ryanpresnell
Puritan Board Freshman
I'm not sure if this is the right place for posting this, but I'm very excited with how my first interaction with Mormon missionaries went and thought I would share it here. I will try and give a play-by-play of what happened in case anyone is interested or would like to give advice or resources for further study (I appreciate the suggestion of Brian Schwertley's sermonaudio clips which I found in another thread).
My campus ministry had a partnership evangelism session today, and unfortunately I showed up late and was unable to find anyone I knew from the ministry, so I'm not sure if anyone ended up going or not. Fortunately, I happened to pass by some Mormons who were speaking with someone. I decided to keep walking a bit and then walk back so that I could wait for them to finish talking with the person before speaking with them. First, they showed me a verse in the book of Mormon that essentially said that if you genuinely seek the truth and pray to God, the Holy Spirit will reveal the truth to you. I added that one who is genuinely seeking the truth should do as Christ commands and search the scriptures in addition to prayer. Then we started discussing Bible translations and I asked their opinion of the Joseph Smith translation and I think they said that they believe the JST mostly contains revelations of verses that were lost or changed. I remembered a specific "prophecy" from the JST attributed to the book of Genesis in which Joseph Smith is apparently predicted by name. I suggested that it was strange that there was not a single shred of manuscript evidence for this prophecy or for any of the other extrabiblical "revelations". They said that they would research it further. I then brought up Deuteronomy 13, which says not to follow a prophet if he instructs you to go after other gods, to prove that Joseph Smith should not be followed because he serves a god that is not triune. To prove this I started with the apostle John saying that the prophet Isaiah saw the glory of Christ in Isaiah 6, when in the cited passage, Christ is referred to as Jehovah. They responded that they believe Jehovah is the Son, and Elohim is the Father. I had heard this before but was uncertain whether this was common to all Mormons. So, I then went to Psalm 100:3 which says that Jehovah is Elohim. They were unable to respond and asked if we could set up a later meeting so that they could look into the matter. I happily obliged and gave them my name and phone number. I have already received a text message from them, so hopefully soon we will be able to speak again. Overall, they seemed fairly knowledgeable about what the LDS beliefs are but did not seem well-equipped to handle Christian polemics. I would appreciate any prayers that may be offered both for the conversion of these two Mormons as well as for me to have the ability to recall scripture and other relevant information when necessary in future encounters.
My campus ministry had a partnership evangelism session today, and unfortunately I showed up late and was unable to find anyone I knew from the ministry, so I'm not sure if anyone ended up going or not. Fortunately, I happened to pass by some Mormons who were speaking with someone. I decided to keep walking a bit and then walk back so that I could wait for them to finish talking with the person before speaking with them. First, they showed me a verse in the book of Mormon that essentially said that if you genuinely seek the truth and pray to God, the Holy Spirit will reveal the truth to you. I added that one who is genuinely seeking the truth should do as Christ commands and search the scriptures in addition to prayer. Then we started discussing Bible translations and I asked their opinion of the Joseph Smith translation and I think they said that they believe the JST mostly contains revelations of verses that were lost or changed. I remembered a specific "prophecy" from the JST attributed to the book of Genesis in which Joseph Smith is apparently predicted by name. I suggested that it was strange that there was not a single shred of manuscript evidence for this prophecy or for any of the other extrabiblical "revelations". They said that they would research it further. I then brought up Deuteronomy 13, which says not to follow a prophet if he instructs you to go after other gods, to prove that Joseph Smith should not be followed because he serves a god that is not triune. To prove this I started with the apostle John saying that the prophet Isaiah saw the glory of Christ in Isaiah 6, when in the cited passage, Christ is referred to as Jehovah. They responded that they believe Jehovah is the Son, and Elohim is the Father. I had heard this before but was uncertain whether this was common to all Mormons. So, I then went to Psalm 100:3 which says that Jehovah is Elohim. They were unable to respond and asked if we could set up a later meeting so that they could look into the matter. I happily obliged and gave them my name and phone number. I have already received a text message from them, so hopefully soon we will be able to speak again. Overall, they seemed fairly knowledgeable about what the LDS beliefs are but did not seem well-equipped to handle Christian polemics. I would appreciate any prayers that may be offered both for the conversion of these two Mormons as well as for me to have the ability to recall scripture and other relevant information when necessary in future encounters.