About 3 years ago, I was playing a game called Team Fortress 2, when all of the 24 players left the server except for me and a player named "Amulon", later to be known as Bryan. We friended each-other in the game and soon joined a clan together and became partners in creating our own gaming group of warriors. As we became better friends we each realized the other person wasn't your everyday guy... something was different, neither of us swore or used crude humor, and we were both very honorable people. That's when we found out that we're both heavily involved in our faiths. Mine being Orthodox Christianity, and his being The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints.
I had no idea what Mormonism was at the time, I "knew" Jehovah's Witnesses were bad and that Mormons might be something like that, but this Mormon was grade "A" material! I figured he's just a Christian, like me! I was happy that we would both be going to heaven someday.
After a while I learned more about the LDS church and came to the conclusion that we did not belong to the same church after all... That we believe in two different Gods, two different Jesus' and that our two faiths could never be reconciled... Our only option was to investigate both faiths and see if we could find out which one, if not both, was false.
So here we are, We've spent about a year going through intensive investigation on each of our respective faiths and decided we'd post them on the web just in case our discussions proved to be helpful in any way for those out there who may run into a similar (completely random) situation.
Today Bryan and I are great friends and although we joke around quite a bit, we both have incredible respect for the other person and their faith. We are both trying to find the truth, for God is truth and the truth will set us free. Please keep us in your prayers and any comments are welcome.
Let the games begin! W007!
-PaulO
Yay my first blog subscription! Great idea Paul. I am interested to see where this goes.
ReplyDeleteThis is extremely intriguing to me, Kudos for taking the leap. Although I don't know a lot of specifics about the Mormon faith I must say the few that I've met in my life were definately top notch people: kind, respectful, loving, considerate, holding family in high regard, non-judgemental, and very charitable.
ReplyDeleteI'm a pastor at the non-denominational christian church where Paul attends and I also happen to be his friend and cousin. I have to say that I have never seen a christian look so deeply and so efficiently into another religion. Many of us claim to have looked into another faith and what we mean is we read a few paragraphs on Wikipedia. When Paul says he "looked into" Mormonism he is actually being quite modest. If looking into it could be taken to mean buying and reading the Book of Mormon and a shelf full of other sacred writings found among the LDS, praying for the witness, watching every documentary available concerning Mormonism, visiting a Mormon church and then engaging a group of the local LDS church leaders in a discussion in one of their homes, sincerely wanting to find the truth... then yes I guess you could say he looked into it. A few of us were actually getting a little concerned for him at first because we believed it was dangerous to consider other faiths for fear of being deceived by them. Whatever the case may be, my fears for Paul were short lived after I heard him out on the matter. "A committed and honest search for the truth is the only way anyone could ever leave the religion of their birth and join the "true faith" which ever faith that may be" Paul said, "even as christians we cannot believe what we are told just because we were told it, we have to dig in and look deep and make sure that what we are believing is the truth." He helped me see that the true faith is the one that is left after all the questions have been asked and all the dirt has been brought back out from under the rug. Perhaps those who refuse to question their faith are only too sure they are believing a lie? Are you sacred to find out you've been wrong? Or maybe you have been right and your questions will only help you become that much more convinced. I encourage you too follow this blog and keep an open mind. I'll be praying that the Truth reveals Himself to us all!
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