“Since Mormon theology leads one to Hell, their effectiveness in youth ministry is irrelevant.”
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Why is it that you think they are going to Hell? They preach the Lord Jesus Christ. He may not look to them like He looks to us but that is who they worship. They may have beliefs about exactly what happens to them in Heaven but we have beliefs too and neither of us have been there and the scriptures are pretty vague about it.
To me I don’t think anything else matters if you confess Jesus Christ is Lord. Maybe their Temples are useless but I don’t believe they hurt anybody with the possible exception of the feelings of some descendants of a few dead Jews.
There is much to admire about the Mormons. Anybody on the outside of Christianity can say we indoctrinate our youth. Of course we do. We try to instill in them a love of The Lord Jesus Christ.
The Mormons do what they do because they love The Lord. Do you realize that they pay tithes in the amount of 10% of their PRE-tax earnings, amazing. They give two years in their youth and then do it again after retirement. How many of our youth would know enough about the Gospel to go out and preach at the age of 18 or 19? Their pastors don’t get paid, their organist don’t get paid, their your ministers don’t get paid! None of them get paid! Think of how much more good in the world your congregation could do if we didn’t have a paid ministry.
The Mormons are a strange lot for sure but Hell? I think not. If they are going to Hell then a lot of us will be there with them.
The Mormons are like any other group though, they have their good and their bad they just do a little better job of weeding out their bad.
As far as how many of them there are, in 2010 there were just over 14 million. From what I have seen they baptize three or four hundred thousand a year and have about that number of babies. They do live to be older than us but that is only because of their clean lifestyle.
Many of us claim to be Christian but then we drink and smoke and carouse and go to church and seek forgiveness or don’t even bother to ask since many believe that once saved always saved. Mormons don’t believe that way. They have an expression, that they must endure till the end. They take the Lords Supper every week to help cleanse them of their sins. If they don’t have their sinning under control they are asked to wait to take the Lords Supper until their Pastor agrees with them that they are ready.
I don’t know that I have ever discussed my worthiness with my preacher, I have always held it to be between me and my God. The Catholic Church however is more like the Mormons in getting absolution or at least notice of absolution from the priest. It’s not all bad, it is probably pretty humbling and we should be humble to approach The Lord.
If all Christian churches participated in the church as well as the Mormons it would be a much better world. They can’t be all bad, they vote overwhelmingly Republican in Utah.
No, I can’t agree with you. I think we need to be more like the Mormons in a lot of ways.
Thank you, JAKraig, for your fairminded reply.
Oh, sorry, I guess I didn’t make myself clear. There’s a lot of “Mormons are going to hell” on this site and it is sickening. Mormons are Christians, believing that through the Atoning Sacrifice of our Lord Jesus Christ, we can be saved. Thanks for giving me the chance to clarify. There’s just so much anti Mormon postings on this site, it’s hard to get through.