00:00
Well, Hey Beat Family, Alan Parr here, and I’ve got a special guest with me here on The Beat. His name is Brian Dwyer, Pastor Brian Dwyer. And he has an amazing, very unique testimony of how God put it on his heart many years ago to start a church, to plant a church in Salt Lake City, Utah, where there is a large concentration of people from the Mormon faith. And he is here today to share that testimony. But more importantly, guys,
00:30
We’re going to talk about the differences between Mormonism and Christianity so that you are well equipped whenever you’re having conversations with your Mormon friends or as they like to call themselves, members of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. And we are also going to go into specifics about how you can have these conversations, engage in conversations with them so that you’re not fearful, so that you know what to stay away from.
00:59
and just some tactics and techniques that you can engage people in these conversations from the Mormon faith. So Pastor Brian, thank you so much for being here with us today. It’s good to be here now and it’s been so fun to get to know you over the years and to see the success of your ministry and Jennifer’s. And I really enjoyed getting to meet your little kiddos just last week when you were out here in Salt Lake. So I’m really happy to be a part of the program today.
01:27
Yeah, guys, I’ll share a little bit later about how Pastor Brian and I got connected. Amazing story. But I actually was out in Utah last week, took our kids out there, did a little snow tubing and different things like that. And we got a chance to connect in person and just had a great time catching up. So guys, as you all know, I’m not going to waste your time. I want to jump right into the content because I made this video specifically for you all. So we’re going to start off and I’m going to just ask Pastor Brian to share a little bit about.
01:56
Why out of all the cities in the world did he choose Salt Lake City, Utah as his mission field or as his operation or headquarters if you will where he wanted to plant his church. So tell us a little bit about Alpine Church, the mission and what God put on your heart over 20 years ago. Well, my wife Tracey and I got married in 1998. At the time I was the chaplain for the Chicago Cubs. We grew up in the Chicago area and
02:24
When we got married, we felt called to ministry together and we started looking at the best places in the United States, the biggest need in the United States, the lowest percentage of Christians per capita around the country. And it was interesting because some people at the time, some people said that it was the Northwest, you know, Washington, Oregon, that area.
02:48
But as we began to look into it, we realized that by far the lowest percentage of Christians per capita statewide was Utah. Now the reason that some polls wouldn’t show it as such, like the Gallup polls, is because it depends on how you classify Mormons. So if you classify Mormons as Christians, and Alan, I know we’re going to talk about this, I can’t wait to get into it, but if you classify Mormons as Christians, Utah is the highest.
03:16
has the highest percentage of churchgoers by far in the whole country. But if you don’t classify Mormons as Christians, which of course we don’t, I’ll explain why here in a little bit, then it is by far the lowest. In fact, Alan, when we moved here in 1999, less than one half of one percent of the population of Utah was Christian. And think about that, there are Muslim countries that have a higher Christian population than Utah did when we first moved here.
03:45
And so that’s why we chose Utah. Wow, wow. Okay, man, what, man, I’m telling you, man, that is not for the faint of heart. And I commend you for what God put on your heart and more importantly for you and Tracy answering that call. So guys, we’re gonna jump right into it because many of you watching this video, you might have friends, you might have neighbors, you might have coworkers. And let me just first start off by saying, if you’re a Mormon, you’re watching this,
04:10
Our goal is to represent your faith in a way that’s honoring to you and way that is respectful. We love you. I love you. But if you’re a Christian watching this, more than likely you may not know the differences between what Mormons believe and what Christians believe. And I say that because, guys, at this point, the question that we have to ask whenever we meet somebody is not so much, do you believe in Jesus?
04:40
but what do you believe about Jesus? That is the question that’s gonna differentiate. And so, you might have a neighbor and they’re really, really nice and they’re sweet and they’re kind and they’re loving and they go to church every week and they call themselves a Christian. But the question is, do they believe in Jesus the same way you do? So, Brian, let’s just kind of tackle some of these differences. We’ll start with scripture. What’s the big difference
05:10
what we as Christians believe as divine revelation and what Mormons believe as divine revelation. And if you want to go ahead and get into the difference between Mormonism and Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints so we can address them correctly from the beginning, feel free to jump into that now as well. Yeah, I think it’s okay to call them Mormons. My Mormon friends, and I have many Mormon friends, they call themselves Mormons. So, you know, I think it’s kind of a mouthful to say Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, but it’s the same thing. We’re talking about the same thing.
05:40
And I’ll also say this, Alan, you know, when we first moved here, Mormons were adamant in the late 90s, early 2000s, they were adamant that they are not Christians. In fact, their prophet was on 60 Minutes or one of those programs, famously was being interviewed and he was very clear that the interviewer said, are you guys, are Mormons Christians? He said, no, we are not Christians. So he himself said that.
06:06
And so again, we’re not trying to denigrate Mormons when we say that they’re not Christians, even though now there’s been a rebranding of the Mormon church. And now Mormons do say that they’re Christians. In fact, Alan, now it’s interesting in the last year, honestly, in the last year, Mormons started using crosses to mark their churches on Google Maps. And it literally happened in the last year. And for those of us living here in Utah,
06:34
It floored us because a Mormon church building, a Mormon ward, the meeting house, will not have a cross at the top. I don’t know if you’ve, any of your listeners or viewers, if you’ve noticed Mormon wards by your house, they look a lot like maybe an old style Baptist church. But there’s a spire at the top and there’s no cross at the top. That’s how you can tell the difference. When I drive to the airport, Alan, I’ll pass 30 Mormon
07:03
meeting houses easily as I drive to the airport. And every single one of those is missing a cross. But now in the last year, they’ve started appropriating the cross and using the cross because here’s why. I think that the Mormon Church is really trying, they’re changing their campaign and they’re really truly trying to appear to be a Christian church. Even though when Joseph Smith started it, he said, I hate the denominations.
07:31
The denominations are an abomination. They’re the reason that we know that it’s not true. And now, I literally, years ago, I went on a tour at the temple grounds in Salt Lake City and the sisters giving the temple tour said that Mormonism is a denomination like the Baptists or the Methodists or the Presbyterians. And I had to raise my hand because that was brand new. Those were brand new talking points at the time.
07:59
I said, wait, are you sure about that? And they were like, you know, these 20-year-old girls were like, well, yes, that’s what they told me to say. So, I think there’s been a real shift into trying to show the Mormons as another Christian church. But as you’re going to hear, as we talk about this today, the doctrinal differences are truly, truly shocking. So again, to your Mormon listeners, and Alan, I appreciate that you’re sensitive to your Mormon listeners. We are as well.
08:28
guests who come into our church and people, we do not Mormon bash, we don’t. We love Mormons and we wanna share the love of Jesus with Mormons, but I think it’s important for us to be honest about our differences. Yes, absolutely. So, and thank you so much for that. That just, I mean, that makes so much sense. And speaking of the differences, let’s talk about those. Let’s talk about first and foremost, how do we as Christians view
08:57
inspiration or revelation from God. How many sources do we believe in? Obviously, we believe in the Bible only as the divine source of authority. But then, talk about the differences with regard to Mormons and what they believe. Okay, so Christians believe in one scripture, the Bible, the 66 books of the Old and New Testaments. We believe that the canon is closed. So I’m sure a lot of your listeners know what that means, Alan. That there’s…
09:25
not going to be any other extra revelation. There’s nothing else, there’s nothing that you’re going to put on your channel, or no book you’re going to write, or anyone’s going to write, that is going to rise to the level of Scripture. Okay, so that’s what Christians believe. Mormons believe a couple of things about Scripture. Number one, they do believe that the Bible is Scripture as far as it is translated correctly. So that’s a huge asterisk. So right away, Joseph Smith was…
09:51
working on a translation of scripture, the Joseph Smith translation, which incidentally the Mormons don’t use as their official translation. They use the King James Version with annotation. It’s like a study Bible for them, using the King James Version and Joseph Smith’s translation in the margins basically, like any kind of commentary notes in the margins. That’s basically the Bible that they have in their quad.
10:18
The quad, quad means four, the quad is that big thick scripture that the Mormons carry around that has the Bible, that’s one, the Book of Mormon, that’s the second one that they believe is canonical or scriptural, the Pearl of Great Price, and doctrines and covenants. So that’s what’s in their quad, and they believe that all of that is authoritative and true. And if you ask most Mormons, most of my Mormon friends, if you ask
10:47
Which one do you read the most? By far, it would be the Book of Mormon. And which one do you read the least? By far, it would be the Bible. And that’s not surprising, because Mormons are taught to be skeptical about the Bible, because Joseph Smith said, it’s true as far as it’s translated correctly, but then he’s, you know, we don’t know if it’s translated correctly. So, see what happens, Alan, is I think for Mormons, they don’t have a high view of scripture, so they throw stuff out, they put stuff in.
11:16
And I think that difference is fundamental the way Christians look at Scripture versus the way Mormons look at Scripture. Yeah, and so thank you for that. Talk to me a little bit about the Book of Mormon. How did Joseph Smith claim that he got this revelation from God? And I believe the Book of Mormon states that it’s another testament of the Gospel of Jesus Christ. I believe that’s how they phrase it. So talk about
11:46
the history and the story behind Joseph Smith claiming he had a revelation from God. I believe it involved some gold plates or something like that. So talk a little bit about that because that’s definitely different than how we, as Christians, believe the Bible was inspired. Yeah, we get into this in great detail on our Unveiling Mormonism podcast, but I’ll give you just like the two minute version, Alan. It’s so interesting. So Joseph Smith was born and lived in the state of New York.
12:16
in the early 1800s. And then he has this supposed revelation where the angel Moroni comes to him and says, I’ve got these new plates. Basically the angel says, all of these churches are an abomination. None of them are true. They’re all apostate. Keep in mind that word. That’s a big Mormon word. They’re all apostate. And so I’m going to restore the…
12:41
New Testament church to you, Joseph. That’s basically what he said, I’m going to restore. So think of Martin Luther as the reformer. It’s the great reformation. Mormons view Joseph Smith as the great restoration. Mormons don’t believe that the church needed to be reformed. They believe the church needed to be restored. That at the end of the first century AD, that basically with the last apostle to die, that
13:08
that God’s authority, the priesthood authority, left the earth and it was restored to Joseph Smith in the early 1800s. And so, Moroni revealed to him that there’s these golden plates and it’s going to be a record of the peoples of the Americas. So the Book of Mormon is actually the religious answer to the question, how did the Native Americans get here to the Americas? I mean, there was…
13:33
there were all these questions in the early 1800s, and nobody really knew. We didn’t have DNA evidence or anything like that. So people were like, how did the Native Americans get here before the Europeans did? Well, the Book of Mormon is brilliantly the religious answer to that. And so, Alan, here’s the answer, is that at the fall of Jerusalem in Israel, right? And you can read about this in your Old Testaments, but what the Book of Mormon purports is that a bunch of Israelites got on a ship
14:03
and came over to the Americas, right? And so this is 586 BC, this is how the people got here to the Americas. This is how the Native Americans got here. And that’s essentially the story of the Book of Mormon. It’s God’s people in the Americas living and doing all these things and having all these battles. It reads a lot like the Old Testament. And then Joseph Smith claimed that Jesus then appeared to, after Jesus…
14:33
did his work in the Middle East that we read about in the Gospels, that Jesus came over the Americas and shared the Gospel with them in the Americas as well. So that’s kind of the quick history lesson of what the Book of Mormon is all about. Wow, okay. Awesome, awesome. So, what about God? What do they believe about God? We as Christians believe that God is the uncreated Creator. He is
15:00
the uncaused cause, he has existed in eternity past and he will continue to exist in eternity future. But it’s to my understanding that, you know, Mormons believe that God was once a man who has progressed to becoming a God. And so, talk a little bit about that and how they’re different there. Yeah, this is where theology proper
15:25
and anthropology, biblical anthropology intersect. Okay, theology proper is about the study of God. Anthropology is the study of man, of humanity, and of course in any good cis-theo, you’re going to talk about both of those things. And this is just vastly different for Mormons. So Mormons believe that, like you said, Alan, that God was once a man and then progressed to Godhood by keeping the commandments and regulations and all these things that he did, that he lived this.
15:54
this worthy life and eventually became a God of His own planet, okay? But it’s not just that. Here’s where the anthropology comes in. They believe then that you also, you men, that you could also do the same thing. So just like God was once a man, you might someday become a God. Now obviously for any Christian who’s listening, you’re going to say, hold on a second, that does not sound at all like biblical Christianity. It’s not.
16:22
It’s so divergent from biblical Christianity. It’s just not at all what God’s Word has to say. And so again, when a Mormon claims to be a Christian, one of the best things you can do is just say, help me to understand how you view God, you know? And help them, I know Alan, some of your Christian viewers are gonna say, well, how do I help my Mormon neighbor, my Mormon friend? Don’t pick fights with them. Do what Jesus would do.
16:46
help them discover the difference between their perspective and a biblical perspective, what God’s word has to say. Yeah, yeah, yeah, awesome. I know we’re gonna dig into some of those conversational techniques and strategies here in a minute, but you talked about the possibility, if you’re a Mormon, they believe that you can progress to becoming a God of your own planet. Does that have…
17:13
something to do with how they view salvation. Obviously, we view salvation as salvation by grace through faith alone. It doesn’t involve inheriting any sort of planet or anything like that. But how do they view being saved? Do they have the assurance of their salvation? Is it more of a workspace thing? But what does salvation look like for the Mormon? Yeah, one of their own great thinkers,
17:37
maybe 20 or 30 years ago said it like this, you just explained it from a Reformation point of view, we’re saved by grace through faith alone. A Mormon would say we’re saved by grace after all we can do. So think about the difference between that, being saved by grace alone through faith alone versus being saved by grace after all we can do. How would you ever know if you’ve done enough? But that’s how a Mormon…
18:06
views it. And that’s why I think Mormonism is such a burdensome religion. Maybe we have some Mormon viewers right now. Look, I get it. It is such a burden to feel like you just don’t know if you’ve ever done enough. In fact, Alan, we were walking with some friends, some people coming out of Mormonism. We were walking through the pursuit. We have that at PursueGod.org and it explains who Jesus is and who we are. And I remember when the wife, it was a husband and wife, when the wife heard—
18:34
about the biblical concept of Jesus, she said, that is so freeing for me to know that Jesus is God so I don’t have to be, to know that Jesus is perfect and I don’t have to be. Now a lot of Mormons, skeptical Mormons would say, well, that’s just because you want to live this life of sin. But no, that’s not what these people wanted to do. They just wanted to know the truth about Jesus and the truth about Jesus is freeing. The biblical truth is freeing.
19:01
any kind of religion that is works based, Mormonism or anything. I mean, Alan, there are Christian listeners out there who have a works based perspective. So we’re not picking on Mormons here. Any faith or approach to God that puts it in your hands to be made right with God is going to depress you. It’s going to create so much anxiety and you’re going to lack freedom and joy. Yeah, yeah. So most importantly…
19:30
Most importantly, what do they believe about Jesus? We’ve talked about what they believe about God. We’ve talked about what they believe about divine inspiration, scripture. We’ve talked about salvation to some degree. Let’s get down to this. What do they believe about Jesus? Who is Jesus to a Mormon? What do they teach? Because I know that they talk about their following Christ and Jesus is their savior and all of that, but who is Jesus to them?
19:59
All right, so we got to kind of mix in some anthropology again, Alan, because this is where, okay, Mormons believe in something called the pre-existence. This is why they have so many kids. Mormons are famous for having so many kids. It’s because they believe that God the Father and God the Mother, that there’s a mother God and a father God. In fact, they believe in polygamy, eternal polygamy. Okay? So, God the Father and His wives.
20:28
had spirit babies, spirit children, and they all exist in the pre-existence. They don’t have bodies yet. They have spirits. The firstborn son of God the Father is Jesus. That’s what they believe, that Jesus is the firstborn. Now, you can kind of see how they’re putting that together, right? God so loved the world that He gave His one and only Son. So okay, and there’s always a little bit of truth mixed in, but then it just goes to this other place.
20:55
So, Alan, you and I and everyone watching, according to a Mormon, that we’re all spirit children of God the Father, which means, here’s the answer to your question, they believe, Mormons believe that Jesus is our older brother. That’s what they believe, that Jesus is our older brother. So Christians believe that Jesus is God, He is creator uncreated. Mormons believe Jesus is created and He’s just a little bit further along the line than you and I are.
21:25
That’s what they believe about Jesus. So how is this connected to all the children that Mormons have? Well, one of the works that they do, one of the good works that a Mormon does, is they have kids. Because what having a child does is it brings, it gives a body to the spirit children. It gives them a body. And without a body, you can’t progress to Godhood. So you need a body to be able to progress and do all these works.
21:54
so that eventually you can be the God of your own planet. Wow, okay, okay. Okay, so am I correct also in assuming that they believe that Lucifer is the spirit brother of Jesus and so? That’s right. And which means he’s one of our spirit brothers too. That’s what they believe. So that Lucifer is a eternal spirit brother of Jesus as just as you and I are.
22:22
But Lucifer made the wrong choices and all that kind of stuff. So again, in Mormonism, here’s a good way to think about it is Mormonism brings Jesus down to our level and it brings us up to Jesus’s level. Mormonism minimizes Jesus. Mormonism minimizes God. Mormonism minimizes the Bible. And so what you end up with, honestly, is you end up with a very, very man-centric
22:52
religion. And when I say man, not just man, I mean man and woman, but definitely more man than woman. And I think a good example of that is their practice of baptism for the dead. So Mormons have temples. This was confusing to me a long time ago, but Mormons have two special meeting places. They have the ward or the meeting house where they meet on Sunday mornings, but then they also have temples all around the world.
23:18
And this was part of the restoration, quote-unquote, restoration, is that God was restoring to Joseph Smith the New Testament church, which never made sense to me, Alan, because the New Testament church didn’t worship in temples. But again, Mormons don’t recognize that and realize that. Really, what Joseph Smith did is he restored Old Testament religion, which Jesus came to fulfill. So Jesus came to fulfill all of that stuff. Jesus came to…
23:46
set us free from the need for sacrifices in temples and all that kind of stuff, but Mormons still have that. Mormons still, good Mormons go to the temple. And here’s what they do in the temple, Alan, this is gonna blow you away. They do something called proxy baptism. So, Mormon youth groups will go to the temple on a Friday night, and if you’re a worthy Mormon high schooler, you can go in there and you can get baptized for the dead. And here’s what that means. This is why Mormons are so into ancestry.
24:15
and genealogy, because what they do is they’ll research all these people who have died, who died apart from hearing the gospel or having the chance to be baptized, which is a work. And it’s a workspace religion. So there are all these people in spirit prison, which is where you go after you die if you’re not a good, faithful Mormon. You’re locked up in spirit prison.
24:42
if you never had a chance to be baptized in a Mormon temple while you’re on earth. But here’s the solution for it, is a 16 year old boy can be baptized in your place. That’s what proxy baptism means. So think about this, Alan. When we talk about the role of Jesus, that’s just diminishing the role of Jesus that much more. Jesus isn’t enough to save somebody. A 16 year old boy has to go and physically be baptized in your place because you physically didn’t do it while you had a body here on earth.
25:11
I mean, truly it gets me upset when I think about how God must view this. It’s got to be just how blasphemous to elevate people and to bring Jesus down. And I think that sadly, I think, Alan, I think that’s what Mormonism does. Yeah. Wow. A couple of other things that came to my mind before we get into
25:38
strategies for tips on what can we do as Christian, but a couple other things that came to my mind. You mentioned spirit prison, and I remember from previous research that I’ve done, I believe if I’m right, correct me if I’m wrong, but they believe in three different levels of heaven. I wanna call them celestial, terrestrial, and telestial, or something of that nature. Talk a little bit about these three levels of heaven, and who gets into each level.
26:08
of heaven in Mormonism. So we recently covered this just a few weeks ago on our Unveiling Mormonism podcast. We get into the details on this. Maybe some of our Christian listeners would be aware of 1 Corinthians 15 where Paul talks about being caught up to the third heaven. It was in another place he talks about being caught up to the third heaven, but in 1 Corinthians 15 he talks about there are different… He’s talking about the resurrection body.
26:36
in order to explain it, he’s talking about the celestial and the terrestrial. He’s saying there are heavenly bodies, celestial bodies, and there are terrestrial bodies, earthly bodies. And all he’s doing in 1 Corinthians 15 is he’s just explaining that the kind of body that will be resurrected with is different than the kind of body we have here on earth. Okay, so just so you know, that’s all he’s talking about. Well, what Joseph Smith did is he took that.
27:04
And he said, ooh, this looks like something that I can use for my own doctrine. And here’s what he did, Alan. In his translation, he added another word. He added the word, telestial, which is straight up a made up word. He literally made up a word and put it in scripture. Again, we said at the start of the program, Christians believe that the canon is closed. Like we can’t go in there and like cross out verses and add words. Like that’d be terrible.
27:33
But that’s just what Joseph Smith did. And now that’s where he comes up with these terms. So the reason behind this is to, I mean, it just makes sense in a workspace religion to say, look, there are different levels. Don’t you want to work for the highest level of heaven? Don’t you want to get to the celestial level of heaven? And so that’s where the concept came from. But the backstory of the concept is really pretty sad. And it shows us how important it is to not.
28:02
add to or take away from God’s Word. Now as for who ends up there, if you were to ask a Mormon, most Mormons wouldn’t, I think, be arrogant enough to say that they would end up at the celestial level. So there’s a little bit, even among Mormons, it’s a little bit confusing who’s going to end up there. But I do know this, that you and I will end up in the telestial level. And so we’ll still go to heaven at least. So in that sense, Mormonism is kind of a universalistic religion.
28:31
But there’s another thing called outer darkness, kind of like hell. And here’s, here’s who our outer darkness is for Alan. Um, it’s for people who were once Mormon and turned their back on Mormonism, which is so sad to me is to think they’re all these people, maybe some of you are listening right now and that’s, that’s kind of what you’re afraid of is, you know, you don’t believe in Mormonism anymore. We have a lot of these people who listen to our podcasts, but they’re really, they’re still, they still feel trapped because.
29:01
They’re afraid that the worst case scenario is gonna happen to them. Like I’ve heard somebody say, I don’t know if this is official doctrine or not, but even Hitler doesn’t end up in outer darkness. But if you were once a Mormon and turned your back on Mormonism, you will. I mean, doesn’t that sound manipulative, Alan? Doesn’t that sound controlling? And I think that’s one of the reasons so many people are afraid to leave. Yeah, fear-based tactic, right, right. It’s like, hey, you know.
29:28
Kind of like a guy telling a girl, hey, if you leave me, then you’re never going to meet anybody else. So, you know, it keeps that per that abuser, you know, that abusive man keeps that woman, you know, attached to, to, to him. So last question is you mentioned earlier about having many wives. I know some of my listeners might wonder about polygamy. Is that something that is still being practiced within certain divisions of Mormonism, or is that kind of a thing of the past? It’s just,
29:56
you know, maybe something that they did back in the day, but don’t practice anymore or what, what, what are you seeing there? Yeah. So mainline Mormonism, when I say mainline, I mean the one, when you see the commercials on TV or, you know, the, the vast majority of Mormons, the official Mormon church does not practice polygamy anymore. So it’s not a thing anymore for mainline Mormonism, but all the offshoots of Mormonism, most of the offshoots of Mormonism,
30:25
practice polygamy. So the fundamentalist groups, and think about what that means. That just means the ones that go back to the roots of Mormonism. Joseph Smith’s Mormonism, Brigham Young’s Mormonism, the early days of Mormonism absolutely celebrated and practiced polygamy, but the mainline church today doesn’t. But I have polygamists that live two doors down. I mean, I live up here in the Salt Lake area. There are polygamists that live all around us.
30:55
Even though they don’t go to the ward down the street, they’re involved in a more fundamentalist version of the religion. Yeah, wow, wow. Well, thank you very, very much for providing such a thorough history and thorough understanding of the differences. So guys, hopefully you see now very, very clearly that it’s not enough.
31:21
to rub shoulders with somebody that’s really, really nice, that’s really sweet, to say, you know, they love Jesus, say they pray, all these things. It’s very religious. They pray, I love Jesus, Jesus is my savior, all of that. But when you start digging in to the specifics of what certain groups, specifically in this video, we’re talking about what Mormons believe, you will see that there’s a huge difference. And that’s why, you know, I work so hard online. That’s why Pastor Brian works so hard online and offline.
31:51
at his church and his ministry because we were trying to equip people with the discernment so that when you hear something your discernment’s like wait, wait, wait, that, that doesn’t sound Christian, right? Something should go up. So with that, let’s talk a little bit about some practical tips. So, okay, so my next door neighbor, not literally, but you know, let’s just say I’m a Christian, I have a next door neighbor, I have a coworker that I really love. I mean, we get along really well.
32:18
And I want, I care about them. I want them to go to heaven. I don’t want them to be deceived anymore, but I’m nervous as a Christian to engage them in conversation because I don’t want to lose their friendship. I don’t want to seem confrontational. What will be some tips that you would give a Christian who wants to engage in that conversation? And then I guess a follow-up question would be, are there some topics that you would encourage us to steer clear of that will immediately set people ablaze?
32:49
Well, I’ll start with that last question. I think in the olden days, and when I say olden days, like in the 80s and 90s in Utah, the tactic was for Christians to go picket at the temple to talk about polygamy and to talk about the blacks and the priesthood, which weren’t allowed until the 70s in the Mormon church, the racism in Mormonism.
33:14
I think the old way of engaging Mormons would be to talk about some of this stuff from their history. But I think if you’re trying to share with a mainline Mormon, they do not connect to that Mormonism. That is not their Mormonism. So I don’t think it’s helpful to talk about polygamy. I don’t think it’s helpful to talk about blacks in the priesthood or any of that kind of stuff, the fundamentalist kind of stuff, unless you’re sharing with a fundamentalist. So I think steer clear of that kind of stuff. There’s no reason I think to fight about that.
33:44
They’re going to just, you know, more, I think a lot of Mormons have kind of a little bit of a martyr complex. I think it’s part of their, part of their story, their origin story. Joseph Smith was quote unquote, martyred, even though he was shooting back. Uh, if you look into his story, most martyrs don’t shoot back, but Joseph Smith did, but they call him a martyr. And I think there’s a real martyr complex in Mormonism. Don’t feed that. Don’t, don’t make them feel like they’re being picked on or a martyr. I mean, Tracy and I moved here. We raised two kids here in Utah.
34:12
And we by far are the minority. We’re the ones that are being persecuted and all that kind of stuff. But still we still have people interact with us like they’re the ones being picked on. It’s really interesting. So don’t pick on people in those sorts of things. I think one of the best things to do, Allen, is find your commonalities. And one commonality is the Bible. Now they don’t believe in it just like you do.
34:38
But I think one way to do that is to say, hey, let’s do a Bible study together, let’s read the Bible together or something like that. That’s a helpful thing. I think another thing is to do what Jesus always did, which he always asked questions. Don’t be shoving truth down their throat. I mean, this is true for anyone, right, Alan? When you’re trying to share your faith with someone, ask them questions, help them understand what they believe. If they say something like, how could you believe that Jesus is God when Jesus was baptized?
35:08
and then God the Father spoke from heaven and the Holy Spirit descended like a dove. This is what they say to me all the time because Mormons don’t believe in the Trinity. Before you even answer that, and we have some great podcasts on this if you want to learn a biblical answer to that for a Mormon, but before you even answer that, just say, what do you believe about God? What do you believe about Jesus? Get them talking, get them processing their beliefs because a lot of Mormons don’t believe
35:35
I think a lot of Mormons don’t even fully understand what they believe. Even some of the stuff I shared right now, Alan, there are probably some Mormon listeners saying, that’s not what we believe. Yeah. So don’t assume that your Mormon friend believes everything you even heard on this podcast. What I shared with you is official Mormon doctrine, but it just all comes out differently depending on their experience of Mormonism.
36:02
So ask a lot of questions and see what they believe. And then one more thing, Alan, is I would just, at some point, if you feel like you have someone who’s interested, who’s questioning, this is why we created the Unveiling Mormonism podcast. It’s all about helping, not just helping Christians understand Mormonism, we speak to that quite a bit, but it’s also about helping Mormons understand biblical Christianity and Mormonism. We’re gracious on that podcast, just like you are on your channel.
36:30
And it’s a great way for someone who’s ready to hear some answers to really start listening. The co-hosts on that podcast are people who just came out of Mormonism. The way they share the gospel is so beautiful, Alan. You can see just their eyes are open and they can share it with Mormons like nobody else can. And so those are some tools that I would encourage you to use to help your Mormon friends and neighbors or even just to learn more about Mormonism yourself.
36:57
Yeah, two things. Normally I, normally guys, I wait until the end to share all the links stuff. But I mean, hopefully you guys wouldn’t click off of this conversation. It’s such an amazing conversation, but in the event that you just have to run, tell us where they can find that podcast. You know, what’s the website address where people can start tuning in today, guys on unveiling Mormonism. Tell us how we can find that. Yeah. Wherever you get your podcasts, just search for unveiling Mormonism. It’s one of our pursue God podcasts. There’s several other podcasts we run as well. And we’re.
37:26
sharing Mormon stories on there. So unveiling Mormonism on Spotify, Apple, or wherever. And then we actually, Alan, we have resources for using these podcasts in your discipleship relationships, whether one-on-one or with your small group or with your family. And you can find all of that at our website, pursuegod.org. And all of that stuff is free. These resources are what we use in our church and churches all around the world are using these as well.
37:54
to sort of supplement their discipleship resources for small groups and evangelism. Yeah, awesome, thank you. Okay, so here’s a question that I’ve always wondered this. I’ve always wondered this. I know that, kind of going backwards a little bit, but I know that they believe that there are four sources of divine truth. You mentioned Pearl of Great Price, Book of Mormon, Doctrines and Covenants, and the Bible, but how can that be possible when these books,
38:22
contradict one another. I mean, you know, it’s obvious that what’s written in these other books contradict what’s in the Bible. Now, I know you mentioned it earlier that they see the Bible as probably the least one that they read and all of that, but they still do believe that this book called the Bible is one of their sources of divine truth. So it would seem like Joseph Smith would have had to go through in just about every other page just rewrite or cross off because
38:51
When you start talking about being a God, you know, of your own planet and, you know, three levels of heaven, and when you start talking about, you know, that Jesus is the spirit brother of Lucifer and Jesus is our older brother, like, you can’t get any of that in the scripture. I mean, it’s not there. And so how do Mormons harmonize all of these different beliefs that clearly diverge, if you will, diverge, should I say, from…
39:21
you know, Christianity, how do they harmonize that and say, oh yeah, but we also believe in the Bible too. Like it just, they’re conflicting. Well, it really is. I mean, this is their trick. It’s really simple. It’s what I said earlier. They believe the Bible is true as far as it’s translated correctly. So if there’s ever a question, Alan, the Bible wasn’t translated correctly. That’s their out, that’s their great asterisk.
39:49
And that’s why most Mormons don’t read the Bible. In fact, we’ve seen many Mormons come to faith and they’re a part of our church at Alpine Church now. And one of the hurdles that they have to get over is learning to trust the Bible because for 30 years, 40 years, 50 years, they were taught not to trust the Bible. Like they look at the Bible with skepticism because they believe that somewhere it got mistranslated. And so, but here’s the thing is, so then you say to them, well, give me the right translation.
40:19
And they won’t do that either. They don’t have the right. Joseph Smith started working on his own translation, the Joseph Smith translation, in fact, years ago, they used to have it on display in Salt Lake. And I saw it with my own eyes, his own Bible. And I think it was open to Philippians and literally there were verses and words crossed out in his Bible. I couldn’t believe, first of all, that he would do it. And secondly, that, that the Mormons would display that. I don’t think they display that anymore, but, but
40:49
I asked one of my Mormon friends, I’m like, well, why don’t, if it’s only correct as far as it’s translated correctly, then give me the correct translation so I have something to stand on. Right. And I think one of the reasons they don’t use the Joseph Smith translation, assuming that’s the correct translation, is because then they wouldn’t have the wiggle room anymore. I think they like having the wiggle room that we’re going to trust the Book of Mormon and the Pearl of Great Price and the Doctrine and Covenants more than we trust the Bible. But we’ll read it every once in a while. We’ll use it when it’s helpful for us.
41:18
But that’s basically what they use it for. They use it, they cherry pick stuff and proof text their own scripture and their own doctrine. Yeah. Another question about that. And I’m going to get back to kind of what you’re seeing in your ministry with Mormons there in Utah. But just real quick, those other two books, Pearl of Great Price and Doctrine of Covenants, who inspired the writing of those? That’s even something I don’t know.
41:46
Okay, so they believe in… I should say that Mormons believe in a fifth source of Scripture, I guess you could say, or authority, spiritual authority. They don’t just believe in those four things, even though the Bible is at the bottom of the list, but they believe in something called progressive revelation. They believe that God reveals Himself to the prophet, through the prophet, today. So Joseph Smith was the first prophet, Brigham Young was the second prophet. So every prophet…
42:15
the president of the church, basically. There’s only one guy, kind of like the Pope in Catholicism. And they believe that he has, when he speaks authoritatively to stuff, that it’s on level with scripture. And again, a Mormon would say, see, look, that’s something we have that Christians don’t have. Like we still have God’s voice here on earth.
42:39
But see, it’s interesting Alan, because for you and I, that’s really scary to us. But for a Mormon, it’s like in the plus column for them, that they believe that they can still hear from God. Because our question to them is, well, then how do you, like, what if the current guy says something to contradict the previous guy? Right. Well, God changed his mind. That’s the God of Mormonism. Yeah. Wow. Man, I’m telling you, man, that’d be dangerous today with everyone who calls themselves a prophet nowadays. I mean, there’s so many people online.
43:09
call themselves a prophet or prophetess and they’re, you know, God told me this, God told me that, God showed me this in a dream. And man, guys, we’d be in trouble if we did not have a standard source of truth. Tell us a little bit about what are you seeing happening there? I’ve talked to you offline about this, but I know you all are seeing some amazing conversion stories and I know that you highlight many of them on your podcast, but tell us, tell us about some, tell us about some.
43:39
What first, generally, generally speaking, what are you seeing happening in the Mormon church right now as it relates to their relationship with Christianity? And then I want you to zoom in and tell me a little bit about a couple of your favorite stories of people that you’ve ministered to, that you’ve had a chance to walk alongside and they came out of Mormonism and now they’re a Christian serving in your church. Kind of walk us through what you all have been able to see.
44:06
Well, so in general terms, in the last several years, there’s been a real mass exodus out of Mormonism. This is one of the reasons I think Mormons are rebranding. This is one of the reasons I think they’re using crosses more, is because they want to make it look more and more Christian. So many young people, young couples, young married couples, 20s, 30s, 40s, 50s, are leaving Mormonism. And part of it, I think part of it was COVID.
44:35
It was happening before COVID, but I think COVID kind of sped it along a little bit because I don’t know wherever, you know, in Texas, I know that Texas is, is kind of a red state. So Texas probably did, I don’t know if they banned churches from meeting. Utah is very much a red state as well, but for a couple of months, you know, at the beginning of COVID, uh, the, the state shut down churches and Mormonism Mormons for the first time in generations. Think about this, Alan.
45:05
Mormons didn’t have to go to church. I mean, in Utah, there are so many, there are wards everywhere. Like the place that you live, it’s kind of like probably the Catholic Church in Louisiana. I don’t know. Like the place that you live in, you’re assigned a ward to attend. And so if you wanna change churches, you literally have to move. That’s how it works in Utah. You don’t get to pick your church. You go to the church and everybody in Utah.
45:31
lives in walking distance to a church. That’s how many Mormons and churches are in Utah, Christian or Mormon churches in Utah. But what happened is when COVID shut down churches, for the first time ever, Mormons didn’t have to go to church and their neighbors wouldn’t judge them. And I personally think, and time will tell, I personally think that it was a taste of freedom that Mormons never got before. And I think a lot of those Mormons never went back to church. I think they kind of were like,
46:02
Well, this wasn’t that bad and I kind of like having my Sundays. And I think that was part of it. But a bigger part of it was even just everything that’s going on with the internet and DNA evidence and all this stuff. When, when you like the foundations of Mormonism, the book of Mormon and the claims of the book of Mormon are just absolutely destroyed by the internet and by, by DNA evidence and because again, Alan, think about it.
46:28
What I just said about the Book of Mormon and the origin story of the Book of Mormon is that the Native Americans are Israelites. That’s who they are. So my questions are like, well, why don’t they speak Hebrew? Why is there no Hebrew on any caves? Or what about like, we should be able to trace the DNA evidence to that. Well, when they started doing DNA tracing, it was clear that the Native Americans were traced back to Asia, not to the Middle East.
46:58
And so that’s a major problem for Mormons. And this kind of stuff gets out with the advent of not just DNA, but the internet. This kind of stuff gets out. And nowadays it really takes a, like someone who’s just going to, you know, close their eyes and plug their ears and, and refuse to listen to reason to stay in the Mormon church. And so in 2013,
47:21
The Mormon Church commissioned a project called the Gospel Topics Essays. In fact, I encourage our listeners to go check it out. Just type out Mormon Gospel Topics Essays and you can read. There were 13 essays and it was the Mormon Church’s attempt to give an apologetics answer to some of these major questions like was Joseph Smith a polygamist and did he really marry a 13-year-old girl and things like this. Well, and this ties into your other question about a specific example.
47:51
One of the co-hosts on our Unveiling Mormonism podcast at this time in 2013 was a seminary teacher for the Mormon Church. So he was like a youth pastor. The equivalence to that is a youth pastor. He was like a youth pastor in the Mormon Church. And when the Gospel Topics Essays came out, he studied them because he wanted to present those to his students. He wanted to help his students answer the questions about the tie to the Masonic roots.
48:18
of Mormonism and Joseph Smith’s sketchy history and the Book of Mormon and the Book of Abraham and all this stuff that the internet like threw at Mormons. And he’s like, finally the Mormon church is giving us the official answer so I can now talk about this with my students. Alan, he read those 13 Gospel Topics essays and he called up his wife and he said, I have to quit my job. He realized when he read the essays, he realized that Mormonism is a cult.
48:47
Now, I don’t say that lightly. Right. But, and he certainly didn’t say that lightly. And here’s the crazy thing. And his story, by the way, is on our podcast. It’s episode 13 on our podcast. He shares his story. It’s powerful. He stayed in the church for 10 more years. Wow. That’s the grip that Mormonism has on its members. He knew it was wrong. He, I mean, he was diehard. He was bought in. He was a teacher.
49:14
And he, as soon as he realized that it was wrong, it was just such a heartbreaking revelation to him, but he didn’t even tell his wife for several years. And I think that happens with couples is a husband or a wife is doing their research and they’re having their doubts, but they’re afraid to share it with their spouse. And maybe some of your viewers are in that place right now. And look, I know that’s a scary place to be. Um, and it took a lot of courage for him to finally say no, but he did. 10 years later, Alan.
49:44
His wife was on the same page with him finally, and it was when they were baptizing their daughter, their eight-year-old daughter, and they came home from baptizing her in the Mormon church, and he said to his wife, we can’t do this to our kids. And two weeks later, they walked into one of our campuses. And to hear them tell the story is so powerful. To walk into a Christian church, these guys were in their mid-30s in America.
50:12
in America and they’d never walked into a non-denominational church or evangelical church in their life ever. And to your viewers, you need to know that about your Mormon friends. They might live in a Christian culture if they’re living in the South or wherever, but I bet you some of those, many of your Mormon friends have never experienced anything except for Mormonism. And so keep that in mind that when they experience the Jesus of the Bible, it will change.
50:41
their lives. And that’s what happened to Bowen KD. And they met Jesus and, and they’ve been just all in for Jesus ever since, but it’s pretty heartbreaking their own story. They’ve been rejected by their neighbors or kids have been rejected. It’s, it really is a sacrifice for a Mormon to leave Mormonism, especially in Utah. Yeah, guys. And I thank you for sharing that such a beautiful story. And guys, I want to, I want to piggyback off of that because you could be watching this video right now.
51:10
And maybe you’re not a Mormon, maybe you are a Christian, you consider yourself a Christian, but you are in a church that feels like it’s a cult. Because they have brainwashed you, they’ve caused you to believe that, hey, you’re not going to find another church if you leave here. Or, hey, if you leave here, you’re going to be out of God’s will, or God’s going to be angry with you. Or, you know, people are starting to feed you this type of thing, and this is maybe all you’ve known, or you grew up in this church. Or…
51:37
Maybe you got married at that church and they’re maybe making you feel like you owe them to stay there for the rest of your life. But there’s something in you that at the same time is starting to feel like there’s something wrong, that God is showing you that there’s an issue, that there’s doubts that you’re having, there’s inconsistencies, there’s discrepancies with the Word of God and things that are happening at that church is not lining up. I want to encourage you to be encouraged with, I believe their name was Bo and Katie, I want to…
52:06
I want you all to be encouraged. If they can find the courage to leave their church, Mormon church that they were members of their whole life, but they were able to step out and risk being embarrassed, risk being scrutinized and talked about by, and even as we mentioned earlier, people believing that, hey, you’re gonna go to the outer darkness, hell, because you were a Mormon and now you left Mormonism.
52:33
You can find the courage to leave that church that you know is not teaching the scriptures and they’re deviating from biblical truth. You can find the courage to do that. And I trust that God’s going to honor that. One final question, Pastor Brian. Let’s just say, you know, you’re talking to a Mormon. They’re watching this video right now and maybe they’re at the point where they’re having doubts. And this was the video that they needed to watch. Or.
53:01
Maybe they’re not having doubts. They just watched it because they were curious. They saw the title and they said, well, let me see what this guy’s got to say about our faith. What would your words of wisdom be to them from a pastoral perspective? What would you say to a Mormon who’s watching this? Yeah, I would say it’s a scary statement, but I’m gonna say it. Don’t be afraid to question. You know, that’s true for Christians as well. Alan, I told my son this, I told my daughter this,
53:31
when they were trying to make their faith their own. You know, it’s hard being a pastor’s kid in Utah or anywhere, and they had to wrestle with their faith. And Tracy and I told our kids, we said, it’s gotta be your faith. You need to read God’s word and make it your faith. We don’t want you to have our faith. We want you to have your faith. And one of the things that we told both of our kids is, don’t be afraid of any question.
53:58
Because I believe that God’s Word will stand up to any question. You don’t have to be afraid of it. So to the Mormon listeners, well, I am the Christian listeners, but to the Mormons listening, I just would challenge you, don’t be afraid to question. Because if Mormonism is true, it’ll stand up to your questions. But see, I believe it’s not true. And I believe a lot of people are afraid to face that, to see Mormonism for what it really is. So I recognize it takes a lot of courage, but don’t be afraid to question.
54:28
And the place to find your answers is God’s Word. And I know if you grew up in Mormonism, you’ve been told the opposite forever. But I just challenge you to question that. God’s Word is faithful. God’s Word is true. I believe in a God who is strong enough and powerful enough and authoritative enough to make sure that over the years we’ve been handed down His Word in its trustworthy.
54:57
Mormonism believes in a God who lost control of his word and the priesthood and the covenants, you know, 1800 years ago, and it had to be, and it was lost on the earth for 16 or 1700 years. That’s not a God I want to follow. I don’t want to follow a God who is that weak, who is unable to make sure that his truth is going to survive generation after generation and generation.
55:26
That’s the God of the Bible. The God of the Bible is faithful and true, and His Word is a reflection of His faithfulness and His truth. And so the Mormon listeners, I encourage you to seek God in His Word. Jeremiah 29, 13 says this, “‘If you seek Me, you’ll find Me, if you seek Me with your whole heart.'” And so I think a lot of Mormons aren’t doing it with their whole heart. They’re holding back, and I challenge you to do it with your whole heart. And the promise of God’s Word is that you’ll find Him.
55:55
to me right now and saying, hey, Christianity is wrong. You need to have the faith and the courage to leave Christianity and become a Muslim. Like I’d be, I would be like deathly afraid, you know, I’d be just, I’d be, my whole world would be shaken. I’d be scared. And so I can imagine like that’s how Mormons feel. This is all they’ve heard their whole life that this is the truth. This is it. And I pray, I pray that God reveals himself to you. And when he does,
56:24
pray that you have the courage to submit your will in exchange for his. What are your final words to the Christian watching this? We’ve touched on it before, but the Christian that they just want to be used by God. They want to have the courage to be able to engage their friends in conversation, but they don’t, a little nervous. But what would be your advice to them? They want to be used. They want to have these conversations, but maybe they just don’t feel prepared. They feel ill-equipped.
56:51
Well, I’ll say, Alan, that’s the reason we created pursuegod.org. We really started it in 2013. But I saved the website. I bought the website in 2001 when we started Alpine Church. You could buy websites back in 2001? Yeah. We bought the domain name, and I sat on it for 10 years. I just waited on it. Because I knew that at some point,
57:20
My heart, Alan, I know your heart is the same way, my heart is for disciple making. I want to empower Christians to make disciples. I mean, we believe that Jesus wants us all to make disciples, not just pastors, not just people like Alan. Jesus wants everyone to make disciples. I think the problem is most people don’t know how. Like you said, most people don’t know how to have the conversation. So pursuegod.org is built with thousands of conversation starters. And Alan, here’s how it works.
57:48
When we do this with so many Mormons and so many non-Mormons, we say, can I walk with you toward Jesus? And when they say yes, then we just, we pick a series or we do topics at the website and what we do is we say, look, listen to the podcast ahead of time. There’s usually a 40, 45 minute podcast. Listen to it ahead of time. And then let’s just sit down for coffee and let’s have a talk. And you know what that does, that strategy, what that does, Alan, is it just makes it so easy for anybody.
58:17
to make a disciple because that person shows up like Bowen KD did. We brought him through the Pursuit, which is like our flagship series at Pursue God. It’s just the basics of biblical Christianity. What is sin? Who is Jesus? How can I be saved? We talk about spiritual disciplines. We talk about Imago Dei. We talk about just the basics of Christianity there. And for 12 weeks, we met with him every single week. We sent him the podcast ahead of time. And then we sat down to have a conversation. And these guys had…
58:46
pages worth of notes. You could tell that the Holy Spirit all week long was working on them. And so when we got there, it was so easy to have the conversation because, Alan, we weren’t the Bible experts. We weren’t coming there to teach a lesson to them. We were coming there to help them discover what they’d already experienced. So for any Christians out there who are, you’re just looking for a way to be more effective in your disciple making, check out the resources that we
59:15
There’s a whole category on Mormonism to help you to have these conversations with people who are ready to have the conversations. Now not everybody is ready, but for the people who are ready, Christians, we need to be equipped with a strategy for walking with someone toward truth. And I think that if you would do that, man, I think that God will blow your mind at the impact that you’ll have in your life. And that’s what we’ve seen here in Utah.
59:43
It’s not, Alan, it’s not just my wife and I, we’ve got eight campuses now in Utah, and it’s beautiful to see the average attender at Alpine Church is making disciples. Like they’re not just inviting people to church, that’s part of it, but then we’re handing that person back off to them to disciple them and walk with them into faith and life. In fact, this Sunday, one of our campuses, we’re baptizing a couple that just came to faith.
01:00:11
out of Mormonism and they’re being baptized by their son who came to faith last year at our church out of Mormonism. And that kind of thing happens every week at our church. And I know that God is on the move in Utah and I think he wants to do the same thing all around the country and all around the world. Wow, guys. Thank you so much, Brian, for just being generous with your time. And guys, I wanna share this. I told you earlier that I was gonna share with you a little bit about how
01:00:40
Pastor Brian and I got connected and I this is the power of discipleship and disciple making He probably remembers the story a little better than I do, but I would say around 2016 2017. I believe it is I Get contacted. I don’t remember whether it was a phone call or whether it was an email somehow or another I think they were using some of my YouTube videos on his pursue God dot o RG website and God put it on his heart
01:01:10
to reach out to me, somebody that he had never spoken to in person, somehow we got on the phone and this gracious man of God offered to disciple me. He said, hey, do you have anybody in your life right now that is walking with you? I know that the space, the digital space and YouTube can be a lonely place and a lot of YouTubers are not really connected, don’t have spiritual leadership. I have a heart for discipleship, making disciples.
01:01:37
Do you have anybody right now that’s that’s walking through life with you? And at that point, guys, I was a newlywed. I just had my first child. I mean, I was just, I was floundering. I was just trying to make it. And God brought him into my life at such a pivotal time. And I want to say for the next four, maybe even six months, we met every Friday morning or so early, like six or seven o’clock in the morning. And we just did discipleship. So let me just go on record and say, once again, Brian.
01:02:05
Thank you so much for not only that, but also lighting a fire in me to want to do that with other men as I’ve been doing since then. So thank you, man. You’re welcome, brother. It’s been a pleasure.
