs it makes me want to do the same. I just wished more Christians would be behind your efforts. It's sad to me that you have both Mormons and Christians against you. I have spent enough time with you to know that you really care about the Mormon people and you don't want them to go to hell because of their belief in a false god. It's hard for me to understand why Christians would be willing to defend non-believers over supporting Christians like you who step out of their comfort zone and talk to people about their beliefs. I can understand some believers saying that they aren't comfortable with street evangelism, but to actually verbally support Mormons not being confronted with truth and opposing a fellow brother about confronting Mormons is hard to understand. I can see that we want to be loving and gentle in our approach, but that doesn't mean we are to be "relational only." I find it hard to believe that Paul only witnessed to people through "friendship evangelism."

There is nothing wrong with lovingly confronting people with truth. Just because those people don't want to hear it doesn't mean we should stop. God's word doesn't return void, we should trust it will serve its purpose. Rob my prayer is that Christians will stop supporting Mormons wrong beliefs being unchallenged and start supporting your God-given passion to lead them to Truth.

...God bless you for not letting opinions about your approach in witnessing change your heart and passion. You are an encouragement to me and to some of my friends who you haven't even met before. Take comfort in that.

[I responded:] Thanks a lot for such an encouraging note. You really are a dear bro to me. ...About Hunt, I've known about him for many, many years now. He loves the Lord and has done a lot of valuable work on cults, but he's very unscholarly and not well thought out. The Passantinos (Bob and Gretchen) did a book called "Witch Hunt" (Nelson) many years ago that primarily deals with him. You may also want to search for that as well. Basically, his message that all truth isn't God's truth is self-contradictory. He claims that the only truth that is real is the spiritual truth found in the Bible, but then I'd like to know where this truth comes from since it certainly isn't found in the Bible. Is this some other lesser truth that we really don't need to pay attention to? Silly.

[From my brother Greg in Serbia:] I forgot to mention that the other day I was talking to Nesa and he said that the day after your lecture in Novi Sad, two Mormon missionaries showed up to the church!!! One lady, who was at your lecture, has been in contact with them for a while and trying to witness to them. Your lecture was a great help to her. Perfect timing! ...I don't know what happened to them; if they talked to anyone afterwards. I think they just left abruptly. Adios!

Great newsletter! I am convinced as we share the Gospel with others, here or abroad, it has a positive effect in our lives. Also, what a joy it is to see the response in the lives of those we get to share with. May God continue to be glorified through your life and obedience (1 Timothy 1:12).

Hey Rob, That is so cool you had a good time with your bro and talking to churches. That makes me happy because I see so much ignorance here about Mormonism...

I have been reading up on Colorado City [a polygamist colony just inside Arizona on the UT-AZ border] and was wondering if you know why in the world the government has not gone in there (after that first time that it went badly) and tried to stop all the illegal activity going on??? It is an absolute mystery to me why they let it all go on. To me it seems to be an issue of the law, therefore why aren't they doing their job? I hope you are doing well. Praying for you.

PS [We] are hooking up with some girl missionaries here and we are hoping to form a continuing friendship and witness to them... Please pray for me, as I am trying to take the LESS argumentative route and building trust (so they will want to ask ME questions instead) before anything...

[I responded:] ...The other reasons are that if they were to really crack down, welfare would have to provide for kids (huge burden), and there aren't enough jails to upset people that are at least attempting to stay together. You really need to watch A&E's Investigative Reports on Polygamy to see how bad the situation really is. I should have a review of it up on my site soon [it's up: http://www.mormoninfo.org/index.php?id=21]. I'm praying for your conversation with the LDS. Don't compromise speaking the whole truth, but ya, if you want further conversations, then it's probably best to take your time and ask a lot of questions.

Hi Bro! I feel very privileged to take part in support of your ministry, no matter the amount. It's kind of a miracle anyway, the fact I can send something back to help God's work that really belongs to Him. I read your latest newsletter... awesome web site and good letter! ...Well, blessings and God's best to you in your work and ministry