Steve Bloor penned a letter to his congregation after resigning from his position as Bishop in his LDS stake.
What he did took much courage and I commend him for not only being willing to investigate his organization’s history, but also for acting upon what he discovered and not putting the problems of Mormonism on the proverbial Mormon shelf.
Here’s an excerpt from his letter:
I realise this will shock you. It has truly shocked me how quickly a testimony of the Church can unravel when Joseph Smith’s divine calling as God’s prophet is undermined by learning the truth about him.
I have come to believe over the last month that there are so many inconsistencies and problems with the historicity of the Book of Mormon, as well as the divinity of Joseph Smith’s calling as prophet, that I can no longer, in good faith, fulfill my calling as Bishop of Helston Ward.
You can read his entire letter here.
Christ Alone Wyoming 
It’s good that he left the cult of Smith. But he’s no better off, according to his own blog – where he states this about himself today:
Evidentiary apologetics is not an evangelical tool.
Mr. Bloor needs to heed the warning in Matthew 12:43ff. May God have mercy on his soul.
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I agree with Manfred’s comment.. while it is good to hear he left behind his false beliefs in the Mormon church, He is now just in another form of delusion. There is a new campain out to combat the “I’m a Mormon” one. The “I’m an ex-Mormon” campaign looked good at first but then I realized these people were not Mormon any more but none of them proclaimed they had found the One True God, just that they were free from the Mormon belief system. To be honest, seeing those videos made me just as sad as the Mormon ones.
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Nicole,
Oh my – those people in the ex-Mormon videos are heart breaking. They both put flesh on the warning Christ gave in His teaching about the clean swept house.
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To the commenter who left a comment about praying for Steve Bloor, I sincerely apologize that while trying to remove your comment from the spam filter, I accidentally deleted it. Can you try commenting again?
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I understand where these ex-Mormons are. When I learned what a fraud the LDS church was, and how I had been “had,” I decided that religion wasn’t worth my time and for a while was angry at the very idea of God. Nevertheless, about 18 months later I was invited to play soccer with guys who turned out to be Navigators, and after a few weeks I began attending Bible study with them until in January 1974 when I became a Christian.
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wow thanks to those who have been walk away from Mormon faith,it is not the church problem or the leaders of the church problem,it is he or she problem,there are lot of members walk away from the lords church because they not happy or agree what the leaders have taught them,or other hand they cant stand in the lords church,paying tithing,or attend church meeting,do missionary work,or keep the commandment,or keep the word of wisdom,or attending temple work,or to keep the Sabbath day holy,well im happy to join the lords church it is not Joseph smith church or other people church or Mormon church or Moses church,it is the lord church every teaching is true,PAUL the prophet extols the high status of charity,1CORINTHIANS.13.4-7;and also 1CORINTHIANS.14.33-34;and also 3NEPHI 27.1-8;or ISAIAH.43.6-7;this is my message to all my brothers and sisters in the gospel of Jesus Christ,hope all of you will find love and peace in your new faith,
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When we end up leaving the Latter-Day Saint church its due to the anachronisms and the fact that we discover so much of early church history, the Joseph Smith story etc has been distorted, twisted and hidden from us. My issue was not with the membership who I still hold a profound love towards. I find it hard to turn to evangelical christianity because so much of it is anathema to me, and to be quite frank evangelical christians seem to be even more self-righteous, nuttier and there are so many more cracks in their denomination.
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jjdw,
Do you believe in creationism? Are you truely saved? A really good book to read is; “In Six Days, Why Fifty Scientists Choose to Believe in Creation”, edited by John F. Ashton PhD, copy writted in 2003. There are Christians who believe to the core of their being, that the bible is true and factual. When one is that compassionate about something, you want to yell it to the world. I guess we get too excited sometimes, but we can’t wait to tell someone how to live for eternity with God in heaven. God/Jesus, wants us to finish his work. We are to spread the gospel to one person or millions. It is important that we reach as many people who are victoms of this world. We need to help them see the path that will give them the understanding as to why they exist and what purpose they have . A person who gives of themselves totally to the Lord on God’s terms not ours ,will be saved and forgiven of sins. As followers of Christ, we will be confronted by scoffers. Our life goes on the same as other peoples do. Life can be difficult. But, we have God as our Father who will protect us. He knows what we need but wants us to ask for it through prayer. God wants us to have conversation with Him and let Him know whatever concerns us no matter how small. As long as there are challenges in life, we will continue to pray for guidence. God wants us to depend on Him. That is why he doesn’t make life perfect for us. We would have no reason to do anything, or work really hard to reach for our dreams. Life would have no meaning. But our heavenly Father has figured it all out in advance. It is gratifying to know we are not alone.
We are living in the end times. We don’t have forever to let people know how they can get to heaven, and have that personal relationship with our creator. It is up to people, what they choose to do. All we can do is to get them thinking and searching to the point that they want to know more. We will have planted a seed. They have many questions to be answered. When they are ready, they will commit totally to the Lord God in secret or with the help of a friend or preacher. They inturn will study the Word and share God with others, because they want to. Their love of the Lord God is tramendous. It is an emotion I had never felt before when I was filled with love over flowing, as saved Christian. Many many of my prayers have been answered. We Christians aren’t trying to be over the top with excitment. We may come across as acting rightous, but we are sharing the truth of the bible because we CARE about all the lost souls. I guess we are rightious, in that we feel we are right about what we believe. I am very sorry if you have been turned off by organized religion. But our faith and trust in God the creator, isn’t religion. Religion is man made. Set up with procedures, rules, laws, administration, etc. the bible actually tells us how to go about creating the church. There has to be organization or the church won’t work. The belief system is seperate and yet connected to the church. I guess the way we chose to praise the Lord God distinguishes groups of believers from each other.
What has happened is that a lot of churches have lost sight of the message. Instead, the various
churches spend a great deal of money on entertainment, watering down the bible, and avoid talking about sin, or hell. They want only happy sermans so the congregation leaves joyful. But the whole message not being told, is offensive to God.
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“the bible actually tells us how to go about creating the church. There has to be organization or the church won’t work. The”
And what the typical american protestant church goer calls church is as far from the NT as mormonism…
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flee: Your statement, “And what the typical american protestant church goer calls church is as far from the NT as mormonism…” is without meaning because there is no “typical American protestant”. Broad brush statements not so good.
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” is without meaning because there is no “typical American protestant”. Broad brush statements not so good.”
Manfred – look up Barna stats, and read Jeremiah 7. Broad brush often hits closer to home than we care to admit…
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flee – Barna is an uber-pragmatist and I want no part of him. Jer 7 is pronouncing woes on Judah, not the US of A. For sure, we can see the same types of idolatry in every culture and time. My point is that there is no more “typical” American church goer than there is an average temperature of the planet Earth. It’s an artificial marker.
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OK, I like your avatar to much to argue with Manfred, and I am not endorsing barna, any christian poll service will tell the same story. Jeremiah pronounced general judgments on all of the land, that was my point there too. He may be accused of using a broad brush. I could come up with a list of bullet points that defines the greater part of american churchianity. I think if I could hit the 75% mark that would justify my use of the word typical.
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jjdw, first, thank you for stopping by here at Defending Contending. We rejoice when we have the privilege of being able to share the truth with those who are looking. Second, I am sure that it is not easy for anybody to leave the environment or church or religious establishment where they were raised. I commend the direction that you are going.
Our intent would not be to denigrate the friendships that you were able to cultivate within the Mormon church. In fact, I would daresay that there are many within evangelicalism who could use a better understanding of what it means to exhibit the love of Christ to others and how to show compassion. Sadly, your assessment of what you are seeing in evangelical circles is true far too often. However, the cracks are because of some of those who have yet to learn what it means to truly follow the Lord Jesus Christ.
You mentioned that much of evangelical Christianity is anathema. Would you be willing to elaborate a little bit? We would be happy to help you through any questions or concerns you might have.
Again, thank you for stopping by. We will remember you in our thoughts and pray the Lord will give grace and shine the light and truth of His Holy Word upon your life and soul.
Mark – TJM
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+1 to all of those that recognize that if Mormonism is not true, then no religion is true. I continue to investigate and study Mormonism everyday for the past 40+ years. It boils down to “he said, she said” as no one knows the true history of Joseph Smith and Mormonism. I have found that one side tries to be more truthful and honest then the other side and that is where I stand. It also helps that I have received a witness from the Holy Ghost, too. In case anyone wonders why I still investigate, it’s because I enjoy history. I like investigating Noah, too.
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I can emphasize with those who leave the LDS church..it is hard at first and after30 years I almost felt guilty to leave…but when I read ancient Christian history such as Eusebius and Ignatius and other early church fathers it bacame obvious that Joseph smith had no idea what the real Christian church was like.it’s as if he read the new testament and expanded a
Few concepts incorrectly to form doctrine. That and all the genetic errors about the lamanites and the incorrect book of abraham material leaved me no choice but to face the truth and leave Mormonism. I did find that eastern orthodox church seems right on to early church practices
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Suzanne,
I would suggest you rethink your opinion about Eastern Orthodoxy. They really aren’t all that different from Romanists. I wrote an article explaining about their biblical errors.
http://watchmansbagpipes.blogspot.com/2010/07/eastern-orthodoxy-is-it-really-orthodox.html
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Thanks for posting that link, Glenn. Very good analysis. Worth saving.
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