Apologetic Evangelism Approaches for Mormons - Part 1

· There is a need for all Christians to be able to boldly and effectively witness to Mormons

I. Why Generic Approaches Miss the Mark

A. Positive aspects of Mormons accepting the One, Most-High God

1. Belief in gods, Jesus, afterlife, moral values, and respect for the Bible

2. Belief in absolute truth and morality, and that they matter

3. Eager to tell you about their own beliefs, and that witnessing is OK

B. Barriers to Mormons accepting the One Most-High God

1. They're "Christians" too, except for a different: god, Jesus, salvation, and scripture

2. Since Mormonism is better than all other Christianity, why change to something inferior?

3. "When the prophet speaks, the thinking is done" (LDS apostle / prophet Ezra Taft Benson)

4. The root problem

C. Let's try a generic approach

a) God loves you and desires that none perish. (The Mormon agrees, thinking...)

b) All have sinned and fall short of the glory of God. (The Mormon agrees, thinking...)

c) Jesus died and rose to pay the price for our sins. (The Mormon agrees, thinking...)

d) Repent of your sins and accept Jesus as Lord and Savior (The Mormon agrees, thinking...)

· Oops! Our fundamental problem here

II. Apologetic-evangelism to Mormons vs. general non-Christians

A. "Cults are the unpaid bills of the church" (Walter Martin)

Christians do not need to understand much about the Trinity, divinity of Christ, salvation, Hell, trustworthiness of the Bible, grace and works. - or do we?

B. A defense of the faith is required before they will believe

Bible's Reliability, unity in Christ, godly Christians, devoted to Christ, working hard for the Lord

C. The five different kinds of Mormons, and the need for different apologetics

Doctrine, History, Experiental, Cultural Mormons (also called Jack Mormons), Liberal Mormons

D. The constant need for prayer, love, and preaching the eternal gospel message

Why pray? Why care?

III. Tailoring the presentation of the Gospel

A. So tell me, why are you a Mormon? - Mormon message show-stoppers

Hypothetically speaking, if someone believed in false prophets and a false god, how they tell?

Other gods (Dt 13:1-12), Brigham Young's Adam God doctrine, and eternal progression

False prophecies (Dt 18:20-22) and "World War 0"

Occult practices (Lev 19:31; 20:6,27) and court convictions for glass-looking

False gospel (Gal 1:9-10) and eternal progression and blood atonement

B. The radical claim: If the Bible is true, then those following Joseph Smith and Brigham Young are bound for Hell, as they have a different God, a different Jesus, and a different salvation. See Gal 1:8-9

C. The Most High Triune God, who created everything loves you. Worshipping any lesser, "littler guys" is idolatry, even more thinking you can be a God yourself. See Isaiah 43:10; 44:6,8; Num23:19; 1 Tim 1:17

D. We are fallen not because we stepped outside the principles of a "system", but because we chose to follow various idols and other gods, and not worship and obey the One True God. See Rom 1:19-23; 3:9-18

E. Our Savior Jesus, God the Son, died and rose to save us completely by His grace alone, though our faith. He did not save us halfway, where we have to the do the other with our works. Our need was so great, that we can never pay Jesus back with our life. See Heb 7:25; Matt 20:1-16. Like Paul, we glory in the cross as Paul did in 1 Cor 1:17-19; Gal 5:11; 6:12. We can pray to Jesus like Stephen did in Acts 7:59, worship Jesus like the angels do in Heb 1:6; Rev 6:9-10, and call Jesus our Lord and our God as Thomas did in John 20:28-29.

F. You must repent of your sins and choices to believe deception, and humbly accept the real Jesus Christ, God the Son, as your Lord and Savior. See 2 Cor 11:4,13-15

IV. Subsequent Sessions

Part 2. Mormon beliefs, and why they are heresy

History, Scriptures, Doctrine, presupposition, "Mormon archaeology", problems

Part 3. Mormon lines of attack, show stoppers, Mormon defenses, and rebuttals

Book of Mormon, prayer, polytheism, burning in the bosom, restoration, Hell, being a god

Part 4. Bible texts Mormons commonly use

Biblical reliability, the True Church, the One Most-High God, God the Son, Salvation by Grace

Apologetic Evangelism Approaches for Mormons - Part 2

MORMON BELIEFS, AND WHY THEY ARE HERESY

I. History

II. Doctrine

The Restored Church

Eternal Progression

Jesus and Satan spirit brothers

Salvation by grace + works

The "organization"

III. Presuppositions

"Archaeology"

· The "Historical Mormon"

IV. Other Problems

The Mormon Book of Abraham

The Black Doctrine (until June 1978). Book of Abraham 1:21,26-27; Journal of Discourses v.13 p.95, v.7 p.290-291, v.22 p.304, v.10 p.110, v.23 p.336 History of the Church v.5 p.218-219 Mormon Doctrine 10th printing p.527-528

 

 

Apologetic Evangelism Approaches for Mormons - Part 3

BIBLE TEXTS MORMONS COMMONLY USE

I. Their Attack on the Reliability of the Bible

A. Are there really 200,000 changes in the Bible?

B. Errors in the Bible? Acts 7:6 vs. Gen 15:13, Ezra 2 vs. Neh 7

C. The Mormon Book of Abraham is OK. Jude 14

II. the TRUE Church vs. THeIR ORGANIZATION

A. Need for church restoration Gal 1:8

B. Over 2,000 Christian denominations Eph 4:3

C. Always be a prophet Amos 3:7 and new revelation Mal 3:6

III. The wrong God - eternal progression

A. Is God a man, with arms? Gen 1:26-27

· The "Almost Biblical" Mormon, and the proud

B. Can we become gods? Rom 8:17

C. Polytheism and attacking the Trinity. Jn 10:35; 1 Cor 8:5; 1 Chr 16:25-26

· The Baptist girl, "How would you like to be my 7th wife?"

IV. A DIFFERENT JESUS

  • Did God have sex to have Jesus? Acts 17:28-29
  • B. Jesus is not to be worshipped or prayed to

    C. Jesus was a polygamist? Isa 53:10; Lk 8:3-4

    V. A DIFFERENT SALVATION

    A. The prexeistence of man. Job 38:4-5

    B. Three heavens. 1 Cor 15:38-41; 2 Cor 12:2

    C. Salvation by grace plus works. Jms 2:14-26

    D. Baptism for the dead. 1 Cor 15:29; Mal 4:5-6

    E. Melchizedek Priesthood. Gen 14:18

    VI. OTHER SHEEP

    Two sticks. Ezek 37:16-17; Jn 10:16

    VII. PRAY TO WHICH GOD?

    Praying for wisdom. James 1:3

    VIII. KJV ISSUES

    Fetch a compass. Acts 28:13


    For more info please contact Christian Debater™ P.O. Box 144441 Austin, TX 78714 www.BibleQuery.org

    by Steven M. Morrison, PhD.