Witnessing to Mormons, part 5

Alpha & Omega Ministries

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Timothy 2 15 be diligent to present yourself approved to God a worker who does not need to be ashamed rightly dividing the word of truth

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Alpha and Omega ministries presents the dividing line radio broadcast The Apostle Peter commanded all

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Christians to be ready to give a defense for the hope that is within us Yet to give this answer with gentleness and reverence

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Your host is dr. James white director of Alpha and Omega ministries and an elder at the Phoenix Reformed Baptist Church If you'd like to talk with dr.

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White, you can call now by dialing 5 0 8 0 9 60. That's 5 0 8 0 9 60 and now with today's topic.

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Here's James White and good afternoon, Phoenix James White is teaching in Tucson and my name is

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Rich Pierce. I'm sitting in for James today, and I am on my soapbox.

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I Have listened to a great deal of discussion over the last couple of weeks regarding the

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Mormon Church and today we're going to talk about the Mormon Church and we're going to talk about witnessing to Mormons and Some may not understand in our valley because they are new

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That Maricopa County the last time I heard had the fourth largest concentration of Mormons per capita in the world

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Folks if you're going to live in Mormon in Maricopa County, you're going to run into Mormons You're going to encounter them and they're going to have some things to say

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At Alpha Omega ministries we have a Philosophy in our witnessing to whatever group we're dealing with that you don't get caught up in sidetracks

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You don't get caught up in other issues that are not relevant to Witnessing to Mormons or to whatever group you're dealing with You stay focused and you stay on target you stay

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Focused on the fact that you're there to share the gospel and in Mormon And witnessing to Mormons one of the easiest things that can happen to a

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Christian One of the most frustrating things is that you can get caught up in Side issues you can get caught up and talk about polygamy for hours

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Where does it get you? What did it do? How did that share the gospel?

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How did that lead them to the true Jesus Christ? You can get caught up in the

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Adam God doctrine I've met folks that stand outside of the Mormon temple with other groups and they just insist

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Mormons believe that Adam is God and yet that was an old teaching that was

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Abandoned years ago if you want to talk about Brigham Young believing that Adam was God Okay, we can talk about Brigham Young believing that Adam was

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God, but Mormons today don't believe that You want to get caught up in white salamanders?

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You want to get caught up in all kinds of scandal and Mark Hoffman bombing in Utah and all that other stuff and The whole nine yards you want to talk about what's called the

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Solomon Spaulding thesis and that somebody else authored the Book of Mormon besides Joseph Smith you can get wrapped up in all of these kinds of issues and it can go on and on and on for hours and It will get you nowhere

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How closer have you brought that person to the gospel? How much witnessing have you actually done?

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You know Paul the Apostle Paul tells us that we are to keep our eye on the prize as we run the race and When you're sharing the gospel, that's one thing you must do, you know folks

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I could get into rumor -mongering and anecdotal information The information that I know and have learned over the last 12 13 years now in witnessing to Mormons.

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I could sit here and I could rail on the Mormon Church. I Could I could just go on and on and on I could rip it to shreds

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I don't understand how that gets anybody any closer to to the gospel

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How does talking about a Mormon bishop who gave a woman counsel to divorce her husband?

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and I'm not saying this doesn't happen regularly, but how does spending our time on the air talking about that and Counseling her to divorce her husband because he left the church.

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How does that further the gospel? If I wanted to like I said, I could rip on the

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Mormon Church and I could rip it to shreds But that's not what Alpha Omega Ministries is about and when we train people

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To go out with us to Mesa to the Easter pageant when we train people to go up to Salt Lake City Which I'll be leading the group this next time

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It'll be the first Saturday in October when we train people and teach them how to share their faith that's what we teach them to do and that is to share their faith how to stay off of the side issues stay on track and focus on the

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Essentials of the faith. We're here. We're here to share God's Word We stand on the

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Word of God and we want to spend as much time sharing his word With Mormons as we possibly can and so that's what

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I'm going to dedicate today's show to doing and Unfortunately, I ran into a little snafu here at the studio when

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I got here, but that's okay. We can work around it That's something we can take care of. I was kind of hoping to have a little bit of an interactive session today with y 'all

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To have you log on to the internet and as I'm logging on I'm on our website And I'm telling and talking about our website.

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You can start to see the kind of Information that we have on that website, and I'm gonna actually talk you through it blindly here

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I can't get on to the website right now because I can't dial up, but that's okay If you have internet access,

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I'd like you to dial up www .aomin .org

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Right now and When you get there write this down because I know your computer doesn't go that fast unless you've got a t1 line

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But when you get there, you're gonna see the apologetics menu on our main menu there click on the apologetics menu, and then when you're there click on Mormonism and There you're going to see a vast

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Array of various you're gonna see debates discussions and topical things. You're gonna see

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An address of the 17 points of the true church and you're gonna see the 100 verse memorization system.

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That's right folks today We're going to talk about 100 verses who probably never get to them all in one day

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But we're gonna go through this listing here and you're gonna find out you can print this out on your computer you can print this out and it is a

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Tremendously valuable tool to being able to be ready to give an answer when the time comes to give that answer

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Now as we talk about verses and sharing with Mormons These aren't the only verses that we're going to be talking about because I want to hear from you today

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Five zero eight zero nine sixty if you're out of the Phoenix area one eight eight eight talk nine sixty

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That's one triple eight talk nine sixty and again in here in the valley. It's five zero eight zero nine sixty.

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Call me up Let's talk about the verses that you might Want to talk about if you're not sure if you've had a

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Mormon throw a Bible verse at you and you're stumped by it Let's talk about it and let's talk about how you can properly interpret what they're saying and understand what they're saying and best

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Answer them give them that answer of the hope that is within you. And so one of the things that We often hear right off the bat is a discussion when folks sit back and go wow 100 verses how in the world can

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I memorize 100 verses that is that's just a lot of work well, that's that's probably the most

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Active word you could use there in that the word work is necessary when studying

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God's Word It's one of those four -letter words that we don't like to do in America work

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Well, we need to sit down and we need to open up our Bible and we need to memorize these verses We need to know them and I have to tell you

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I have found these verses valuable to have at my Disposal at any time when

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I whether I'm carrying a Bible or not In sharing the gospel with someone sharing

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God's truth whether I'm at work whether I'm in whatever Situation and I don't just have to be witnessing to a

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Mormon. There are many groups out there that I Mean just regular

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Philistines out there that that don't believe that the Bible is God's Word they don't believe that the they believe the

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Bible is just a bunch of myths and When you start sharing from God's Word what it has to say about itself

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It can be a powerful thing because we need to understand we need to be ready to understand that the

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Word of God is quick and powerful and sharper than any two -edged sword piercing even to the dividing of thunder of Soul and spirit and of the joints and marrow and is a discerner of the thoughts and intents of the heart

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That's from Hebrews 4 12 when you think about what that has to say. That is a powerful powerful verse

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Now did you notice something I quoted from the King James Version of the Bible now

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We've got a book called the King James only controversy and some in the King James camp seem to think that we

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Don't believe that the King James is God's Word and nothing could be farther from the truth

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We don't believe it's the only Translation that is valuable for a believer to use today

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In fact, we believe that the King James English can be very difficult for folks to to use

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But in this situation if you're going to communicate with a Mormon One of the things that you need to understand is is that part of their articles of faith is where they believe the

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Bible insofar it is translated correctly and when they say the Bible they mean the King James Version and So unless you want to sit there and have a big old discussion about the translation you're using and sometimes that's valuable

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And why you're using that translation of why that translation is trustworthy you'll use the

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King James and it can cut through to the Unacceptable version for them and communicating with them

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If you're not using the King James, I recommend the New American Standard It is close to the King James in wording and if you've memorized your scriptures in New American Standard, oftentimes, they won't bother they won't

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See the difference in the language Because it is so close. The only difference is that it's been brought up to more of a a modern vernacular

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And and how it expresses itself, but I understand it is not a paraphrase of the King James The New American Standard is an excellent translation in in the modern -day vernacular

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When we talk about the authority of God's Word one of the most important verses we need to understand is

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Of passage that talks about or addresses directly the issue of whether or not we should add to God's Word Oftentimes what happens is we find ourselves

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We're doing an outreach visit or something like that and we find ourselves sitting in front of a Mormon in their home

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And they're talking about the Book of Mormon And they're talking about the Doctrine and Covenants and the Pearl of Great Price and that we need modern -day prophets, etc, etc, etc, and We suddenly say well, wait a minute the

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Book of Revelation It says that you're not to add to the words of this book. Let's all these curses are gonna happen

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And a Mormon comes back and says well, that's actually just for the Book of Revelation Guess what the

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Mormons, right? contextually the Book of Revelation Didn't necessarily fall into that place in in our order as we look at the 66 books of the

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Bible now the thing we need to understand is we need to take a little bit of different approach because a lot of times people think they

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Can just like cut to the chase with a handful of verses and they can slay the Mormon theology real quick And it doesn't work that way

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Mormons have been well trained and they know what verses to give you an answer for and they know how to deal with you

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On shall we say the average level again as I said in a broadcast back in May The last statistic

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I heard was from the quote -unquote as the Mormon Church had stated

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I can't remember the source But the idea was that 24 Baptists were being converted into the

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Mormon Church to every one that the Mormons lost to the Baptists Now that says something about whatever approach we're taking

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That says that we're not using the Word of God that we don't know the Word of God and when the Mormons give an answer or response

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The person on the other end who thought they had this thing nailed suddenly find themselves going.

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Oh, wait a second Maybe I'm I don't have this right, you know, they haven't been trained Properly by the

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Word of God. They may even haven't been discipled oftentimes they just don't have the information and the ammunition to be able to respond properly and So we look at the point right up front

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Well, what is the standard of a prophet and we can find that in the book of Deuteronomy?

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We talked about that back in May But I want to focus on one thing here if God were to reveal

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More scripture if the Bible isn't all of it, then there are certain things that we can test that new revelation with we can we can take a look at that new revelation and ask some questions and One of the warnings we see in the book of Proverbs It's Proverbs chapter 30 verses 5 and 6 and it says to us that every word of God is pure He is a shield unto them that put their trust in him we are warned add thou not unto his words lest he reprove thee and thou be found a liar and So we're immediately warned right up front that we are not to add to the

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Word of God. We're not to come up with Revelations of our own we're not to come up with systems of our own

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We're not to sit back and say well You know what? I could do it better than God and I have my way of looking at things and suddenly

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I invent my own Version of the Bible or something like that. It doesn't work that way. We are warned up front by the

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Word of God Now one of the things you deal with immediately right off the bat when you encounter a Mormon conversation starts off I don't know how many times

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I have heard this but to Christians when you talk about your testimony

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You're talking about your personal testimony and I can tell you right off the bat here

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That if you hear a Mormon sharing their testimony, it's gonna sound something like this.

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I know That the Book of Mormon is true. I know that the Mormon Church is true.

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I Know that Joseph Smith is a true prophet The Holy Spirit or the

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Holy Ghost has revealed these things to me and they may go on and on and on depending on how flowery They want to make it but there's three major elements to the

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Mormon testimony a they know That the Mormon Church is true to or B they know that the

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Book of Mormon is true and see they know that Joseph Smith and the current prophet

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Whose name suddenly Gordon Hinckley is a true prophet Okay, so you want to ask the question well, how is it that you know this how do you know?

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Well, you see I've prayed about it. I've prayed and I have received the

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Holy Ghost's assurance I've received a Feeling that I know He's assured me that these things are true.

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And so we can follow the teachings of the Mormon Church Had to take a sip there real quick.

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It is for some reason really dry in the studio, but goodness gracious folks What happened to it's a dry heat outside?

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It's it's supposed to be It's supposed to be a dry heat out there and it seems like this summer has just been drenching us here in Phoenix Those are you listening on the internet and other places the world

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Phoenix has been going through a very lengthy monsoon season and not that I mind the cool

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Rain, it cools us down, but the humidity that we get afterwards can be can be something else to endure

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So when you understand what the Mormon testimony is about you understand that this person is basically expressing to you that they have prayed and that the

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Holy Ghost as they see it has given them a warm feeling inside that is an assurance of their faith and Assurance of what it is that they're praying about and they're asking you to pray about it.

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Well first and foremost I'm gonna warn you right up front. They're gonna ask you to pray about the Mormon Church they're gonna ask you to pray about Joseph Smith and When they ask me this question,

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I answer. No, I have not prayed about it. And no, I will not pray about it I've read the Book of Mormon.

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I Understand Mormon theology oftentimes better than many Mormons I encounter

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Because I've studied it because I want to be prepared properly to be able to accurately represent what their faith is so that I can deal with it from a biblical perspective and They kind of get this look why wouldn't you pray about it?

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I don't understand because I'm commanded by the Word of God that I am NOT to tempt the Lord my God okay, and If I were to for instance have committed murder

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Or want to commit murder? I'm not gonna go to the Word of God Or I'm not gonna go to God and pray about and say, you know

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God is is it okay if I like just you know Kill this person if I want to if it's in my heart or my mind to commit adultery

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I'm not going to go to God in prayer and say is it you know? Are you really sure that thou shalt not commit adultery thou shalt not murder.

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Are you really sure about that? That's tempting God. He has already expressed himself in this he has already laid out his will his law

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And he's not gonna back off of it Okay, and so I would be tempting God and I would say in the same vein folks that if you're going to pray about the

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Mormon Church, he's already revealed this stuff He's already said in his word where he stands on the doctrines that the

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Mormon Church teaches Okay, and we're gonna talk about that. We're gonna go on again I'm a little puzzled why the phones aren't lighting up right now because I know we are

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Broadcasting all over the state of Arizona. I was coming back from Denver, Colorado off a vacation a little over a week ago and picked

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KPXQ up on 1360 in Winslow, Arizona, so I know we're out there and You know, maybe you're a

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Mormon listening today. I know that some Mormons have called other talk shows Here at KPXQ and and they've had some interaction

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Maybe you'd like to to talk with me today about your faith and and the things that the Mormon Church teaches but understand something

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I'm not gonna get sidetracked on all these irrelevancies I want to talk about what the Word of God has to say and I want to talk about What what it has to say to you

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Proverbs 14 12 regarding that feeling that we were talking about Proverbs 14 12 says that there is a way which seemeth right unto a man

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But the end thereof are the ways of death That's the thing right up front that we need to understand

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This is an issue of sin the heart and the way we feel there are things that seem right to us.

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Oh My gosh the world at large right now If it feels good do it

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It seems right to these people. It seems right to the world around us to be doing what?

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The things that they're doing and yet they are in They're in immorality all right, and Proverbs 14 12 says of them those who are guided by their feelings that there's a way which seems right

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It seems right, but the end thereof are the ways of death We're to look to the

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Word of God for our answers not not what seems really cool I'll bet when David's was standing up on there on the top of his roof

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Oh, you know looking at Bathsheba. It seemed right to do what he did But then suddenly he found himself in a very difficult position and he had to deal with her husband

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That was an end a way that lead led to death, okay, it was a sinful way it was a rebellion against God now

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Jeremiah 17 9 tells us that the heart is deceitful above all things and desperately

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Wicked who can know it this is important This is a very important verse to camp out on general

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God has revealed to Jeremiah about the condition of man's heart Can I trust my?

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feelings If it feels good do it if I pray about something and I get a good feeling

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Then it must be right. Is that the is that what we're gonna say here that that's what

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Mormons are saying regarding their testimony well Jeremiah says that the heart is deceitful.

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It's gonna lie to you folks your own heart lies to you all the time And it's deceitful above all things

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Jeremiah says there's nothing more deceitful than the heart of a man and it's desperately wicked and no one can know it you surely can't know your own heart and So it's important to lay that foundation a there's a way which seems right but leads to death

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The heart is deceitful above all things we can't trust our feelings Okay.

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Now, let's point them in the right direction acts 1711 This is the

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Berean passage and it's talking about the Bereans and the thing is is that you need to understand that Paul and Silas They were over in a town called

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Thessalonica and they got beat up The Thessalonians did not like what

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Paul and Silas were preaching and so they beat him up They threw rocks at them. They kicked him out of town. In fact, they had to be smuggled out of town and so they went from there to a town called

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Berea and it says of the Bereans that these were more noble -minded than those in Thessalonica in that they received the word with all readiness of mind and Searched the scriptures daily whether those things were so Luke applauds the

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Bereans he puts them apart he sets them apart in the chronology and of time that they have a

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Place in the scripture that all believers from then on would look to them with honor

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Because they searched the scriptures now, let's read this again.

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Maybe it says something a little bit differently These were more noble -minded in that That than those in Thessalonica in that they received the word with all readiness of mind and prayed about it whether those things were so That's what the

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Mormon Church would tell you That's what Mormons do So Paul and Silas would come to them and preach some

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Doctrine that they've never heard before and they go and pray about it. No these people look to God's Word for their answer they look to God's Word for the answer and They relied upon God's Word for the answer and they are commended in Scripture They are commended in Scripture as being noble noble Now one verse that you have to deal with the the

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Mormon missionary is going to bring this up very quickly, especially if he's talking about Joseph Smith's first vision because Joseph Smith was supposedly impacted by James 1 5 and It says that if any of you lack wisdom

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Let him ask of God that giveth to all men liberally and upbraideth not and it shall be given him now

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Joseph Smith was in a quandary He's got all these different as he put it religions all these denominations

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And there as he saw it preaching different doctrines and they're just confusing the heck out of him.

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He can't understand anything, he just doesn't know what to do and he's looking for the true faith and he sees

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James 1 5 and it says to Him if any of you lack wisdom ask of God go out and pray about this ask

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God He'll give you liberally and he'll upbraid if not And of course the events that follow this situation are he goes out and he has a vision

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Where God the Father and his son Jesus Christ appear to him and separate and distinct bodies on and on and on So this is a pattern for Mormons to follow the they look at this and say well, you know

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That's why we need to pray about these things. Well, here's a problem It's his wisdom

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It does not say knowledge and if you examine what Joseph Smith's quandary was

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He didn't know Which true church was true now

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I would venture to tell you that he probably lacked wisdom in the process as well because he did have the information

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And he did have the Word of God in his hand And he didn't have wisdom either But the point is is that he did not have knowledge.

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That's what he was seeking. And that's what as the Mormon As the first vision unfolds you see

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Joseph Smith telling everybody suddenly he now has the knowledge and he has direct knowledge from God So he never did get wisdom.

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Okay, he got knowledge and the Greek word for knowledge is gnosis But the

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Greek word for wisdom is Safia and that's the word here And you see you want to go back and look at what wisdom is and define the word wisdom

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Go read the book of Proverbs Go read the book of Proverbs. You're going to find out very quickly that knowledge and wisdom are two very different things and Joseph Smith, unfortunately

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Didn't get the kind of knowledge that Well, he was looking for he thought he was looking for knowledge or wisdom, whatever

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But the point is that this verse cannot apply To the reason or the motivation to to pray about the

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Mormon Church and to pray about the Book of Mormon The next section we're going to look at is

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The section on God and again, we are looking at Alpha Omega Ministries web page at www .aomin

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.org We are in the apologetics section from the main menu under Mormonism looking at 100 verses for witnessing to Mormons and We're got a break coming up here real quick.

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We're gonna take that break and Again, five zero eight zero nine sixty one eight eight eight talk nine sixty.

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We'll be right back We're back my name is

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Rich Pierce I'm sitting in for James White on the dividing line today And we are talking about the

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Mormon Church and we're talking about Mormon doctrine and how best to witness to Mormons and the 100 verses that Alpha Omega Ministries has

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Assembled from the scripture. There's not just 100 verses There's a lot more in the Word of God, but these we felt were the best 100 if you will, this is our top 100 from God's Word To use to witness to a

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Mormon and as we As we continue on here, we're gonna focus on the person of God and who

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God is and If we look at what Joseph Smith had to say about God and folks this is despite the what

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I call plausible deniability approach that Mormon Church is taking in their public relations today

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Trying to avoid this doctrine because it doesn't sound real hot This is what Joseph Smith had to say

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I have always declared God to be a distinct personage Jesus Christ to be a separate and distinct personage from God the

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Father and the Holy Ghost was a distinct personage and a spirit and these three Constitute three distinct personages and three gods if this is in accordance with the

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New Testament Lo and behold we have three gods anyhow, and they are plural and who can contradict it

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This is from teachings of the Prophet Joseph Smith pages 370 and 372

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In fact, he even goes on to say or this is interesting the head God organized the heavens and the earth

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I defy all the world to refute me in the beginning the heads of the gods organized the heavens and the earth

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Fascinating fascinating perspective from Joseph Smith, but it has nothing to do with the

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Bible and the Bible will have None of it as we're about to see Turn to Deuteronomy chapter 6 verse 4

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And see if I can't do this in Hebrew. My Hebrew professor is probably listening and Dr.

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White, I hope I don't slaughter this Shema Yisrael Yahweh Eloheinu Yahweh Echad Here Oh Israel the

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Lord our God is one Lord This verse in and of itself just put what

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Joseph Smith said to shame and to this sinful absolutely

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Heretical statement that he made in in that quote Here Oh Israel the

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Yahweh the Elohim as Mormons like to call the first to God the father our

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The Yahweh or I'm sorry not Elohim the Yahweh God's personal name the Jehovah Our Elohim is one

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Jehovah. You see the point is is that in Scripture? Jehovah or Yahweh is the personal name for the one true

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God of Israel You see the thing is is that what Joseph Smith describes there is polytheism

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There is no way around it it is a multiplicity of gods and he even says it outright lo and behold we have three gods anyhow and who can contradict it and of course if you

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Understand more about Mormon Church's teachings you understand quickly that they teach that there is an endless

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Genealogy of gods and so there is a million billion different gods that have gone before these gods and that are out there populating other worlds like ours and New Deuteronomy 6 4 which is the

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Hebrew Shema it is something that every good Jew gets up in the morning Recites teaches very clearly that Jehovah is

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Elohim he is one Jehovah and That is the major point that we need to understand

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Understand something in Hebrew thought now understand we believe in a

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Judeo Christian The Bible is a Judeo Christian ethic or it is a

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Judeo Christian Work, that's our faith. That's the word.

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I'm looking for Judeo Christian faith And the point is is that the Christianity comes out of Judaism?

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Okay, and in Judaism, they are absolutely monotheistic the

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God of Israel is the God we worship and he Is one he clearly states in the upcoming verse.

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I'm about to talk about Isaiah 43 verses 10 11 that there are none else besides him

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He says here you are my witnesses saith the Lord and my servant whom I have chosen

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That you may know and believe me and understand that I am he now listen carefully

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Before me there was no God formed Neither shall there be after me.

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I even I am the Lord and beside me. There is no Savior now I love the major difference in the responses that I get and talking with Mormons out in Mesa and in Salt Lake these days as opposed to Just ten years ago

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And when I was starting out doing this and James had started teaching many of us the basics of Mormonism You know, we went out there and oftentimes you kind of sit and going man this idea that Joseph Smith is putting forth

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This is incredible. Can anybody actually believe this stuff? Can he anybody actually? You know really want to defend this and you stand up there and you go, okay

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This is what Joseph Smith taught and and you're expecting them to go. No, he didn't no no And they're looking at you going.

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Yeah, absolutely. You got a problem with that And you're just going. Oh, yeah, the Bible it

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Doesn't say that and back then I was a whole lot more nervous on this topic than I am now

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I've been doing it for so long but clearly He says that before him there was no

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God formed now Mormons today in their quest to look like just another

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Christian denomination Are running around saying? Oh, we just we believe in one God We believe there's only one

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God and you have to really press them to get them to admit the fact that the church actually does teach a multiplicity of gods and They say well we have one

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God for this earth and that's Heavenly Father Well, wait a second didn't

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Joseph Smith just say they have three gods anyhow Didn't we just read that? They have three gods at least just for this world

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So they're polytheistic and I've seen all kinds of twists and turns, but ultimately the belief that there is in existence

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More than one God anywhere anytime anytime Is polytheism, okay, so we need to understand that let's continue on talking about the nature of God Isaiah 44 6 and 8 44 verses 6 and 8 and thus saith the

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Lord now understand when you're looking at your Bible And I talked about this back in May when you're looking at your

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Bible and you see the word Lord there in all caps The Lord are smaller, but they're still capital letters

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Thus saith the Lord the King of Israel that word Lord when you see it appear like that in capital letters is the

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Hebrew word Yahweh It's a Hebrew word Yahweh or what we got from Germany Martin Luther translated into German as Jehovah and we brought it over and transliterated it into English and So we see this and he's saying thus saith the

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Yahweh or the Jehovah the King of Israel and his Redeemer the Jehovah of hosts I am the first and I am the last and beside me.

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There is no Elohim God Capital G OD when you see that the term is

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Elohim Fear you not neither be afraid have I not told thee have not told thee from that time and have declared it

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You are even my witnesses. Is there a God is there an Elohim beside me? Yay, there is no

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Elohim. I know not any now I find that absolutely fascinating in light of what Joseph Smith says in the

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King Follett funeral discourse that I just read Because in essence Joseph Smith comes along thousands of years after Isaiah gives this prophecy

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And God says there is no God beside me. Yay. There's no

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God he doesn't know of any other God and Yet Joseph Smith comes along thousands of years later and says he's wrong

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But there's actually thousands of gods millions of gods and endless genealogy of gods out there Isaiah 45 5 and 6

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By the way, you can go Isaiah 40 through 48 is replete with verses like this

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I am the Lord. I am the Yahweh. I'm the Jehovah and there is none else. There is no

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No God no Elohim beside me What did

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Joseph Smith say? He said that? Jesus who's beside The Father and the

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Holy Spirit or Holy Ghost who's beside Jesus and the Father their gods, too He says there's no

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God beside me I girded thee though thou hast not known me that they may know from the rising of the

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Sun and from the West that there is None beside me. I am Jehovah. There is none else. Now you have to understand we're also going to we're kind of leaning into Inadvertently the

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Christian doctrine of the Trinity and the idea that the one true God is The Father the person of the

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Father the person of the Son the person of the Holy Spirit These three persons make up the one being who is

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God He is unique and there is no one else and we need to understand that is what we are saying on this program

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Don't get into all this I'm saying that Jesus isn't God and the Holy Spirit isn't God.

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Yes, of course, they are They are triune. They are one they make up the one true God Deuteronomy 435

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Differentiating between Yahweh and Elohim as I've already been doing It is it is an interesting passage unto thee it was showed or shown that thou mightest know that Yahweh or Jehovah he is

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Elohim and there is none else beside him And though it is important, especially in this series of verses to stick with the

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King James You might want to take and for instance insert Pronounce it showed or at least maybe even shown in in that verse so that it's a little bit more understandable

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Moving along here Isaiah 44 24 and then we're going to get into the nature of God and talk about his eternal nature

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This be the last verse on that Isaiah 44 24 Thus saith the Lord thy Redeemer and he that formed thee from the womb

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I am the Lord that maketh all things that stretcheth forth the heavens alone that spreadeth abroad the earth by Myself now, this is key and understanding that the

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Mormon temple ceremony Depict God the Father Jehovah sending down or actually

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Elohim sending down Michael and Jehovah to organize the matter.

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All right, so in Mormon thought the quote -unquote head God for this earth does doesn't even do the organization let alone the creation

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We need to understand that Jehovah He says that he did it alone by himself and of course the verses we've already revealed

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It says that Jehovah is Elohim. And so the one true God of Israel the creator of all things created this planet alone, and he also created the heavens

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All things he says here all things and he spreadeth abroad the earth by Himself and that's a key verse to understanding that We're gonna get into God's nature here in a second

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But first we are up for a break and so we're gonna talk about Psalm 90 verse 2

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Before the mountains were formed from everlasting to everlasting thou art God in just a minute and we're back that young lady was

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James White's daughter summer and She's not my daughter. Her daddy won't be right back.

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He's probably at this moment Just wrapping up some teaching and Golden Gate Seminary and he's down in Tucson right now

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Teaching down there. He's gonna have believe five different times this semester. He'll be doing that and so I'll be filling in and Five zero eight zero nine sixty.

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I've been informed today that we're gonna actually have an extra ten minutes of the program today

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And I hope that's a blessing the lines aren't lighting up and I hope that's not a bad sign

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But at the very least we have lots of Bible verses to cover here certainly more than what we have time for But at after the top of the hour, we're going to actually continue with the program

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Till about ten after three o 'clock. So just wanted to let you know that so if you call in now

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There will be plenty of time to talk with you We are talking about Bible verses for witnessing to Mormons in a theme where we're staying on Target and being focused on what the real issues are in witnessing to Mormons and not getting sidetracked

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Psalm 90 verse 2 we're talking about the nature of God here. It is a this is more of a

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Interactive verse if you will in using it Do you actually have to use your arms and if you're like me? that's real easy because I like to let my arms and hands flail around a lot while I'm talking and It says before the mountains were brought forth or ever thou hast formed the earth and the world even from everlasting to everlasting

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Thou art God Now this is as I recall a psalm of Moses and I read this psalm and if you really look at what the whole passage is saying

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It is a beautiful beautiful psalm where Moses is exalting God in his true nature in his genuine

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Nature as the Creator and as eternal and so if you will you use your arms and you use your left arm

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And you stretch it all the way out to your side And then you use your right arm and you stretch it all the way out to your other side, and it would go like this before the mountains were brought forth opening extending your left arm, so Before the mountains were brought forth or ever thou hadst formed the earth in the world even from everlasting so your left arms out there pointing to everlasting

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To everlasting your right arm now comes out and points to everlasting thou art God now

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I have one question how long does everlasting last? Well, it's it's it's everlasting.

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It's like forever Okay, you put a time limit on it of any kind. It's and it's got that much further to go.

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It's infinity It's infinite from everlasting to everlasting thou art

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God present tense statement Where Moses is saying you are God?

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Even from everlasting to everlasting before the mountains were brought forth or ever he had formed the earth and the world from everlasting to everlasting your

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God you are and Joseph Smith's God can't say that because there was a time when he lived in a mortal probation and He was on earth as a human being himself

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As Orson Pratt taught a sinful human being and he eventually became a

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God through working his way up to exaltation But that's not the

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God of the Bible. No way. No way. He's always been God There are no other gods and he will always be

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God Okay, that is a very key verse to understand

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Hosea 11 9 God says it outright Because again, we talked about Joseph Smith teaching that God was once a man lived on another planet

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And if you looked in the heavens He says if you looked in the veil were rent today and you could look the old you would see

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God in the very form as a man So he's he's an exalted man, but he's still by nature a man

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But God in Hosea 11 9 Differentiates very clearly. He says for I am

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God and not man the Holy One in the midst of thee he's talking about his nature now, that's

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Expound on that a second here nature. What are we talking about that if you? If you ever been up in the mountains and you've seen some of these big huge boulders.

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I want you to imagine a big rock Imagining the big rock. Okay good That rock has the being of a rock

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That's right. It has the nature and being of a rock Human beings have the nature and being of a human of a man

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Okay What God is differentiating here is that he has the nature the being of God?

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He is a totally different order of being he is not a man He is

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God and he is the Holy One in the midst of thee and that this verse is something

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We've got to explain that very clearly that he is not an exalted man. He is not of the same species

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My dog I got to take my dog to the vet this morning, okay, and my dog has a wonderful personality

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I mean this guy this dog is fun. Okay He I love the fact that I throw the ball and all growing up the

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German Shepherds My parents bought me would never bring the thing back. They just stand there look at me like I was stupid Okay, but this dog actually brings the ball back and he loves to do this.

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He has great personality Okay, and he's fun. But the thing is is that He is of the nature and species and being of a dog.

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He's a canine Okay We are human beings he is the one unique God being okay

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That's what Hosea 11 9 is getting after here. Jeremiah 23 24 Jeremiah 23 verse 24 can any man hide himself in secret places that I shall not see him saith the

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Lord? Listen closely. Do not I fill the heaven and the earth saith the

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Lord. This is talking about God's omnipresence We're talking about the fact that God fills all space and all time

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Okay, and so we need to understand that in Jeremiah 23 24 he's saying it's not his influence that fills the heaven and the earth

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It's him that fills the heaven and the earth Jeremiah 23 24 where we're talking about God filling the heaven and the earth and Can anyone hide himself in secret places that he shall not see him he is is very clear

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On He's very clear on this issue 2nd Chronicles 618 2nd

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Chronicles 618 But will God in very deed dwell with men on earth behold heaven and the heaven of heavens

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Cannot contain thee how much less this house, which I have built Now let's get some context here as we take a look at this the

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The context is is Solomon. He's dedicating the temple. Okay He says but will

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God and very deed dwell with men on earth behold the heaven and the heavens cannot contain thee

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How much less this house, which I have built? well The the the temple was a very large place and A great deal of work went into building it

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The thing that needs to be expressed here is that God cannot be contained in limited space and in Mormon thought?

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the the god of Mormonism is contained within a limited space and The the

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We need we need to understand he's on the present. He's everywhere his Not his influence as Mormons like to describe it but his being is everywhere he is everywhere

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Talking about Jesus and Lucifer now one of the things we need to often understand here. Is is that Jesus?

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According to the Mormon Church is the spirit brother of Lucifer. In fact, they teach that he is the Firstborn spirit child of God the

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Father and he is in fact the literal born Child of God the

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Father in the flesh and that God the Father actually begat through Mary through physical intercourse

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His son Jesus Christ and they look to Jesus as their elder brother and so We need to understand that as we take a look at Colossians chapter 1

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I'm Looking at the board here and there's all kinds of things here. Let me bring KJ on the line on line 1

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KJ, how are you today? Hi. How are you today? Great. That's good Well, I'm calling because I've been listening to the the program on the day the weekday talk show where they've been upbraiding the

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Mormons for for putting the ad on PAX TV and My background is

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I was baptized in Mormon when I was 8 years old First thing I did was I went when

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I was about 10 I read Mormon doctrine by David O McKay, which is a book about what Mormons are supposed to believe mm -hmm, and then

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I and then I read the Bible and compared it and found several inconsistencies and Attempted to get the answers and never received satisfactory answers and then finally

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I became inactive in the church and became a Christian but but I Think I think people like I don't even understand to me a lot of the concept of what the

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Trinity is is a mystery, you know There are many things about Christianity.

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I don't understand but there are many things that are Mormon doctrine that are definitely Non -biblical but but I must say that the