Welcome to the Liberty Baptist Sermon Archives.
The message you're about to hear was preached at Liberty Baptist
Church in Easton, MA. You can find out more about us
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message from God's Word will be a blessing to you.
Turn in your Bibles, the second Corinthians chapter #5 this
morning. Brother Vince, would you grab my
clicker right there on the back shelf and bring it up?
You like that, Brother John? That was good.
I've been practicing that for the last few weeks.
Yeah, yeah. You could toss it up here, but
thank you very much. Drake May himself.
All right, thank you. The Second Corinthians chapter
#5 And we're going to be looking this morning as we finish our
miniseries on the Church of Jesus Christ, the Latter Day
Saints, the Mormons. We're going to be looking at how
do we witness to a Mormon? We've talked a lot about the
Mormon Church. We've talked a lot about the
fallacies of their teaching. But here's the thing, What
happens when you get a on your door and there's two young men,
probably in their very early 20s who have come to their door or
come to your door and they want to talk to you about Jesus
Christ. Well, how are you going to be
able to witness to them? Because again, if they say elder
so and so on that name tag, the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter
Day Saints, they are lost. They do not know the true Jesus
Christ as their savior. How do you interact with them?
What do you do? What do you say?
What do you do if you meet a Mormon who works at your
workplace or someone at a place that you've had some
opportunities to talk to them and they believe that they're a
Christian just like you? Hey, you're a Christian, I'm a
Christian. We go to different
denominations, but we're just the same, aren't we?
Well, of course, as we've seen the last several weeks, the
answer to that is an emphatic no.
We are not the same. We're not just talking about
some subtle denominational difference.
We're talking about preaching the truth against preaching
error, as they do in the Mormon church.
And so how do we share the gospel with these types of
people? Well, as I've mentioned you
before, remember that large flow chart that we had that showed
how someone could make it to the Kingdom?
And of course there were three levels of kingdoms as well.
And the celestial Kingdom, the terrestrial Kingdom and the
terrestrial Kingdom, those three different kingdoms, how does
someone come to know that they are going to be part of the
Kingdom in the Mormon church? Well, before we get to what I
want to show you this morning, I have a video that we show you
that's very much in the vein of the same gentleman who gave us
the video from the Jehovah Witnesses of probably about a
month or two ago. Do you remember when he asked
that young man that Jehovah Witness said can you in 3
minutes I'm dying? Can you tell me how that I can
know I'm going to have him? Does the same thing with a young
woman. I would like to tell you,
certainly she seems like she's a little bit flustered by the fact
that she only has about 3 minutes to be able to explain
this. But the issue is not necessarily
this man is kind of putting her in a time crunch.
It's trying to illustrate that it should be easy to explain
what salvation is. And that she is representative
of many Mormons who have no idea what it means to even be able to
go to the Kingdom and helps us to understand how we have an
opportunity to be able to reach them with the gospel.
So if we had that, Brother Scott, let's go ahead and show
that. The foundation of Mormonism is
idolatry. Their God lives on a planet
called Kolob or his multiple wives.
They preach another gospel 1 of salvation by works and they have
another Jesus, the brother of Lucifer.
They only pay lip service to the Bible because they have their
own so-called holy book which denies the existence of hell and
allows Adolf Hitler to make it into the 3rd heaven. 3 times
this young lady looked to her friends to be rescued.
Finally they got the hint and took her away before she heard
the biblical gospel. Do you think there's an
afterlife? Yes.
Are you a Christian? Yes, have.
You been born again. I've been baptized.
It mean born again. So I'm a member of the Church of
Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints.
The question for you. There's a knife in my back.
I've got 3 minutes to live. How can I enter the Kingdom?
How can I get saved? What should I do?
I've got 3 minutes. I'm dying.
Enter the Kingdom. Well, you need to.
I got 2 1/2 minutes quick 2. And a half minutes.
I'm dying. I'm going to teach you about
Jesus well. Do it because I've now got 2
minutes you. Need to accept Jesus as your
savior? How do I do that?
Allow His atonement to work through you.
Accept Him, and let accept that he died for you, and that He
took upon him all of your sins, and then just.
Is that all I have to do? Also allow yourself to
understand that. One minute, Oh my gosh, blood
straining out of my body. I'm going, you know, I've, I've
come talk to him. Over there.
Go talk to him over there. I'm a fornicator, I'm a liar,
I'm a thief. I've broken the commandments.
I know I'm a big trouble on judgement day.
I think I'm going to go to hell. And what have I got to do again
you? Just have to accept Jesus and be
baptized and follow him and follow.
Hey I got 40 seconds, how do I get baptized?
Find somebody who has the authority to baptize.
I can't move. I'm dying.
I've now got 15 seconds. Here.
We're going. To call somebody.
Quickly. I'm under pressure.
I don't. So you can't help me, cannot get
up. I am.
I'm dead. It's all over.
I've gone to hell and you couldn't help me.
No, you didn't go. Dead.
I'm dead. No, you didn't go to hell.
Oh yes, I did. Oh, you just went to the spirit
world. When Jesus said he said fear not
humorous power to kill your body and cast your soul into hell.
Fear him. Jesus said that he said the
place where the fire is never quenched and the worm never
dies. The Bible speaks to the lake of
fire and I'm terrified while I've gone.
Let me let me share with you a couple of thoughts.
Remember the thief on the cross? Yes.
Did he get baptized? I.
Don't remember. No, you don't.
I. Think so.
He was nailed to the cross. He couldn't go anywhere, he
couldn't do anything. Right, OK.
All over. Yeah, sorry.
No, no, it's not. He has another chance.
I. Don't.
I've gone. Hey, thanks for talking to me.
Bye bye. I kind of added that.
I kind of added that music in there, if you like that.
No, that was no, that was the way that it came.
But no, it's again, very illustrative of the fact that
there seems to be some answers that sound like something that
we would say, but then when you dig below the surface, you
realize, oh, this, there is no salvation.
But hey, that's OK because there's still a chance you're
die, you're dead, but you you can still make it somewhere
else. And again, that flow chart that
we showed you before. And I want to make clear as we
go through these things, you think, well, how on earth am I
going to reach a, if I don't remember all of these things
that we have learned? How am I reach Jehovah Witness
if I don't remember all the things we've learned?
I, I'm sure that you're not going to remember all the things
that we've gone over in, well, 22 weeks of trying to talk about
false religions and Islam and Jehovah Witnesses and Mormons so
far. But I do believe there's some
things that will help you here this morning, specifically with
the Mormons, but also that we could apply several of these to
some of these other cults and world religions as well.
So let's go ahead and start looking at these and we'll first
look at #1 which is this Start with the sinlessness of Christ.
Start with the sinlessness of Christ.
You know, it's often better to start with someone that you
have, or let me put it this way, it's it's often better to start
when you're talking with someone with something that you might
have in common to bring common ground.
Now we're not talking about hiding the truth.
This is what the Mormons will do is that they will try to hide
the ball from you and not actually tell you about all of
these other things. I'm just talking about in the
course of a conversation. Why don't you start first with
something that you might have in common and then when you have
common ground, be able to show where the differences are.
One of those places that you can show common ground is with the
sinlessness of Christ because of the Mormons will at least give
lip service to the sinlessness of Jesus Christ.
Now do they believe that he is the Jesus Christ of the Bible?
No, they believe that he is the brother of Lucifer.
They believe that he is not very God like Father, Son and Holy
Ghost as the Bible teaches. Yet there is a place that you
can kind of have a starting point with them talking of the
sinlessness of Christ. Now God's Word shows us that
Christ was sinless in every way, and that's why we're starting in
Second Corinthians chapter 5. Look at verse #18 with me, if
you will. It's a great place to be able to
start 2nd Corinthians 5 verse 18.
And all things are of God, who hath reconciled us to himself by
Jesus Christ, and have given to us the ministry of
reconciliation. By the way, why do we need to
reach the Mormons? Because Jesus Christ reconciled
us to the Father, and we now have the ministry of
reconciliation to bring other people to Jesus Christ as well.
The ministry that I am in is the.
Very same ministry to be honest with you that you are in the
ministry of reconciliation. I'm in full time quote UN quote
ministry, but really we're all to be full time ministers of the
ministry of reconciliation. Verse 19 To wit, that God was in
Christ reconciling the world unto himself, not imputing their
trespasses unto them, and has committed us to the unto us the
word of reconciliation them we are ambassadors for Christ, as
through as though God did beseech you by us.
We pray you in Christ's stead be reconciled to God, for he hath
made him to be sin for us who what knew no sin, that we might
be made the righteousness of God in him.
So where can we start with a more?
But we can start with the fact that Jesus knew no sin and the
sin of the world was placed upon him.
And reconciliation therefore comes through who Jesus Christ.
And you'll find some common ground here with a Mormon.
Now again, they take that very basic truth and run in an
opposite direction of what the Bible teaches.
But you could take them there and help them to understand what
the the sinlessness of Jesus Christ means.
He. 726 and 27 you want to turn there, but it's for such an high
priest became us, who is holy, harmless, undefiled, separate
from sinners, higher than the heavens, who needed not daily as
those high priests to OfferUp sacrifice first for his own sins
and then for the peoples. For this he did once when he
offered up himself. Listen, even Mormons would
acknowledge that Joseph Smith was a sinful creature.
Even Mormons would acknowledge that he was not sinless, as
Jesus Christ was sinless. So again, this gives you a great
jumping off place in a conversation with them.
Because Christ's perfection is found for the true Bible
believing faith as well as Mormonism.
A person who begins with this doctrine meets a Mormon on
common ground. But if you're talking to a
Mormon, ask him if he believes about Jesus perfectionism.
Let him express his understanding until you start to
hear the differences emerge between that and Christianity.
And then when that moment arrives, ask simple questions
that reveal how other Mormon beliefs are inconsistent with
this conviction. So allow them to talk about a
little bit as they do talk about Jesus, and you started this
common ground, you'll start to hear things that are not common
ground. You'll start to hear things that
are unbiblical. And this gives you places to be
able to have conversation and to be able to start to show them
the truth. You might even ask how your
friend understands Jesus's perfect words, because if Jesus
was perfect and sinless. His words were.
Perfect as well, so you could ask them, well, how do you feel
about Matthew 2435? Heaven and earth shall pass
away, but my word shall not pass away.
If the perfect Jesus established his gospel forever, then why
does it need to be restored? Why was Joseph Smith necessary?
Was Jesus's promise incorrect? Was Jesus lying when he spoke
about this? It was Jesus just not
understanding what the truth was.
Listen, any of those things would be problematic.
It just happens to be that Jesus was who He said He was, and the
gospel does not need restoring, because the gospel has always
been. If your Mormon friend says,
well, God needs new prophets to bring new revelation, you can go
to Hebrews chapter 1, verses one and two.
God, who at sundry times in divers manners spake in time
passed under the fathers, by the prophets, hath in these last
days spoken unto us by His Son, whom He hath appointed heir of
all things, by whom also He made the world.
Jesus is the one who speaks to us today.
He is the living Word. We have the Word in front of us.
We don't need something new. And Jesus Christ is perfect.
And so being able to start there, you'll start to see, as
you discussed, the cracks emerge in their belief, and you follow
those cracks as they go along, and then you're able to talk to
them about other biblical doctrines as well.
Now #2 goes in hand, in hand with #1 and that's this.
Show them the sufficiency of Christ, sufficiency of Christ.
Christ isn't just perfect. He is perfectly sufficient to
meet the needs of mankind. Meaning it's this, It's Jesus
and nothing else. That's what salvation is.
It is not Jesus and self. It is not Jesus and work, Jesus
and money, Jesus and membership, Jesus and baptism, Jesus and any
of those things you know, Christ is sufficient to save us without
any of our help. Listen, Mormons don't believe
that. That Jesus just got the ball
rolling. But you need to be involved in
your own salvation. This isn't just Adam Rivero
talking. This is their own prophets who
say this. For instance, Listen,
immortality has been accomplished by the Savior's
sacrifice. Eternal life hangs in the
balance awaiting the works of men.
That was Spencer Kimball, the 12th LDS president, back in the
1980s, a book called The Miracle of Forgiveness.
It even has the page page 208. So if you have that at home,
just go to page 208 and you'll find it.
But listen, blasphemous immortality has been
accomplished by the Savior's sacrifice.
Eternal life hangs in the balance awaiting the works of
men. Meaning this Christ's sacrifice
was not sufficient. Christ's sacrifice wasn't
enough. Christ needs you to be able to
save yourself. That's a blasphemous statement.
That's a blasphemous thought. And the the Jehovah Witness, or
rather the Mormons, will give lip service to the fact that
Jesus is perfect, but he's not perfectly able to save you.
He needs you like Uncle Sam. I need you, Jesus.
I need you to be able to finish your salvation.
There's nothing biblical about that whatsoever.
When Paul addresses the false teaching about Jesus to the
church at Colossus, we don't know exactly all the details of
this false teaching, but we do know this.
He paints a picture of the fullness and sufficiency of
Jesus Christ. So why don't you turn to
Colossians chapter 2? This doesn't necessarily talk of
Mormonism, but certainly it does give us a better understanding
of the sufficiency of Christ. Colossians chapter #2 We'll look
at verse 8 to start. Beware lest any man spoil you
through philosophy and vain deceit, after the traditions of
men, after the rudiments of the world, and not after Christ.
Now look at this. For in Him.
Now who's the Him? Well, you can go back up to the
previous verse. What's the last word of verse #8
Christ. For in him that would be Christ
dwelleth all the fullness of the Godhead bodily meaning this
Jesus is God. There is no contradiction.
There is no question about that whatsoever.
And ye are what's that next word?
Complete in Him which is the head of all principality and
power. We are complete in Jesus Christ.
No, we do not complete ourselves after Jesus gives us a head
start. Jesus is not the one who gets
the ball rolling. And then you are the one who
saves yourself so that you can become a God and have your own
spirit children and populate your own worlds.
No, no, we see that we are complete and Jesus Christ He is
sufficient as these New Testament passages model.
You want to move your Mormon friends or those Mormon
acquaintances that you meet who are on your doorstep from
Christ's perfection to His sufficiency.
Help them to understand that Jesus Christ is enough.
Ask questions again to be able to understand exactly what they
think they need to do to be able to help themselves to eternal
life, to salvation. Ask questions.
We'll talk more about that in a few moments.
But you can find passages like these and others that would show
that the sufficiency of Christ is real.
We just saw this morning's brother Vince read several
different passages for us, that when Jesus died on the cross
that the veil was rent in twain. The Bible says it was ripped in
two. What does that mean?
That the work was done, It was complete, It is finished.
Wasn't saying that Jesus was giving up his life, He's giving
up the ghost. That would happen later.
It is finished. What was the finished?
The work that was done, paying the atonement for our sins, that
was what was finished. He would give up in the ghost a
few moments later. But the idea is this, it is
done. It is sufficient.
We can't help ourselves to get to heaven.
We get in the way of getting ourselves to heaven.
We're the ones that have been the stumbling block to
ourselves. Even accept Jesus Christ in the
1st place. We are not the answer, we are
the problem. We are the one that needs
saving. And so point out how sufficient
Christ is #3 as you go, define your terms.
I've said this before, I'll say it again, because Voltaire was
an atheist. He was a not a very kind man.
He hated Christians. But he has this one quote that I
really like. So I use it all the time.
And I've used it since Bible college.
And it's this. If you wish to converse with me,
define your terms. If you wish to converse with me,
define your terms. Now I've lived through this in
my life growing up, as I've told you before, I was a Lutheran
before I became saved and then became a Bible believing
Baptist. I went to a Christian School.
And so people would ask me for a long time, they would say, are
you saved? And my answer would be yes,
meaning I thought I was going to heaven, but was I saved the
Bible way? Well, the answer is no.
So they would say, are you saved?
And then they would mean are you saved by faith through Jesus
Christ. When I'd say I was saved, I
meant something like this. Well, I'm saved because I was
baptized as a baby and I'd take the Lord's Supper.
I would even say I would save by grace through faith because
that's what the Lutheran Church would say.
Martin Luther made a big deal about that even while still
holding to the sacraments, giving eternal life.
And so we see the Bible does not teach that.
So we would be saying the same things.
The Baptist and myself as a Lutheran, we would say the same
thing, but we meant 2 completely different things.
So as you're talking with a Mormon, you remember that video
that she used, terms that would seem to suggest that we were on
common ground, but yet we are not on common ground even in the
terms in which she would use and we would use.
For instance, I would say, I believe that Jesus is God.
A Mormon would say, great, so do I Jesus is so important to our
faith. I would say, well, I believe
that salvation is a work of grace.
And that Mormon would say, so do I Unless it's by God's grace, I
have no hope. I would say I believe the Bible
is God's word. And the Mormon would say so do
I. The Bible is central to our
faith. You would seem like men.
We're the same person. It would seem like we believe
the same thing. And that's why you have to be
very careful when speaking to the Mormons to be able to
understand that although they might be trying to build that
common ground, there really is no common ground to be able to
be found when it comes to the issue of who Jesus Christ is,
who God the Father, the Son, the Holy Ghost is, what salvation
is, what baptism is. She used a word I believe
atonement, that they wouldn't understand what the atonement
truly is, that they use the same terms.
But don't be fooled by that. Listen, Mormons are taught that
there are 6 different meanings for the word salvation. 6.
Salvation for physical death, salvation from sin, being born
again, salvation from ignorance, salvation from the second death,
exaltation or eternal life. All of those are baked into the
cake when they use the term salvation.
So listen, you could talk about are you saved?
And they could be thinking about any of those things.
So you have to be very careful when you talk to them.
Here's what it comes down to. And I will tell you, this has
been so good for me, going through these lessons and being
able to understand better how to talk to the cultists, to be able
to better talk to those who believe in false religion.
Because a lot of times in dealing with these types of
folks, I have found that I have taken more.
I wouldn't even say necessarily a combative stance because I'm
not trying to combat them, but I would say this, that I was
certainly more willing to win an argument than wanting to win
their heart. It's almost like I wanted to
prove to them Jesus was God. And really, that's not the
point. You say, well, that's not the
point. Well, of course they have to
understand that Jesus is God to be saved.
But the real point is not to just prove them that Jesus is
God. I win and they still go to hell.
The point is I want them to understand they need to accept
that same Jesus to be saved. And so because of that has
helped me to understand that the way that I approach this ought
to be a lot different, meaning this you ought to ask a lot of
questions, come into these conversations like you know
nothing about Mormonism. And I'm not saying lie.
I'm not saying to try to present yourself falsely, but ask
questions to understand what they believe.
And in doing so, that will help you to be able to define your
terms. Here's where you can find hope
and comfort in the fact You say, well, pastor, I don't remember
what I was supposed to say to Jehovah Witnesses.
We looked at the witnessing to Jehovah Witness about, you know,
a month and a half ago. I don't remember what I was
supposed to say from that. You know, what do I do?
Well, here's what you can do with a Jehovah Witness you can
do with a Mormon. Listen, you can do with anybody.
Just ask questions. Just ask them questions.
For instance, you talk a lot about atonement.
What does that mean to you? Have you ever been baptized for
a dead person? Why did you do that?
Where do you see that in the Bible?
Can you explain to me why you think they're modern prophets?
Why don't the prophets always agree?
I know some Mormon prophets have taught that Adam was God.
Do you believe that by asking questions rather than just
making accusations, you can draw out a person's heart and
understand more about who they are and where they're coming
from and to be able to have a better biblical conversation,
all while being able to know where they're coming from
without having to remember. Oh, what did the Mormons
believe? How is it different than Jehovah
Witnesses? I don't remember.
I don't know what to say. We'll just ask them and even
just say, you know, I know there's some similarities
between the Jehovah Witnesses and the Mormons, but maybe can
you tell me a little bit about that?
You say, well, would they be insulted?
I think they would probably just say, well, we're not like
Jehovah Witnesses. They they'd say, well, and we'll
start giving you and now all of a sudden you have some things to
talk about because you have asked questions because you'll
start hearing things. You say, Nope, that's not in the
Bible. That's not in the Bible.
This gives you points of
conversation, ask questions. Proverbs 20 verse 5 says, as
counsel in the heart of man is like deep water, but a man of
understanding will draw it out. Meaning this, that you are not
going into an adversarial, combative situation with this
person. What are you trying to do?
You're trying to draw the error out of them so that you
understand why they believe what they believe so that you can
then give them the truth. Again, we're not talking about
hiding the truth. We're not talking about
listening to error and saying, Oh yeah, well, Oh well, well,
God bless you and walking away. We're talking about having a
real conversation and being able to present the truth to them.
But don't you think you have a better opportunity to be able to
talk to one of these people with that type of comfort, with that
type of situation than being confrontational?
I've told you 2 stories about dealing with Jehovah Witnesses.
I've dealt with a lot more Jehovah Witnesses, the Mormons,
over the years. But I've talked to you about one
that was more combative, that was out here on the parking lot
where they were trying to win me to Jehovah Witness to be a job
witness in the parking lot of the Church of which I pastor.
And I had to tell, and I started with this.
I said, listen, you know, don't give me the new world
translation because that's a corrupt translation.
Now I'm right in that. But you know where that
conversation went? Nowhere.
It would absolutely nowhere because I shut them down before
we started. The best conversation I've ever
had with Jehovah Witnesses, as I mentioned to you before, was
when I was in Vermont and I saw three of them sitting there.
They're really the saddest looking people I ever saw.
A mother, a father and a teenage daughter.
And it was hot and they were sitting there and that you could
just tell they were like, is our hour done yet?
You know, they were waiting to get out of there.
So I bought them bottles of water at the store, a cold
bottles of water and brought it to him.
I started talking to him and I started asking him questions and
I talked about different things and I asked him, you know, you
know, why would you? Because I tried to give him a
track and they said they'd, you know, they wouldn't take.
I said, why would you not? Why would you not take a track?
I don't mind taking one of your pieces of literature.
You know, we had a good conversation here, dude.
Why would why would you be afraid to take a little piece of
paper that, well, we're not allowed to do that.
Where, where does it say in the Bible to be able to do that?
Can I tell you, I still wonder if I had an impact on them that
day more than anyone else ever talked to.
I'm not saying they got saved that day, but I'm wondering if I
planted something and Lord willing, someone else watered
and hopefully someday I meet him in heaven.
I pray that would be the case. But what is that?
What's the difference? Well, I was able to go define
terms. I was able to ask questions.
It was a different way of looking at it.
Listen, if I've learned anything about studying these cults and
studying these false religions, it's this, that they are so
typically mistreated when they go to a door that they are
expecting you're going to be a jerk.
Now listen, they're peddling falsehood.
I don't know that I feel sorry for them, but I will say this,
that just the fact that you treat them with just a tiny bit
of decency will go such a long way.
I've made a point to Jehovah Witnesses and Mormons and
talking to them before to say, listen, I appreciate what you do
and I stand up for the right for what you do because we do the
same. But I do say this, but we have a
different message. I support your right to be able
to go to door to door because it's what we do as a church as
well. But I will say don't be fooled.
Our messages are different. They are not the same.
And even in that, there's a little common ground.
Well, they support what we do. Well, I was able to tell them,
yeah, we support what you do in the sense that legally you
should be allowed to do it because we have the
constitutional right to be able to do so.
But you also are wrong in what you're doing.
And I want to tell you why. So making accusations or or
saying, Hey, did you know you're you're God lives on the planet
Kolob. Probably not a great way to
start. Did did you did you know, did
you know your God had a physical relations with Mary and that's
how Jesus was born? That's not a great way to start.
Now, is that a great way to win an argument?
Probably because you're going to show them how absurd they are.
Are you going to win them to Christ?
Probably not. So just define the terms.
You're not trying to win an argument, you are trying to win
them to Christ. And if in general, just remind
yourself this, don't quarrel, question, don't quarrel, don't
have a quarrel with them. Again, that doesn't mean that
you're not emphatic about what you believe, but you're not
trying to start an argument. Just ask them questions if
you're not sure you know, you know what is Mormonism like what
what, what do you believe? What, what is your church like?
You know, and as you just have an honest conversation with
them, you will find plenty of things to be able to talk to
them about the word of God because you've drawn it out of
them in a very normal conversation.
Their guard will come down. They won't be so as willing to
be able to maybe be adversarial as they were in the beginning.
Unless I'm not saying you're going to win them to Christ
necessarily. In fact, the chances are very
low that you're going to win a cultist to Christ at your door.
I'm not saying it can't happen, but I'm saying it's very low
because they're coming to be able to win you.
It's unlikely you'll do the opposite.
But what if you just push them a little bit closer to Jesus
Christ, the real Jesus Christ? Isn't that worth it?
Isn't that what we're trying to do?
So as you go, define your terms #4 show the sufficiency of
Scripture. Here's that word again.
Sufficiency. But it's not just Jesus Christ
that is sufficient. It is the Scriptures that are
sufficient. The eighth article of faith of
the LDS says this. We believe the Bible to be the
word of God as far as it's translated correctly.
Now that is their escape clause, meaning this we believe the
Bible is true, but anything we don't like, what's a
mistranslation? Isn't that kind of what the
Jehovah Witnesses did? And they did it to such a degree
that they created their own Bible.
But interestingly enough that when you interact with a Mormon,
guess what Bible they're going to use, They will be using the
King James Bible. So you will be able to have
familiar verses to be able to interact with them because you
will be on the same ground using the King James Bible as the
Mormons do. However, we believe that the
King James Bible has been preserved for the English people
is perfect, that there is no error within it.
They do not believe that about any Bible.
They do not believe that. And that is their way of saying
if something doesn't agree with them, well, that's just been
corrupted over time. Whenever there's been a problem,
they simply say, oh, well, it wasn't translated correctly.
And by the way, that's why the doctrine of both inspiration and
preservation are so important. The Word of God was inspired,
but it's also been preserved through all generations so that
we can know that we trust the Word of God when we have it in
front of us as we do man. There's a lot of verses about
this. Second Timothy 315 through 17
that from a child thou has known the Holy Scriptures which are
able to make thee wise, and the salvation through faith which is
in Christ Jesus. All scriptures by given by
inspiration of God is proful for doctrine, for reproof, for
correction, for instruction and righteousness, that the man of
God may be perfect again sufficient, thoroughly furnished
unto all good works. Proverbs 30, verses 5:00 and
6:00. Every word of God is pure.
He is a shield unto them that put their trust in him.
Add thou not unto his words, lest he reprove thee, and thou
be found a liar, and not unto his words.
Isn't that what the Mormons have done they've created three other
holy books to be able to be put on equal footing and really
greater footing than the word of God, but he said this don't add
to it. We can go to the end of the Book
of Revelation. What does it say?
Don't add to it. Don't subtract from it.
Psalm 19 verse 7 The law of the Lord is perfect, converting the
soul, the testimony the Lord is sure making wise the simple.
Psalm one 19160 The word is true from beginning from the
beginning, and every one of thy righteous judgments endureth
forever. Isaiah 820 Galatians 189 over
and over and over again, the sufficiency, the preservation of
the Scriptures. You can trust the word of God.
You can trust the word of God that you have in front of you.
We thank the Lord for that. The Mormons do not believe that
First Nephi 13, verse 26. After the 12 apostles from the
Jews under the Gentiles, they have taken away from the gospel
of the Lamb many parts which are plain and most precious, and
also many covenants of the Lord have they taken away.
First Nephi 1328, few verses later.
There are many plain and precious things taken away from
the book which is the book of the Lamb of God.
Few verses later, verse 34. First Nephi chapter 13.
The Gentiles do stumble exceedingly because of the most
plain and precious parts of the gospel which have been kept back
by that abominable church doctrine and covenants 20 verse
9. The Book of Mormon contains the
fullness of the gospel of Jesus Christ to the Gentiles and to
the Jews also. Doctrines and Covenants 42 verse
12, The elders, priests and teachers of this church.
So I'll teach the principles of my gospel which are in the Bible
and the Book of Mormon, in which is the fullness of the gospel.
What are they saying over and over again?
The Bible is not enough, but yet the Bible teaches it is enough.
Listen, you can't have both. The Book of Mormon is a fraud
and a falsehood, and all of its other books like the Pearl of
Great Price and the Doctrines of Covenants, or the Bible is what
it is. They cannot hold the Bible and
say it is one of their holy books when it so plainly
contradicts what the Book of Mormon says.
The fullness of the gospel came through these books.
That means there was no gospel. That means that Jesus Christ was
wrong. That means Jesus Christ did not
do. And again, this goes back to the
sufficiency of Christ, that He was not enough.
No, this is not what is taught. And so there is certainly plenty
of place for conversation about the sufficiency of Scripture and
also those other books as well. Listen, wait to expose
contradictions. Now, is it important for us to
expose contradictions? Well, of course, of course it's
important. But again, as I mentioned
before, don't lead with that. Don't go through and talk about
the most egregious things first. As I said, every time that I've
talked to a Jehovah Witness and I've said something about, well,
the New World Translation is a corrupt translation.
Listen, that ends the conversation.
I'm right, but it ends the conversation.
And so I've learned that that's probably not the best way to go.
In fact, the best way to go is to be able to use their own
corrupted New World translation to be able to show them versus
that still remain that show who Jesus Christ is.
Remember we saw first John 1/3 that they scrub Jesus Christ and
His exclusivity as the Son in John 11, but yet they left an
opening and John 1/3 were able to show that through the New
World translation. But don't start from that point.
This is the place I've failed many times over the years is
again as I mentioned, I've tried to win the argument but not win
the heart and win them to Christ.
Now are there a lot of contradictions in their faith?
Yes. Are they contradiction?
They contradict the Bible, their books contradict the Bible,
their books contradict their own books, and on top of that, their
prophets contradict the books and the prophets contradict each
other. Is that confusing enough for
you? There's plenty of things.
Thank you, Marcia. There are many good things.
It is confusing, isn't it? There are plenty of things that
you can show that are contradictions, but make sure
that you get the conversation to the right place before you start
to be able to expose all these things.
And This is why these in any of these conversations, there's not
A1 size fits all way of dealing with it.
And I want to be careful in how I present this because really
you just have to be led by the spirit.
It would be like saying, well, there's one way to show someone
to Jesus Christ. Well, as long as it's biblical,
you might have many different approaches because people are
different. Some people might need a more
confrontational style. Some people you start like that,
they're gone. They don't want to talk to you.
And so be spirit LED when dealing with these things.
But I will say this, when Jesus talked with the woman at the
well, did he start with this? Hey, woman, you got you had five
husbands and the man that you're living with is not your husband.
I have a feeling that conversation would never have
commenced if he had opened with that.
Now he didn't avoid it. Let's be careful about this.
He didn't say, well, the only way I can reveal who I am is by,
you know, not really dealing with sin.
He dealt with her sin, but he dealt with it at a time when she
heard that that she was pricked in the heart.
She would not have been pricked in the heart.
If he had LED with that at the beginning.
What would have happened? She probably would have just
gone away. Now Jesus knows all hearts so
it's easy for him to be able to do right because he knows every
we don't know every heart and again, that's why it's so
important to be spirit LED got to go through these quickly.
Number six, share the rest that Christ brings.
This is true with all cultists. It's especially true with
Mormons because it's all about works.
There is no rest for them. They do and they do and they do
and they do. And again, you could say this
about Catholicism, you could say this about Jehovah Witnesses,
that it's all about doing works. And so because of that, there's
no real peace. But it is especially true at the
Mormons because of the hoops that they make them jump
through. They have to be able to do
things at the church level or the stake level.
They have to then end up doing things outside of their stake,
outside of their group of churches.
Then they have to do things in the temple, including being
baptized on behalf of the dead. They go through genealogies to
find people who may have died in their family in the past, and
they're baptized on their behalf.
The temple writes the temple rituals.
It goes on and on. On top of the fact that the men
from 18, I think he's 18 years old to 20.
I may be a little bit off on the on the ages, but I do know all
Mormon men are supposed to give two years to missionary work and
all Mormon women 18 months to mission work right at the
beginning of their lives. They gave their adulthood
rather. And So what are they doing?
They've been working and working and working and working and
working and working and still no promise of eternal life.
To be able to share with them that Jesus yoke is easy and his
burden is light is something they can't comprehend.
It is something they cannot understand.
So be able to share with them how you can have peace.
Well, I know for certain that I'll go to heaven someday.
To them that's unfathomable. They don't even know how that's
possible. You can show them from the
Bible. That's the case.
All the all the gospel interactions that took place in
the book of Acts. When they were done, people
said, well, I guess I'm a little bit closer to eternal life.
They never said that. They said this, I'm saved.
They came to understand that they knew Jesus Christ the
Savior. I look at the Ethiopian eunuch,
and by the time he was baptized, he didn't say, well, I guess I'm
a little closer to heaven. No, he went away rejoicing and
his life changed forever. Because there's rest that comes
with knowing Jesus Christ as your Savior.
And then #7 listen, don't ever get over this.
Share your testimony when you don't know what to do.
Share your testimony as you're listening and question them.
Find common ground. I have found over the years,
even though I didn't grow up Catholic, I grew up Lutheran.
I've been able to interact with a lot of people who were
Catholics because I found common ground in our stories.
Listen, Catholics believe 7 sacraments, Lutheran's believe
two. Guess what?
There's enough common ground there that I could show we were,
we had altar boys. I was an altar boy when I was a
Luther. Could you imagine me as an altar
boy? How cute would that be, right?
I was a 7th grader wearing the whole get up and a little limp
mustache, but it was pretty bad. So all things considered, but I
understood being an altar boy, I understood I never went through
CCD, but we had confirmation which what it was called.
So I'm able to find those things.
I'm able to talk to someone who was a Catholic or someone who
may be as newly saved, unable to find some common ground and
share my testimony. Listen, do you have much common
ground with a Mormon? No, but do you have some common
ground? Well, yes.
Here's why. If we go all the way back to
lesson 1, which seems like a a while ago, but if we went all
the way back, yeah, I feel you, Ralph.
But if we go all the way back to lesson 1, we saw there's really
only two religions, right? God and not God.
That's it. I mean, that's it.
So guess what? In the time you were not God,
you can find common ground with a Mormon.
You can maybe find, you know, listen, I wasn't a Mormon, but I
was a Catholic that I understood that I just never had peace
because I wasn't sure that I'd ever done enough.
I went to Catholic funerals and they were always telling us to
pray for the dead because know if they had gone to heaven or
not. And so I can empathize a little
bit of what you're saying. Be able some of your testimony,
listen, your testimony is the greatest weapon, if you will,
outside of the word of God that you have.
And if you don't know how to share your faith with somebody,
if you get confused, listen, just share your testimony.
You cannot go wrong saying how you got saved.
It is a wonderful thing and we say it's a weapon.
I don't mean it's a weapon in a offensive sense that on offense,
but the idea is this God has given you this life.
Share that transformation that took place and show them,
listen, I don't know that I can answer everything for you, but
he changed my life and talk about the woman at the well.
She ran away. She left her water pot down and
she didn't say, now let me explain to you the sufficiency
of Christ. Let me explain to you about his
dual nature of being 100% God, 100% man.
She couldn't explain all that. She said this.
Come see a man. He knows all things.
Surely this is the Christ. That's what she says.
Listen, if you can't say anything else, you could say
this. Surely this is the Christ.
He's changed my life and he's changed your life as well.
Thank you for listening to the sermon from the pulpit of
Liberty Baptist Church. If this message was a blessing
to you, or if there's any way we can serve you, please let us
know by contacting us at info@mylibertybaptist.org.
Or you can visit us this Sunday at 800 Washington St. in Easton,
MA. May the Lord bless you as you
grow in His Word.