So last night was the last night of the Manti Pageant in Utah, it was another great night to speak to people going in and out. We spoke to an LDS guy who had just retired from the police and mostly just gave out flyers the rest of the time. As well as this I took the chance to interview some Christians who are active in reaching out to Mormons in Utah and other states to ask them why it is important to speak to Mormons when you get the chance. Please see the video above and the videos below for this.

Also there is this video done by Russ Bales interviewing various Christians talking about why they went to Manti.

Hope you enjoyed these, we only have a few days left in Utah now and my desire is to get back home and be more active than ever in the UK reaching out to Mormon people, Jehovah’s Witness people or anyone caught up in religion that keeps Christ away from His place of total sufficency for peoples salvation. If your a Christian in the UK and want to be involved with this please let me know.

Yesterday we visited Brigham Young University which is a University in Provo Utah which has around 32.000 students which are 95% plus Mormon.

Some Byu students playing Basketball, great Sport!!

Now the evening was particularly interesting, on the night a guy was there at the Manti Pageant with a banner saying that everything Brigham Young said was true see below.

This guy is called Jered and is a part of the F-LDS church, which is the Fundamentalist Latter Day Saint Church which is a large Mormon offshoot group that practices polygamy. They state that the “Revelation” from Wilfred Woodruff stating that Polygamy should cease in the church was wrong and they broke off and carried on. So Jered was there to share that he stood fully by all that Brigham Young said, this included the teaching that Adam was God the Father, that God the Father sexually impregnated Mary.  I had the chance to share with Him the biblical gospel of salvation by faith in Christ which he certainly did not agree with. I also pointed out from what he was saying the God He believed in was a sinner and an adulterer if He was saying that God committed the sin of Adam and had sex with Mary.

For Mormons reading this and Christians please dont think I am saying that the LDS church of today believes these things, however these beliefs are the heritage of the LDS church, as they are stated by one of their key founding prophets Brigham Young.

Please pray for Jered, we had a good conversation but it was not long before he did not want to speak to me anymore, He certainly heard the gospel from me and others so please pray as I will be that it challenges Him to consider the God He believes in compared to the God of the bible.

As well as this we had a great night giving out flyers and speaking to other people, a great highlight of the night was seeing Aaron Shafovaloff preaching to anyone that would listen, see below.

Among many things Aaron was preaching about whether it is right for LDS people who believe that one day they will be Gods to accept worship from their spirit Children. The thinking behind this comes from the LDS teaching that God was once a man and so by implication must have had a God, however why in the bible does God seek worship for Himself so much rather than point us to His God who must be greater. This logic goes on to any LDS members today who hope to one day be a God. Do you think that it is right that you would accept worship from your spirit children knowing that the God that you followed is so much greater than you? Please think about that and comment.

Aaron is a part of Mormonism Research Ministry and posts on the Mormon Coffee Blog, both I would heavily recommend.

On a humorous note Aaron said that if you ever become gods and one of your spirit children start to worship you “Spank them”.

So there you go more soon.

Hello all aside from telling Joseph Smith and Brigham Young a thing or two this has been the most exciting couple of days of the trip so far.

Last night we went into Ogden town centre area just with some questionnaires to go through with people and we had our two best discussions yet on this trip. Firstly we met a Mormon lady who at first said that she believed Jesus was all we needed for salvation. As the discussion went on she stated that she did not believe at all that she was righteous in the sight of God and that there was still much work to be done. We were able to share with her the biblical message of salvation by faith alone and that Christ was enough for her.

After this we talked to a guy who has a heavy criminal background and due to his Mormon understanding he was totally burdoned with guilt and believed he was a very long way off being acceptable to God. In both cases I shared these great verses from the bible.

Romans 4:1-5

What shall we say then that Abraham our father, as pertaining to the flesh, hath found?For if Abraham were justified by works, he hath whereof to glory; but not before God.For what saith the scripture? Abraham believed God, and it was counted unto him for righteousness.Now to him that worketh is the reward not reckoned of grace, but of debt.But to him that worketh not, but believeth on him that justifieth the ungodly, his faith is counted for righteousness.

This is whats on offer regardless of your religious background Mormon or not, you can be righteous in the sight of God meaning forgiven clean with your eternal life secure just by trusting in Him that justifies the ungoldly. We are having a great time sharing this with people out here.

Today we went to Insititute classes and ended up speaking to a guy for two hours afterwards about the gospel, God is opening up loads of opportunities for us and I think for me and Vicky we are growing in our confidence to boldly share the gospel to people in Utah, heres hoping that goes home with us, thanks for reading.

Hello just a quick update with all thats been going on, its been an amazing weekend at the Manti Pageant in Utah, around 200 Christians and us have been there as thousands of Mormons have been coming in and out of the area, its been a great chance to give out flyers to people and have some discussions looking at the biblical concept of grace compared to the Mormon one.

Now we are back in Ogden and are working with a team of teenagers from California, we will be going back into temple square salt lake and other parts of Ogden. Thanks for your prayers and please keep them coming, this is a challenging place but we are having an amazing time here. Please see below for some photos.

This is Vicky and the other Utah Partnerships for Christ interns.

You will never guess what I have bought, yep you guessed it I have bought some Mormon Missionary action figures woooo, great stuff.

Anyway the last couple of days have been great, on monday me and Vicky got to know the area of Salt Lake city and temple square, temple square is Mormon Central within Salt Lake City and has the temple, the Mormon Church headquarters, museums and various other key places.

Later on we went to a family home evening at a singles ward, which is a Mormon church just full of single people, where we just played a game of wrapping up an egg in straws and then dropping it to see if it breaks.

This was a great chance to hang out with some local young Mormons and get to know them, they all love the english accent.

The next day we went back to temple square with a group of Teenagers from Arkensaw, Texas, but on the way we visited the Famous Utah Lighthouse ministry bookshop which is ran by Sandra Tanner.

Sandra is a descendant of Brigham Young, Her and her late Husband Jerald left the LDS church many years ago and at the time the problematic issues of Mormon History were not easily available so they set up what is now the best ministry in the world for information on Mormonism from a biblical and honest historical perspective. Their site is at www.utlm.org

So after that we went to Temple square again with the kids from Arkensaw and spoke to some Sister Missionaries and had a tour of the conference centre which holds 21.000 people at the Mormon general conference.

This is where every 6 months the Mormon Church has its “General conference”. Where its Prophets and Apostles speak, the teaching of the church is that when the Apostle speaks His words are comparible to scripture.

So after this we went to watch Heart of the Matter, a show hosted by an ex Mormon now Christian Shawn Mccraney pictured here. Every week he looks at something within Mormonism and compares it to Christianity and has people call in to ask questions or make comments, its a fanastic show and you can watch past episodes at www.hotm.tv

So there we are so far, its wednesday and we are thinking of walking around Brigham City and praaying and asking God to give us opportunities to speak to people. We are having an amazing time here and its even better than we thought it would be.

We are realizing its not as easy as once thought to have good conversations with Mormons as we found around temple square they are very much on guard for people to go there and witness. On friday we are going to the Manti Pageant, from what we hear this should be the high point of our trip as thousands of Mormons go into this big even where the book of Mormon is portrayed through a big drama show, but while they are coming in and out there will be around 200 of us there to speak to them.

Please pray for us for that as that should be the best opportunity while we are here to reach out, more updates soon.

Hello my avid readers, only three days into my trip I have missed a day of posting already so this one is to keep you up to date with Saturday 10th and Sunday the 11th in Our Utah Trip.

Saturday was a great day, it started with me and Vicky visiting a Mormon guy who lives in Layton called Eric. Eric is a great guy who we spent some time with meeting his family and discussing our faith with each other, it was interesting to learn how a Mormon family lives within Utah.

After that we went to the blue plate Diner pictured here for a Buffalo Burger, very good.

In the evening we went to Rob Sivulkas house, he is a missionary to Mormons and anyone else in Utah, we heard David Bartosiewicz tell his story of coming out of Mormonism and into Christ, the videos of this testimony you can watch just below.

Today the 12th we have been to Aldersgate United Methodist Church in Brigham City, after this we passed by the LDS Temple which is in the process of being built pictured here. This is where the church carries out its baptisms for the dead amongst many other things, we also saw the Brigham City tabernacle.

So its all fun so far and we are feeling pretty settled in to Utah now, tommorow the fun should really start and we are going to be going out into Ogden to start our outreach efforts speaking to people in the area, as well as possibly going to other parts of Utah, more news to follow, someone left a comment asking for what to pray for us, thanks for that and here are some points.

• That God would direct us to people He wants us to speak to and people whose heart He has been preparing.
• That we would be a good influence on the teams of teenagers that are working with Utah Partnerships for Christ here.
• That we in our actions as well as our words would show Christ to people in Utah and that we would work in His strength and not ours, basically we need the Holy Spirit big time, without Him we are just using words and ideas and we all know there are lots of those out there. I heard a great quote at church today

Without the Holy Spirit we are a mess, with the Holy Spirit we are a message.

Enough said thanks guys more soon.

Hi all for the next few weeks this blog will be used to keep you all up to date with the goings on with my wife Vicky and I’s ministry trip to Utah, please drop in and as ever leave a comment if you want to.

After about 20 hours of travel and 3 flights we finally arrived in Salt Lake City airport at 7:20pm yesterday on the 9th of June, not much of an eventful day after that other than an essential walmart visit.

Today we spent some time with Russ East director of Utah partnerships for Christ, praying and discussing what we will be doing, after that we went to have a tour of the mountains given by UPFC interns Kelly Douglas and Colleen Zack.

Me and my Wife Vicky at the mountains near, Ogden.

So its been a cool day, ultimately we are here to reach out to Mormons and tell anyone who will listen about Christ and what He has done for the world, but it was a great day to see the place and get to know some of the people we will be working with, please watch this space for more updates on what we get up to, and please be praying for us while we are out here as its gonna be fun but no doubt challenging too.

Right above is the Ogden LDS temple, its sealed off at the moment for people to walk around the grounds as from what I hear it is being knocked down and replaced, if there is anyone reading that knows about this stuff I would be interested to know if this is true and why that is? Just out of curiosity.

Hi all this post is a prayer letter I have been sending to people to make them aware of what we are doing this summer, just keeping you all in the loop :) Some of the information on here is quite basic and I am not trying to start a debate or argument, just sharing our heart.

This post is to make you aware of Vicky and I’s mission trip to Utah this year, why we are going and what we will be doing, and to ask that you support us in any way that you can.

For many years now I have felt God’s call to communicate the biblical gospel to groups that claim to be the worlds true Christians and yet teach an entirely different gospel to what we see in the bible. Over the years Vicky has massively caught a heart for this and this is a ministry we both feel very called to together.

Mormonism is a religion that worldwide has around 14 million members and exists with the claim that it is the only true Christian Church on the earth. The Mormon Church places many restrictive rules and teachings on its members and places them back under the laws that we see in the Old Testament, as well as many others.

Its members do their best to live out these laws and regulations in the hope that they can be exalted after death to a position of godhood as they believe our heavenly Father did. They see the sacrifice of Jesus as one of the many factors necessary to get them to where they want to be, faith in Christ alone is by no means enough for them to be secure in their eternity.
Our desire is to see as many Mormons as possible won for Christ and to find freedom in Him, and no longer captive in the rules of a religious organisation. God has blessed this ministry greatly in

Middlesbrough (England) recently where we have seen Cheryl  (pictured telling her story at our church with me and Vicky) a member of the Mormon church come to Christ, separating herself from the Mormon church, this has been amazing to see the change in her and to see God actively working in her life.

Utah is an American State with an estimated population of 2,737,000 out of this 1,884,377 are members of the Mormon church, this means 68% of the people in this state are Mormons or 1 in every 1.47 people. There are at the most around 5% Christians there, this is the most in need and relevant place in the world to do mission reaching out to Mormon people, there are parts of Utah with near 100% Mormons living in it with no Christians there.

We are going to Utah for 3 weeks in June and are starting to pray about whether God is calling us to go there for a year or longer, this is all a massive step of faith and we are trusting in God big time to provide for us financially. We are by no means doing this for the glamour of going to the US, this is purely about seeing people tied up in religion finding freedom in Christ.

So when we go in June we are going to be working with Russ East from Utah Partnerships for Christ. This ministry has teams of teenagers going there in the Summer, and it equips them in sharing the gospel through Street outreach, volunteer work and interaction with Mormons in various settings including their own church meetings. We will be helping to lead two of these mission weeks, we will equip these teenagers to go out and do outreach to Mormons as well as help prepare their food and do debriefings at the end of the days to see how its helping them grow. As well as this we will be visiting local Christian churches in Utah and asking them to support us in our plans to go back their for a longer period.

So guys please pray that:

• We see God at work in the lives of lost people in our time at Utah in June
• That God uses us to encourage the Christian Teenagers we will be working with.
• That God speaks to us about His plans for us in Utah in the future.
• That God provides for us financially.

Please pray for us and consider supporting us financially, going in June is a massive cost and going there for longer would only be possible if God provides for us.

Often today when we think about mission we think about poor countries and people with great physical needs, however Mormons are just as in need as any other lost person world-wide and are just as loved by God.  Please support us, if you would like more information on how to go about this, or have any questions please email me on [email protected] or feel free to give via paypal to this email address, any amount would be greatly appreciated.

If everyone reading this gave £10 (or $10) this trip would be mostly or fully covered. Please don’t worry about large amounts (unless you really want to), but please support what God is doing through us in the Mormon people, our hope is to see many more people like Cheryl coming out of Mormonism to Christ.

This blog is by no means here to make me money however any support would be really appreciated.

If you are a church leader please consider having me do a seminar at your church equipping your church members on how to respond when they come into contact with Mormons. Or members of other groups like the Jehovah’s Witness’s who are equally as lost but are often avoided by Christians due to them not knowing how to share the gospel with them.

Also please keep an eye on this blog,  this will have many updates when we are at Utah to keep you up to date with what we are doing.

Thanks for reading.