Etsuko Stanhope heads a team of web developers with a heart for reaching Mormons for Christ. She describes her passion for members of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints and how it coalesced into the production of an Internet site that gently challenges while offering a significant insight into this world-wide cult.
Help Mormons wrestle with the gospel
The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints received lots of positive media attention during 1990s and gained 300,000 converts worldwide each year. Time magazine in 1997 featured Mormon growth. University of Washington sociologist, Rodney Stark, projected that Mormonism would become the next world religion, with a membership of 267 million by 2080. Alarmed by this, the Southern Baptist Convention produced training programmes in 1998. Current Mormon President Gordon B Hinckley has had wide-audience interviews. This prompted me to develop an outreach ministry to Mormons.
The growth of the Mormon Church did not seem an imminent threat in Australia, so not many Australians were interested in reaching out to Mormons. Mormon beliefs are the most theologically complex among all the new religious movements. I could easily miss the subtlety of Mormon doctrines, as I do not have a Mormon background and English is my second language. If evangelism were only a human enterprise, I would not challenge such a gigantic organization. Instead of focusing on my weakness, I focused on what I could do, depending on God's power. Developing our website seemed the best option.
The MOM website focuses on who Jesus is and why He came. Christians should never attack Joseph Smith or Mormon Church leaders, as Mormons will simply clam up, but should challenge their teachings, the Mormon gospel, and help Mormons wrestle with the biblical gospel. But classic evangelical presentations of the gospel may not convey what we intend, as the particular language Mormons use is one of the greatest barriers. MOM has adapted Paul's mission model in 1 Cor.9:19-23 because reaching out to Mormons is a cross-cultural mission. We become like Mormons to win them for Christ. We use language Mormons can understand and compare the official teachings of the Mormon Church with the Bible in order to present the gospel.
The MOM website has several sections: articles for people who are thinking about joining the Mormon Church, "Open letters to Mormon Friends" and "Response to Mormon Claims", a link with "Mormons in transition E-mail Support Group", witnessing tools for Christians and miscellaneous articles.
I would encourage Christians to use the website to learn more about Mormonism - the official teachings of the Mormon church, the differences between Christian terminology and Mormon terminology. It is also an excellent training aid for learning how to tell the truth to Mormons in a loving way and to follow this up by recommending the website to their Mormon friends.
