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Transcript
[00:00:03] Mark: We didn’t.
[00:00:04] Remy: Great.
[00:00:04] Mark: This was perfect. This was just. Let’s. Let’s visit and catch up.
[00:00:10] Remy: Yeah, absolutely. Absolutely. Pastor Mark, thank you so much for willing to. Being willing to come back on to the show, huh?
[00:00:21] Mark: Absolutely. Thanks for the opportunity.
[00:00:24] Remy: Yeah, you’re. Your episodes were some of my favorite last season.
Some of my favorite that, that I, that I’ve ever.
[00:00:40] Mark: Thank you.
[00:00:40] Remy: Yeah, I actually, I started watching a.
An ex Mormon and so many Mormons deconstruct into atheism, which is sad because they’re just as lost. Right. And that’s, that’s so depressing. And I got to watching this girl on YouTube named Alyssa Grinfell.
[00:01:11] Mark: I think, yes, she is the up and coming ex Mormon influencer, if you want to call her that.
[00:01:17] Remy: Yeah, yeah, yeah. She. I mean, I have watched probably most of her videos start to finish and there’s long man. They’re like, she puts out really long form content, but it’s so captivating. And I’m trying to get her on the show honestly, just to chat, but she doesn’t respond to my emails.
[00:01:37] Mark: Mine either, so we’re the same boat.
[00:01:41] Remy: But I was watching one of her videos and it was something she said and I don’t know if she worded it exactly like this or kind of like this, but it made me realize her videos that if you’re a woman in the LDS faith, the best you can hope for. The best you can hope for is.
And it’s, it’s. I’m sorry, this is harsh and it’s like a hard way to put it, but the best thing that there is for you in eternity is to be.
[00:02:15] Mark: A sex slave and perpetually pregnant. Propagating your worlds. Yeah, yeah.
[00:02:22] Remy: And that’s it. And like that’s for LDS women. That’s like, that is LDS men are the ones that get all of the, all of the blessing. You get to be a God of your own planet and do all this.
LDS women, you get exalted, but your only purpose is to provide spirit children to populate the world. And you talk to LDS people about this and they. I’ve tried it a few times and they get really defensive because it’s a very offensive thing to say. But then you ask them questions. You say, well, what does Heavenly Mother do in our daily lives?
Are we allowed to pray to Heavenly Mother? No. And then here’s the real big one. Is there only one Heavenly Mother?
LDS doctrine doesn’t actually clarify that.
[00:03:17] Mark: It doesn’t. It is one of the most under expounded upon doctrines but overly embraced doctrines of Mormonism. And when it comes to specifically women that are leaving the church today, I would say Alyssa is really resonating with them because she’s helping them unpack some of the trauma that they’ve experienced while in the church. And one that most would not have realized was just this trauma of like, you’re on this path that you really felt was all about your physical family and bringing them together in this forever family. But the plan of salvation doesn’t really work that way. You don’t actually get to live with your physical family forever because they need to be doing the same thing as. As their own unique husband, wife, divine being entities propagating their own lives. And so, yeah, the whole facade of Mormonism and its forever families doesn’t actually work even in their plan.
[00:04:20] Remy: It’s heartbreaking. It’s. It’s really heartbreaking.
So you guys launched when. When we last spoke, we timed it to sort of coincide with the launch of a new thing y’all were doing called Jesus is Enough.
How’s that going? Tell me about that.
[00:04:43] Mark: Yeah, so the crazy idea came about three years ago to film a number of ex Mormon now Christians sharing the stories of how they left Mormonism for biblical Christianity. And our crazy plan was we’re going to film a bunch of content, produce it, and distribute it all within a year. We are two years in and we’re still working on getting that content distributed. So last January, in the January of 2024, we did launch our first episode. And after that, it was about once a month until the summer and took a break. And we just released our seventh of nine episodes. Two more will come out in December to wrap up the story of Eric Briggs and his wife Emily. Three kind of episodes for their story, but overall, the reception has been very positive, both from Christians who are using it as a tool to better understand how to witness to and engage with Latter Day Saints. But we have also really hit our target audience of those that have one foot in and one foot out and really just need to almost see a different path that they could take, rather than going the path of so many before them into atheism or agnosticism. Recently we had a comment on one of the YouTube videos where a woman, frankly, it this way. She said, thank you for showing me a better way to go astray. And at first I thought that was a really intriguing comment. And then I thought about it more. I’m like, you know what? She’s right. That’s really what this is. And that’s how we designed it is there is so much ex Mormon atheist angry content out there that does not lead people into a relationship with Jesus. And so we designed it to be the alternative for Mormons that are struggling in their faith to watch these. And we’re finding them both. Those that were already headed out, those that are on their way out, those that didn’t know they were on their way out, are reaching out to us in many different ways, directly through YouTube, over social media, by email, phone calls. We really try and leave our door open in as many ways as possible.
[00:07:03] Remy: That’s awesome.
Really having the impact that you all were hoping for here.
[00:07:11] Mark: Yeah. In some surprising ways. We weren’t sure with putting it onto YouTube as our distribution platform, what kind of viewership it would receive. And it has not necessarily received a viral viewership. The most views on any single episode right now are about 20,000, but maybe the average is 5. And what we would have to say is they are quality views in the sense that we are hearing from people that are saying, like, I have watched this whole thing with my family or with my extended family, with my congregation as a witnessing tool, or for families that are unpacking their faith, they pulled it up on their living room TV and watched the whole thing together multiple times. So we would say they’re very quality views. And with the number of people that have watched, even the number that are reaching out for a time, we could not keep up with. And I went to our board of directors saying like, hey, we put this stuff out there and people are responding and I can’t keep up with all of the people that need guidance as they’re leaving Mormonism. And one of our board of directors said, mark, that’s not a good problem. That’s like having a suicide helpline that we’ve been advertising for. And people are calling and we’re saying, no, nope, we’re too busy working on more content and more advertisement to actually deal with you. And so we actually slowed down our distribution, slowed down any, any paid ads behind it. We’re just coming back to doing that now because the blessing of saying this, this is being blessed by God. People are resonating with the content is. We were able to bring on three part time interns. They are all still in training to be Lutheran pastors. And now they are each serving 15 hours a week from their location in Mequon, Wisconsin. And it is just a cool blessing because we brought kind of a full time pastor on 40 a week really just to do evangelism. And they Oversee our social media channels. They respond to emails, they do phone calls, they meet with local missionaries. It has been a huge blessing this year.
[00:09:17] Remy: That’s really awesome. That’s so great to hear.
How are, how are the, how are the other arms of the ministry still doing, still doing well, I suppose y’all. Y’all still get out and do door.
[00:09:32] Mark: To door stuff and they really are. So we are gearing up for our annual mission trip to Gilbert, Arizona. We take a group of Lutheran high school students or college students on this one. Yeah, Gilbert, it is a very heavily Mormon populated area. So that’ll take place in January. And then we’re already gearing up for a new location, Idaho Falls, Idaho. We’ll be going to this summer. We’re expecting about 150 participants in that trip. And so we’re going to be knocking on thousands of doors, planting gospel seeds. So that arm is really through our Be ye Perfect ministry website. So it’s a much less direct approach to Mormon evangelism where Jesus is enough. We’re trying to reach one foot in, one foot out. Struggling Mormons. Be you Perfect is designed for those that are still deeply ingrained and entrenched. And so one of the things we’re going to be doing differently this year is we’re actually teaching folks how to use the story of the prodigal son, or as I like to refer to it, the prodigal sons in a dormitory to door conversation to really show the two different ways we can be lost either in outright sin, rejection of Heavenly Father, or in self righteousness as a rejection of Heavenly Father and his grace. So two ways that Mormons traditionally tend to go. Truth in love. We’re just doing presentations all over the country. Still got lots of opportunities to do one day or two day long workshops or presentations. Just lots of folks wanting to get better equipped and empowered to get out there either going door too, or just in their really relational evangelism lives.
[00:11:14] Remy: Yeah, yeah, I had, I had some missionaries reach out to me. They. I don’t know why they haven’t blocked my number. They really don’t give up, which is amazing to me.
But let’s see right here.
Oh yeah, they invited me to go to their church, but I had a, I had a chili cook off at my church and I wasn’t, I wasn’t.
[00:11:53] Mark: Gonna miss the chili cook off, man.
[00:11:54] Remy: No. So here’s the thing is the aalc, my denomination, we do our pastors conference every year over whatever week Reformation falls on.
[00:12:08] Mark: Nice.
[00:12:09] Remy: Yeah. Yeah. Well, I don’t know, the guys with kids kind of hate it because it’s like you can’t, like, go trick or treating with your kids or whatever, but.
[00:12:16] Mark: Oh, okay.
[00:12:17] Remy: Yeah. Otherwise, you know, pretty great. The problem is we, at my church, we hold the chili cook off on Reformation Sunday and. Okay, usually I’m not there for Reformation Sunday because I’m doing this conference. Right. Yeah. But this year, it. The stars aligned and it worked out such that I had to get on the plane on Monday morning after Reformation Sunday, and I was able to. To get my chili in. I didn’t even place, but, you know, it was a great chili.
[00:12:48] Mark: Sorry, man.
[00:12:49] Remy: Yeah, it’s okay. It’s okay. There was a. There was a very vocal block of children voters. We let everybody vote and so, like a whole group of kids got together and decided to vot for the same guy. So, you know, what can you do? What can you do?
[00:13:06] Mark: I missed out on critical future politics block voting.
[00:13:10] Remy: Yeah. Honestly.
Oh, man, that’s great. Yeah. So what do you do? What would you recommend someone do if the LDS missionaries knock on their door, reach out and invite them to church?
[00:13:24] Mark: Yeah, if. If, you know, usually the. The invitation to church takes a little bit of time. So they must know that you’ve met with missionaries in the. And now they’re kind of making that. I tell folks not to hesitate to go and observe a sacrament meeting. I would not encourage them to participate in the sacrament. That would be participating in really a pagan ritual because it is not a Christian sacrament. And go as an observer. And I usually use that as an opportunity to kind of do a reverse invite and say, yeah, I’ll go and observe your service if you would come with me the following week. And because I’m not a traditional parish pastor right now, where I have be at my church every week preaching and teaching, I’ve done that quite often with missionaries and other Latter Day Saint friends here locally in Nampa, where they’ve gone with me and then I’ve gone with them. And it gives us great things to talk about. What were some of the differences that you noticed? What was a message that you heard that resonated with you? What was something that you heard that you were confused about or concerned about? And I have found that it leads actually to some really valuable conversations. It gives you something very specific rather than just talking about whatever.
[00:14:35] Remy: Yeah, I, It’s. I don’t.
I’m gonna sound really sexist.
I can’t avoid that. I’m sorry.
I think it’s easier for me to talk to the elders than the sisters, the. The male missionaries than the females.
Because the men, we used to live in a different part of town, and it was not great. And that was where all the male missionaries are. And where we’re at now is a nice part of town, and it’s where all the female missionaries are.
[00:15:15] Mark: So interesting.
[00:15:17] Remy: Yeah, yeah, yeah. So it’s a safer part of town or whatever, which, you know, good for them, cutting down the liability.
[00:15:22] Mark: Yeah, yeah.
[00:15:23] Remy: But for, like, the past four years, all the missionaries I’ve interacted with have been female. And I have found that with the male missionaries, when you give them pushback, when you give them anything to chew on their result, the result is either they shut down and leave, or they are willing to actually chew on it and talk to you about it and kind of engage. Men, I think, are a bit more, you know, you’ve got to hunt the boar or whatever. So men, I think, are a bit more willing to kind of come to blows with it, and they’re willing to actually talk this out with you.
The female missionaries, I found when you start giving any kind of resistance, any kind of pushback, well, here’s what your teaching says and here’s what you’re telling me, but here’s what the scripture says, and we can even look it up in your Joseph Smith translation. It’s going to say the same thing.
You know, as long as we avoid this, like, two chapters or whatever, it’s. It’s going to largely be the same thing. And, you know, they.
They immediately all just start parroting off their testimony over and over again.
And then they. It’s like they go. It’s like they go into, like, safety mode.
Does that make sense? I’ve only ever really seen that with the female missionaries. I don’t know.
[00:16:43] Mark: Yeah. And. And I think the. The missionary training is. Is. Is continuing to change. They’re really trying to do more to prepare both genders to be able to give more articulate answers. But there’s a lot of informal training that missionaries are now receiving. There is a online Facebook group that a bunch of former missionaries created that is really helping missionaries do counter apologetics with all of the Christians that are being trained to witness to them. And we are finding with. We call them our please open the door participants, those folks that are very actively engaged, not just waiting for someone to knock on the door, but actually reaching out to Mormon missionaries to come into their homes. They’re just finding that more and more of them are actually better prepared to engage in conversations and sometimes maybe over. Prepared for the conversations that they’re having. But yeah, I’ve experienced that too, Remy, where they just drop their testimony over and over again. As this is the definitive thing that I’ve been taught, when I get backed into a corner, my testimony, nobody’s going to get past my testimony. And it is frustrating. And so often I’ll say, hey, you’ve given that to me three times already in this conversation. Let’s. Let’s go somewhere else with this.
[00:17:59] Remy: Yeah, I remember one time we. I got into a pretty good, like, sort of theological back and forth with. With a young. With a young man, a missionary, and he was there with his partner. They were sitting on my couch, and I was sitting across from them on a love seat, and we were just sort of kind of going back and forth with everything and. And they got into this like, you know, God is a. God was once a guy, you know, he was once a man just like you, and now he’s. Now he’s this God or whatever. And I said, well, so that means God is flesh and bone like me. And they were like, yeah, isn’t that wonderful? And I said, yeah, great. Can you read these words of Jesus for me real quick? And of course, you know, like, right where it’s going, right? And it’s like the Lord is a spirit, and you, you know, you must worship him in spirit and truth. And they both sat there after they read this and, like, they look at it and the one guy, like, flips back like a page and he kind of reads a little bit in context and flips back forward. And the other guy’s, like, looking through his little booklets that he had with him for some stuff. And then after a minute, I mean, it was.
It was at least a minute of actual silence while they consulted their, like, books and whatnot. And then the one guy was like, well, we gotta go. Like, that was it. They didn’t offer to pray, nothing. They were just like, we gotta. We gotta head out.
[00:19:24] Mark: And I wouldn’t see that as a complete loss. You know, in a situation like that, a seed of doubt was planted that is going to be put on their shelf. So going back to the Jesus is enough episodes. So many of those stories, what we’ve really recounted is how it wasn’t just one conversation, one time with one Christian or one Christian pastor that God used to plant seeds, but it was multiple conversations, multiple interactions with law and gospel content that God used to free them from the darkness of Mormonism. And I really think that helps us as Christian witnesses. To be patient and to be persistent and to realize that some of the conversations may end with an awkward minute of silence and then they just get up and leave. But that conversation is going to be one that they remember, not just for the next week, month, or the rest of their mission, but for the rest of their lives. And then somebody else is going to say something and God’s word is going to continue to be given to them.
[00:20:29] Remy: It’s one of the, one of the things that you said last time you were on that was really impacting for me was this idea of like just being a link in a chain. You know, you just want to be one more link in the chain. It doesn’t matter if you’re the first link or the last link or more. More than likely one of the countless middle links, but just be a link in the chain. And I have found that that helps not only with evangelism to Mormons, but just evangelism in general. Right, because.
[00:21:01] Mark: Absolutely, absolutely.
[00:21:03] Remy: Yeah. So it’s third article stuff, right? Like, I believe that. I cannot believe it’s the Holy Spirit that does the drawing. All I have to do is be a link in the chain for that person and let God do the God part.
[00:21:15] Mark: Yeah, absolutely. Maybe to give you another picture to dwell on. That has been for me personally and then for our minist, something we’ve been clinging to recently.
A couple of years ago, four years now, my family and I took a trip to Tucson, Arizona. And in Tucson there are forests of saguaro cacti. So these big giant ones that look like they’ve got arms waving at you. And my oldest daughter, Bella, really was captivated by the saguaro. And she said, dad, I want one of these. Well, you can’t buy a full grown saguaro. Like they’re, they’re like a state treasure. But you can buy seeds. And so she bought a packet of saguaro seeds and when she was in the car on the way home, she’s like, dad, it says that it could take up to four years before you will ever see any growth. I was like, wow, saguaro cacti farmers are some dedicated, patient people. So she got a little pot and planted the seeds in the soil and placed it in our windowsill. And there it sat. And there it sat. And every time I would dust or clean the windowsill, I started to pick it up and throw it in the garbage. And inevitably one of my children would remind me, dad, it said it’s going to take time, up to four years. Well, lo and behold, three and a half years in this last Easter, the week before Easter, I was cleaning the windowsill once again, and I thought to myself, oh, no, wasn’t expecting that. I thought it was mold now growing in the little pot, but it was actually a little tiny bud of the cactus peeking its way through the soil. And over the next few weeks, it grew quite a bit so that it actually broken all the way through. And now, lo and behold, six months later, it’s almost. Almost an inch tall in those six months. And what it really taught me was when it comes to Mormon evangelism, we are often not going to see growth for a very, very long time. It’s a lot like cactus farming. It’s a little bit prickly, it’s a little bit slow. But we need to be patient and we need to be pers.
Over the last year, we have been seeing over and over again how the faithful witness of Christians for decades is now bearing fruit. And we’re even really shifting our mindset as a ministry where we’re still going to 100% be a seed planting ministry first and foremost, but we are also trying to position ourselves to be better prepared for those little buds and the growth that needs to be watered. You know, it makes me think of Paul’s words where he’s talking about, you know, I planted the seed, Apollos watered it, but God made it grow. And we’ve mostly been doing the seed planting, and now we need more Apollos to come along and help water it, but all the while trusting that God is the one that is going to continue to do all this work. And so that, that I. We’re calling it the Parable of the Cacti now in our ministry, and we’re getting a lot of mileage out of it, just encouraging our Christian witnesses to go and plant those little cacti seeds.
[00:24:18] Remy: That’s so. That’s so beautiful. That’s so great.
I really love that. The Parable of the Cacti. I’m keeping that. That’s great.
[00:24:29] Mark: Yeah, you can steal it, man.
[00:24:30] Remy: Yeah, yeah, I’m going to use it. I actually, I think I have to preach coming up in a couple of weeks, maybe a week. I don’t know. I’m going to. I’m going to sneak it in there somehow, though. Nice.
That’s so. It’s so wonderful.
It’s encouraging. Have you.
On that kind of. That theme of the planting the seed, and it takes so long for it to grow. Have you had anybody come interact with you during this? Jesus is Enough and say, hey, actually I ran across your content before. Has that happened yet.
[00:25:08] Mark: As far as content prior to Jesus is enough or.
[00:25:11] Remy: Yeah, yeah, like somebody, you know, maybe once they start seeing what you’re about, it’s like, oh, this is familiar to me.
[00:25:22] Mark: Yeah, you know, we’ve had a few that would say like, hey, over the years I saw your Be Perfect social media posts and they’re making the connection. We do not try to make the connection for them that all three of these ministries are connected to Truth and Love.
We’re a little more open with Jesus is Enough than Be Ye Perfect. Because at first we really created Be Ye Perfect so that it was not obvious that we were a Christian outreach. We wanted this to be very non threatening, not anti Mormon. And if they saw it as connected to truth and love, they would right away say, oh, this is anti Mormon. So some folks have connected with us through all three of our platforms. Now I’ve got a ex Mormon now Christian friend that he said, yeah, it was really truth and love. I ran into some of your content on there, then ran into it on Be Perfect. Now I’ve been watching the Jesus is Enough episodes. You know, recently we’ve been blessed to actually be able to connect a number of individuals with local Christian churches so that they could go and worship there the first time, including here in Idaho. At my local church, a lady reached out that lived like eight minutes from my house. She came and worshiped with me and my family the next week at our church. Oh, wow. Cool, cool, cool. Local connections taking place.
[00:26:37] Remy: Yeah. That’s so great. That’s so great. It’s.
I don’t know, man, it’s so beautiful to see, to see that, to see.
I like this. There was this moment at my first ever Lutheran service and the Pentecostals won’t admit this to you, Pastor. They’ll never admit this to you, but it’s a lot closer to Mormonism than they want to believe. Believe the, the Pentecostal theology. It’s. It’s holiness theology, right? And at the end of the day, that’s what Mormonism is. It’s a holiness theology.
And so to, to that moment, I know it was certainly tough for me the first time. And it’s sometimes, man, it still is. Sometimes it just gets you. It just hits you just right, you know, where you, where you. I don’t know how Yalls corporate confession sounds, but when you go through that, you know, sin against you in thought and word and deed, what I’ve done and left undone and you just, like, really lay it all out there, and you’re like, God, I am garbage. I am garbage. And then to have that guy stand up there and say, hey, you know what? As a cult and ordained minister of the Church of Christ, I forgive you. And it’s like, to hear that doesn’t.
[00:27:55] Mark: Get better than that.
[00:27:56] Remy: No, man, it just washes over you, you know? Like, I remember thinking one time.
One time I was going up to the rail, and I was thinking, man, how can God love me? I’m a sinner. How can God ever forgive me? And I. I take communion. I receive the body and the blood, and I’m walking back, and I can still kind of taste the wine on my lips. And I think, like.
Like, God can’t forgive me. And yet he just did anyway, you know, like, he just steps in and does.
[00:28:31] Mark: How cool is that?
[00:28:32] Remy: It’s so great. And I love seeing other people, like, also have that. That, like, light bulb, you know?
So good.
[00:28:43] Mark: Oh, absolutely.
[00:28:45] Remy: That’s so great.
So, I mean, outside of. Outside of that, what else is going on with you? How’s. How’s things?
[00:28:54] Mark: Yeah, it’s good. You know, this year, spending a lot of time writing scripts for Jesus is Enough has been a new opportunity for me as a Lutheran pastor. So that’s been fun. The kids have all gotten to be involved in acting in B roll.
So the reenactment scenes, all my kids, my wife, a lot of friends and family have been in it. So that’s just been kind of a cool thing for the family. The kids are getting older. They love going on mission trips and being a part of the work that we do. My son actually got his driver’s license today, so that’s going to change everything in our house.
[00:29:31] Remy: Mostly your insurance premium.
[00:29:33] Mark: Mostly the insurance premium, yep.
And then really just traveling all over the world via Zoom, just having opportunities to present to either Christian congregations via Zoom or in person person. But recently, a lot of former Mormons that we’re connecting with over Zoom got a group of ex Mormon Christians in Kenya that reached out to us. And so an ex Mormon Christian Kenyan pastor is training with me to really be able to serve his former people, his Mormon people, better. And so meet with them, go to Kenya every Friday afternoon, and I come back a couple hours later. So it’s a great way to do ministry.
[00:30:17] Remy: That’s amazing.
[00:30:18] Mark: So one of our goals at Truth and Love was to really make more of a global impact in the last year, and we didn’t do a lot of very specific plans, but God keeps sending people our way, including the Kenyans.
[00:30:31] Remy: That’s so wonderful. That’s so great. And Africa especially is like one of those places where, like, Lutheranism really works.
[00:30:41] Mark: You know, once they hear it. One of the joys of this zoom thing is we do a back and forth translation. And so I’ll be sharing law and gospel content, and anytime there is just a sweet nugget of the gospel, I just wait for the translation to go through and then they break forth with amens and like, clap. And I’m like, they get it and they love it and they understand why this is such a blessing. And so many of them coming out of a Mormon background where it’s been a conditionalized grace, a conditional gospel, a you’ve got to do all this work when their lives are already very difficult to begin with. And now to hear, like, when it comes to this one thing, my eternal relationship with God and having a home with him in eternity isn’t about me and eventually figuring out how to take care of myself, but it’s about one that’s done it for me. I don’t think there’s any greater joy as a missionary than just getting to share pure, unadulterated gospel with somebody for the first time and them, like, rejoicing in it.
[00:31:45] Remy: Yeah, that’s so cool. That’s really great.
You spoke earlier about how there’s a little bit of, I guess, like, counter apologetics that, that a lot of missionaries are leaning into on their, on their side. Is there any.
Have you run across any counter apologetics or any of your people or teams or whatever that you’ve heard of run across a counter apologetic? That was like a bit of a stumper. Like, is there any novel argument where you’ve been like, oh, that’s a good one, actually?
[00:32:22] Mark: Yeah, I think sometimes the one that Christians run into is if they try to use the Book of Revelation to say that we have a closed canon, they’ll say that, you know, do not add anything or subtract anything from this. And. And Christians have used that to say that this is all of God’s revelation. Well, turns out there is a part of the Book of Deuteronomy that says something very similar. And so they’ve been taught in their apologetic to say, all right, so does that mean we have to throw everything out after the Book of Deuteronomy? And that often for Christians that are a little bit unprepared is a stumper for them? I would say, excuse me, if we get that on air. Others that maybe Catch them. Really come down to, what about, what is it about God and his love for us that causes him to choose some people for eternal life and not others. They really want to get into what they have heard about Christians believing in double predestination. And sometimes for Christians, maybe even Lutherans that don’t have a great understanding of that false doctrine, they’re like, well, I don’t even know what you’re referring to. And what they’re really alluding to is it seems like that God played a divine game of duck, duck, dam and was just duck, duck, duck, duck, damn, randomly sending people to hell, and they can’t believe in a God like that. And I don’t either. And so sometimes that provides me with an opportunity to say, yeah, you’re really responding to Calvinistic tulip theology, and I don’t adhere to that. And so that sometimes is. You need to know not only Mormon doctrine and a little bit of. Or a little bit of Mormon doctrine, but a whole lot of Christian doctrine in order to be able to respond articulately. I’m trying to think of others that are. Are stumping our Christians.
One would be just, is there a need for a specific leadership structure in the church? And I feel most are very comfortable saying, no, there isn’t. This. There has to be the top president, prophet guy on top with two people under him and then 70 under him. But when Christians sometimes hear about. About that part of the restored gospel, that one of the things that was restored was the hierarchical leadership struggle. Yeah. It’s almost like the papacy and this was one of those places where Joseph Smith just begged, borrowed, and stole from other things that were out there at the time. And really, to allow Christians to see that Peter didn’t drop the ball. He wasn’t supposed to be the pope or the prophet. He was to be a disciple and an evangelist. And. Yeah. Did. Did people drop balls along the way? Absolutely, but not in the way that the great apostasy supposedly took place.
[00:35:33] Remy: Yeah, yeah, it’s those.
It’s funny that those are the objections, because I feel like as Lutherans, we are uniquely positioned to answer all of those objections. Right. The Book of Concord does not outline a canon of scripture, so you’re not gonna. You’re not gonna catch me out on that one.
[00:35:56] Mark: Yep.
[00:35:57] Remy: You know, I.
The why? Why? To why. The why does. Why does some. Why are some saved and not others? Because God saves some and others damn themselves. Okay, great.
[00:36:10] Mark: Yeah, moving on.
[00:36:12] Remy: Yeah, moving on. Yeah, yeah.
[00:36:14] Mark: And, you know, not always satisfactory to Christians in general. Or Mormons specifically. They want to say. Well then. Oh yeah, then why, why this one and not that one? And that’s the, the crooks. Theologum, as theologum as it’s called.
[00:36:29] Remy: Yeah, yeah. And you know who, you know, who knows? Not me. It’s. That’s above my pay grade. But you know, they, I’m sure they have their own, they have their own questions, their own crosses to bear that are much the same way, you know.
Yeah, I don’t know. That’s interesting. It, it’s like the, it’s like that you have to know. You, you don’t, you don’t learn what fake money looks like. You learn what real money looks like and then you can tell.
[00:36:56] Mark: Exactly.
[00:36:57] Remy: You know, you may need to know some Mormones to converse.
[00:37:01] Mark: Well, exactly.
[00:37:03] Remy: But you really need to try to.
[00:37:04] Mark: Do their counterfeiting very well and, and make their, their fake money gospel look like the real thing. So it. Yeah, yeah, it is good to know both.
[00:37:13] Remy: Yeah, yeah. That’s fascinating.
That’s really interesting.
Wow. What are you guys doing? More of the Jesuses Enough. I know you said you had like a whole year of recording and.
[00:37:30] Mark: Yeah, we’ve got two more, two more episodes coming out in December of 2024 and then we’ve got a lot of additional supplementary content that we’re working on producing. We’ve got a series of key biblical terms that we’re unpacking. So Christian doctrine from a perspective that really understands the Mormon world. So we’ve got a bunch more of those to write a number of core differences blogs where we’re really not just looking at a single doctrine, but kind of some of the underlying theological things that make Mormonism what it is. Maybe a simple one to think about is biblical Christianity is really focused on becoming increasingly dependent specifically on the person and work of Jesus Christ, where Mormonism is really focused on becoming increasingly independent, more focused on yourself, really an underlying theme in so much of its theology. So really trying to unpack that so that someone that’s in this in between place of like, well, it’s not this and it might be this. What are the differences? Trying to help them really understand those. A lot of additional supplementary video content, additional Q and A type pieces with each of the interviewees. But we’re going to really put a pause on recording and producing the full length episodes for a time just so that we can catch up and really do a better job of following up with all the people that are reaching out. At some point we will probably go back and Record a few more episodes to fill in the blank a little bit more diversity when it comes to the demographics that we’re featuring in the films. But Eric and Emily’s wrapping things up. I think we saved some of the best stories for last and some of the best law and gospel opportunities. So we’ll see where it goes from here. I’ve enjoyed being a script writer, but I also am excited to just get back to being a good old simple missionary with words and zoom.
[00:39:28] Remy: Yeah, I was thinking the very first long form episode that I watched, I heard your narration and I was thinking like, man, I bet that took forever too. Like, how much time must Mark have spent recording?
[00:39:42] Mark: We greatly under anticipated how long each episode would take to produce and we’re so thankful to our production company, company that we’ve partnered with, and just Brian Urbaneck of Goldwing Productions and his heart and passion for this project as well. He has become a dear friend and colleague in this work.
[00:40:01] Remy: That’s so good. That’s so awesome.
I’ve heard it said that Utah is probably the least Christian and most pagan place in America.
Is that a hard, hard agree from you?
[00:40:21] Mark: Yeah, I would say in many ways it is because and it’s fascinating because they would think they are and they would say we’re one of the most Christian.
[00:40:30] Remy: Well, even probably a lot of outsiders would say that as well. Maybe even a lot of Christians would say that.
[00:40:35] Mark: Yep. Yeah. And you know, there are a lot of folks moving into Utah. It’s a beautiful state. So a lot of folks moved in during COVID from California, Oregon, Washington that were looking political refugees they call themselves at times. And so the population density of active Mormons is below 50% in Utah currently. And really for the almost for the first time ever in its history continuing to go down, more and more folks are leaving the church. And so I would say in that sense, it’s becoming an increasingly atheist state. Very secular, worldly. Salt Lake City itself is just, you know, you drive around, you see all of the flags for all of the different progressive movements because if you abandon one false ideology for another, you went from believing in specific religious dogma to now I just want to live for myself, live for the things of this world that Alyssa Greenfeld that you talked about earlier, she had a video earlier this week where she was talking about the difference between the way that she views her body as a Mormon and now as a atheist.
She had viewed it as, well, my body is a temple, which we as Christians would actually agree with. And now she says my Body is an amusement park. And she showed all of these different photos of herself smoking various drugs, using mushrooms, dancing, drinking.
Now my body is for my own enjoyment. And so often, often when Mormons leave the church and do not seek out God in a true relationship, they embrace the exact opposite of what they had before. If I was going to try and find freedom and life in keeping the rules, now I’m going to find freedom in life, in breaking the rules and in a sense of salvation. And so that’s going back and maybe making this connection to the parable of the prodigal son. That’s really why we have chosen that for our door to door evangelism tool as we are meeting both of those types of Mormons, the deeply ingrained pharisaical Mormon that is saying, father, the reason you should reward me is my faithfulness. All of these years I’ve checked boxes, I’ve been obedient. And then there’s those that have left the church that are more like the traditional, what we call prodigal son that have said, you know what? I want nothing to do with you. I just want your stuff. I want to go out and use my body in whatever way. Both of them need grace. Both of them are lost just in their own way. Ways.
[00:43:15] Remy: It’s so, it’s so fascinating because as you were just saying that just then, I was thinking, well, you know, I’m going to try and find meaning in keeping the rules. And that’s not it. Now I’m going to try and find meaning and breaking the rules. And that’s not it. And it’s. Well, where do you find the meaning? And I mean, you really do just find it. It’s in Jesus. Right?
[00:43:37] Mark: It’s just.
[00:43:38] Remy: The meaning is just in Jesus. That’s it. You know, there’s no, there’s nothing more, there’s nothing less.
[00:43:45] Mark: It’s just y. Jesus is enough.
[00:43:49] Remy: Jesus is enough. Yeah. Wow.
[00:43:52] Mark: Wow. Someone should make a ministry with that title.
[00:43:55] Remy: Roll. Roll credits. We. We got it.
[00:43:59] Mark: We. We got there. Yeah.
[00:44:00] Remy: Yeah. No, I mean, but that’s, that’s really what it is. And I don’t know. That’s so key. I think it’s so. It’s so interesting because the devil really only has the one trick. You know, it’s, it’s. It’s an incredibly effective trick because he’s been using it for, you know, however long we’ve all been here. But it’s just the same trick, you know, did God really say right? And.
[00:44:28] Mark: Yep. And then the moment on the Lie.
[00:44:30] Remy: Yeah. And the moment. The moment you mess up, he’s like, well, God actually said, right. You know, and it’s. Yeah, it’s.
Have you found that this ministry has helped you?
I maybe I’ve already asked this with non Mormon evangelism as well. Like, if you bump into someone and they’re not.
[00:44:52] Mark: Absolutely, absolutely. Yeah. So I don’t go to coffee shops a lot. I really should. Every time I go there, I get into great witnessing conversations. So my son was doing his driver’s test and it happened to be at Panera. So I stopped in there for a few minutes, and as I was waiting in line to get a drink, I saw a guy sitting at his table crying over a Bible.
And I said, hey, are you a Christian pastor that’s just frustrated about your sermon? And he thought that was funny and said, no, I’m just a Christian that still hasn’t figured out this whole Christian thing. And he said, I’ve been so focused on trying to do great things for God, and I’m realizing I will never be able to live up to my expectations or his expectations for me. And I said, said, did you grow up in the Mormon Church? He said, no, but close to it. And really talked about growing up in kind of a workspaced religion. And he’s still recovering from it. And it was great opportunity to share Jesus with him and then also share some witnessing tips for serving his Mormon friends and family in the area. So it really has. And I would say anytime I’m on an airplane, talking to the person next to me, whether they’re Mormon or non Mormon, it has really, really allowed me to become more adept at contextualizing the gospel. In whatever circumstance. I find myself to really listen, ask a lot of questions, rather than going into it thinking, oh, I know what this person believes. I know exactly the type of person they are. But hearing their own personal story, hearing what makes them tick, what makes them, where their identity is found, and so much of that is applicable across the board. And just certain things like trusting in the power of God’s Word. That has become a big part of Mormon outreach. That’s a part of every outreach. Patience and persistence, prayer, not thinking you have all the answers. Acknowledging when you don’t have all the answers, that goes a long way with anybody when it comes to outreach.
[00:46:59] Remy: Yeah, the.
The power of God’s Word, man, that.
[00:47:04] Mark: That’s.
[00:47:05] Remy: That’s. Somehow I got in trouble with Christians for that because it. With Lutherans nonetheless, on the Internet, because I said, you know what if I Had a gay friend who decided that they wanted that because. Because of conversations with me or with someone else, their parents, whatever. They said, you know what? I’m going to give this church thing a shot. And they chose a progressive mainline like the elca because they could keep their homosexuality and still go to church and feel good. But that ELCA church had the lectionary, and this person was read large swaths of scripture every week.
You know what? That’s a win for me. That’s better than nothing. You went from zero Bible a week to like three or four chapters a week. Good.
You know, it’s something. And I have people get mad at me about that.
[00:47:57] Mark: Huh.
[00:47:58] Remy: You know, everybody wants. They want a big fancy conversion story, I guess.
[00:48:03] Mark: Yeah. May not be as tidy as that. So many of the ex Mormon stories are not. Like, there are times when we’re putting together the episodes where I’ll have other members of our team look at it, and they’ll be like, ooh, that doesn’t seem right.
You should take that out. And I’m like, no, that’s part of their story. We can’t curate it into this nice little tight little package that we want God to follow. No. There are certain times where God used some pretty unexplainable circumstances to get people to see one thing or another, and all of those were connected in that chain. And if we’re saying, like, nope, this chain, we’re a little bit uncomfortable with the. It’s a little too rusty. It doesn’t work as well. And we break that one out now the whole chain is broken. I want people to be able to see the fullness of the way that God works. Now, there are times, for sake of brevity, that we do have to cut things, but we’re not cutting things because we’re uncomfortable with them. If you watched Eric’s episode, I really appreciated Eric Briggs story where he. One of the things that he realized the church so often did was whitewash their stories and sanitize things, whitewash the stories of Moses and Abraham and David in the Bible to make them heroes and to sanitize the fact that they were sinful human beings. That at times God used some terrible circumstances, some terrible decisions in their lives as part of his way of justifying or bringing them into the family of faith and then sanctifying.
And in these stories, we see that over and over again. Like, we want to cut the messy out, but God works most effectively in the mess.
[00:49:43] Remy: Yeah, yeah. And, and, and not always. Not always the way we want him to, you know, I think, I think about my own coming out of Pentecostal theology and into Lutheran theology and, and you know, depending on, I guess, just, I mean, I would say like the sacraments were a big part of it. Once I, once I came around on the supper, you know, that was, it was, it was kind of a. I came around on Luther and then I thought, well, I like what these Lutherans believe. And I started to kind of come around on the sacrament and I thought, well, if I’m in a be a Lutheran, I’m just going to believe the things Lutherans believe. And I just kind of dove in and eventually like I did come around on all of it, but like it wasn’t. There wasn’t ever this big aha moment where I’m holding the small catechism and I’m like, ah, you know, of course this is it, you know, it was like. It’s like a bunch of. It’s, it’s a bunch of small moments. It’s a bunch of. It’s like the shelf thing is so great because that’s really what it’s like. You just, you put things on the shelf and eventually there’s two many little things to ignore and they sort of snowball into a big thing, you know.
[00:51:03] Mark: Yep. And then so much of our work now, when the shelf is broken is picking back up a few of those things. Some of them, they’re like, I don’t even want to look at that anymore, like temples.
But like, what is the proper place of the temple in the Christian life?
Where does revelation come from?
Who is our authorities?
What do we do with our money? Do we have to tithe? Do we not have to tithe? What about the sacraments? We’re holding each one of those back up and we can’t do it all at once. And we need to understand that for some, this may take years to unpack. One thing I’m increasingly realizing is that at times we might be a little bit too quick to invite a ex Mormon to come to public worship where especially in Lutheran worship, they’re going to hear and maybe see things close communion, union in certain denominator or certain parts of Lutheranism. Like what you’re inviting me and now you’re telling me I can’t participate in this gift. Yeah, yeah. And so that can often be a roadblock. Even just the Lutheran understanding of baptism can be very, very confusing. So often I’ll say to Christians, yeah, get your Mormon friends into a Bible class. Get them into a foundations, a Bible information Class, adult education, then start inviting them to public worship.
[00:52:25] Remy: We have a guy who is a member of our church and he’s prior military and not a crowds person, not a people person. Definitely deals with something like that, with stuff like that because of his time in the military. He is one of these kinds of guys, sweet as can be, greatest guy you’ve ever met, but like, not a. Not gonna willingly go out into crowds, not gonna willingly, you know, put himself in any kind of situation. And he got invited by a member to our men’s breakfast group that meets one the first Saturday of the month. And he just kept coming to that and he came to that a couple of times and then he went home and started reading his Bible. He had his little Bible from the service, you know, the little Niv pocket New Testament or. And he started reading it and he would come back with questions the next week. Boom. Or the next month. This is what, this is what I’ve learned in the meantime. And you know, we work through them and all this. Pastor Joe would. And we, I mean this went on for. Had to be eight months to a year. And then one Sunday he showed up at church, you know, and you give it. He then, you know, he wasn’t there for a little while, but then he would show up at like Easter, you know, or Christmas, you know, and now a couple years later, and he’s there every single Sunday, rain or shine. You know, it takes time. Yeah.
[00:53:55] Mark: There’s your. There’s your slowly blossoming cacti.
[00:53:59] Remy: There it is. Wow. There it is.
Wow. That’s so great.
That’s so lovely.
Pastor Mark, thank you so much for stopping by and talking to me.
[00:54:12] Mark: You betcha. Man. I love traveling back east, so it was fun to come for a visit. And I’ll be back home for dinner. So it’s great.
[00:54:19] Remy: Perfect. Perfect timing.
If people want to have you do some kind of a presentation at their church, either live or zoom or what have you, how can they do that?
[00:54:31] Mark: Yeah. So definitely check out all our resources on tilm.org, so truthinloveministry.org is where all of the content is housed, but I’ll give you my personal email if you want to reach out and talk to me about an opportunity. So it’s Mark M A R k p I l m.org so markpilm.org reach out and love to discuss with you all about empowering Christians to witness and proclaiming Christ to Mormons and would love to work with others on that.
[00:55:04] Remy: That’s wonderful.
If people want to get involved in any other ways, Obviously they can. There’s the book that Mark Carter wrote.
[00:55:14] Mark: So go, go to tilm.org and order yourself a book. Take one of our multiple online classes. We have a podcast, the Witnessing Christ Podcast, that you could subscribe to. We’re walking through similar content that I did with you last year on sin, grace, faith and works. The three interns are talking through those with me right now. And then, yeah, just keep praying about Jesus is enough. We’re trying to find ways to get it into more homes, so financial assistance is always appreciated it as well.
[00:55:45] Remy: Very good, very good. And of course, share everything that you guys put out.
[00:55:51] Mark: Just share, watch it, share it.
Other than the few books in the store, everything’s free. Go and use it.
[00:55:57] Remy: And it’s truly amazing too, the impact that just sharing has.
[00:56:02] Mark: It does.
[00:56:03] Remy: I’ll go on Twitter and I’ll ask for money or something or buy my merch or whatever, but I always put on there. If you can’t do that, I don’t want you to. But if you could share it because the sharing is really impactful.
[00:56:19] Mark: Absolutely.
[00:56:20] Remy: Every end. Yeah. So very good, Mark. Thank you.
Yeah, thank you.
[00:56:28] Mark: Have a lovely day.
[00:56:29] Remy: God bless.
[00:56:31] Mark: Awesome. Thanks, man.
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