High Tide Youth Ministry

Temple Opening

2009-06-17T08:31:00.000-07:00

Tuesday was a very eventful day. We started by going to visit Sandra Tanner (Utah Lighthouse Ministries)who gave us a talk on Mormon Temple rituals. As a former Mormon she and her late husband have an amazing story. She has truly done amazing things for the kingdom by shedding light on the LDS religion. After an hour with her and some time in her bookstore, we were off to visit a temple.

We had a chance to walk through a Mormon Temple in West Jordan. I have to tell you it looked like and impressive hotel lobby. Before we actually entered, we were escorted into a tent to watch a short intro movie to what we will be seeing and how the temple plays in people’s lives.

One thing that still boggles my mind is the fact that there is virtually no talk about Jesus. In the video we saw they talked about heaven and how it would be nothing without their family, which would be kind of sad if we think about not having a family here on earth, but we are going to be in HEAVEN! Jesus the creator of the universe, savior of my life is going to be there! I’ll in the presence of the creator of love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness and self-control joy, I will be totally fulfilled. I love my family, don’t miss hear me, I just love Jesus more!

Anyways, after all of that we went around Woods Cross, Utah to go door to door and do some survey’s and while going door to door, Josh had a chance to get into a conversation with a man named Randy. He wasn’t a LDS member or a member of any church so Josh had the chance to talk to him about the LDS church and a little about grace. And here is the God moment. When Josh started talking about grace, the man stopped and said wait one second, he walked to his back room and brought out a book where just the night before he was making notes about grace. So it was just God putting us in a place to talk to someone who needed to be talk to. He was blown away that just the night before he was thinking about grace and here we have Josh come talking about grace. They exchanged numbers and hope he keep in contact.

We also had other member of our group get into a great conversation at Starbucks, with some LDS members who left the church and were now agnostic and atheists. I have to tell you Starbucks has been an awesome place. Not only for coffee, for those addicts (please pray for them) but also as a ministry tool. We had a great conversation go on last night and the night before we had 30 Christians singing Christian songs inside the Starbucks which allowed for great conversations after.

Today we are at BYU so pray for us.

P.S. Aneta we love you and will miss you. Have a safe trip home!

Temple Square

2009-06-15T19:27:00.000-07:00

Pastor Loren, from New Covenanting Community Church who we are joining with for this mission, had a great idea for devotionals. Since this mission trip is so Truth based, and talking about God and the Gospel to others, that our devotionals should be inwardly, spiritually refreshing. The reason I think believe it is such a great idea is because we as Christians can get so caught up in doing the “right” things that we forget about the inside and simply worry about the outside.

It is easy to fake being good; it is hard to truly be honest. We are meditating on Psalm 139 this morning, thinking about those dark places in our lives that we refuse to let God in. Psalm 139 is one we should all read and reflect sometime in our life. If God knows us from the inside out, if He knows our hearts, let us take some time to get to know our own hearts.

If you can keep us in prayer: for the trip in general and for our hearts, that we can dig down deep and allow Gods light to shine!

Bill McKeever from MRM.org came to speak to our group about the concept of LDS forgiveness. He did a great job of really showing the difference between the truth of forgiveness and the LDS view. After we head to Temple Square which I believe after a slow start, turned out to be an eye opener for our new comers. We did all the tours and talked to the missionaries there, but it was our last conversation that our eyes were opened to the lost people trapped in Mormonism.

We were finishing the tour and we had a chance to talk to the sister missionaries one on one and ask great questions that hopefully leave them thinking.

Some of the things the missionaries said really hit our hearts. The missionaries saying things like “Salvation is earned by hard work and simply saying ‘I believe in Christ as my Savior’ is too easy.” Broke our hearts. It is saying like those that remind us why we are here and the need for more missionaries here in Utah!

Here are some of our thoughts on the day, enjoy!

Pray for someone!

Day 2... on the road

2009-06-15T19:11:00.000-07:00

Day 2 has been awesome. Going a day earlier to Utah and splitting the driving days to two days instead of one has made things so much more fun. We have had so much fun stopping at random obscure spots along the way. We have a short video to show you the obscure places we stopped, but our highlight was the Grand Canyon. I think it really set the mood knowing that after we were going to leave there was Utah.

While on one of the cliffs, we got into conversation with some people and we took pictures for each other’s groups then got into conversation about where we are from and where we were going. We told them we were going to Utah and why and they just happened to be Christians and were happy to hear of Gods work and that we would be in their prayer. It is encouraging to meet Christians in the most random places.

The Grand Canyon was amazing; who knew it was so big. We all just wanted to sit and not leave. It really speaks a lot about how wonderful God is and his creation. For me personally it made me realize how BIG God continues to be and he can change the hearts of anyone, if He can make something that grand. Anyway, enjoy!

God is Good

Born to Ride

2009-06-13T22:23:00.000-07:00

Day one... driving and it just happens to be my(Stephen) birthday! We left Fresno this morning at 9:00 am and drove for ten hours only making a few stops. I am used to having my birthday celebrated during a summer mission but today was special, I got to celebrate my birthday in two different states!

We met this morning and Josh and Cori had gifts waiting for me and they were amazing, it is like they know me! They got me two shirts, magic trick kit, a football, harmonica, tambourine, yo yo, and probably a few other things I am forgetting. After a small gift opening we were on the road.

The drive was long but fun. We stopped at a Cheveron and took some picture in front of some abandoned saloon.

We then drove some more spending time in flagstaff (eating dinner at Chili's and stopping at Target) I guess Target makes Cori feel at home :-).

We ended the night looking for a geocache(unsuccessfully). Tomorrow will be a better day, stopping by the Grand Canyon before arriving at American Fork.

How beautiful are the feet of those who bring good news!

2009-06-11T16:28:00.001-07:00

It is so amazing how many mission opportunities are going around CCF. We have a mission teams going to Mendota, CA; a team going to El Salvador with Living Water, and a team going to Utah. But let's not forget that everyday, every conversation, every one of our actions is a mission opportunity. We don't to have to cross the border or go to a third world country to make an impact, we can make an impact where you are, right now.

For those who don't know we are headed to Utah to bring the good news. We will be traveling to several locations hoping to engage people in conversation to ask questions and share the gift of grace. We will be in Salt Lake City walking around Temple Square, walking around the neighborhoods of Woods Cross, spending a couple of days on BYU's campus talking to students, and finally spend time in Manti for the Miracle Pageant.

The Miracle Pageant is what the entire trip is leading up to. The Pageant is the equivalent to the Christian reenactment of Easter. The Pageant is a very elaborate reenactment of the Book of Mormon; how Joseph Smith received the Book of Mormon, what happened when Jesus came to the Americas, and the best part about the Pageant is that there are thousands of LDS Members there to engage in conversation.

Some might be interested in knowing how we "engage" in conversation and what exactly is the tone. I want to assure you that it is non confrontational and we do a lot of question asking, letting them explain their own religion, clarifying, and walking them through their own Gospel which is truly another Gospel(as well as no real gospel at all Galatians 1:6-7). As we walk them through their own Gospel we pray that they feel the weight of what their "gospel" calls for, perfection.

If they feel the weight, it is then that LDS Member can hear(and when I say hear I mean actually comprehending) the GOOD NEWS. That Christ has died for them and they can know TODAY that if they were to die they would live with Heavenly Father.

As all the wrinkles have been ironed out we ask that you pray for our hearts and the hearts of those we will get into conversation with.

God is Good!