The Narrow Path Ministries

Steve had a caller last month who asked what he could ask mormon missionaries that might actually make them stop and think. This is a long answer, but maybe you’ll find it is worth reading. I assume that the caller was asking this out of love for me and those of the church I belong to, so I’ll give you best answer I can give.

In short most mormons ignore attacks on their church the same way many evangelicals might ignore an atheist attack on the Bible. We love God, we trust God, and we are convinced that this is His church. We aren’t surprised that some people oppose it, so when someone has something negative to say about it, no matter how well thought out it may be, it really isn’t likely to leave a lasting impression.

If you want to do something meaningful for a mormon missionary, ask if they are interested in hearing why you believe in Christ, and then SHARE YOUR REASONS FOR BELIEVING WITH THEM. This isn’t to compete to see who can come up with the best reasons, it is to show them that your position is reasonable as well, and that God is active in your life, and the lives of other Christians too.

You might think this is fruitless advice, after all, I am still LDS and very devoutly so, but I can listen to criticisms and problems raised now and can take an honest hard look at them. Before meeting you all on TNP I dismissed criticisms before they were really even presented.

Let me explain why this might be. As a missionary, some of the nastiest encounters I ever had were the ones with people who had strong Christian convinctions. They would often yell at us, try to kick us out of neighborhoods, mock us, or they would invite us in only to try to trip us up on our words. I even had objects thrown at me on several occasions. It was all expected as part of spreading the gospel so I never took it personally, it actually added to my conviction that I was doing the Lords work. From my perspective, evangelical Christians were very much the Pharasees and Sadducees of our day. I would pray for these people, but I would never take the problems they raised seriously.

After hearing TNP radio show I found out that you guys have close relationships with the Savior too, and you aren’t just a bunch of angry loons. I know now how thoroughly God works in your lives and in your churches. This allows me to look at the LDS church with healthy skepticism whenever I wish, while retaining my faith and trust in God because I can see more clearly that God works closely with people outside of the LDS church as well. Does that make sense? In other words, I can now see attacks against the LDS church as, attacks against the LDS Church, where before I tended to see them as attacks against God.

That is the gift that TNP has given me anyway and I treasure it. We rarely get to really see what evangelical Christianity is all about because once you guys find out we are mormon, the conversation quickly switches gears.

Also, for those who do end up losing their faith in the church, unless they are really shown good reasons to still believe in Christ, they often end up throwing their faith in God out as well. I know far more agnostic/atheist ex-mormons than I do Christian ex-mormons which is not good in IMO. If you insist on trying to plant doubt please expend at least as much effort to also plant something good to replace it with. That's reasonable right?

That’s my two cents anyway. I’d be interested in hearing your thoughts, and in hearing how it goes next time the mormons come knocking

This is probably also a good time to express my gratitude to Steve and those who call the show. Your faith, knowledge, conviction, and the struggles you share on the radio are very uplifting. I have called a time or two over the years with Bible questions without reminding you I am a mormon. Hopefully you don't find this to be sneaky or dishonest, I just don't always want the call focused around mormonism when I have other questions I'm looking for insight on.

Thanks for sharing your take on this, it is interesting to me to hear from "the other side".

To flip this around, what would you as LDS consider to be the most important thing(s) that you think evangelicals need to know they are missing by not being LDS?

I have had several discussions with Mormon missionaries, most of which I enjoyed. I am always delighted to discuss matters of faith with folks. The main issue I have noticed while chatting with Mormons is that oftentimes we use the same words(salvation, God the Father, Holy Spirit, Jesus, etc)but have different meanings. The language barrier can be a problem if you are not familiar with both sides of the issue. For example, when the Mormon(or many other groups)talk about "church", they are using an entirely different construct than the average Christian.

Aside from doctrinal differences, I usually try and focus on what scripture says regarding Jesus and the nature of God when I talk to Mormons. I try to show the love of Christ and avoid getting emotional. I never come out and attack Joseph Smith or bring up sensational topics like polygamy, racism, or gun battles, as this will cause most Mormons to shut down.

Sorry to hear that you have had bad experiences while witnessing. The world is certainly getting more and more hostile towards the idea of "faith" in general.

-Brody

I don't know whether or not this was a "good" question to ask Mormons, but it is a question which I did, in fact, ask a couple of them who had a Mormon booth at a fall fair:

If translation of the Book of Mormon was given to Joseph Smith through his donning the pair of special glasses which he called "Urim and Thummim", why was the translation of many of the words which Jesus supposedly spoke to the people in America identical to the record of His words in the King James Bible? The answer I was given was that that was the English spoken in Joseph Smith's day. Of course, this was not the case. Smith lived from 1805 to 1844.

As far as doctrine, you can see on this board, no two people agree completely on anything. So from one religion to another, things really get different.

I think the singular question that most have is the Book of Mormon itself.

The Bible warns against adding to it and yet the Book of Mormon appears to do just that.

I have handed many a twenty to missionary kids on bikes or JW that come to the door. That can't be a bad thing.

I have handed many a twenty to missionary kids on bikes or JW that come to the door. That can't be a bad thing.

I don't think I understand the meaning of this part of your post. It sounds like you are saying that you have given financial support to those who come to your door bearing alternative gospels. While my heart goes out to those young people, and I admire their dedication, I am not sure that giving them support necessarily "can't be a bad thing." John warned that we should not give assistance to those carrying the wrong message such as would help them along in their mission (2 John 10-11).

Of course, the Mormon and JW missionaries are not depending on your support, so your gift might have nothing to do with helping them spread their message (unlike the missionaries from your church, they can afford to do that with or without your gift). It might just buy them lunch. Therefore, your gift might just be an expression of kindness to some young people trying to serve God. If their doctrines are not as offensive to God as were those of the false teachers about whom John was concerned, this might not make you one who "shares in his evil deeds." John's words sound like he has antinomian Gnostic-types in mind—something not quite like the Mormons or Jehovah's Witnesses, who can hardly be referred to as perpetrators of "evil deeds." In my opinion, these are good people. Being deceived may be spiritually hazardous, but it does not always accompany bad character.

This matter of giving such gifts is morally ambiguous, I think. I would not feel comfortable giving cash to a missionary of another faith—unless, of course, he or she was hungry, naked, or otherwise in dire need—in which case, our assistance should be as available to them as to anyone else in such need, I think. The Good Samaritan's kindness was to a man of a faith other than his own.

Polygamy, racism, gun battles, KJV English in the BOM, adding to scripture, these and many more are all really good questions to bring up and reasonable concerns for anyone interested in investigating the claims of the LDS church. If your intention is to investigate LDS truth claims then of course any question you have is completey appropriate.

The caller from the other week though sounded like he wasn’t so much interested in investigating the claims of the LDS church as he was interested in helping missionaries themselves come closer to Christ. That’s what I was trying to address. If your goal is to help these missionaries draw closer to God, and if we are in fact deceived (I of course don't think that we are, but I'm still grateful to have people looking out for me and the missionaries) I would definitely suggest talking up Jesus Christ and showing them all the reasons you have to believe in him. Odds are, you have reasons for believing that they haven’t heard of and they are going to be likely to remember being edified by your conversation for years to come.

brody196 pointed out that

“oftentimes we use the same words…but have different meanings.”

That’s a good point, how about calling 19 year old boys “Elders”

KyleB, that is a very good question, I’ll have to think about it for a little while before I post a reply.

steve wrote: Of course, the Mormon and JW missionaries are not depending on your support, so your gift might have nothing to do with helping them spread their message (unlike the missionaries from your church, they can afford to do that with or without your gift). It might just buy them lunch.

I meant it more in terms of buying them lunch to be sure.

I've yet to hear an explaination of the BOM being an addition to the Bible. I don't know if they look at it as their "Bible".

I don't think the matter of adding to the Word of God is a particularly damning criticism of Mormonism (though I certainly do not think that what Joseph Smith added was legitimate). In principle, there is nothing about adding new books to the canon of scripture that would violate any biblical mandate. I do not believe that the church needs any more books in the Bible than those already present, since the apostolic witness is thorough and adequate, but this does not mean there would be any impropriety in God giving additional books. After all, most of the books now in the Bible were once new additions to previous collections.

Though there are warnings not to "add to" Moses' commandments (Deut.4:2; 12:32), God's words (Prov.30:5-6), and "these things" (Rev.22:18), none of these warnings has in view a completed canon of scripture. These exhortations mean that God's words are not to be modified or tampered with. They do not mean that God cannot inspire any further books. After all, quite a few inspired books were "added" after Deuteronomy and Proverbs. It is even likely, it seems to me, that there were additional biblical books written after Revelation (I am thinking of John's other writings).

While no statement in scripture would forbid the addition of new inspired writings beyond the present Bible, yet there are warnings about false prophets who will claim to be providing such new inspired oracles, but whose words will lead many astray (Deut.13:1-3; Matt.24:11; 1 John 4:1). There is no reason to reject the phenomenon of genuine prophecy wholesale, but there is a mandate that anyone professing to speak from God should be tested (1 Cor.14:29; 1 Thess.5:21; 1 John 4:1). Even genuine prophecy does not always rise to the status of "scripture" (e.g., Elijah, Elishah, Micaiah, Agabus and Silas were all called "prophets" but did not write any scripture).

There seems no reason, in a world that has produced more false prophets than true ones, to include Joseph Smith in the latter category. Anyone who requires the people of God to recognize him as God's true spokesman had better be prepared to give some unmistakable evidences that his claim is more than hot air. In my opinion, Smith provided nothing of this sort.

My Mormon friends generally say that the Book of Mormon itself is the evidence. However, it takes no inspiration to write a book—especially such a book as the Book of Mormon. I find it to be unimpressive as a literary work, and unconvincing as a piece of alleged historical writing.

If one were to point to the immense growth of the LDS religion as proof of Smith's legitimacy as a prophet, this would suggest that Mohammed was an even more legitimate prophet, since his religion has many more adherents than has Mormonism.

KyleB asked

what would you as LDS consider to be the most important thing(s) that you think evangelicals need to know they are missing by not being LDS?

To attempt an answer of your question, there are a lot of little things and a few big things that Christians outside the LDS church are missing out on but I think it can be best summed up in the concept that that we have authentic inspired scripture that you miss out on. To illustrate this check out this website by a Christian man who rejects Paul as an apostle but accepts Jesus Christ. http://www.jesuswordsonly.com . I suppose this man has a real relationship with Jesus, and I certainly can’t shake a stick at all of the wonderful doctrines that Jesus taught that he believes in and can live by, but think of all he misses out on by rejecting the God inspired teachings of Paul.

I see the same thing when I meet you guys, I know you have a real relationship with Jesus Christ and am edified by your faith but I would also love to share with you truly inspired scripture that has been revealed in our day that would clarify many issues and increase your knowledge and understanding of Christ. As an individual I don’t claim that I know more about Jesus, or am living a life closer to him than you are, or even that I know more than this jesuswordsonly guy does, but I have access to truths and blessings that you are missing out on and I’d like to give you access to all of that.