Until yesterday, I had never been approached by a member of the church of Jesus Christ of the Latter-Day Saints. Thats a mouthful. Lets shorten that to Mormons, as they are more properly called.
It went down like this. I was pumping gas at the Sunoco station, and out of my periferal vision I saw a bicycle helmet float over the hood of my truck and swoop around the back, where the full body of a mormon greeted me in the name of the "Church of Jesus Christ" and asked me if he could share a message of Jesus with me. I love Jesus, as a matter of fact, I am one of his favorite people in the world. So of course, I wanted to talk about Him, and I expressed as much to the cycling missionary.
They came over about 10:15 to where I was working, and I invited them in to sit and talk and it became obvious to me that they were nervous about being there, which was OK, because honestly, I was a little nervous about them being there too. I was nervous about being able to be a reliable ambassador for Christ. These guys were nervous, because I am sure that walking into somebody's house to convert them to a cultish religion is a daunting task for any 18-20 year old.
Anyway, we talked for about an hour and a half. They didn't convert me and I didn't convert them. They had a lot of beliefs that mirrored Christian doctrine, but as soon as you dug into what they were saying, paying close attention to semantical details, you realized that the whole authority of the eternal creative Father is undermined by a system of promoting oneself to God status through works. You might even get to rule your own universe someday. The interesting thing is that Jesus is savior, salvation only comes through Him, but Jesus is only attainable through Joseph Smith and his teachings. The paradox of this is not worth exploring here.
I eventually had to get back to work, but the conversation was encouraging one one hand and heartbreaking on the other. The Lord really loves these people, and they want to be like Him, but they are so thoroughly deceived by Joseph Smith's teachings, that they don't come into a real relationship with Christ. They relate to Him through the elders and the teachings....same old religion that Joseph was trying to repair.
I am not going to rant about these guys, the truth is that compassion was stirred in me for them. I am not going to run out and try to convert them all, but they do fall under the umbrella of "all nations" to whom we are supposed to reach out and touch with a real God experience.
I know people are tired of this type of missionary style. I have never had to deal with them much other than almost dating a Mormon girl one summer (smoking hot, btw). But I look forward to getting to sit down with them again sometime, not to convert them necesarily, that would take time, but for Jesus to touch them through prophecy, healing, a supernatural touch of some sort is way better than me describing anything to them.
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