MormonInfo.org

July 1, 2004

Dear Family and Friends,

June is always the busiest month I have for ministry. This is because of the Mormon Miracle Pageant in Manti (a small town right in the center of Utah). This year the pageant was from June 17th - 19th and 22nd - 26th. This event is an outdoor play performance of the early formation of the Mormon Church and some stories from the Book of Mormon, and it takes place on the grassy slope just outside the Manti Temple. It draws thousands of LDS there each night, but it also draws hundreds of Christian evangelists from all over the country! The gates open at 6 p.m., and many try to grab a good seat. Now the pageant doesn't start for 3 and a half hours later, so many will come out and talk with us Christians on the street that is blocked off to automobiles. We would also pass tracts out and hold up signs (all my signs are web sites). Then about the last half-hour before the pageant began, I would begin walking around the gate preaching to the crowds. Usually I would have two teenage brothers, Daniel and Taylor Seitz, from Branson, MO walk with me and hold up signs while I preached. The cops and pageant security workers would also walk with me to make sure LDS people didn't get out of line. This was completely different from last year when they actually dragged me off the sidewalk for preaching (you can see 3 pictures of this beginning by clicking here)!

This year, on the very first night, we had Christians disrupting our preaching and witnessing! There was a group from a Christian college that actually reinforced the LDS belief of how Christians are all divided and can't get along. (This is caricatured in the very opening of the pageant!) This happened not just to me but to another friend of mine, Allen Dardenelle (my web master who was staying with me for the month). One guy said to the crowd I was witnessing to that I was totally un-Christ-like, and that he was an Evangelical, who knew that Christ would be about taking these guys out for dinner and showing them love and peace. Then this guy went around to different members of my crowd and started shaking their hands and telling them "love" and "peace".

This was sickening. I'm all for relational evangelism; I do it myself. But these guys need to stop messing up what we really feel called to do. There are different ways of doing evangelism given what's required for the specific situation. If these guys want to be so limited that they simply concentrate on building a handful of friendships, then that's their business. But these guys need to cut their more confrontational brothers and sisters some slack, and pray for them and encourage them when they want to follow another aspect of Jesus', the prophets' and apostles' ministry in getting the word out to the masses, many of whom will naturally be quite angry.

These sorts of "relational evangelists" have a basic problem, viz., they think of love as identical to friendship. So it's inconceivable for them to love without being friendly. But is friendship with the world really the supreme good? Aren't there more important things than friendship? If there aren't, then this friendship is in fact "hostility toward God" (James 4:4). These relational evangelists have no room for sometimes "[a]nswer[ing] a fool according to his folly, lest he be wise in his own conceit" (Proverbs 26:5). They have no room for Elijah mocking the prophets of Baal. And they even have no room for Jesus (Love incarnate) humiliating His opponents (Luke 13:17). These relational evangelists are consumed with everyone liking them and speaking well of them. But Jesus says woe to them, since that's what the people in the Old Testament did to the false prophets (Lk. 6:26). Walter Martin used to put it this way: "You aren't here to win popularity contests!"

These relational evangelists have been socialized by their culture to provide the material content for the formal principle of love. In other words, they naturally see someone screaming the law and offering the gospel as the means of escaping the impending judgment of "an angry" God as unloving. Certainly, a truly loving person would never do such a thing! Instead, if the individual wants to truly love, then she would do the type of things that make everyone feel good about themselves. Speaking of telling sinners simply that God loves them, noted pastor and preacher Ray Comfort said,

The message is more appealing to both the Christian and the sinner. It is certainly easier to speak of love than to speak of sin. Many years ago, before I understood the function of God's Law, I told a prostitute of God's love and was delighted that she immediately began weeping. Unbeknown to me, her tears were not tears of godly sorrow for sin, but merely an emotional response to the need of a father's love. In my ignorance, I joyfully led her in a sinner's prayer. However, I was disappointed some time later when she fell away, and her tender heart became very callous toward the things of God.

Paradoxical as it may seem, the Law makes grace abound, in the same way darkness makes light shine (Revival's Golden Key, 77-8).

Comfort goes on to quote D. L. Moody, "The Law is what he needs...Do not offer the consolation of the gospel until he sees and knows he is guilty before God. We must give enough of the Law to take away all self-righteousness. I pity the man who preaches only one side of the truth--always the gospel, and never the Law" (Ibid., 117-8).

These relational evangelists have also been socialized to understand the "gentleness" required of Christians according to their politically correct culture, and totally distort it from its biblical context. These relational evangelists will generally speaking never experience the joy and reward of being persecuted for their faith. This is simply because they are all too comfortable in not telling the whole truth to their friends who are on their way to hell. "God commands all men everywhere to repent, because He has appointed a day on which He will judge the world in righteousness" (Acts 17:30-1).

The following is a letter I just had published in the summer Biola Connections (an alumni magazine), and it fits in quite well at this point:

Excellent article on developing a thicker skin [On My Heart, Spring 2004]. It's a great reminder for evangelicals who are all too willing to not "rock the boat" as it were. You're right on! When the gospel remains in the closet, the apparent motive of "love" actually turns out to be a lack of it (cf. 2 Cor. 5:14ff.). The politically correct culture here in America is turning too many evangelicals into a bunch of wimps. The only caveats I would add to your article are: 1) Yes, while love is necessary, too many times others are too quick to judge the witnessing methods of others as a lack of love. These judgments typically come from arm-chair quarterbacks who want to micro-manage others into their preferred means. And, 2) we still should rejoice and support the preaching of the gospel even when we don't support a truly unloving means of getting it out (Philippians 1:14-18). Rob Sivulka ('88, '89, '93) Salt Lake City, UT

Now here's what happens when a small community isn't used to people coming to publicly stand against its unrighteousness: they as well as the demons snap, and become quite defensive. It doesn't matter how polite and sweet you are. You're not going to be liked by everybody! And that's why after preaching, someone in the dark began throwing small rocks at us (one of which actually hit me in the head). And that's why Ray Keller, a "fine, outstanding member of Manti" and an LDS home teacher at least at one point, actually attempted to run over three of us Christian missionaries in his Chevy SUV (Daniel Seitz was almost ran over earlier, and Marshall Almarode and I were almost ran over later). Immediately after Keller went for us, I grabbed onto his window, running with the car, and told him that he stands guilty before God and he needs his sins forgiven. Keller immediately spit in my face (fortunately I was wearing sunglasses, and his dried saliva is still on them today just in case DNA evidence is needed), and sped off. But he only went several houses down, and the cops immediately followed him. They got him to finally come out of his house. They didn't arrest him, since they didn't see the attempted hit and run. They just saw me hanging onto his window. But there were numerous police reports filed on him by eyewitnesses to both of his attempted hit and runs.

Manti's defensiveness was also on display the next night when we had to file police reports again! As five of us (Daniel and Taylor Seitz, Glenn Hendrickson, Allen Dardenelle, and I) were walking to the local restaurant immediately as the pageant began, a car pulled onto the street ahead of us, but stopped for a moment. It drove past us, and the guys thought it was a friend of ours. They waved to the car as they held up their signs. When they saw that it wasn't our friend, they immediately began to walk away. The car turned around, parked, and a stocky middle-age man immediately got out of the car. We both approached each other, and I apologized for my friends, since they made an honest mistake in judgement. The guy was obviously bothered, and he started saying that what we were doing with our signs is a bunch of &%$#@. I told the guy that he had a dirty mouth and stood condemned before God, and that he needed all his sins forgiven by letting Jesus give him a new heart. This guy said that he could finish this all that night. I asked him what exactly he meant by that. Glenn could tell this guy was boiling over, so he started to take pictures of him. The guy immediately went after Glenn, grabbing him to try and take his camera away. Glenn past it off to Allen, and the guy immediately tackled Allen behind his car. The guy really whacked the back of his own head on back of his car bumper. He and another guy with him began choking Allen. As we began calling for the police who were just a block away and I began videoing the event, Allen kept his wits about him, hid the camera under the car, and pretended like he was still holding onto the camera. Allen kicked the guy, and Glenn whacked him with his backpack. When Allen got free somehow, he grabbed the camera and ran, sticking the digital camera card into his pocket just in case they were to steal the camera from him. The police arrived within a few minutes, but again they never made an arrest. The suspect and his cronies blamed us for the event. So again, many police reports were filed, and now it will be up to the county prosecutor in both cases to bring these guys to justice.

Now here's the good news: this public display of the truth results in salvations. People are set free from Satan's kingdom, and of course he's going to be upset about that. All together, there were around 16 people who repented and gave their lives to Christ during those 2 weeks. I was privileged to lead one of those to the Lord. The day before the pageant started, many Christian missionaries descended on downtown Salt Lake City. Daniel Seitz got to lead a guy named Des to the Lord, but Des' buddy Paul wasn't interested. Later that day I met both Des and Paul. Des told me that he received the Lord, but Paul hadn't. After I gave Paul the Law, he realized how desperate he was, and he repented and asked Christ to save him. Both Paul and Des were born into LDS homes, but haven't been to church since they were little kids. We prayed for them, both expressed an interest in coming to my church, and the next day Allen gave them Bibles.

I had a team of around 20 from Rock Hills Church in Mission Viejo, CA come up for a week of ministry. This was a high school group with a handful of adult counselors. My buddy Brett Kunkle did a great job in training them for a couple months prior to the mission. Brett has been out to work with me in Utah many times before. He's now working with Stand to Reason (Greg Koukl, president) to train the youth with apologetics. The Rock Hills youth pastor, Jim Wallace, invited Brett to train their team, and help lead them on the trip to Utah. From Jim's e-mail below, it seems like he's caught the "disease" too and is already looking forward to next year!

I lectured to a group from Iowa at my church in Salt Lake City on the evening before the pageant. Some of them had heard me speak down at The Ephraim Church of the Bible (about 2 hours from Salt Lake City) last year and were disappointed that they were going to miss my lecture there this year, since they had to return home the day I was speaking, so I gave them a pre-packaged and less detailed version of what I was going to give the Ephraim church a few days later. (The Ephraim church has morning training sessions for all the Christian workers.) When I spoke to the Ephraim church, not only did I speak in the morning, but many requested to hear from me in the afternoon, so that's what I did. I spoke for not quite 2 hours in the morning on the nature of God and Mormonism, and then I spoke for 2 hours on the Trinity and the 2 natures of Christ in the afternoon. The next morning I spoke on a much more condensed version of what I had given the day before to the Rock Hills group back up at my church in Salt Lake City.

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

Shaking the beehive (UT's state symbol),

Rob
Rob@mormon info.org
Mormon Info

****PRAYER LIST****

1. For more salvations
2. For God to move more people to do street ministry downtown
3. For Utah churches and individual Christians to support each other's various ministries
4. For financial provision
5. For the ability to get my rough draft comprehensive done soon
6. For God to use my web site
7. For love, protection, and wisdom as I minister
8. For justice to be done in Manti, since the people are becoming more brazen
9. For more good shots of our sites on the news (it's become very difficult now with the cameramen quick to cut us out)
10. For God to really use me as I go to minister for a week at a high school camp in Alaska this month

****MAILBAG****

[Mike Norton of JosephLied.com forwarded this onto me. This is another indication of how holding signs work:] About a week ago I went to Youth Conference in Ephraim and while there, our group participated in "The Mormon Miracle Pageant". At the entrance of the temple grounds there were people who were holding signs, handing out pamphlets, etc. And they were, not so much petitioning, as discrediting and disapproving of the Mormon Church. For all I know, you were one of them! One of the signs that was being held up was a sign that said "JosephLied.com", and since then I have wanted to see what that site was all about. I am a faithful and practicing Mormon, but this is a recent development. Up until recently, I have questioned my faith. The reason I am writing and telling you these things is this, I have some questions for you after reading through some of your website. ...Please, I would like to make it clear that I am not persecuting you nor am I accusing you of blasphemy. I am just a curious being, looking for any possible answer to life, exploring any and every teaching. Thank you for your time. I look forward to your response. Sincerely

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Please stop this nonsense!! If you have lost your testimony and choose to believe something new, why put all your energy into trying to change everyone else? You know as well as I do that Satan is your driving force. Here you are speaking for all Christians in the world, how can you possibly do such a thing? It's ridiculous. Please, save yourself and stop this insanity. And I don't think Channel 2 appreciates you using them to push this evil in the world. Let people believe what they may, you are welcome to do the same. I am praying for you

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It is interesting to me that you heap persecution on only one church and that you don't attack other churches. What about the catholic church and the things happening within, also with church's that attach priesthood with women, and members of the priesthood can live immoral lives. It tends to think that the church that you attack is the only true church on the face of the earth.

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[From Jim Wallace, the youth pastor that brought his team up to work with me:] I can hardly find the words to tell you how much I appreciate what you did for us there in Utah last week. Our group was overwhelmed with the burden they felt for these people, and the time spent there was truly transformational. We love how you came alongside us with encouragement, hope and fellowship. We will partner with you from now on, OK? Our financial resources are very small, but we will start aiming some of them in your direction.

Rob, we feel as though you are our brother out there and we love you! I will email you occasionally with questions if that is OK. I am dedicating the next year to study of the book of Mormon as we prepare for our next trip! Looking forward to seeing what God has in store for us!!

[And this is what he sent out to his youth group:] Well, there are hardly words to describe the great joy I feel following our trip. It was nothing less than amazing. I can tell you that in all the years that I have been involved in ministry, nothing compares to what we experienced out there as we worked elbow to elbow to share the Gospel of Jesus Christ. And can I say that I am SOOO proud of you all and how you grew in your relationship with God and your bold desire to share him? I am still amazed! I actually can't wait to go back next year and I am dedicating myself to a year of research and study before we return! I started an early version of the webpage that will document our trip.

But we will add so much more to this site as we collect all the images and video! SO please send everything my way! Also, by the end of Summer I hope to have a Mormon page on our website! So stay tuned! Love you guys and I can't wait to do it again!

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[From one of the team members that came up with the Mission Viejo group:] Family & Friends,
First of all I'd like to thank you all for your thoughts and prayers, and also thank those who were able to support me financially. By God's grace it all worked out quite perfectly. The trip was simply awesome. It was by far the most impactful trip I've ever been on (compared to Thailand, Hume, Mexico, etc.), not just in my life, but noticeably in everyone else's.

...We then went down to the Mormon Miracle Pageant in Manti. This is a huge pageant they hold every year for 8 nights, with an average of about 90-100 thousand people attending. For the 3 hours before the pageant we stood outside passing out tracts and having conversations. Some of these conversations were very fruitful, some weren't. Overall it was a tremendous experience. The first night we were there we watched the Pageant. It was incredibly offensive to Christians, but that didn't bother me because I expected it. What really got to me was the blatant blaspheme of Joseph Smith presented in the Pageant. It really brought home to me that Mormonism is man-centered religion, the key is self worship, and in that sense, it's no better than being an atheist. I was so infuriated at the blaspheme that I'm glad we didn't witness after the Pageant, I doubt I would have been very loving.

...our host for the trip was Rob Sivulka. He runs Mormoninfo.org and does full-time ministry in Salt Lake. What defines Rob, aside from knowing just about everything and being a cool surfer-dude, is that he often carries around signs in front of the Temple and at the Pageant advertising his site and Josephlied.com. Needless to say, this usually doesn't generate a lot of love and support. When I first saw him doing his thing I was hesitant. I didn't think it was the best way of going about witnessing, but then he does do this for a living. After seeing many of the dirty looks and anger that the signs stirred up I decided I didn't want to have anything to do with it. Rob was a great guy, as long as he stood a good way away from where I was witnessing.

Something changed in me though through all of our training on Mormonism and through watching the Pageant. I saw Mormonism for what it is and became more determined than ever and willing to do anything to get people out of it. We had been passing out tracts defining the differences between Mormonism and Christianity. That hadn't been working for me, it wasn't enough to let people know that Mormonism just doesn't cut it. Our last night at Manti Rob needed help. About 40 minutes before the Pageant begins he starts marching around and yelling at the top of his lungs why people need to leave Mormonism. He needed another person to follow him with a sign, and I did it. The first major thing that God did in me from the trip was boldness. Unfortunately I haven't been bold in my faith in non-Christian situations. That final night I stepped up to the plate to stand beside a man exploiting the flaws of Mormonism. We were cursed at, hassled, mocked, laughed at, etc., but I know that some of the things Rob said put a stone in people's shoes that won't go away. Next time I hope to go with signs of my own.

The second major work God did in me was realized in the midst of that boldness. I began to see people the way I believe God sees them. Overwhelmed with grief at their idolatry and sinfulness. They were blind to their flawed religion, and my heart broke for them. After we had finished marching and we were leaving I couldn't help but weep for them. I wanted so much for them to know the one true God, I would have done anything. That perspective is one that I pray I will never lose. It will sharpen my boldness when I need it most, and I believe I've been shaped into a better ambassador for Christ through that.

I'm well aware of the changes in me, but I was also greatly encourage by the students. I don't know that I've seen high school students more transformed by a mission experience in any other setting. There's something about being on the front lines with real people who need salvation that I believe makes us better Christians. At this point I cannot be grateful enough for being able to be a part of the team. And I'm more grateful as well for my salvation in Christ by grace through faith. A faith that I now have even greater assurance of.

In His service,

Roger Overton

P.S.- I'll be posting pictures (hopefully tonight) at RogerOverton.com

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[From a Christian missionary who came from Washington to work the Manti Pageant:] Dear Christian friends that are still in Utah, Today I have been back from Utah for only one day. Already I'm back in my busy work routine of working too many hours and not having enough time to take care of the basics...All I can think of is what you guys must be doing still in Utah. Are you taking a rest after the busy two weeks in Manti or are you out on the streets, witnessing again? Or are you doing follow up work with a newborn? Whatever it is, I feel envy. You are on the front lines, working to tear down that evil empire. I want to be back in Utah.

... Rob I admire your tenacity to go to the temple each day. I pray for God to give you wisdom and strength to keep serving Him and putting Him first in your life. God gave you a unique talent and it is cool to see how you have used your skills and desires to serve Him.

Chip, I pray for your little church also. You are this bright light piercing through a thick cloud of darkness. I'm amazed at how God has blessed you and am excited to see what will happen through your new college house. I'm also praying that the local converts from Manti will be able to attend your church or at least some of the activities on a weekly basis.

I don't want to work. All I want to do is pray and read. Since Utah has been on my mind all day, I wanted to send off an email to the few people that I know are still there. It was wonderful meeting each of you. I realize you may not remember who I am, but I will be praying for you and am thankful for the contact I now have. Thank you Chip for the training sessions at your church. In addition to the training, and helping us work as a team, I also got the opportunity to meet a lot more people. God is so cool!

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[From an ex-Mormon Christian missionary that came to work here for a week:] Dear Rob & Allen, Thanks so much for teaching me yer my heroes!! I love you both... never never never stop doing what your doing. Ez. 3:9 Is. 50:7 Rev. 3:11 Love you both P.S. ...you will always be in my prayers.

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I hear that you and your "Christian" cronies were down in Manti trying to spoil the evening (yes, trying to spoil the evening. You weren't preaching the good word) for a group of people that were just trying to enjoy themselves. Article of Faith #11. We claim the privilege of worshiping Almighty God according to the dictates of our own conscience, and allow all men the same privilege, let them worship how, where, or what they may. Isn't the articles of faith demonic??!! Boy, everything that Joseph did was so evil.

Rob: Yea, but it says in a book that was written by a hateful semi-retarded individual who wasn't actually there and has no other life than to discredit Joseph, that Joseph did all these evil things. It must be true if it's in a book! See it's printed in a book!!

Book Shmook.

Thanks for bringing contention into so many lives. You're helping no one and wasting your lives in this obsession of yours. Why don't you go and preach to someone who actually wants to hear what you have to say. Brag about what you do believe. There's an idea.

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I was intrigued when I saw your "proselyters" standing in front of Temple Square with their signs and other forms of propaganda. In fact, when I returned to my office one of the first things I did was look up your web site. In short, however, I found the website to be poorly organized and self-centered. More specifically, the majority of your arguments are fallacious, misguided, and without purpose. As a quick piece of feedback, I would think that if you're going to put so much effort into advertising your web site, you might attempt to make it worth the investigator's time.

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[The following comes from a fellow Biolan of all people. I believe it was last year that a reporter from the British Broadcasting Company visited Biola University. What I recall from the interview was how she asked at least one student if he could see how "arrogant" his claim was that Jesus is the only way to God. Evidently, the reporter left her mark on the following student (perhaps this is the student who was interviewed):] hey rob...just stumbled on your website and mailbag section. i got to tell you, you are a jackass, and you are doing immeasurable damage to Christian ministries to the mormons. your hateful accusatory and void of love "witnessing" to people betrays nothing but pride, and a mean, hardened, bitter spirit. please stop, for the sake of the True Gospel.

there is a difference b/c what you do and the "hard truth" preached by many of the disciples and even Christ. (i say this b/c i read you justifying your language and tone by pointing to Christ's hostility towards the pharisees). what they did was selfless, in love, and out of a passion for the Truth and for the lost. what you do is an exercise in your own cleverness. you spit one liners and harp on pointless text-based trivialities (whether Christ created all worlds or not...what an absurd issue to debate. do you really think that someone will come to the Lord after being browbeaten on such a small issue when their whole cosmology/theology/worldview is wrong?)

your final discussion breaks my heart b/c what could have been an opportunity to shine the light of Christ into a darkened heart turned into an embittered, futile, and circular argument based completely on one upmanship and personal pride in pushing a certain issue you apparently see as some "key" to unlocking a lost mind. please stop this, and start thinking about how you can love lost people, and serve them as our Savior did, rather than try to tell them how stupid they are.

[I responded:] Hi____, I've been ministrying to LDS for over 20 years now, and I've led more of them to Christ than you probably ever will. I moved to UT because I love LDS. They need to be confronted with their weak god and Jesus, because Jesus Himself said to beware of false Christs (Mt. 24:24) and that if they deny that Jesus is the I AM (which LDS do), they'll die in their sin (Jn. 8:24). Eternal life is based on knowing God and His Son whom He has sent (Jn. 17:3), so if LDS cheapen God to make Him a man who has to grow up to become a God by obeying His God before Him, having to score a wife, and not being the creator of all that is, then quite obviously they are worshipping a false god, breaking the first commandment, and as such will "not inherit the kingdom of God" (1 Cor. 6:9). This is how Paul preached, for example, in Acts 17. It's only your lack of love that would keep you from telling LDS this, and allowing them to go to hell. I care more than you do, and that's why I'm here telling them precisely this.

Now I do various forms of ministry up here. I also do relational ministry in which I concentrate on building relationships with people prior to telling them the above. But if I continue to prevent the preaching of the above, then it would be obvious how little I care about people. You're not going to change my mind. I'm following Christ, His apostles, and prophets, and there was a reason they were almost all martyred. Your approach would rule that out.

If you have further problems, may I suggest you go talk to Moreland. Lk. 6:26,

[He responded:] i dont care how much you say you care..i believe that you do, doesn't change that your a jackass (see above statement) i guess i'll just have to agree to think that your one of those people that values "realness" and "in your faceness" when in actuality your just rude and prideful

[I responded:] I'm sure the same could be said of Christ, His apostles and prophets as the people they ministered to put them to death.

[He responded:] no it couldn't be said b/c paul wouldn't deal with concerned criticism by saying "i've led more people to X than you ever will"

newsflash: you have never led anyone to Christ...no one does. if God has used you, praise Him..thats a testament to His power not yours.

if you could stop loving your discussions and intellectualized browbeatings so much and started loving the people more then maybe i could agree with your ministry, but as Pascal said, no one can ever be led into faith through an intellectual argument. regardless, i'm less than interested in what mr. moreland has to say about it..i hardly see how its relevant

[I responded:] Wow, thanks for the newsflash. I never realized that it was God and not myself who led people to Himself. I guess Paul never really "persuaded the Jews and the Greeks" after all (Acts 18:4, 28:23, & 2 Cor. 5:11). And I guess the Bible is wrong when it says that we can and should "save men" (e.g., Prov. 14:25 & Jude 23).

Now if you aren't interested in what one of your own Biola profs says, then I guess I shouldn't be interested in what Pascal says. The problem is that you, just like LDS generally speaking, have been socialized by your culture and you don't quote from the Word of God, and it leads me to assume that you really don't know what it teaches.

As for the "jackass", "rude", and "prideful" comments, remove the board plank out of your own eye before you take the speck out of your neighbor's (that's in the Bible too, btw).

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[The following LDS guy sounds quite a bit like the Christian guy above:] Where in the bible (since that is what you claim to believe in) does it teach to diss what others believe? I mean Peter, James, and John all taught that, go and tell others that what they believe is wrong! And the way you guys do it is totally not Christ-like! So I have no idea why you even consider yourselves Christians? You have no proof of what we believe, only hearsay, rumors, and lies! So let's grow up, and actually teach those who don't believe in Jesus Christ. The same guy you claim to worship! You need to get your facts correct before trying to prove that what we believe is incorrect!

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I have a couple of bible related questions, but need to give you some background before I ask them. I was raised Catholic, altar boy etc... At twelve I was saved at a Bible camp with some Baptist friends. Accepting Jesus changed me forever.

I delved into the scriptures and fell in love with the word of God. I visited different churches, some main stream, some charismatic, some pentecostal.

One thing struck me. No two Christians believed the same thing. The scriptures said God was not the author of confusion, and all I hungered for was to serve the Savior and believe what was right. Some of my questions included... Pre-trib or post trib rapture? Scripture quoted to support both. Gift of tongues and Toronto blessing. Real or fake? Inspired of God or the devil? Incoherent babbling or languages of men for preaching the gospel? Is man born evil or is there some good? What about the millions who have died without knowing Jesus. Are they destined for hell, or will they hear the testimony of Jesus at some point?

I ended up joining the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints because they had answers to every question I asked. I guess I'm a bit of an anomaly I am a Saved Mormon. I truly believe that I accepted Jesus' shed blood as the solution for my sins and fallen nature. I know that no matter how many times I help the scouts or feed a neighbor or baptize a convert, it is not going to save me. Only Jesus can save me. I preach this whenever I teach a Sunday School class and talk in Church. I taught it as a missionary and as a bishop's counsellor.

Average every day latter-day saints know that Jesus saves completely and eternally even if they can't explain it in the lingo of evangelical christainity. What do you think? Could you please answer my questions from your perspective. God bless you. Sincerely

[I responded:] Thanks for your note. Here are some thoughts:

1. Just because you may in fact be saved is no reason for you to be in a cult.

2. Just because you had some experience of what you took to be salvation doesn't necessarily mean you were saved by God. It's certainly hard for me to say having just one e-mail from you. But we know them by their fruits as Jesus said, and Paul tells us to "test yourselves to see if you are in the faith" (2 Cor. 13:5, paraphrase).

3. Did you read my statement concerning the Church on my home page? St. Augustine put it this way, and I think this accurately reflects the New Testament outlook: "In essentials unity; in non-essentials liberty, but in all things charity." Look, I know the denominations differ; that's obvious. But I think you're being a little myopic if you assume there's nothing that binds them all together. My dad is pre-trib, and I'm a post. My dad doesn't think tongues are for today, and I do. Big deal. We still think of each other as Christians. We don't view LDS, JW's, Christian Science, Scientology, Moonies, etc. in the same boat simply because they aren't "following Christ" (the definition of a Christian). They are following what Jesus and His apostles called a "false Christ" (Mt. 24:24 and 2 Cor. 11:3-4, 13-15). If you want more clarification on how different the LDS Jesus is from what the creeds of Christianity (Catholic, Protestant, and Orthodox) think the Bible clearly teaches, then check out my home page and my tract on "The 7 Differences".

4. Average LDS I talk to off the street are on a personal "worthiness" quest, and temple LDS think they've got to know secret/sacred handshakes and tokens to enter into the celestial kingdom where the Father dwells. But regardless of what the average think, LDS Scripture and prophets teach that Christ's death was only a necessary condition, and not a sufficient one. We still need to be saved as the 3rd Article of Faith says, "by obedience to the laws and ordinances of the Gospel." I have perfect peace with God, because I rest completely in Christ's worthiness and His obedience. Mine will never cut it. And I can trust Him to come into my life and complete the good work that He started in me (Phil. 1:6). I can even have a bad day and murder someone and still be saved like Moses and David did. LDS can't as D&C 42 says.

I hope this is somewhat helpful. Best,

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Just FYI, I really credit you with leading me to Christ. You started the process, well God started it, but he used you as the person to start it. I wonder where I would be if I had never met you that day in Salt Lake City!