Michael's Story Part 2

You're entering outer brightness. Things took a really big turn on my mission, on my second companionship. We were both really new out. I'd been out about three months, and this other guy had been out four.

So we were both just past being greenies. He had this experience where he went by somebody on the street, and he didn't talk to them. His name was Elder Mitchell. And then he told me afterwards, he's like, Oh, man, like, God told me to talk to them.

And I didn't do it. And I'm like, Well, you should have, you know. And then he went a couple of weeks. And he's like, Oh, my gosh, like, I'm not hearing from God anymore. Like, he's punishing me because I didn't listen to him when he told me to talk to these people on the street. And that's really how it was being a missionary.

You just constantly were feeling like you were getting these impressions and God was telling you to do this or that. And he finally, we were biking down the street, and he told me later that he got one of these impressions for the first time in weeks. And so it was to go down the street. So he turned down the street like a madman on his bike.

And so I'm following him trying to keep up. And nobody's there. It's like a ghost town on this street. And his tire slips into a crack in the sidewalk. This is Yorba Linda, California.

It's Thorn City. So his tire goes flat instantly. There was like 100 thorns in that tire. And so he's just like, why would God send me down here for this to happen? I'm like, I don't know. So we start walking our bikes up to the bike shop where they knew us pretty well at this point, because we did not know how to maintain our bikes very well. And on the way there, this guy, this evangelical Christian comes out from across the street and he waves us over and he's like, guys, come in and talk to me. And we look at each other like, oh my gosh, this is why God sent us down the street so that we could talk to this guy and baptize him. And so we go over there and we stop at the door and Elder Mitchell looks at me and he's like, I have a bad feeling about this. And I'm like, what are you talking about?

Let's go. And we go in and it's not a normal house. It's like a study. There's the walls are filled with these religious books. The Book of Mormon is among them and there's computer desks and we're like, wait, what is this place? And the guy sits us down and gives us some water and he introduces himself as Ed Enochs. And he says he's the head of the Evangelical Debate Society. And he's like, before you guys start telling me how Joseph Smith was a prophet and the church was restored, I have three questions for you. Who is God? Where do you get your authority?

And how are you saved by grace or by works? And we ended up having a three hour discussion where he just stampeded us into the ground. I remember one of the biggest arguments he was using was, you know, there can't be an infinite recession of gods because who is God's God and who's his God? And I was like, Elder Mitchell, go find the verse that says that we can become God in the Bible. I swear he was looking through the Bible for the whole three hours trying to find that verse. And I was just stunned because I was like, I'd never actually talked to a born again Christian up to this point. I mean, there was this one guy at the thrift shop that I worked at who said that Mormonism was wrong, but he didn't actually use the Bible. He just had an opinion as far as I could tell. But this guy was using the Bible to show me his arguments and it was really unnerving. And so after three hours of this, he says, you know, I'm going to exchange phone numbers with you guys.

You know, I work with some college age students and we should get together and have a little dialogue with, you know, five to 10 of them and you can share your message with them and then and then I'll talk to them afterwards. Well, I just wanted to get out of there. So I'm like, fine.

Like, here's our number. And we we hightailed it out of there. And me and Elder Mitchell didn't talk on the way home because it was just such a devastating experience. I felt like somebody had just ripped the veil from my eyes and and the sunny sky was actually it was actually raining and I was aware of it for the first time. And I was like, oh, my goodness, the LDS Church.

I don't think it's true. And I thought about my family members and my bishop and and the even the elders that I knew before I left. And I was like, how can all these good people have been roped in by this? Like, how can they have been tricked so badly?

How could my my parents who are so intelligent, you know, have been tricked by this? And I was really depressed and I was about ready to pack up my things and go home because I was I was so convinced that the church was false at that. But can I ask if you so did you feel like you had a testimony before that experience and then you felt like you lost it or had you always not you were you never really quite super sure. And that experience kind of just really rattled you. I was never sure. The only thing that I was certain of was that Jesus was my savior and that he loved me.

And that was from my experience at EFY. A lot of the other elders had had prayed over the Book of Mormon and they'd gotten an answer. And I desperately wanted that answer. And so I was reading and I was praying and I never got anything. And the leadership of the church has said, you know, that the best way to obtain a testimony is in the bearing of it. And so I was bearing a testimony to people that I did not have in the hopes that I would gain one. And I was trying to show God my faith to prove to him that I deserved an answer to know that the Book of Mormon was true. And so I went and taught my investigators and I told them that I knew the Book of Mormon was true countless times when I knew no such thing. And so when this experience happened, it really rattled me because I had not gained a testimony of anything except for Jesus at that point. Now, I decided that I was going to not take this guy's word for it because he actually convinced me. And I talked a little bit earlier about the seeds that God planted in my life.

Well, this was another one of those seeds. The guy that we debated convinced me that the Bible was the inerrant word of God. And so I was like, man, like, what an amazing tool. I'm going to read the Bible and I'm going to find out once and for all if Mormonism is true or not.

Like, like I can't trust some guy that I just ran into on the street. So I went home. I started just going through the Bible like crazy. And somehow I just happened across all the passages that look like they support Mormonism. And my testimony was born at that at that time. I came to believe that the church was absolutely true because of a cursory reading of the Bible.

And it's kind of crazy. But yeah, that's how I came to my my testimony that the Mormon Church was true. And all of that was while you were still on your mission?

Yep. All of that was while I was on my mission. And then and then, you know, I kind of hoped that that this guy wouldn't call me back, but he had my number and and he was serious about this. So my friend Ed called us. He's like, yeah, like, you know, let's do this thing. Let's meet up at Starbucks. And we're like, no, no, we can't go to Starbucks, you know, because coffee is evil. And I was just like, man, what if one of the members like drove by and saw us in the window? We'd probably get excommunicated from the church just for being at Starbucks. So we told him we couldn't do Starbucks. So we agreed to do it at our ward building because we figured, you know, we're allowed to bring investigators to the ward building. It's just going to be a couple of people.

No big deal. So he he made an agreement with us that one week he would come to our church and the next week we could go visit his. So we're like, OK, that sounds good. Well, he shows up at our ward with a couple of his friends and we go to gospel principles with them. And the ward mission leader was teaching.

His name was Brother Lightnin, Kari Lightnin. And in the middle of the lesson, they start kind of asking him these tough questions. And I'm just like, oh, great. You know, I'm the one that brought these guys here to disrupt church.

This is my fault. Anything that happens. I think they asked him something. They were asking him about the Sabbath, like, well, how do you know that it was always Sunday? And he kind of answered them back talking about like some kind of calendar and stones. And I'm like, wait, what?

What is he talking about? And he was actually able to answer them back intelligently. And I was really surprised because kind of at that point, I was still thinking that the church was false. And I didn't think anybody in the church really was intelligent enough to answer some of the questions that could be thrown at it.

But but he was. And at the end of the lesson, they kind of came up to me and said, hey, we want him to come to this discussion that we're going to have. And he agreed to come, which I was really glad because I'm like, OK, we've got firepower on our side now, not just to, you know, dumb missionaries. And so so the next week, well, actually, this is funny, too, because we were actually asked to speak in sacrament meetings the week that they came to our ward. And, you know, I ended up speaking about James, too, and how faith without works is dead.

And and I thought that I really, you know, taught those guys a lesson. But my funny companion, you know, I feel like the whole week he just kind of like rolled around in his rolly chair, like, what should I talk about on Sunday? And I'm like, I don't know, dude, like figure something out because, you know, I'm doing my talk and I need to make sure it's epic because these guys are coming. And he ended up finding like this little missionary book of, you know, heartwarming stories. I don't know what it's really called, but he's like, I could use this. I'm like, yeah, go for it. And so he finds the most awkward story in that book, which is about warm fuzzy. And it's about this village of people who gave warm fuzzies to each other and it made them all happy. And he's like, do you think I should use this story, Elder Fornoy?

I'm like, yeah, sounds great. And so this is a fictional story, right? Like people aren't the story that that he was sharing was fictional.

But unfortunately, what happened next is true. So I gave my, you know, my account on James to, you know, I'm like hitting the podium, like, you know, take that you crazy evangelicals. And then my companion gets up after me and starts talking about the warm fuzzies. And I can still remember the look on our guests faces.

It was I wish I'd been able to take a picture because they're sitting there. All of them have their Bibles open to the passages that I just been talking about. So their Bibles are still open and they're looking at my companion and their jaws have just dropped.

Like, what is this? So that was that was really interesting. But we we ended up going to their church. It was a Calvary Chapel the next Sunday.

And we're sitting there. I really I thought it was cool until they started passing out these flyers and they were flyers to this Mormon evangelical dialog, which is the one that we set up. And the pastor invited everybody to go. And all of a sudden, I'm just like, well, wait a sec. Like this isn't five or six college students. This this could be a lot more people. And we start getting phone calls from other missionaries in different cities saying that they came across somebody with one of these flyers.

And what is this thing all about? I'm just like, great, just what I need. So we ended up bringing it up to the ward council. And they were all really excited about it, especially our ward mission leader. But it was kind of interesting because half the members that we would talk to were excited about it and half of them were worried that we were going to be persecuted publicly when we when we went to do this. But in fact, I guess we were so worried about it that we didn't invite a single Latter-day Saint to go to the dialog because we didn't want anybody to start questioning. And in case things got ugly, because when you're LDS, you know, you just I think you just think that's going to happen. And I didn't trust these evangelicals at all.

But we we thought, yeah, go ahead. Did the flyers have some kind of like anti-Mormon message on it or something? Or were they were they kind of innocuous or benign? It was overtly. Yes.

The words and everything were completely fine. But it had a picture of these two guys at podiums and one of them was pointing at the other like he was accusing him. And when I saw that, I'm just like, Elder Mitchell, what have we done?

I don't know. Yeah. It seems like with Christians, you know, they're willing to challenge at least this has been my experience is like, you know, coming out of Mormonism into Christianity, they're much more willing to challenge their beliefs, you know, and accept or at least hear out other ideas. Whereas like when when you're in Mormonism, it's like any kind of affront to the status quo was kind of like a threat. And it's like, oh, we just got to either avoid it or, you know, people deal with it in different ways. But yeah, like, you know, there's like that gut instinct where you just your stomach turns when you hear or read something that's anti-Mormon.

You're like, oh, I just got to get away from that. So is that kind of how you're experiencing that and like saying, oh, we got to let's not bring anyone to this is just going to be a disaster at the time. My my viewpoint was starting to shift a little bit at this point, especially after kind of reading the Bible and coming up with some arguments for myself. But a big part of it is that it's just not the culture in Mormonism to debate anything, even amongst each other. You know, I'd be in Sunday school and I'd say something and somebody else would kind of have their own opinion. That's a little bit different than something I said.

And you just let it go because it's like, oh, I don't want to cause waves. You know, we're all unified contention is of the devil. But I feel like, yeah, Christian culture is a lot more open to debating things. And, you know, it's like iron sharp sharpens iron and and debating and hashing things out is a positive thing.

But in my past life, it was not so positive. Now, I started to go out and actually challenge evangelicals to debates and I not not public ones, but just one on one. If I if I'd find them, I'd start to argue with them and I'd start, you know, the Bible bash in a friendly way because I wasn't I don't like contention or conflict that much, but I just like look like here's what the verses the Bible says.

And so I was using the Bible a lot to try to persuade them that Mormonism was true. But the the day of this dialog finally comes up and Ed had called us the night before. And he's like, dude, like, I think we're going to have, you know, 100 people. And and we're just like, he's he's pulling our chain.

But there can't be that many people coming to our building. And we're like, there's probably going to be seventy five. Yeah. Yeah.

Seventy five. Well, we go there the next day and we set up 110 chairs just in case. And Ed and his friends showed up and they're like, no, you're going to need more than this. And they all start setting up chairs in the gym like crazy. And we go have a little prayer meeting with them and I come back to sit on stage and the whole gym is full.

It looks like steak conference and they've got cameras set up in the aisles and I'm like, oh, my gosh, this is my worst nightmare come true. I don't want to speak with cameras pointing at me. Just curious, did you let your mission president know about this beforehand or did you just figure it's going to be a small thing you needed to know? Funny story on that.

And then I'll come back to to this dialog here. We actually had two of the assistants to the mission president also speaking with us. And I assumed that they had passed the information up to the mission president and they had not. So, no, he had no idea that we had done this until I bragged about it in our numbers report, because I said that I taught 300 first vision accounts and that made them a little suspicious. So they ended up calling my companion. I'm glad he's the one that answered the phone and not me, because it was like 30 minutes of him just looking pale and saying, yes, sir.

Yes, sir. So I think I think he got told that he was not supposed to be doing things like that. But yeah, there ended up being 300 people seated in the gym and then there were several more lining the hallways or along the walls and out in the hall. There's a pretty pretty good sized audience there. And I was the first speaker. So I got up and I told them about the first vision and I told them that I had a testimony that the Book of Mormon was true. And I challenged them to read it and sat down and and it was weird because they all applauded. And I'm like, wait, is that allowed?

I didn't know you can clap at church, but OK, cool. Basically, the way we had it set up was it wasn't a debate. It was just a dialogue. So our side got up and we got to share and then their side got up and it got to share. What they didn't realize is that they were just preaching to their own people because the only Mormons present were us. And we thought that we were so clever doing that.

In retrospect, I don't think that was very nice, but you know, it is what it is. But they got up and they pretty much talked about how the Bible was inerrant and that's what they spent most of their time talking about. And then we got to do a little bit of a question and answer, which Kari Lighton took care of.

I didn't deal with that at all. And then it was over and I was really relieved. And people just wanted to talk to us. I remember this one lady came out of the crowd and she said, you know, God was talking to me the whole time you were talking.

He kept telling me I love him. And I was like, that's cool. And after the dialogue, you know, Ed was a Calvinist.

All his friends were Calvinist. And he said that at the during the dialogue that a lot of the Christians present were convinced that I was elect. And I'm like, well, of course I am. I'm LDS. I'm just surprised that you guys would catch on to that.

Not that I even knew what elect meant, but no, I'm like, I'm a member. So, yes, that sounds about right to me. But they ended up being so big that they decided they wanted to do another dialogue. So they had a second one which had six to eight hundred people present. And then they ended up doing a third one in Anaheim, California. And Robert Millet and Pastor Greg Johnson flew down and there was somewhere between two to three thousand people present. I always said there were two thousand, but Ed says that that's very modest.

And it was it was more like three thousand. I wasn't actually there because it was outside my mission boundaries. And so I felt like being the the rule guy that I was, I could not go out of my boundaries and go. It turned out tons of missionaries went out of their boundaries to go and the mission president was there and I was the only one that didn't go. So I kind of feel like I missed out on that. So how far along was this in your mission again? The the first dialogue happened when I was probably five months out and then there were a couple months in between all of these. So the third one happened when I was probably a year more than a year out. I was probably three fourths of the way through my mission.

So it's just a long series of events that kept happening. And during that time, I just I ran into lots of pastors and a lot of Christians and I had a lot of good discussions and opportunity to talk to Christians on my mission and and kind of get a feel for for what they believed. But by the time I did come home, I had a strong testimony that the church was true and I decided that I was going to be an amateur apologist and I was going to make sure that nobody ever fell into the trap that I did, where I almost was lured out of out of the church by some, you know, evangelical with an oversized brain.

I'm like, I'm going to protect the people in the church. And that's what my life calling is going to be. Sounds like you had a pretty, pretty eventful mission, even though you went stateside. What was it like to come home from the from the mission? What did you do after?

Did you did you go to school? Did you start working both? How was that transition? The transition was incredibly difficult. I came home and I was so on fire and I was so used to having a schedule and and doing one thing that I really enjoyed doing.

And the state president told me that roughly half of return missionaries go inactive after coming home. And I'm like, I'm not going to let that happen to me no matter what. I can be really stubborn when I put my mind to it. And I started going to the singles ward and I really didn't feel like I fit in. So I I ended up getting really depressed and just didn't have any friends, didn't click with anybody. And I held on and stayed active by sheer willpower. I hated going to church during like right after coming off of my mission.

I would just feel depressed, like I wasn't as cool as everybody else and I never was going to be. And I ended up working at this at this bakery for a while. And after a while, I started actually going on dates and things because, you know, after your mission, your next step is that you need to get married.

Everybody knows that. And I got I got a good number of first dates, but I didn't ever get a second. I remember just kind of having these thoughts like talking to God and being like, OK, God, like I know that you have the power to make me not so awkward. So let's do this. You know, go ahead and work your magic because you're the one that you know, in Mormonism, it's a commandment to get married. It's not just something that you can do. It's something that you must do in order to obtain your exaltation. And in the Book of Mormon, it says that God will give no commandments except he shall prepare a way that they may be fulfilled. So so I'm like, OK, like this is your commandment. And you said that you would prepare a way.

So so prepare a way. And there was no way prepared. Things were very bleak. And I actually got into sort of an attitude of wanting to shake my fist at God because I knew better than he did. And and how dare he not bless me after after my two years of service. But yeah, initially it was it was really rough going for me coming home from my mission. And it's just such an emotional and a spiritual high. And you come back and suddenly you have to live a normal life again.

And there's no training for going back to that normal life. And there was some awkwardness because like I remember kind of going after some of the ladies and using some of the same stalker tactics that you use when you're an LDS missionary. And that doesn't go over very well. So so you were using the commitment pattern with them? Pretty much.

Yeah. I mean, you just don't come off like a normal person right after your mission. If you catch my drift, it's like, you know, when you're a missionary, everything that you do has an ulterior motive. Like I am trying to lead this person to baptism. And then you try to take that to the dating realm.

And it's like people can see through that. I am trying to lead this person to marriage. Yes. It's like this guy seems really serious for a first date. You're like giving me interview questions.

You're like, how many children are you willing to stay home? Or the big one, right? Like when you're a missionary, it's like, if you come to find that this is true, will you get baptized? Like if you come to find that you are in love with me, will you marry me? I never actually did that one, but I could see myself having done that if I just thought of it. So you were working at the bakery and you were going on some dates. What came next? Well, I ended up meeting a couple of guys that needed a roommate. And so I finally got out of my parents' house, which is a very big deal and really helpful for the dating scene.

I recommend it highly. And so, yeah, I finally, I had like these two guys that were my roommates and they were really good friends of mine. And so they helped me get connected to the other people in the singles ward. And all of a sudden it just changed everything. Once I had friends and a social network of people to see and talk to, it was night and day. All of a sudden I wanted to go to church again.

And they made me, they let me do, I was able to do like missionary work and things like that again on the side. I got my first girlfriend at 23, just this, this girl in the ward and, and we started dating seriously. And next thing I knew we were engaged. How long, how long was it between starting to date and being engaged? Was it the typical Mormon three weeks? Yes. No, no, not quite. It was like three months from dating to engaged and then another three months to married after that.

Oh, wow. So you were, you were flirting with disaster there. You were pushing like, uh, you know, towards being a menace to society. I was very close to, actually I was a menace to society for like a week or two and I kind of planned it that way on purpose. Cause I'm like, Ooh, I'm going to be the bad guy for the first time in my life. Cause I'm going to be a menace to society. You wanted to test the chaotic evil waters. You're like, I'm done with being lawful good for now. Yeah.

Yeah. I was like, I'm going to try being chaotic, you know, evil for two weeks. And uh, it was, it was, it was riveting.

It was amazing. Um, but I was, you know, I was really proud of my track record because I married a hundred percent of the women that I dated by the way, I still have that track record. That's pretty dead, man. I'm very successful when it comes to dating. It turns out it's if I can get, if I can get to the second date, which never happens.

It's like intense stare. We're like polar opposites. I'm at 0%. Oh man. Hold on. My mic's acting, getting tangled in my hair. Just kidding.

I don't have a hair. So you got married within, uh, two, three years of being home? Well, no, it did take me a couple of years before I met her.

So I was 25 when I got me and for being a return missionary, that is a long time. I was kind of losing hope. I'm like, I'm going to go my whole life and not have a girlfriend. And then, and then I met her and, and I, you know, I watched all my friends get married, you know, the odd quad and everybody. And it's just, just that thing, you know, just like, man, you know, God must really love them and not be, I can laugh about it now, but I wasn't laughing at the time I was crying. So when you, when you got married and seemed like things were going upwards, you know, uh, do you feel like God had been blessing you for your missionary service and like, and where did that lead?

Because we all know where you are now, but we're trying to connect the dots when you finished your mission and how you got to where you are here. So after you got married, how did, where, where were you headed after that? So I absolutely believe that God was blessing me. In fact, I got to the point where I was like, even the awkwardness that God didn't cure me from was actually God blessing me because he was trying to protect my relationship with my future wife and making sure that I got with the right person and good job, God, like you're amazing. And so, and so I was definitely more committed than ever at that point.

I was happier than I'd ever been and had just complete bliss for the first two or three years of that marriage. And in the meantime, I was really gearing up the, the apologist stuff. I was getting online and I was debating Christians and it's just something that I, I really felt called to do during my spare time. And I ended up, I guess it was my junior year, I ended up going to Texas State University and I was studying for an English literature degree and about that time Mitt Romney was running for president and I just kept reading these articles from evangelicals or about evangelicals who they would not support Mitt Romney. And I was a, I was a big Mitt Romney fan because I was LDS.

I think that was a big part of it. And I was like, man, it is not fair that people would not vote for him just because of his religious affiliation. And I just felt this, this strong pull to write a book and I'd kind of on my mission, I'd kind of gathered all my arguments together and I'd kind of toyed with the idea of putting it together in a book. But at this point I was like, man, I need to, I need to help Mitt Romney win this election because we need a Mormon in the Oval Office. And, and man, how much would that help the church, you know, look good.

And, and I just saw so many positives for the church if he had been elected. And so I actually dropped out of school to write this book. That is how committed I was. And I wasn't doing great in Spanish anyway.

See if, if only they'd sent me to the Spanish-speaking country, everything would have been different. So I dropped out of school and I published this book, A Biblical Defense of Mormonism. That was in 2012 and actually finished it after the election.

So it didn't really make any sort of an impact, not that it would have anyways. But, but I put it online and, and people started to purchase it. And it got me a lot of attention that I didn't really want from evangelicals wanting to debate and have conversations with me because I had written this book. And right about that time, I'd also started my Facebook group, Evangelicals and Latter-day Saints, except it wasn't called that at first. Yeah. Tell us about what it was at first.

Yeah. So, interesting stuff about that. I started a group called the, what was it called? The Mormon Grace Project because I decided I was going to start studying grace to become a more effective weapon. And I was like, I need to really study this out and learn more about it because these guys are constantly pushing grace and I need to figure out what the weakness is in their argument so I can take them down and show them that, that Mormonism is the true gospel, not their watered down Protestantism. And, and I invited evangelicals to the group, even though some of my LDS friends told me not to do it, that it was a big mistake.

And I'm like, no, I'm doing it because they will force us to ask questions that we would not ask otherwise. And so I got a group together and we started going through one book of the scriptures at a time and looking for, from Genesis on, just looking for instances of grace, how it worked, who got it, and that kind of thing. It ended up turning into a big group and people wanted to argue. So I turned it into a debate group, Evangelicals and Latter-day Saints. And my main goal initially was to use the group to bring ex-Mormons back to the church and to convince any evangelicals that I could that the church was true. It ended up kind of backfiring on me like so many things do because I ended up meeting a lot of, a lot of these ex-Mormon Christians. And when you're LDS, the stigma is these guys are sons and daughters of perdition. They are as evil as evil gets. You know, anything that they say about the church is going to be false.

It's going to be a lie. You know, they're going to try to charm me out. And so I was, I was really cautious about it, but I had a couple of them that were my admins in the group and they shared with me their stories and I kept hearing these stories about people leaving. And I came to the conclusion where I was like, man, like some of these leaders are going to have it, have it tough on judgment day for things that they've done, but the church is still true and these guys are still accountable for leaving the church.

That makes sense. I kind of had a similar sentiment toward people like Sandra Tanner, you know, I wasn't that I hated her or people who left the church. I just felt really kind of sad for them to think that they had so much knowledge that they had received the temple ordinances or, you know, however, however far they went in the church and then for them to reject that, you know, like, whereas if you compare it to evangelicals who have never known the church, usually Mormons have kind of a higher view of them like, oh, they're good people. You know, they're really seeking after truth and they just haven't found the truth yet. Whereas like people who left the church are like, oh, those people like have the light and they willingly went against it.

That's, that's, that's not good. Absolutely. I had a much higher view going in of the Christians who'd never been part of the church. You know, I'm like, I'm like, they can throw accusations out because they don't really know what they're talking about. But the ex-Mormons were straight up lying is how I saw it at the time. But I started to befriend a lot of them and, and I sympathized with a lot of their stories. I couldn't quite understand why anybody would leave the church though. And I was, I was so stubborn. I was like, I'm never going to leave the church no matter what happens. I was like, even if, even if the whole church crumbles around me and there's just one ward left and there's like six people in it, I'm going to be one of those six people because nothing on this planet can convince me to leave the church. Like I'm among the most faithful that there is.

Yeah. So I gotta say it was, it was kind of fun watching you go through all of that. I was one of the ex-Mormon evangelical Christians that you invited to the Mormon grace project. And then later I became an admin in that group and you know, you and I talked a lot online and you know, some of the, I think you even did like a April fool's day joke where you pretended that you had let you, you posted that you were going to leave the LDS church and then, you know, called everybody out who was, who was praising that, Oh, it's an April fool's joke. You know, this is kind of fun to watch you go through that. Did you really do that? I, I did. I, I'm a horrible person on April fool's day.

Actually pretty much every year I change my religion, but I do it to protect everybody the rest of the year, because as long as I can be horrible one day, then you know that I will be honest with you the rest of the year. But yeah. And I was saying stuff like, you know, it's not grace if you have to earn it and stuff like that. And I remember one, even talk who got on the thread and she was like, you know, what's funny is everything you just said is absolutely true. And there was actually a member of the church of the ward who got on.

She was kind of less active, but I knew, I knew her. And she said, you know, this really struck a chord with me. And I think you're right, Michael. And I was like, you know, it was an April fool's joke. I'm like, Oh no, that kind of reminds me of when one time I was talking to Christians in a chat room and I said, well, I've put all my trust to save me. You know, I don't trust any of my works or anything else to save me. And that was when I was transitioning out of the Mormon church. And then they asked me, so why are you still Mormon then?

Because everything you just said was biblical. And I, you know, I think that kind of challenge, maybe that was the same for you, but for me it was like a real wake up calls to like, wow, you're right. Like what I just said was not Mormon theology.

Yeah, it was, it was exactly like that for me. And, and, and really it was when I decided to start studying grace is when everything started to turn upside down for me because I was studying grace and I was getting really frustrated because there's so many different definitions of grace in the church and salvation. You know, I'm like, okay, you know, when the scripture here talks about salvation, is it just talking about terrestrial salvation or is it celestial? Like is this exaltation or is it just being saved from my sin? And it was, it was really tough because I had to keep connecting these dots and it was so complicated it's, and I started to get jealous because I'm like, man, my Christian friends, you know, if you ask them how grace works, they'll have a unified answer.

And it's this really simple, elegant gospel. But when I would ask my Mormon friends, it varied depending on who I was asking. It was always a different story and nobody really seemed to know. It was this thing that was talked about a lot in, in our holy book and, and in conference, but it's, it was still a mystery. And so I was really trying to figure out what grace was, hence the Mormon grace project. And during my search, you know, I was in, in a secret LDS Facebook group for apologetics and, and they started talking about this argument called the impossible gospel argument. And they're like, Hey, does anybody have any advice for dealing with this argument?

You know, a couple of people were having a hard time with it. And so I'm like, you know what? I'm going to give it a go because this is kind of along the lines of what I'm studying anyway.

And so maybe it'll help me come up with the right question while I'm doing my study. So I started looking into it and, and it was a really tough argument. I felt like I could pretty much deal with any argument that an evangelical brought up.

In fact, I feel like I hardly ever lost any arguments, but that's, you know, that's just my Mormon mind. Like thinking probably I probably lost lots of them, but he's just talking about some of the verses in the book of Mormon, like second Nephi 25, 23, where we were saved by grace after all we can do. And Moroni 10, 32, you know, we, we, we receive grace if we deny ourselves of all ungodliness.

And I'm like, wow. Like I hadn't really looked at those verses that way, but that is definitely what they said. And the more I thought about it, the more I realized I had not denied myself of all ungodliness or done all that I could do. And so I really was trying at that point to repent and to be a pure person. And the harder I tried, the more I realized that I wasn't achieving that.

And in the Mormon mindset, it's like a staircase, you know, they always say like, well, I'm not perfect yet, but I'm on the path, you know, I'm, I'm getting there. I'm, I'm heading in that direction. But I, I couldn't even say that I was heading in that direction. My life was like a spiritual rollercoaster is what it kind of looked like. You know, some weeks I would start with just problem A and I'd solve problem A and then I'd have like a bunch more problems and sins that I committed.

So I'm just like, great. Like I'm not getting anywhere. And the whole impossible gospel argument, it was like a giant leech that was just attached to me all the time, sucking away at my life force. And no matter how much fun I was having somewhere in the back of my mind, there was always this nagging voice that was saying, you're not doing all you can do. You haven't denied yourself of all ungodliness.

If you were to die right now, you would not be going to heaven because you do not deserve grace. And it just put me in a state of anguish. And I was praying to God to give me something, anything to defeat this argument. And to my surprise, God gave me something somewhere in the groups. I don't even know how I came across this concept. It was an alien concept, pun intended, but that was alien righteousness.

And I learned about that. It's like, okay, like Christ's righteousness is imputed to me and he is perfect. He has done all he could do and he has no ungodliness. And if I'm going based on that, I'm okay. I don't need to worry about these things.

I'm secure. And, and so I was like, great. The impossible gospel is, it's nothing now.

It is defeated on the floor. Like that was awesome. And so I went back to my Mormon apologist life and I stayed that way for a couple of months. So proud of my intellect because I came up with imputed righteousness of all things to beat back this argument. And then one day God just opened my eyes to the fact that that's not a Mormon doctrine. And I remember even going through it in my head and I was like, wait a second. If Christ's righteousness is imputed to me, wouldn't that include his baptism and any ordinances that he went through?

And if it does, I don't need those things. And then I realized, oh my goodness, I'm not Mormon anymore. I'm a Christian. We thank you for tuning into this episode of the outer brightness podcast. We'd love to hear from you. Please visit the outer brightness podcast page on Facebook. Feel free to send us a message there with comments or questions by clicking, send a message at the top of the page and we would appreciate it if you give the page a like. We also have an outer brightness group on Facebook where you can join and interact with us and others as we discuss the podcast, past episodes and suggestions for future episodes, et cetera. You can also send us an email at outer brightness at gmail.com.

We hope to hear from you soon. You can subscribe to the outer brightness podcast on Apple podcasts, cast box, Google podcasts, pocket casts, pod feed, Spotify, and stitcher. Also, you can check out our new YouTube channel and if you like it, be sure to lay hands on that subscribe button and confirm it. If you like what you hear, please give us a rating and review wherever you listen and help spread the word. You can also connect with Michael, the ex Mormon apologist at from water to wine.org where he blogs and sometimes Paul and Matthew do as well. Music for the outer brightness podcast is graciously provided by the talented Brianna Flournoy and by Adam's road. Learn more about Adam's road by visiting their ministry page at adamsroadministry.com.

Stay bright, Flyer flies. Lord, to whom shall we go? You have the words of eternal life and we have believed and have found that you are the holy one of God. The word made fresh, the risen Son. Heaven and earth will pass away but the word of the Lord endures forever. All this world is in decay but the word of our God through ages remains. Lord, you promised that we as your church would remain upon this rock and the gates of hell will not prevail against us.

Cause you have power to keep your word unspoiled in purity. Heaven and earth will pass away but the word of the Lord endures forever. All this world is in decay but the word of our God through ages remains. As the rain falls down from heaven and waters the earth bringing it light so the word that goes out from your mouth will not return empty but does what you desire. Lord, we hear your word and believe in you. Heaven and earth will pass away but the word of the Lord endures forever. All this world is in decay but the word of our God through ages remains. The word of God remains.