6 minute read
What I Thought I Knew
By Rev. Dr. Kent Heimbigner
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It was the morning of July 8, 1978. I was 16. My parents were on vacation, but I had stayed at our home in Anaheim, California so that I could continue working at my job. The previous night, my prayers had been different than ever before. Mormon missionaries from The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints, had been visiting my home, giving me their polished presentation of “missionary lessons.” They had urged me to read the Book of Mormon, and to pray asking God to reveal to me that it was true. They had told me that I would know its truth by a “burning in the bosom” which I would receive. So I asked God to reveal to me the truthfulness of it. Sure enough, the next morning, I awoke not only convinced in my mind that Mormonism was true, but excited enough about it to have what might reasonably pass for a “burning in the bosom” as well.
Thus began a two-year episode of my life that has in some ways marked me ever since. There were repercussions, both positive and negative, almost immediately. First came the negative. I asked my parents to sign a permission slip allowing me to be baptized in the Mormon religion. My father, himself a devout Lutheran, with the support of my non-Lutheran but Christian mother refused to sign. Thus, my senior year of high school, I was Mormon by conviction, but never baptized.
A positive change was that I found a whole new circle of friends. For the most part, these young people took their religion quite seriously. They didn’t drink or smoke. They kept dating “clean.” The church had a fabulous social organization. I could go to a dance for high-school aged youth every weekend!
Mormons are similarly well-organized for religious instruction. Not only was there church and Sunday School every Sunday, but they also had what they called “seminary.” Attendance at these classes was expected of all high-school aged Mormons. They met every weekday morning before school started. One year was devoted to Old Testament, one to the New Testament, one to the Book of Mormon, and one to the other books the Mormons consider Scriptural. These people took their faith seriously!
After graduating from high school, I went to live with a family in what was then West Germany. While I continued to live an outwardly Mormon life, inside my confidence in Mormonism was beginning to be shaken. What looked like a perfectly sensible religion in California now looked alien, strangely more American than universal in nature. The Book of Mormon claims that, after His resurrection from the dead, Jesus came to America and started the Church on this continent. This had previously failed to raise my American eyebrow, but the Germans to whom I tried to explain it found it patently ridiculous that the God of heaven and earth was somehow so uniquely pro-American.
I continued questioning Mormonism because of a very special uncle who was himself an ex- Mormon. He openly admitted that he became a Mormon in an attempt to win the affections of some girls in Jackson Hole, Wyoming when he was young. Nevertheless, he knew something about the Mormon religion and, as a devout Baptist, he sought to open my eyes to the errors of Mormonism. With the help of a book called The Mormon Illusion by Floyd C. McElveen, I was shown convincing proof that Mormonism simply could not be true.
Regrettably, it was not at all clear to me that Christianity was true since Mormonism was not. I spent several more years searching, trying to figure out what I alon should believe, if anything. In the end, by the grace of God, I returned to the faith of my youth, the Christian faith of the Bible alone as it is correctly taught by the Lutheran Church.
I have often reflected upon my several-year detour from the Lutheran Church. What was that “burning in the bosom”? How could I have been so sure that Mormonism was true, only to have it made so plain that it could not possibly be? The answer is simple. It is contained in our Small Catechism, right along with many other plain and faith-preserving teachings from which I had simply walked away:
Mormon teaching is not Christian. Mormons do not believe in the Holy Trinity as Christians do. They believe Father, Son, and Holy Spirit are three separate gods, “one” only in will and purpose, but not “of one substance.” The Father became a god by living a good “Mormon”life as a man on some other world, and as a result, when his god resurrected him, he became a god.
Jesus became a god by living a good “Mormon” life in this world, including apparently by being married to three women. (According to Mormonism, marriage is necessary to achieve godhood!)
The Holy Spirit isn’t even a “god” yet. Mormons believe his development toward godhood will be completed during the millennium, when he receives a body and presumably gets married.
The Mormons believe in different gods than our one true God. They believe in a different Jesus than the one Scripture reveals. And they believe in a different way of salvation, by “obedience to the laws andordinances of the gospel,” not by grace through faith alone for the sake of (the true) Jesus alone.
Now, why does the explanation to “lead us not into temptation” focus first on “false belief and despair,” and only then on “other great shame and vice”? Aren’t there bigger sins than false belief and despair?
Well, no, not really. You see, if you pray to the wrong god or have a false Jesus (false belief), or if you give up on God ever forgiving you (despair), then you are cut off from the forgiveness of sins and salvation. However, if you know the true God, and trust that He will forgive all of your sins, by grace, because of what Jesus did for you on the cross, then there is still a way out. Repent, ask God’s forgiveness for the sake of Jesus, and receive the forgiveness that His Word promises you (1 Jn. 1:7-9).
I am not proud of my wanderings; I am ashamed that I ever turned away from my Savior, who so graciously saved me by the shedding of His holy, precious blood. Thanks be to God, that blood was still there, the Holy Spirit still pursued me, and by His grace, I was returned to the Faith. God grant you rather to remain faithful to Him all the days of your life, and at the last to receive the life of the world to come, through Jesus Christ our Lord.
Rev. Dr. Kent Heimbigner is pastor of Charity Lutheran Church in Burleson, Texas.
