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Advent HOPE Sabbath School

Cody Francis Weekend

Cody Francis

My Journey Out Of Mormonism

It's good to be here with you this Sabbath and I'm looking forward to our time together.

So as was mentioned, I'm going to be sharing with you what I'm going to be entitled, My Journey Out of Mormonism.

And I want to make just a few or from Mormonism to Adventism and then tonight we're looking at my journey out of Mormonism.

And I want to just give a few clarifying aspects here.

When I refer to Mormonism, I am referring to what would technically be called the Latter-day Saint movement.

And so the Latter-day Saint movement includes more than the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints that most are familiar with yet that's based out of Utah.

We'll talk about some of the history of that tonight, some, because it ties into my story.

But there are a number of smaller groups as well.

And so I'm using it broadly, although the technical term would be the latter, it would be Latter-day Saint movement.

Also, a disclaimer, this is my experience, my journey.

I'm not crossing every scholarly T and I, and things like that, And so I'm sharing my journey, my recollections, my memories.

I've also done reading outside of that as well.

And then tomorrow we'll look at what I believe is very fascinating, a counterfeit movement.

And then in the afternoon I plan to look at how do we share with Mormons, those that are in Mormonism, and what are some of the, how do some of the tests when we share, what are some of the ways that Mormonism falls short in some of those areas?

And so I wanna begin, there's 2 main groups.

1 is the Latter Day Saint, in the Latter Day Saint movement.

I mentioned it, the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints.

This is the 1 that everybody is familiar with because they have young missionaries that will come to your door.

And I imagine that most of us have had some type of interaction with some of these missionaries.

They're very good people and I do not want to, although I'll share my journey, I don't want to disparage anybody.

I still have family members that are in the Mormon movement, in Mormonism.

And so I'm not casting reproach or speaking against anyone.

Now, the other group is called the Community of Christ.

Now, I imagine that this is the much smaller group to begin with, but it's also very localized to the Midwest.

So there may be a group or 2 out in this area.

But these are the 2 main groups in the Latter-day Saint movement.

And then there's other smaller groups as well.

The main group, the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, the Utah, has about 17 million members, and they have the temples and the very distinctive churches as well.

Other 1 that I mentioned, the Community of Christ, which used to be referred to as the Latter-day Saints, Reorganized Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, has about a quarter of a million members, mainly in Missouri, Iowa, Illinois, Wisconsin, and Michigan.

But I want to look at a little bit of history because as we're going to be sharing, there's a lot of history that comes into this as well.

And so I want to begin by thinking about what I believe is a very pivotal year in religious history.

It was a pivotal year in the work of God.

We know what was going on during that time and the build-up to that time, right?

We have that was when Advent, the Advent movement was climaxing into the Midnight Cry, and of course they believed that Jesus was going to come in October 22 of 1844.

We believe from Bible prophecy that prophecies were fulfilled, just not in the way that they were expecting.

But something very fascinating to me is when we look at the year of 1844, there's a number of things that are converging all around that same time period, particularly in 1844.

If we had more time, we could talk about more of these things.

But the advent of modern technology took place essentially in 1844.

The Morse code was sent over the telegraph in 1844.

There's other things that took place as well.

But we also have a counterfeit message that began to develop during this time.

We're all familiar with this individual and in 1830s Darwin travels to the Galapagos Islands on the HMS Beagle and As he's there he begins to develop his theory and there's a lot of reasons behind that.

But it was actually in 1844 that he wrote out his ideas as his essay.

Now I believe that God, that we know, I don't believe this, we know that God predicted in Revelation 14, verse 7, that there would be a message, 6 and 7, that would go to all the world, that the hour of his judgment has come and worship him who made heaven and earth and sea and the waters." And so that's Revelation 14, 6 and 7.

Well, there's a message that began right around that time that was denying the idea of a creator God.

And of course it's grown Exponentially from that time, of course, it was in 1859 that Darwin then published origin of species Interesting when he first wrote out his ideas in 1844 his original essay He said he felt like he was confessing a murder and It took him 15 more years before that was actually published Other interesting things taking place right around that time I would say that there was a new counterfeit power that was developing during that time.

Anybody know what that's a picture of or who that's a picture of?

And so they're credited with the birth of modern spiritualism.

It was March of 1848, Hydesville, New York, that mysterious wrappings were heard.

Now, you can go back a little bit further and in Swedensburg, I think is his name, in 1844 was writing out some of the things that became modern spiritualism.

But the Fox sisters then began to communicate with a series of knocks and things like that with these wrappings and it grew into the modern spiritualist movement.

Just like God had said there was going to be a message that was going to go to the world proclaiming to worship the Creator, we also know from the Bible that there's a message or not just a message but God is going to pour out His Spirit in the last days as well.

And as God is going to pour out His Spirit, I think you have a counterfeit power that was developing right around this time also.

But it was also a pivotal year with a new counterfeit movement and that's where we come into Mormonism.

Joseph Smith, born in 1805 in Vermont, they moved to, in 1816, they moved to Palmyra, New York.

It was there as a young man, as Joseph Smith, the story goes, this is what I believe most Mormon missionaries, as they come to your door, would tell you.

This is a story that I grew up learning, was that there were lots of revivals going on and that's true.

History says there were lots of revivals going on during this time and the Smith family would go to these different revivals but nothing seemed to fit.

And The story goes that Joseph Smith was praying about which church he should join and it was communicated to him that he should not join any church but that God was going to restore the true gospel.

And so Mormonism is a restoration movement.

So as he was praying in 1820, Joseph Smith's first vision.

And he has his first vision and it's interesting.

They'll tell you this when they come to your door that the Father and Jesus appeared to him in that first vision.

Now That's a very interesting thing to say because what does the Bible say about seeing the Father in particular?

And so you have a contradiction right here at the beginning.

But this is a story the father and the son appeared to him said don't join any church we're going to restore the true gospel to you.

He would have been a teenager at this time with about mid-teenager something like that.

And this is what is on the top of every Mormon temple.

And notice you have, if you look at it, it's an angel, golden angel with a trumpet.

Of course, they believe it was actually a prophet that died.

But 1827, the angel Moroni appears to Joseph Smith and he gives him lets him see for the first time these golden plates and then he lets him take these golden plates.

So he receives the golden plates at the Hill Cumorah outside of Palmyra, New York.

And so then the story is that he would have this seeing glass and he would be able to interpret these golden plates which were in some type of Egyptian hieroglyphics and he would interpret it and then it would be written down.

Nobody saw them, they would just, that he would be speaking this and so then this was the method that he says that the interpretation took place and then the Book of Mormon was published in 1830.

Now the Book of Mormon, this is a, you can't read it, I can hardly read it, well maybe you can read it some, the very beginning of it, it talks about the record of the people of Nephi and the Lamanites, which was the remnant of the house of Israel.

The Nephites and the Lamanites were a part where lived in, they were a family with 4 brothers.

They lived in Jerusalem near the fall of Jerusalem, contemporary with Jeremiah.

And they were warned to flee to a different location.

This is the story that I grew up hearing.

A Counterfeit Movement

Father in heaven, we're grateful that you have brought us to worship together.

We thank you that we can praise your name and open your word together.

And we pray that you will guide us now in Jesus name.

I want to turn to begin with to 2 Thessalonians chapter 2.

2 Thessalonians chapter 2 and verses 8 through 12.

Describing here the falling away, the apostasy of the man of sin, antichrist power, but there's some very words that we need to take heart and take warning from in the latter part of this chapter.

Verses 8-12 of 2 Thessalonians chapter 2.

And then the lawless 1 will be revealed, whom the Lord will consume with the breath of his mouth, and destroy with the brightness of his coming.

The coming of the lawless 1 is according to the working of Satan, with all power, signs, and lying wonders, and with all unrighteous deception among those who perish because they did not receive the love of the truth that they might be saved.

And for this reason God will send them strong delusion that they should believe the lie and that they all may be condemned who did not believe the truth but had pleasure in unrighteousness." Description here of the Antichrist in The first verses of the chapter describes the inevitable end, the destruction with the brightness of his coming when Jesus comes in verses 8 and then 9 talks about the power and signs that he works.

And then notice verse 10, with all unrighteous deception among those that perish.

You know you could look through the Bible and you would see many different counterfeits that the devil has for what God is doing.

You see in Revelation the mark of the beast and the seal of God, don't you?

You see in Revelation 13, fire comes down from heaven and people are led to erect the image to the beast, a false revival there.

But we also know according to Scripture, there's going to be a true revival as well.

In Jesus' ministry, Pilate brought before the multitude Jesus and Barabbas.

Barabbas, the Bible records that he was a thief and a murderer, that he had led an insurrection.

But of course the name Barabbas means son of the father and desire of ages tells us he had claimed to be a Messiah.

And you could look through and see various other counterfeits throughout scripture.

And the warning is that the devil's going to work with all unrighteous deception because they did not receive the love of the truth.

If we do not love the truth, we will be deceived.

We must cling to the truth from God's Word.

We must not only know it theoretically, but we need to love the truth from God as well.

Because it's loving him and loving his truth that will shield us from deception.

And the tragedy is that when we are deceived, we don't even realize we're deceived.

I shared with you last night, how my family roots went all the way back to the very beginning of the Latter-day Saint movement or the Mormon movement.

And how I believed with all my heart that I was in the true church.

That Joseph Smith was God's last day prophet.

Now God had been at work in my life and had been directing me to start reading the word of God.

And somehow God was able to break my pride and stubbornness and to surrender to the truth from God's word.

And I want to look a little bit today at how I believe Mormonism, the Latter-day Saint movement, the devil used as a, and is using, as a counterfeit to the Advent movement.

And I wanna go through and look at some of those parallels as well.

And then I want to look at why this is a counterfeit movement.

But we need to realize as we share with people that we may know that they are deceived, but they do not.

And we need to recognize and understand where they're coming from and love them where they are and seek to lead them to the truth from God's Word.

And I'm going to share quotations from primarily the Doctrine of Covenants, maybe a couple from the Book of Mormon and other sources.

As I mentioned, I have family members, more distant family now, but I have family members that are still in the Latter-day Saint movement.

I know people that are there and I believe that I pray that God will reach them.

Sometimes when we talk about Mormonism, there is a tendency because there are some very unique beliefs.

There's a tendency to sensationalize some of the Mormon teaching and beliefs.

And I don't believe that that helps us if we're going to try to reach them.

Now I'm not defending some of those unique beliefs by any means.

But I'm saying we can be fair with them and try to understand where they're coming from.

I don't remember who put them out, which is probably a good thing.

They weren't Adventists, they're Christian video type things.

And I was offended by what they were saying.

We don't, we need to be careful in how we say and what we say and how we portray not to offend those that are deceived.

And so, anyway, I still believe, I believe as I mentioned that it is a counterfeit movement that was raised up right around the same time as the advent movement just a little bit before.

And so I want to go through some parallels and notice the some of the parallels between William Miller and Joseph Smith.

William Miller, born in 1782, was converted, became a Christian.

He was a deist before and then in the War of 1812, he started to think a little bit more about some of these things.

And he began to realize his need for a Savior.

And he found in the Bible the Savior that he needed.

So he was converted there, he began to study, and within a couple years after his conversion, he became convinced that Jesus was coming very soon.

And of course, as he continued studying, he came to the conclusion it was about the year 1843.

Continued to study, came to the conclusion 1844.

1822, William Miller wrote out his convictions.

So this is when he put them down on paper.

Of course, he wasn't sharing them publicly yet.

It wasn't until 1831 that he gave his first public lecture.

And we know the story of how his, what was it, his nephew, relative came and asked him to come preach the next day and share some of the things that he had been studying just when he had said, Lord, I will go if somebody asks me.

He thought he was confident that nobody would ask him until a few minutes or hour or so later when he got that invitation and had to go wrestle with the Lord whether he was going to hold up to what he had agreed or not.

And of course he did, and then barely stopped preaching after that.

And then several years later, he passed away.

And we know from the book early writings that angels are watching over his grave.

He might not have understood everything afterward, but we expect and look forward to him coming out of his grave when Jesus comes.

Joseph Smith, born in 1805, so a little bit younger than William Miller.

In 1820, he had his first vision, or At least that's how he describes it, in which he saw, according to his account, the father and the son.

And they told him, according to his account, that he should not join any church, but that the true, true church would be restored to him.

And then in 1827, the angel Moroni gave him, and this is his account.

I'm not saying that this is actually what happened.

1827, he said that the golden plates were given to him.

And then in 1830, the Book of Mormon was published.

And also that year of 1830, the church was organized with a few hundred members.

I mentioned last night that 1 of my 4 times great-grandfather was baptized into the church right about then when I believe there are about 600 people total in the church at that point.

And right shortly thereafter, he was ordained to the priesthood by Joseph Smith.

Now, not an exact parallel, but it's very interesting when you look at it that they are coming to their conclusions, William Miller and Joseph Smith, around the same time and they are beginning to share and these movements are growing around the same time and they actually are both movements are bitterly disappointed around the same time as well.

And so there's some interesting just parallel, not parallels even so much as just trajectories of the Advent movement and then the Mormon movement.

Now as I mentioned, I believe it's a counterfeit remnant.

The Latter-day Saint movement believes that they are restoring the true gospel.

So they believe that the true gospel, and I remember hearing this growing up as a boy in Sunday school and in church, and that the gospel, the true gospel through time had been lost sight of and God raised up Joseph Smith to be able to restore the true gospel.

Now as Adventist, do we believe that God has raised up the Advent movement to restore the gospel as well?

You know, we read it in, we didn't read it actually, but in 2 Thessalonians chapter 2, it says there will be a falling away.

There was a time where the true faith was lost sight of through the dark ages, and we believe that God is raising up or has raised up the Advent movement in order to restore that that had been lost.

Reaching Mormons

I was in the Philippines 1 time and we were preaching and going through the slides and the power went off.

So it was totally dark then and I just kept preaching because time was rolling and eventually I'm not sure if we fired up a generator or if the power came back on, but we got it working again and, but we went forward.

And It's a blessing to be able to have the Sabbath, isn't it?

And I have enjoyed seeing a little bit more sun than I normally see and not needing a big winter coat.

Although I did admit I was, of course, we're 3 hours ahead in Michigan.

I did have a jacket on, and that was beneficial, but it's much warmer than where it is at my home right now.

We are anticipating highs in the single digits on Monday and Tuesday, I think, and you can imagine where the lows are going to go from there.

But it's all good, and fortunately we have heaters and coats and things like that.

And, but I have enjoyed the sun and a little bit warmer here today.

And so we looked, yeah, last night, we looked a little bit at some of the history of Mormonism and also my journey out of Mormonism and referring to the broader Latter-day Saint movement, not just 1 of the branches.

And then this morning we looked at the counterfeit movement.

I really believe that the Mormon movement, the Latter-day Saint movement is a counterfeit to the Adventist movement.

And when we look at the Bible, we see that the Bible is very clear that there will be a last day remnant who will be keeping the commandments of God and having the testimony of Jesus.

But the Mormon movement claims to be the true church that has restored the gospel.

And so today we're going to be looking at reaching, or this afternoon we're looking at reaching Mormons.

And I want to say that there's not a magic bullet.

God has the keys to every heart and we have to pray and seek for wisdom to know what to be able to say and when, because only God is the 1 that can know how to reach somebody's heart.

And there can be things that we, wouldn't make sense, normally speaking, that God could impress us to do that, and that would be a way of reaching them.

And so, there's not a pat answer, there's not a definite formula that you do, and once you've performed this formula, well, there's going to be success.

No, it is praying and asking God to work.

And that being said, there are some ideas and there are some concepts that we can recognize that are some things to avoid and some things to, approaches to use as well.

And when we look this morning at the counterfeit movement, to me, when you look at the counterfeit, what's important is to have our faith established in the real.

And so we're gonna do the same today, this afternoon as well, because there's pitfalls of Mormonism, but we want our faith to be established in what is real and true as well.

But you know, We have been given a commission, haven't we?

God has given us, we refer to it as a great commission found in Matthew 28, 18 to 20.

Go therefore and preach the gospel to all nations, right?

And how we are to make disciples and all of these things.

In Acts chapter 1, Jesus said, and it's another form of the Great Commission, that you shall receive power from on high and you'll be my witnesses in Judea and Samaria and Jerusalem rather, Judea, Samaria and to the uttermost parts of the earth.

They started with the people that they knew.

They started with those that were right around them and they spread out from there.

Now I want to be as we begin, I want to go to Acts chapter 8 to begin with.

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Cody Francis Weekend

My Journey Out Of Mormonism

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