Lynn Wilder reveals the innerworking of the Mormon Church - Focus Today 08-28-13 - theDove.us

Oh but welcome to focus today today is going to be a very special day I heard our guest today just a few days ago on a program that we air on the Dove radio and that's the Janet Parshall program in the market with Janet Parshall and I was just I just couldn't stop listening I fact I found myself it's my truck that's sitting in the truck once I got to my appointment to finish listening to this interview and lo and behold polina mated arrangements for us to have with us today lynn wilder and she is a very special lady she is a mom a wife a grandmother a scholar PhD and a former professor at BYU niversity and she's authored this book that I think is a must read it's called unveiling grace the story of how we their family found their way out of the Mormon Church and so I asked Lynn if she could be with us for the full program today because the story is so fascinating so Lynn nice to have you with us today wow it is nice to have that kind of an introduction I'm just thrilled you've read the book well I have to tell you when I heard the interview I was just so fascinated with your story can we say to our audience this is a recent story this all began in 2006 is that correct correct all right all right now I am not even sure where to start here but you were first raised as a Protestant and then you got involved in Mormonism and then you come out because that's the short story of it but what made you get involved with the Mormon Church what was it that attracted you and your family probably you need to know that 85% of converts that go into Mormonism come straight out of biblical Christianity what I did is not so unusual I was raised nominally Christian we went to church every week but my family didn't open the Bible and I was I didn't know the Bible and so I couldn't tell truth from error my husband and I at the age of 25 were looking for a church and the Mormon missionaries knocked on her door and I was kind of interested in latter days and their badges said the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter day Saints so you know that was kind of interesting to me the people are wonderful they took us in just like family and it really pretty soon after I met all of them the Mormon church family supplanted my biological family it's a 24/7 culture in the Mormon Church so what took me in relationships feeling loved thinking it was a Christian option um and their persistence you know the missionaries just came back and back and back and back and back and eventually my husband prayed about the Book of Mormon Mormons believe that the way you tell if something is true is you go to your knees and you ask the Holy Spirit and the Holy Spirit will make you feel good um it's all about feelings and so my husband did pray about the Book of Mormon and he got a dream and in this dream he was defending warm and people and he decided that we needed to go into Mormonism and I said okay I'll try it with you but I have to tell you was so compelling within six months I was lolling and bearing testimony that I just knew that the Mormon Church was the only true church on the face of the earth does that help Wow I mean that's quite a conversion yeah yeah um again I think I thought it was a crucial option and so alright that started your journey you and your family and and as I read through some of the timelines that you shared in the book and also some of the information we got I mean your family was really involved and you went on with your education and ended up becoming a professor at BYU I mean it and you were even in the temple ranks and I don't understand all of this I've heard bits and pieces of it but your own journey your own family your own missionary journey I mean you guys were just really fully involved you know Mike and I had had a number of miscarriages and so I wanted very we wanted very badly to have children and the Mormons told us that if we went to I'm sorry good heads popping up here then we went to the temple that we would God would bless us with children and we went from Indiana we were living in Indiana at the time and we went to Washington DC that was our closest temple look so if you've ever seen the Washington DC it looks a little like the city of Oz big old white thing you can see beltway um got sealed as a husband and wife which means you can live together as husband and wife in this life but also in the next life and immediately got pregnant with the first child that we capped and so I had this great testimony that Mormonism was true because they told us to go to the temple we'd have a child and that's exactly what happened Wow so how many children do you have we have four they were all born Mormons they under the Covenant and they we were all very active in Mormonism very very active um there were there were years where I gave twenty hours during the week of my life to lay Church work and my husband did the same we always had a temple recommend not all Mormons do have temple recommends you have to work your way there you have to work your way to be worthy enough to have I'll recommend we had a temple recommend um from the time we'd been in the church about a year you can't go to the temple until you've been a member at least a year and then we held temple recommends for 30 years until God totally turned our life upside down yeah I want to get into that what what is a temple recommend what is that um you cannot go into a Mormon temple without a temple recommend you have Sunday meeting church buildings and Mormonism and that is very much like a Protestant church building where you go to church on Sunday and you have youth activities and things during the week but Morgan's also attend a temple there 141 operating Mormon temples on the face of the earth right now you know of course a Jewish temple there was only one Mormons think that their temple is a lot like the Jewish temple but I can tell you now that I know what happened in the Jewish temple there's nothing similar all because between what goes on Mormon temple and we can talk about that if you want and what could Jewish temple but um Mormonism is great plus works actually it starts with works plus grace it says in the Book of Mormon you are saved by grace after all you can do which mean you have to do all you can do first you offer all these works to this Mormon God and then if you've done enough works His grace will kick in and save you but in this life you never know if you've done enough works so Mormons are constantly constantly constantly doing good works and part of those good works are to be worthy enough to go to the temple so let me I think I actually have the temple recommend questions here there are 14 things you have to be worthy about in order to go to the temple all right go ahead all right you have ooh ah let's see have a testimony of the atonement of Christ which Mormons believe happened in the garden and not on the cross you have to have a testimony of the restoration of the gospel Mormonism teaches that after Christ and his Twelve Apostles died that his church failed and the church died so none of the churches that sprung up you know during the products the Catholic and Protestant areas eras are true churches Christ's Church was in apostasy all these years and then in 1830 Joseph Smith restored the original Church so Mormonism believes they are the one true church and that Protestant churches are corrupt today no you have to attest to that before you can go to the temple you have to sustain the profit of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter day Saints as a prophet seer and Revelator and the only person on the earth who possesses and is authorized to exercise all priesthood keys so the one man who speaks for God on the earth is a Mormon prophet he has two counselors and he has Twelve Apostles there are actually 15 men at the top of the Mormon Church considered prophets seers and Revelator's you have to live the law of chastity you have to be honest in your dealings with your fellow man you have to be a full-time payer and you have to have done this for a whole year before you can get a temple recommend um you have to keep the word of wisdom which is a health code no coffee no tea no tobacco um so um and you cannot affiliate with anyone who's apostate from the church so those are some of the things that you agree to and if you have done those and you can get a temple recommend and then when you go into the temple there's a little couple usually standing as Sentinel there and checking out your your temple recommend to make sure that you're worthy to enter before you enter but my family went to the temple and kids can go as young as 12 they can go to the basement of the temple and this is what they do at the basement of the temple they do baptisms for the dead now I know that sounds a little creepy but what that means is you can see this picture behind me this is it this is my family right so Mormons do a lot of genealogy I did 20 years of genealogy well the reason you do genealogy is to find the name of people who are dead so that you can take their name in proxy to a temple and go through a whole bunch of laws and ordinances for these people so that although they're dead and on the other side of the veil they can choose to become Mormon so you have a second chance in warmth Wow all right I'm got to take a break here I want to come back this is so fascinating I want to get into your conversion back to Protestants and what how that happened and in that I think you can probably then begin to continue to give us the the differences that you saw in the Enlightenment that you you and your family have now experienced this is fascinating the book is entitled unveiling love unveiling great excuse me the story of how we found our way out of Mormonism by Lyn Wilder she's holding up a copy we also put a copy on the screen there for you watching on the double inning on the radio check it out and we'll be right back with Lynne in just a few moments hi I'm Paulina and I work at the deaf TV did you know that when you support the deaf TV you have a profound impact not only in our community but around the world it's your continued support that takes the inspiration and hope in the programs we produced and makes them available to the thousands of people for watching this videos online every week help bring encouragement and hope to our Valley and beyond by making a secure online donation today at our website the dobbed at us ok we're back and our special guest today dr. Lynn K Wilder she is the author of this book that is what a story unveiling grace the story of how we found our way out of the Mormon Church and let me encourage you to check it out put out by Zondervan so check it out at Evangel or discount christian books or online at amazon barnes and noble fascinating read and it's a true story and it's recent I mean all this started back in 2006 and you know lenez I looked through your professional career it's just amazing as an educator and then 12 years as a professor at BYU and PhD and I mean your family involved in this for 30 years I I can't imagine that kind of background in history and your dedication to the church what happened what what happened in your family that begin to open the door for you to question something that you were involved in so deeply boy that is a good question the God that we serve in the New Testament and in the Bible is huge and this God loves us and he reaches out for us and that's literally what he did to myself and my family I give him all the glory for what happened it truly is a miracle that's why it's such a great story it's what God did it not what we did you know let me just interrupt you here it just dawned on me one of the scriptures that we use here at the dub both radio and television that underscores the mission of what we do here's Romans 10 20 you may want to jot this down it says this I was found by those who weren't seeking me and I manifested myself to those who didn't ask so it sounds like something happened in your family's life that was the fulfillment of that scripture yes we did have kind of a point where everything was turned upside down but God is good enough my life was so good in Mormonism I would never have left except that in 1999 when I came to BYU I was actually officially at BYU eight years I'm at Florida Gulf Coast University now yeah but um when we moved to Utah the culture there was really hard for us we began to see people that were living polygamy do you know that as many as the estimates are as many as a hundred thousand people live polygamy in the United States and all of that came from the root of Mormonism the Mormon founder Joseph Smith was polygamous so there's a lot of polygamy in Utah you've probably seen right of him set and you know sister wives and some of that gets real you know you thought the old polygamy with the pioneer dresses but you also have new polygamy it was all around us that was a shock for me the other shock for me I taught diversity at BYU was racism racism ran deep in Mormonism for a long time blacks could not hold the Mormon priests to it which meant they couldn't go to the highest degree of heaven until 1978 and a lot of my students who had been generational members were well aware of those policies they believe that the curse of Cain was black skin which of course the Bible doesn't say that but Book of Abraham says that in one of the Mormon scriptures and they started showing me just how serious the racism was now I thought well God must have sent me here to BYU to fix the racism in the next generation wow you realize felt in the scripture so Islam and this is 2013 those racist scripture still exists The Book of Mormon makes it very clear that black skin is a curse and it's less than white skin and it happens when you're when you're evil oh and that's also in my book you know if you've read it that there's a whole chapter on on that see if I can find the one Scripture here we go the skin of the Lamanites were dark this is right out of the book of Mormon Elma three six according to the mark which was sat upon their fathers which was a curse upon them because of their transgression and their rebellion so the whole idea that dark skin is occurs it's still all over Mormon scripture and that was a real problem for me Wow Wow all right so something happened to your sons your sons were doing their Mormon missionary work and something happen my oldest then went to Russia for two years very tough mission gave his gave his time and effort to some orphanages there came home very thin it was a tough mission second son went to Denmark to preach the Worman gospel my third son ended up in the middle of evangelical Bible Belt Territory Orlando Florida and he was so is Ellis for the Mormon gospel like we all were that he started trying to convert pastors because he knew if they came their whole congregations were would come there are all kinds of school in original Mormonism in the 1800s where that would have a pastor we get comforted and the whole congregation returned Mormon so he really believed he could do that he has two wonderful stories of confronting pastors and then those pastors showing him in the New Testament where Mormonism might not be the same gospel that Jesus himself taught Micah didn't like those ideas but he did begin to read the Bible only for one purpose because it was angry and to try to refute the evangelicals that he was bumping up against the boy God had a plan Wow 20 months of reading you're on a Mormon mission for two years he began to read the New Testament about three months in he read it for 20 months before his eyes were completely open to the fact that not only was Worman ism a little different than the New Testament gospel but Mormonism must be a false gospel a false price that Jesus himself warned about so my gig is life to Christ while he's still a Mormon missionary and he's a leader it is more a mission than the funny you know God is so he's just so personal and he's really funny so Micah says I get down to my knees and I pray okay now what who do I tell two days later he's invited to stand in front of 60 to 80 missionaries and bear testimony bloody over the last two years my stars yes they were this is going and he was he had met Abad so real that he was willing to stand for him and I mean think of this all he had was the Bible and the Holy Spirit to teach him II didn't talk to any Christians except for a couple of pastors he bumped up against you know a year and a half earlier no um but God must have revealed himself to be so large to Mike he knew what he knew what he knew and he stood up in front of those missionaries and his leader had just said if you don't have five points of a Mormon testimony you don't have a real testimony and four of those things were Mormon things and the last thing was you believe the Bible but the other things were things like you believe in the living prophet you believe that Joseph Smith who founded the church was a prophet you believe in the Book of Mormon those kind of things Micah got up and said basically I've been reading the New Testament and it says you're saved by grace not by works I don't need a man to stand between myself and God it says in the New Testament that Jesus is the only mediator between man and God and he wore testimony of what he learned one of the missionaries in that room um Joseph Warren is now my son-in-law and a Christian as well Joseph said that there was hardly a dry eye in the place that Micah talked about Christ being on the cross looking at you and and paying for your sins and and loving you so much that he would do it all for you that you don't have to do the work all you believe in him uh took Joseph another six or seven months until he was off his mission and he gave his life to Jesus and we heard actually from a handful of people that were in that room that day that God continues to call from that seed it was planted well it didn't go down well as you can imagine with Micah's leaders two days later he was called in for a face-to-face in position with his Mormon mission leader who's his leader in the church the man took his temple recommend away told him he had the spirit of the devil in him called him an antichrist and friend excommunicate him where were you where were you as parents in all this is the shock I mean God sometimes has to just grab ya when you're in the middle of your crazy life right right and do something so bizarre and unusual that gets your attention and that was what this did they put Mike on a plane they set him home we picked him up on the other end totally confused about why somebody saying our son has a dump devil in them we get to set it's late on a Saturday night the stake president who's our Mormon leader in Alpine Utah has us bring him directly to his office and this man does the same thing as the other man does and he makes it very clear II as the spirit of the devil in him he refers to him as nee hoor who's an antichrist from elma one in the book of mormon and then he asked us to bring him in front of the High Council early the next morning now my husband had been a high councilor for I don't know ten years at least and he knew exactly what that meant they bring in front of the High Council they quiz him about his faith he professed biblical Christianity and they excommunicated on the spot so Mike and I are stunned but we are sure we are not taking him in so that he can be excommunicated until we figure out what in the world is going on we trust this kid you know all right yeah so that in fact things were so hot that we put Micah on a plane and got him out of we didn't want him excommunicated we didn't want neighbors questioning we just we just got him out of there and that probably was a good thing Wow but then we were left without Micah to talk to without any way to figure this out and Micah said was mom and dad please read the New Testament read it and so Mike and I agreed to do that and we started reading it and it just immediately became an obsession for me I was just consumed by this thought of love could not read enough about the life of Jesus and who he was and it didn't take very long before I realized this was not the gospel that I had learned in 30 years of Mormonism and and so I'm going to BYU every day I don't even want to go to work I just want to read the word let me ask you one question here are you telling me that 30 years of Mormonism you did not read the New Testament Mormons have four standard works of Scripture they have the Book of Mormon which they believe is the most correct book on the face of the earth they have the pearl of great price and they have the Doctrine and Covenants which is a collection of revelations to their prophets down through years they believe that the Bible is often mistranslated therefore it's corrupt and it can't be trusted so you trust the other Mormon scriptures and the words of the living warm and prophet and his 12 apostles before you trust the Bible yes so did I read it not only did I read it I taught it my husband and I taught Mormon seminary which is a four year course preparing guys to audition Wow and one of those years you teach the Bible but I have to tell you this well in fact you teach the new the Old Testament one year the New Testament another year church history and dr. new covenants another year but what we did when we taught we had very scripted manuals and you have to stick to the manual Mormons are very strict about that um every Church around the world that's Mormon teaches the same lesson on the same day Wow let me take a break here I hate to do this I gotta cut into you real quick and we'll come back this is its spell bounding let you catch your breath uh go read Romans 10 20 during this break we'll be right back with Lynn Wilder and her book entitled unveiling grace the story of how we found our way out of the Mormon Church fascinating book we'll be right back hi I'm Dan land I work at the Dove TV you know compared to Portland Seattle and LA Medford might be considered a small market but at the Dove we're excited about the opportunity to make a big impact right here in our community and you helped make that happen did you know that more than 90% of our income comes from people like you you can help us now by making a secure online donation at our website WS or by phoning five four one seven seven six five three six eight well we're back and absolutely fascinating time together with our very special guests today Lyn Wilder she is the author of unveiling grace the story of how we found our way out of the Mormon Church and you may want to check it out as published by Zondervan there's a picture of it on the screen try it pick it up at Evangel or christian discount books in Jacksonville or check it out amazon online at Amazon or Barnes and Noble incredible story and a very recent story because this only goes back to 2006 and I can tell just by talking to her they're still in the process they've kind of come to this incredible experience and to deal with how God has revealed themselves to them and the story here is their families involved in this for 30 years her and her husband Mike taught in the seminary she's a professor at BYU her children do the missionary tours and it's because of one of their sons who sat down one day and read the Old Testament begin to read the New Testament for himself and obviously realizing there's incredible contrast between the Jesus of the New Testament and the Jesus of Mormonism and so he's excommunicated from his missionary to her now he's about ready to be excommunicated from the church and her and Mike or get him out of town I just see and and your son's been told that he's filled with a demon I mean you're the very core of your belief system is being rocked here I don't know what you do heart you know heart of that issue is we thought we believed in the biblical Jesus so then we had to read the New Testament in order to figure out why they would think if he professed a god of graces in the New Testament why that would be so horrific to the Mormon Church you know recently I read John 3:36 that says whoever believes in the son has eternal life Mormons believe they have the son they believe they have the right Christ and they believe they have the same Christ that Christians do their view of Christianity is that you have a little bit of the truth they have the fullness of the truth because Joseph Smith restored the fullness of the truth therefore Christians like I said 85% of their converts come from Christianity Christians need to take what they know and add Mormonism to it so Mormons don't necessarily see Christians as people with doctrine contrary to theirs they just see them as people who need more added to if that makes sense but when I began to realize when I read the New Testament is this is not the same gospel this is a contrary gospel I started in the book of John and the very first verse in John says in the beginning was the word okay I'm going the word is Christ and the Word was with God and Word was God wait a minute if he was God from the beginning he can't worked his way there Morgan ISM teaches that God started as men and they work their way through works they earn their way to God this and that and if you ask so does that mean Jesus sinned they'll say we don't know maybe and that Heavenly Father sinned we don't know maybe they also refute the trying of God they believe that gods are separate gods and actually that there are lots and lots and lots of gods because um Jesus he had a father who had a father God who had a father God so um in the very first verse of John I'm seeing an opposite so there are a number of major differences one is of course that biblical Christians believe that the Bible is the infallible Word of God that God is big enough and able enough to keep words together for all time Mormons believe the Bible is corrupt but they believe a lot of what atheists believe about how the Bible was put together and you can't trust it and that kind of stuff um so the Mormonism believes they're the only true church a biblical Christianity believes that the body of Christ are the belief you know what makes us the temple right ah you know what makes this so difficult Lynn is and I'm sure you you understand this and we work alongside with Mormons when it comes to traditional family values and upholding the righteousness of our nature I think where we're trying to draw the line here is theologically we are miles apart I think on the social issues we're together but and we I work with them and I consider them great partners and some of the battles of the social struggles that we have but theologically were miles apart in your experience I'm still trying to figure out what you and Mike went through your son's being thrown out you got 30 years of experience he's asked you to read the New Testament come on mom and dad give this some second thoughts what happened to you Mike you know what what I was learning you know I think conviction stirs it up in fact when Mormons come back to me they're so angry and they'll say why do you say that about us um I'm I'm not offended I think well maybe the Holy Spirit's working with them because we're starting to notice some of the things that we're showing our differences when you realize they're contrary doctrines and you want to keep Christ you have to make a choice do you want this Christ or this Christ so I guess the bottom line in all of this is that Mormons need the God of grace they need to know about the biblical Jesus it's I had Christian family that for thirty years never told me I was in a bad place and when I became born-again I was angry didn't anybody care enough about me to tell me that I might have not been in a good place wow what a statement we tend to think they're wonderful people they're well educated their kids are always top notch and everything in the schools and we have a lot to learn from them rather than seeing them as a mission field of people that so want Jesus but have the wrong Jesus and what are the consequences of that I mean only God can sort that out but I will spend the rest of my life telling the story of how we turn my life upside down how I came to this realization and how I'd like other people to help Mormons come to that realization and I want Mormons to read the book so that maybe they'll rethink where they are all right so you and Mike and your whole family is out and you voluntarily gave up your membership you were next communicate is that correct that's correct do you know that there is an honor code at Brigham Young University that you sign and it says that if you become apostate from the Mormon Church if you give up your membership in the Mormon Church that if you're a student you can't enroll in classes you cannot graduate and if you're a professor you cannot stay I had to have what's called ecclesiastical clearance from my bishop in order to stay there and if I lost that ecclesiastical clear I would have lost my job God was good he kept our journey underground it wasn't a public thing they did not um they they did not fire me yeah but it could have it could have happened I saw it happened to a number of my colleagues all right I gonna have to squeeze another break in here when I come back and I notice your blouse you have a cross on your blouse today you're wearing a cross around your neck and you didn't do that as a Mormon I want you to explain that I have been to a Mormon service I didn't see a Bible in the Pew I didn't see a cross on the wall I saw nothing but the exit sign over the door I want you to kind of help me process that we'll be right back with Lynn Wilder right after this hi I'm Paula and I work at the Dove TV every day we get letters and emails from people who've been encouraged blessed and challenged by the programs on the duck TV but we couldn't do it without you did you know that more than 90% of our income comes from people like you you can help us continue to bring inspiration and hope to our community by making a secure online donation at our website the ws or call us at five four one seven seven six five three six eight we're back with our very special guest today dr. Lynn Wilder and she's a former professor at BYU mom and her and her family was involved in the Mormon Church for thirty years her book is entitled unveiling grace I think that title says it all and it's their story of how they came out of the Mormon Church and I just want to encourage you to check this out it's a fascinating read put out by Jean Durbin so check it out at the book stores or online and get a copy today and then I got to tell you I I just got to have your back there's just so much more to your story it's just absolutely fascinating and I can tell by just your heart the the spirit of what God has done for you there is an incredible humility of God's grace that you're now experiencing that you didn't experience in the Mormon Church and I I don't know if that's being fair I want to be disrespectful but it's just a feel and our talk together today that you're still trying to process this love in this grace absolutely I get up every day and risa rendered the day to this God and then watch what he'll do um this God has answered my prayers he has conducted my life he I I can't be in the word enough I just can't know him enough you had asked about the cross before the grave right let me give you the Mormon point on the cross why should we bow down before a cross or use it as a symbol because our Savior died on the cross the wearing of crosses is to most latter-day saints in very poor taste and this is from one of their prophets here's another one from the most recent prophet for us the cross is the symbol of the dying Christ his great suffering was before he ever was placed on the cross it was in the Garden of Gethsemane that the blood is from the pores of his body that was when he was that was not when he was on the cross that was in the okay so Mormons believe that the atonement happened when he was praying in the garden all that happened on the cross was his death and and so we wore Mormon temple garments to remind us of our faith but crosses are nowhere in Mormon temples nowhere in Mormon meeting houses and Mormons do not wear them and I could not have one of these I use campus but when I became born-again I was still there at BYU kind of underground I Christmas of O six I took off 30 years of normal to Mormon temple garments that I had worn and put this cross on and and to wear it but I wore high-necked clothes and covered it up at BYU because I'd have been you know immediately called in and lost my job and I was kind of in between trying to figure out and I didn't know how big this God was I had to be with him for a little while to realize how big he was the God of Mormonism is a man who worked his way there he can't be all played he's not not on the present yeah let me ask you a couple of quick questions before run out of time how are women considered in Mormonism uh women still wear dresses to church in Mormonism although there was a there was a little mutiny a couple of months ago and some women across the u.s. wore pants to church in Mormonism the priesthood is everything the priesthood is the power of God the priesthood rules so that would be your husband and he would have a certain calling in the priesthood and you have more power from God kind of based on what your priesthood calling is my husband was a high priest which is he worked his way there at the age of 36 I think so women are attached to man like you can only get to the highest degree of heaven if you're married to a man who's a righteous priesthood holder and that you get sealed to him oh that man by the way can be sealed to more than one life so that in the next life he can be polygamous Wow are there Bibles in the Mormon Church I didn't see any when I attended I I didn't know and I all I saw was a Mormon hymnal I didn't know if they allowed the Bible in the Pew or anything like that um you'll see them carrying the really thick things there they're either a quad or a triple and they have all their scriptures together and so the Bible is in there it's the King James Version only and in the footnotes of their Bible Joseph Smith has clarified certain verses that weren't right like John 1:1 and that would be in their footnotes ok so back to your family is your whole family now you Mike all your children your daughter-in-laws you're all Christians now yes Micah first converted his girlfriend she found Jesus actually writing letters back and forth when Michael was still on his mission they got married in a Baptist Church when we got off his mission he converted his Brotherhood bedded Denmark he helped bring his girlfriend along it's just been this remarkable story of God's grace one and each of us has a different journey and several of those journeys are in the book you said something earlier in our time together the day I'm still trying to process through my heart and that was none of your family none of your friends who were Protestant reached in to get you out they never attempted to show you the difference and how that hurt I'm still trying to process that and I don't know if we Christians know how to do that I don't know if we know our doctrine well enough to contrast it without seemingly being unloving or unkind well this is I think this is why Mormons use the same Christianese as you use so grace they'll say oh I'm saved by grace they'll say oh yeah salvation but their ways salvation is different than your rapists salvation their grace is different than your grace and Christians just make the assumption when Mormons are using those words that they mean the same thing so in order to have a religious conversation with a Mormon you need to say okay so tell me about your God the Father what's he like cuz God their God the Father has a body of flesh and bone he worked his way there he has these wives you know these mother gods and their wife God does a young missionary Mormon missionary know that or they just talk taught the platitudes of basic Christian ease so they can get by yes boy what a great question the missionaries often do not know the deep doctrines of Mormonism they come in Sunday school classes and priesthood classes and Relief Society classes as they've been in the Mormon Church and as they're growing as an adult that's why yes they'll use the book but they'll use the Bible when they go into people's homes and they'll use the Book of Mormon book of Mormon by the way is not so different from the Bible there are places where the Bible is plagiarized right in the Book of Mormon several chapters taken right out of Isaiah put in the Book of Mormon so it sounds very familiar and very Christian to people what if you're in the if you're a Christian and you're investigating Mormonism ask them to show you the other Mormon scriptures missionaries never do mmm because they're so bizarre that people would not go into it if they knew that polygamy was an eternal principle those kind of things so is it the guilt of works that hold people in tack I think that's it I can only answer for myself but yes because I thought I had to work my way there I always feared that wasn't going to do enough there's a lot of fear in a workspace system when you try to extricate yourself what if I'm wrong what if I really will go to hell if I leave Mormonism did you struggle with that when you begin to you did what did accept that God became so big for me that you know it was back and forth for a while with the fear but boy this God was so big I got so I follow him anywhere I kind of have did you did you have a an encounter that of this revelation of this big God I mean what happened to you personally Lind that said wait a minute I just was sick him in the wrong direction here well I got about a minute I hate to do that's a big question in a minute but go for it try it your professor I read the Bible and and the god of grace is in the Bible and his Spirit worked through me when I read it in a lot of ways it was a reasoning conversion Mary this was not Mormonism but this God I wanted and yes or some pretty dramatic I was saying your training is an academic opened up the scriptures for you in a whole new way yeah works personally with each of us doesn't he yeah I this is absolutely fascinating and I know we only scratched the surface of the story can we get you back I know your time is tough but I'd love to have you back I would I can talk about this forever so absolutely okay this will be up on YouTube you can share it with your friends it'll be on roku you can share with your friends and let's get you back Thank You Lyn for your time blessings to you and your family and I learned them much about God's grace through you today thank you Oh Thank You Perry and let's let's pray for the Mormon people we will thank you all right we'll see you next time on focus today hi I'm Jim and I work at the dub TV every weekday between 6 and 8 a.m. our award-winning news and sports team bring you the best sporting show around it's live it's honest and it's a whole lot of fun and you helped make it happen did you know that more than 90% of our income comes from people like you you can help us continue to air local programs that share your voice by making a secure online donation at our website the WS

Channel: theDoveTV

Views: 190,166

Rating: 4.3128581 out of 5

Keywords: theDove, the dove, the dove tv, dove tv, radio, kdov, focus today, Perry Atkinson, Lynn Wilder, Unveiling Grace, Mormon church, Christianity., journey to Christianity., innerworkings

Id: TB5-0sThaX0

Length: 49min 58sec (2998 seconds)

Published: Wed Aug 28 2013