LDS Evangelism 101

Why Evangelism to LDS Neighbors Matters

Well, it is an absolute blessing to be able to come here tonight and to not only preach the gospel. But to have the opportunity to refresh on these things and also to teach you. So I just want to thank you guys for being willing to come here tonight to learn as well as I.

Hope if you're coming here to learn that you really want the opportunity to take the gospel message to your neighbor. Whether they be near or far. So before we begin I do want to offer a prayer real fast before we get into tonight's teaching on evangelism to the LDS.

So let's pray.

Lord God, we just want to be praying. And thanks thankfulness Lord for this opportunity. That's coming to us in the manner of two temples That are to follow that are is a false religion. Lord We thank you for the opportunity to take your gospel out to those that don't know you Lord and we just want to be in specific prayer for those that are Considered a part of the LDS faith those that are Mormon.

Lord, we just pray that they might be converted and that you might use willing vessels like ourselves or that you might fit us together for that opportunity. God I would just pray that as these opportunities present themselves and give us strength and courage to preach and to teach and to Evangelize your gospel message the death and resurrection of our Lord Jesus Christ.

God I would just pray that you might encourage us and remembering that conversion does not come about by us. And God I would just pray that we would just do all these things into your glory and according to your will.

And I say this in your name Jesus Christ.

Amen.

So I think I recognize everyone. Yeah, everybody in here for the most part knows me but I just want to introduce myself just a little bit and kind of give a little bit of a maybe a Testimony might be the best word to use.

But like I like Pastor Paul said my name is Brayden Patterson. I have the fortunate blessed opportunity to pastor Valley Baptist Church in Hagerman. Like I said, it's an absolute privilege and blessing to do that to be underneath the Lordship and and sovereign Lord Jesus Christ and doing those things.

Defining Evangelism and the Mormon Challenge

But tonight is going to be on Evangelism as you know evangelism specifically to the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. And this might be a 101 classic crash course for.

For tonight.

So just a couple expectations of what I'm planning on doing tonight. It's it's going through a couple different definitions that might help us as Christians as we approach the Mormon Church as well as a Just a quick go-to guide on how we might be willing to share the gospel to them issue of Mormonism and Christianity and Method and if there's any questions that you have regarding What is being taught tonight or anything that has been maybe in the last six months a year or something like that that?

Member of the Church of Jesus Christ has come to you and you don't know how to talk to them or you don't know how To confront what they brought to you now is your opportunity. I would do my best to answer that.

So just to give you a little bit of history about myself. I think most of us know but I was raised in LDS Church for 19 years of my life. And when I say church, I mean a religious organization. When I say that LDS Church I do not think that they are a part of the Church of Christ.

They are not a part of the members of the body of Christ. They don't know who Jesus is. Let me be clear in saying that so I was a member of the Church of Jesus Christ Of Latter-day Saints for 19 years of my life and in those 19 years.

I was baptized. I held the priesthood that they had According to themselves and I believed in the Book of Mormon. And I went to seminary and I graduated all with all four years and I was getting ready to go on a mission.

And I was having the opportunity to share the restored gospel as they would call it plan of salvation Joseph Smith with a lovely lady Who's now my wife and after dating it for a month and sharing that message with her for two hours in the driveway of her parents.

She sat very quietly and listened and when I was done bearing my testimony and whatnot. She looked over at me and she said that's stupid. And I think that's really funny because I think oftentimes.

When.

Evangelist teachers come and tell a church or a group of people on how to evangelize to another group of people. I think that they get very much as the way that you should do it very much in the methodology.

And I think this is wrong because I think that evangelism can take many many different methods and modes Into reaching the lost and I think that ultimately and I know that this is the truth according to John chapter 3.

And I know that us as this church goes we would believe and confirm this that it's all according to the will of God. And it's going to be upon the Holy Spirit to draw those that are going to have faith in Jesus Christ.

And so we just get the opportunity to be vessels and glorify God in those ways.

So.

Methods of Evangelizing at the Temple

Speaking of the methods of doing this so because this is geared towards Evangelism at the temple whether it be in Pocatello or in Burley here soon, which I'm very very excited about I'm saddened by the fact that it is sin and I know it's going to be taking place.

But I'm excited for the opportunity to have something a little closer by that I can travel to even more readily and vividly. But some of the modes that you might see. It's people that are handing out gospel tracts you might see people that are holding signs.

You might be seeing people that are singing hymns at the church. There might be groups of people that are praying there and you might even see One or two individuals that are old enough to do open-air witnessing and so that's what I am expecting myself to be doing.

Tomorrow the 19th the 20th of September as well as October 7th I plan on doing a lot of open-air preaching and hopefully to get into some good one-on-one or one-on. Hopefully 50 or however many LDS people are there Conversations so that they can hear a gospel message.

I.

Get quieter, okay, I appreciate that. So as far as the night goes I wanted to find a couple things for us. Better prepared to preach the gospel to those that are our neighbors, right? So we have a commandment in the Bible to love our neighbors as we love ourselves.

And it is a loving message if you have hold to the gospel message and you understand who Jesus Christ is. You should be wanting to tell everybody that you come across about. There's no way around this to walk by somebody not telling the gospel even though I I know that we all do it.

It is one of the most evil and hateful things that we could do to somebody to not tell them about how you have been Saved is truly shameful. It's sad and it hurts me to think about how many people I do not.

And so it's important for us to be doing this. So what is a definition of an evangelist. What is an evangelist. We use this word quite often as Christians, and I know pastor Paul talks about it quite often.

Putting on your gospel shoes, and there's a meaning and a reason behind that Evangelists are a proclaimer of the gospel a Proclaimer of the gospel that is what evangelism is. So I like like I said, there are many different modes and methods that we can do this by a Gospel track can easily introduce somebody to the biblical Jesus that you and I know as much as a person that is holding a sign.

Person is Doing a Bible study at their next-door neighbor's house or knocking on their neighbor's house or so on and so forth. That is what it is. It's proclaiming the gospel message that which we know and we hold to and love so dearly the thing that saved us.

It is us taking that to the next person. That's what the evangelist is.

What is?

Mormonism as a False Religion and False Church

Mormonism what is the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints? There might be many different ways that we can go about defining this. I think a biblical way of defining it would be a false heretical religion.

I think that would be the most biblical way that we could define it, but maybe in a more general sense. What is LDS like I said LDS stands for the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. LDS it came about by a gentleman named Joseph Smith as many of us.

I'm assuming all of us know 1800s after growing up in a Presbyterian church with his mother. He supposedly as the story goes went into the woods after thinking to himself. How can all these different denominations all be saying that they have truth yet?

They disagree with each other and so in his opinion he and according to his story. He went out to the woods one day. He prayed and he saw depending on the story you're reading. He saw two.

Distinct beings.

Whom he claimed and whom they claimed to him supposedly were God the Father and the Son Being two separate beings. And right then and there should be throwing up red lights in the back of your head. I hope anyway if it doesn't.

You need to learn a little bit more about the Trinity.

A little bit more about the biblical definition of the Father. But right then and there it should tell you that this has gone far away from what biblical Christianity teaches so. That is the initiating of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints.

From there Joseph Smith claimed to have received revelation about how to.

Restore the gospel.

Restore the church of Jesus Christ out of 2 ,000 years later because the Mormon Church Fundamentally teaches that truth the true church Prophets. The gospel itself was lost at the departure and death of the Apostles that when they died There was no continuation of the true church.

Which I hope that all of us know our church history and know that there have been faithful men and women that have been proclaiming the gospel of Jesus Christ ever since his ascension which is according to his promise that He would build his church upon the rock.

And that it would never fall into the gates of hell would never ever prevail against it. It's that promise that Jesus Christ made to the church of us. That we would take confidence in what he built. So that that would be my working definition of Mormonism is a false church that is founded upon a 14 year old boy's Testimony of seeing something that is completely contradictory to what the Bible ever has taught us about who God is.

And not only that but it was a thief a liar and we're going to do many many.

Atrocious things.

Distorting truth and distorting the Bible as well in the process. It's truly worrying that there's so many people that have come to the conclusion that it is true, but.

For us.

Preaching and sharing and going out and telling our Mormon friends. So who in here knows somebody that's LDS. I. All the kids We have the opportunity to live in Twin Falls in the Magic Valley area of Idaho and guess what there should be a Mormon on.

Every single street of your town no matter where you go I know there will be Mormons that are around you and this gives us the opportunity to go and share your gospel. It gives us that opportunity to love our neighbor and to glorify our God in that way.

So What is in my opinion the right way to share the gospel? I'm not going to tell you not to tell them that it's stupid because that was something that was said to me. And actually really helped it really really did.

I'm not going to tell you that you should go and do that maybe on every door that you knock on. Don't do that necessarily unless maybe you feel glad to do so. But I want to talk about the methodology that I go about approaching the issue of Mormonism versus Christianity.

Many people and there might be even some of us here in this congregation in this church tonight that think and feel the necessary feel it necessary to approach confronting Mormonism by bringing up Church history and by church history I mean their church history.

By bringing up the black the stains the evil the wrongdoings that they had done in their past. And while this has been effective for many many many people throughout the years of getting somebody out of Mormonism this usually results in them going to atheism or agnosticism.

And the reason that is is because they have so much trust and faith in their false God. When you tell them that their church is wrong, and you show them the evidence for it. They lose any Possibility of trusting in anything other than their church.

They've been scarred so severely from it. And so what I think as Christians we have failed to do is give the Mormon the true Jesus of the Bible in process. That would be my opinion of most evangelists to Mormons.

So some of the.

Exposing Mormon History Without Losing the Gospel

Contradictory things that in their church history that people might bring up. I brought just a few examples to show us. So this is a book that was done by Sandra Tanner a woman in Utah who exposed throughout the years of Mormonism The changes that were made in the book of Mormon and as you can see from the title of this.

This is the 3913 changes of the book of Mormon. They claim that the book of Mormon is the most true book in the world including over the Bible. This right here is a stain.

Upon the Mormon Church.

I want to share with you what happens when you show this to a Mormon. They do this. They don't listen to you. They ignore you and they might even close their eyes. Because what they associate is your attempt of trying to love them With what they would call an anti-mormon.

And i'm quick to tell them i'm not anti-mormon. I'm anti-mormon doctrine. I love mormons. I love you guys. I absolutely love them. And so I do not prefer to do this method. I really don't because this is not the heart of the issue.

Isn't.

Let me show you another stain that is upon the church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. And the only reason I do this is to show how easy it is to expose these kind of things to those that are LDS.

It's another thing to get them to listen. So this book right here is the seventh volume of a long series of volumes of what's called the journal discourses. They're different articles and sermons and or they don't call them sermons talks and messages.

That throughout the years of Joseph Smith and some other people that were recorded Looked through by the current prophet said it was doctrine and then published. It is the journal discourses. This book was published by the desert industry news or desert Desert industries.

So the di right it was produced by them and it was once mormon doctrine. They realized how much of a stain it is. And so if you were to go onto their website the church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, they would say that this is non-doctrine.

Even though Brigham Young in one of the journals of discourses Said that what he has signed off on in this book is as good as scripture as good as what you and I are in the bible. So just to show us two different stains in this journal discourse, uh journal seven on page 289.

I don't expect you to remember this by any means but just to show us how easy it is to do.

In here.

It is said.

Joseph smith holds the keys of this last dispensation. And is now engaged behind the veil in the great work of the last days I can tell our beloved brethren christians. This is speaking to us Who have slain the prophets and butchered and otherwise caused the death of thousands of latter-day saints.

The priests who have thanked god in their prayers and thanksgiving from the pulpit that we have plundered driven and slain. And the deacons under the pulpit and their brethren and sisters in close closets.

In their closets who have thanked god thinking that the latter-day saints will waste away something that no doubt mortified them. Something that to say something that to say the least is the matter of deep regret to them.

Namely that no man or woman in this dispensation will ever enter Into the celestial kingdom of god without the consent of joseph smith. I hear laughs rightfully so that is a stain Upon the church of jesus christ.

This is a doctrine that they would still believe but not hold openly before you. I want to read one more. This is just the very next page.

290 in the same book.

Let me uh read Here this and some of us might be familiar with this. This is shameful and I even hate reading it. It says this. You see some classes of the human family that are black.

Uncouth.

Uncommon.

Disagreeable and low in their habits wild and seemingly deprived of nearly all the blessings of intelligence That is generally bestowed upon mankind. The first man that committed the odious crime of killing one of his brother and would be cursed.

The longest of any one of the children of adam Cain slew his brother cain might have been killed and that would have been. That have put a termination to that line of human beings. This was not to be as the lord and the lord put a mark upon him, which is the flat nose and black skin.

Trace mankind down to after the flood. And then another curse is pronounced upon the same race. That they should be the least or the servants of servants. And they would be until the curse is removed and the abolitionists cannot help it nor in the least alter the decree.

How long is that race to endure the dreadful curse. That is upon them. That curse will reign and remain upon them. And they never can hold the priesthood or share in it until the other descendants Out of it receive the promise and enjoy the blessings of the priesthood and the keys.

Thereof.

This is another stain.

Of mormonism.

Absolutely wrong. Like I said bring this up to the mormon and their instinct is to immediately run away And denounce you as saying anything good for them. In fact, I would argue by bringing this up to them They will completely shut out any conversation about jesus christ.

And if anything if they heard anything that you said their first go-to is going to be atheism. It's going to be them going to the internet and researching more and more and more evil that their church has no.

Undoubtedly committed.

Very clearly. And they're going to be driven to another way to hell atheism. I think we're failing when we're doing this to mormons. Like I said, if you feel led to show a mormon this kind of stuff i'm not here to tell you not to.

I'm here to tell you tell them about jesus christ preach the cross. Tell it to them make sure they understand that they don't know it currently because they think they do. What I'll I go about sharing the gospel with the mormon, it's very simple.

I have a book here and i'm going to hand it out. And let everybody look through it if you'd like to. This was my first book mormon. And I uh when I was saved and became a christian I ran into some missionaries in my very first encounter with them.

I wanted to tell them about jesus christ. And so I found that if you asked a mormon missionary To get a book of mormon from them. They will listen to you a little bit longer than if you didn't ask them for a book of mormon.

You see what i'm saying? And I think that if you take a book from them, it's one less book. They have the opportunity to hand out to another person that might not know. That's my opinion. You can do this if you would like to but I took this book from him and I quickly Wanted to go through that which I remember and what I could find that was quickly false.

So I think should go back to him and show them so you can you can finger through the pages if you'd like. Um, I have some tags on there with different things that are in reference to it.

But.

I have right here just as evidence that I used to be mormon. I have what I would call my quad. This is my Quad, this is my old testament new testament book of mormon doctrine covenants and the rule of great christ that I was using.

In preparation to go on a mission as you can see it says elder braden roger patterson, that's my name. I was getting ready to go on a mission as you can tell. But in here, I want to show us a couple different examples that you can look through when this book comes around to you.

About why how I approach the mormon about the issue of jesus christ. I first asked him. I asked him for a book of mormon. I said, hey, can I get a book of mormon from you? They'll give it to me. I immediately go and tell them I see that on your name tag that you are a member of the church of jesus christ of latter-day saints.

And you're telling me that you have a restored gospel that actually may say yes, that is my message for you today. I tell them I ask them. Okay, if you knew all things you knew I was going to die in 30 seconds.

How would you tell me the gospel of jesus christ is how would you tell me to repent and believe in the gospels? How would you convince me to believe in your message? And so I asked him to tell me this in 30 seconds or less and I think for a christian I think we should all be prepared to give that kind of a message to somebody.

I would hold I I would encourage you to at least go home and maybe study that or be ready to do that and give him the case. But they might say I guarantee you right now. If you ask one missionary one day and a missionary the next day and a missionary the next day.

You will get three different answers. You will never get a consistent answer from the mormon missionary. So be prepared for that. But many of them will come close to saying something along what they call their third and fourth article of faith.

This is something that they're taught when they're very young in what they would call the primary. When they're very young in their church, they're taught the 13 articles of faith. And the third and fourth article of faith they do say this.

The third.

We believe that through the atonement all mankind May be saved by obedience. By obedience, sorry, excuse me by obedience to the laws and ordinances of the gospel. That's how they think that they will be saved.

Article of faith.

Four says this.

We believe that the first principle and ordinances of the gospel are faith in the lord. Jesus christ. Second repentance. Third baptism by immersion for the remission of sins. Fourth laying on of hands For the gift of the holy ghost.

They believe all these things to be essential To being what they would call the celestial kingdom of god. They would believe that this is a necessary step for you To do. In other words, this is a works-based salvation.

And if you don't know what that term means i'll break it down for you works being something that you have to do. And because based off that you then get salvation. And it doesn't take us very long in the bible.

I'll just open up real quick one Galatians chapter 2 To confront this false idea that you are saved by works. Galatians chapter 2 verse 16 20 and 21 say this. Nevertheless knowing that a man is not justified by the works of the law, but through faith in christ.

Jesus.

Even we.

Have believed in christ. Jesus that we may be justified by faith in christ. And not by the works of the law since by the works of the law shall no flesh be justified. Verse 20 and 21 is a real showing to the woman if they bring this up.

I have been crucified with christ and there's no longer I who lived but christ lives in me. And the life which I now live in flesh. I live by faith in the son of god who loved me and delivered himself for me.

I do not nullify the grace of god. For if righteousness comes through the law Then christ died.

Needlessly.

If you believe even here today, and you're not out. Yes that you are saved upon one thing that you have done in your life christ died needlessly according to this Abandon that have faith in jesus christ and in heaven and earth.

I would encourage you that today and I would also encourage you to tell the mormon this. That they must abandon all hopes in their works in order to have a true faith in jesus christ. So what would a mormon say is their gospel message.

They would allude to something that has to do with faith in jesus christ. They will mention something along those lines. They will say that you have to be baptized. That you have to have proper authority that you have to be a member of the church of jesus christ of latter-day saints.

And they might mention something about believing in joseph smith believing in the book of mormon believing in their modern prophet today. Which is russell and nelson. They would say that these things are a necessary fact in you having salvation.

Now we just talked about how that means christ died needlessly then for them. So how then we address this issue. This is this is usually how I do I go about and I say tell me your gospel message in three seconds.

They tell me almost exactly what I just told you in some way or another.

And i'll say.

Well.

That's not the gospel. I tell them true. That is not the gospel. And I go on and I say you see there's a bible verse that tells me something that I think You need to be aware of that. I think you should be very scared of actually see.

Volations chapter one verses eight and nine. And church, if you have your bible with you and you don't know this verse, I would encourage you to turn there. And even if you do know it, please turn there.

Volations chapter one eight through nine. This is very important. Galatians chapter one eight through nine. And just as a precursor the lds church believes that the king james version is the only closest inspired version to the original.

So if you're going to do evangelism to a mormon, it's a good idea to try to do so out of the king james version I'm reading from my 1977 nasp tonight. But just know if you're going to be talking to a mormon, it's helpful to have a king james version because that just keeps their ears open.

And their minds open a little bit longer if that makes sense. Volations chapter one eight and nine says this but even though we Or an angel from heaven should preach to you a gospel Contrary to that which we have preached to you.

Let it be a curse. As we've said before so I say again now if any man is preaching to you a gospel contrary to that which you receive Let it be a curse. And I make a note to the person I say you see it says another one other than the one that you have yet received meaning that the church of galatia Have received the gospel message already.

It was a message that had already gone out to them. They already understood what it was and paul's Earnest Telling them to the church in this earnest letter. He says if I If we or an angel doesn't matter who it is doesn't matter what authority they proclaim to have.

If they tell you a different gospel to let them be accursed. And so I tell them this I say according to your gospel definition. It is a false gospel. And according to galatians 1 8 9 not only should you be accursed but your church should be accursed too.

If you're telling me this is the message of the church of jesus christ of latter-day saints. And I ask do you want to know what the true gospel is? And so they usually will ask me they'll usually say well, what do you say the gospel is.

And I say well. Let's turn to the bible and let's look at it. If I only had 30 seconds to tell you what the gospel message is, I would go to first corinthians Chapter 15 1 through 4 and I quickly tell them I say in verses 1 and 2 paul describes the church of corinth.

That if you have faith in this gospel message, you are saved and if your faith is in vain you are not it is that simple. Paul puts it that way and he says in verses 3 and 4 the gospel message that saves is this.

That jesus christ died for your sins according to scriptures that he was buried and he rose again on the third day according to scriptures. It is the death bearing on the resurrection of jesus christ.

That is the simple message of the gospel. I say to them if you want to have a longer than a 30 second conversation. Now we can go to what it says in there.

According to the scriptures.

According to the scriptures jesus christ.

In mark chapter 1 verse 14 through 15. Is doing the work of evangelism. I want to turn us to it with us. Mark chapter 1 verse 14 through 15.

It says this.

And after john had been taken into custom. This is after jesus's baptism. The very first thing that jesus said about making his public entry into his public ministry.

This is it.

Jesus came into galilee.

Preaching the gospel of god.

That is evangelism right there. Verse 15 goes on to say and saying.

The time.

Is to build the kingdom of god is a kingdom of repent. And believe in the gospel Jesus christ himself is doing was doing the very same thing that we are told to do in the bible. And that is to take the gospel message forth and once again church.

What is the simplest form we have to define the gospel down to just a couple of one sentence? The death bearing on the resurrection of jesus christ according to scriptures according to the first corinthians 15 1 through 4 that is the Smallest and shortest way I know how to describe it.

I don't know. That's the shortest and smallest way that the bible can describe it for us. And so I explained to them you see jesus himself is doing this. And if I had 30 more seconds to talk to you, or maybe even a couple more minutes.

This is what I would say. You being lds you most likely say it's good for me to have faith in jesus christ and they shake their heads. Yes, that is what we believe. That you should have faith in jesus christ.

And I go on to say well what happens if I told you that the jesus I was having my faith put in. Sometimes goes by jesus and he's my cashier down at fred meyer down at my local grocery store. And their eyes open up and they see oh, no, that's not what you should put your faith in.

That's absolutely right. Amen. Don't put your faith in the person that is the cashier. Faith is only as good as the object that we are putting it into. If I put my faith in this chair right here to get me home tonight.

It's not going to get me there.

It's faith and putting an improper thing. If I put faith in my vehicle outside with no gas in it It's still not going to get me home. Faith is only as good as the thing that you are putting it into.

And so.

I asked him I say You think that you're a christian. And they say yeah, I do. And they say it's not our name tag. It's on our church building. Says the church of jesus christ of latter-day saints. And I say well, I have a question for you.

If I.

Didn't believe in joseph smith. I didn't believe in the book of the mormon. I didn't believe in your temples.

I.

Do things that you would think are wrong for me to do that would put me outside of your church. If I did all these things, would it be fair for me to say i'm a mormon? Would it be fair to say i'm a member of the church of jesus christ of latter-day saints?

And they say no you can't say that.

And so I then tell them deeply and lovingly because I absolutely love them and I this is the message I tell them. That is why you can't claim to be a christian. You deny the deity of jesus christ. You deny what he did on the cross.

You deny the grace that is freely bestowed on those that have faith in him. You deny the essentials of christianity and therefore you can't be a christian. I make it clear to them that there are two jesuses that are in this equation.