Communion with God - Seminary Statement

[Mathew Enoch Mount]

## Bellow is my testimony for entrance into Seminary School in a
Master of Divinity Program ##

Unfortunately, for about twenty years I attended the Community of
Christ Church both prior to its name change and after; moreover, the
church had been so exclusive that my father who was a professed
Methodist was passed over with the communion elements every Sunday for
the decades that I attended because he was baptized in a different
church. Most of the ministers believed that Jesus was just a man, the
scripture was full or errors, every child born into this world is free
from sin, and worst of all the ministry often taught that if a person
ever commits a sin after baptism that such a person would lose their
salvation without the ability to obtain it again. Thus, since the
‘church’ and my parents taught complete obedience to human authority
as well as the necessity to keep perfect sanctification more so than
anything else thus when I was taught by public elementary school by an
atheist instructor how to believe about the world I thus became
atheist. Overall, the combination of such doctrines in my youth
caused me and my immediate family to became almost completely
alienated from the rest of the world as a result of having to withdraw
from the world to keep so called perfect sanctification in order that
no one in the family would lose their salvation.

In order for my family and the people at my ‘church’ to believe that
they all had been sin free and following the example of Jesus Christ
thus such people that had been members for generations had to believe
that they did not commit sins and this meant that people had to
believe that their sins had not really been sins but instead had been
acts of righteousness (this is the root of the reason why such people
believed the bible to be full or errors). In order for me to be an
atheist, attend church without missing even as much as four Sundays in
twenty years, and see my mother become increasingly mentally ill,
physically ill, and other such things while my father constantly only
could find errors in any good that my mother and I did I thus out of
lack for better understanding had to eventually believe that I was the
only person that existed and that everyone else was like a figment of
my imagination (I was thus also afraid to see my own reflection in the
mirror). After obtaining my degree in philosophy, I realize that the
doctrine that everything else does not really exit is called Anti-
Realism, and this doctrine sadly is held by many professional
philosophers whom I suspect are all atheist (Anti-Realism is often
behind many systems of justice that have been administered throughout
the world such as in the case of Hitler’s Germany).

From time to time things would happen beyond my control that would
harm me, and my understanding of reality would come crashing down
because I would find that despite my willfulness to try to imagine
different circumstances and events such circumstances and events would
happen to me anyway and thus cause the most undesirable results. For
example for many years a group of children from Chicago, whom
sometimes went so far as to target elderly pedestrians, would target
me after school and would kick me in the groin for excessively long
periods of time while the pack would also kick me in other regions as
well with what felt like steel two boots. Overall, the youth that did
such things to me gave me more reason to believe that God existed than
any set of rules or teachings about how to live that I would learn
from school or church, and the reason for this is because I eventually
realized that I was not god who could be the maker of my own happiness
and righteousness.

All throughout church and school during my early years people taught
that the power of salvation is within our own hands, that if we just
put aside our differences and work together then we will bring about
the greatest happiness, and that if we just work hard enough then we
will eventually save ourselves. I did not realize that I was being
taught the doctrine of the golden calf that people would worship and
delight in what their hands had made, and I did not realize that I was
being taught the doctrine of the Tower of Bable that teaches people
that if they just put aside their god that everyone could work
together to build a mighty tower that would reach to heaven in order
that people could proclaim themselves to be their own gods without the
need of a savior. Overall, I like many other people, governments, and
many false systems of justice did not believe in the most important
commandment of God namely to love God with all of your heart, mind,
soul, and strength, and as a result I like most people in the world
completely missed all righteousness since everything that I did was
not out of a love for God but instead was out of a care for myself as
I saw myself as the source of everything that I needed including my
own happiness.

During all the time that I was a youth, everyone in any position of
authority believed me to be like the most righteous person that
existed. People believed that I was so incredibly righteous because
when people made up rules for other people to follow I thus obeyed
those rules, and people in authority thus thought that since I was so
obedient that I was someone that everyone else should be like. The
entire time during my youth that I was obedient to all man made
authority I had a incredible emptiness that could only be filled with
hatred, and for much time I rejected all gifts and pleasures as I
found others to try to use such things as a way of emotionally trying
to control me beyond what the man made rules would control me (this
control of emotions would invade my ability to believe that I was the
only one that existed and that everyone else was imaginary).

After graduating from High School, I attended Sauk Valley Community
College, and in my first few semesters of attending college I was a
work-study security guard that was put in charge of monitoring some
visiting evangelists that would stand outside of the college and read
aloud out of the bible. Lots of people attending the college believed
that they had been Christian, but almost everyone of them responded
almost violently at the sound of the bible being read in public. I
soon learned that the college had a plan to have the men that read the
bible arrested because even many professing Christians walked all the
way around the college in order to enter the school as a result of the
embarrassment, and not only that but also people that had not been
Christian acted as if they wanted to harm the evangelists (this caused
legal liability problems for the school). Overall, some college
administrators felt that they would be better to call the police and
say, "arrest these men" and if the police questioned why then the
school would say, "we assume the responsibility", and the rational for
this course of action was that arresting the men would bring lesser
monetary damages than medical bills and law suits as a result of
things getting out of hand.

At the time I believed that Christianity was completely dead and false
even though I went to church anyway every Sunday, and as a result I
believed that if the evangelists could be shown how the scripture is
clearly wrong then they could join the unity that all the ‘educated’
people had that taught at colleges and such. I thus bought my first
bible in order to show how foolish the entire book was, and I
purchased the works of Plato as well at the same time in order to
judge the scripture with what educated people knew to be the truth
that founded all of academics. In the meantime I had a college
instructor that had eight children that he taught at home as he was a
profound conservative, and the man was so very intelligent that I
thought that I needed to prove to him that the scripture was clearly
wrong in order to free him from the stupidity that everyone else that
was Christian embraced as the Christian religion. Thus during six
years of intensive study with this man, Kevin Megill (also a Sunday
school teacher at a church of over a thousand members), I not only
found the bible to be correct in everything that it said, but I also
began to realize that everyone that I had known all throughout my
lifetime for the most part had been utterly completely wrong about the
scripture and about Christianity because no one that I knew believed
in what the bible said. Overall, I thus began to believe that people
that did not care to learn about things had all been wicked, I thought
that Satan was like the most ignorant person that existed, and I had
so much pride that I did not even know what pride was as I believed
that everyone except for a select few pristine educated people had all
been like a pack of fools.

Within a short time of me studying with Kevin Megill, I venomously
attacked the teachings of my local church by reading the words of the
prophets out of the bible during public prayer and testimony time.
People at my church entered into a extreme state of shock especially
since for decades I only answered questions with yes or no and only
when people directly asked me a question. Overall, I soon entered
into one of the homes of a minister at my local church, and I
explained the bible to him nightly from after college until early in
the morning while extreme excitement was felt by us both regarding the
scripture being shared between us (this happened for about a year or
so until the man’s wife basically told me not to come over anymore to
discuss the scripture as she was a minister in the same church as
well).

Lots of people from high positions of church leadership came over to
the local church at various times as I would boldly read the words of
the prophets in a powerful voice as well as biblical condemnation of
false prophets and false teachers; moreover, a few people thus
adamantly believed that I had a calling to be part of the local
priesthood of the church that I attended. Since I was not baptized in
the church despite the twenty years that I attended and since I would
not become baptized in the church because I no longer believed in
salvation by works thus I eventually stopped attending the church all
together for fear, and thus for many years I did not attend any formal
congregation but instead continued to receive Christian discipleship
from Kevin Megill (I also got involved in various organizations that I
started and such).

As time progressed, I diligently tried to find the church that I
belonged to, and I attended many different bible study groups. After
studies in history, I began to believe that the Greek Orthodox church
was the true Christian church, and as a result I applied to Hellenic
College/ Holy Cross in a attempt to gain admission in order to attempt
to gain a degree that would lead to perhaps eventually gaining further
education to become a Greek Orthodox priest if I found the teachings
of Orthodoxy to be as correct as history and the ‘church fathers’
indicated. Overall, I was devastated to learn that I was not admitted
into the Classical Studies program that I applied to at Hellenic
College perhaps because my father (who was opposed to professional
ministry) would not help fund the high costs of private east coast
education as Boston area schools can be costly (the school however
encouraged me to apply for graduate study after my undergraduate
education was complete as funding would be more open).

Very soon I came to the conclusion that I would try to bring my
testimony about Jesus to my local city as well as to broaden my
Christian network of people by carrying a ten foot by six foot wooden
cross around in the city while giving away free bibles. Although
cross walking became a somewhat easy way to identify some other
Christians that I could work with, I found that the vast majority of
people opposed me so very much that I was becoming more and more
alienated from the public in my personal life. Soon enough others in
the community began to make their own crosses, and soon enough others
began to mimic my idea as lots of cross walkers appeared throughout
the neighboring cities. Sadly, I only performed cross walking for a
few short weeks, but about the time of the one year anniversary of my
first cross walking I found a new cross walker in the city of Rock
Falls.

I drove up to see the new cross walker beside the street, and at the
very same time Bishop John Robert Curran that came away from the Roman
Catholic Church appeared with his wife at the cross. Bishop Curran, I
later found was in no way associated with the cross walker, and the
cross walker was different than most because he traveled the United
States in a junk car in order to carry the cross in cities that he
felt lead by the spirit to go to. I learned that my cross walking a
year prior inspired the professional cross walker to come to my town
and perform cross walking.

Prior to cross walking but after working with Kevin Megill my hatred
and negative feelings that I had my entire lifetime turned into joy
that could never be extinguished, but I only began to realize the
potential for my ministry when I met with Bishop John Robert Curran.
Bishop Curran identified himself as a retired priest from the Roman
Catholic church from outside of the area, and he claimed to have
became a bishop both through ordination by a group of three Bishops
(one from the Roman Catholic Church, one from the Episcopal Church,
and one from the Greek Orthodox Church) who promoted church unity
behind the backs of greater church leaders and by his Roman Catholic
Bishop before death proclaiming, "you will be the bishop after me."
Within a short time of knowing Bishop Curran, he extended the offer of
training me to become a priest as he was disabled and retired, and I
took him up on his offer.

Bishop Curran held Temple of Faith Ministries that he identified as
being a ministry that he continued from the Roman Catholic Church (he
dealt with other churches as time progressed). Bishop Curran had the
ability to construct a congregation very easily, but he had little to
know ability to keep a congregation as a result of having bipolar
disorder. Eventually bipolar disorder combined with the fight that
Bishop Curran had with sin in his life lead him to take his own life
about a year ago.

Although I received direct instruction about how to operate a church
from Bishop Curran in such a way that pleases the members, Bishop
Curran did not focus upon scripture as much as I felt that he should
have. One time Bishop Curran assembled a small congregation of
neighbors who gathered together in a second level apartment until
every seat in the home was filled, and he had me give a sermon in
order to practice my ministry after he had ordained me to the office
of priest (it soon became interactive as everyone gathered around me
and questioned me during my speaking). Overall, I celebrated the
Eucharist with the people, but unfortunately after I went back to
school to begin a new semester Bishop Curran lost the entire
congregation because he could not drive (as was the common case with
the others as well) and he also had to move.

Bishop Curran is someone that I met just prior to having attended
Southern Illinois University for the first time, so I almost always
worked with Bishop Curran extensively during the times that I was home
for seasonal university breaks. Bishop Curran hoped that I would
found a congregation in Carbondale, within the first few semesters of
having attended, but I had to spend a few years working on networking
Christians together before I was able to found my congregation in
Carbondale. When I began my congregation in Carbondale, it was so
small that after about a year and a half when students from the
congregation graduated the congregation had no more members to serve.
I thus retired my congregation that I operated in the Interfaith
Center that I rented as I was opposed to the Interfaith ideal, had no
more members to serve, and was not allowed rental of the building
again, but I kept my congregation on my theological news group called
Jesus on the Web that today has grown to more than three hundred
ninety members.

The former presidential third party candidate and Interfaith Center
director Dwight Welch was key to solving the problem of housing my
congregation as he rented me the space in the Interfaith Center
library. The library was the size of a large family dining room and
it contained the writings of the early church fathers, the ancient
Jewish sages, Protestant theological writings, the writings of the
doctors of the Roman Catholic Church, and a few works from eastern
religions. Despite the fact that Dwight Welch had envisioned the
Interfaith Center becoming a Christian collision like it had been in
the past he lost his position as director of the Interfaith Center as
my conservatism was looked upon poorly by the board members that came
to the conclusion that Christianity was no longer a popular religion.

I knew Dwight prior to his run for office on a third party as we both
had been students of a political philosophy class at Southern Illinois
University, but Dwight was a graduate student attempting his second
graduate degree while I was a undergraduate student. Dwight
eventually introduced me to Professor Randel Auxier who is a
professional philosopher and a Methodist theologian, and Doctor Auxier
was fascinated with my explanation of the doctrine of the Trinity as
he found in it much value for process theology. Although my
explanation of the doctrine of the Trinity arises as a result of my
investigation into the reconciliation between Arminianism and
Calvinism while holding to an orthodox prospective, my understanding
and study into the subject does not necessarily constitute process
theology.

Randel was important to my ministry because under his authority I was
able to administer Apologia Society that provided me access to a table
in the university Student Center three days a week that I used for
promoting the gospel and involving others in the work that I was
doing. Wayne Southerland the apologist for Cornerstone Reformed
Church, the local Pentecostal Minister, and Dwight Welch the apologist
for University Ministries often bordered my apologetics table with
their apologetics tables. Sometimes John Martin the Messianic Jewish
leader attend the Pentecostal table, and the Pentecostal apologist
almost always opposed Wayne Southerland of the Reformed Church.
Clearly, my early ministry thus involved diligent growth among greatly
clashing theological views as I used long periods of time three days a
week both challenging those around me and being challenged by those
around me while serve others.

Wayne Southerland was not just my rival in the university Student
Center, but he also had affiliations with Bishop Thomas Gentry that
operated Grace Episcopal Church located just outside of Carbondale as
Bishop Gentry like me at one time attended Cornerstone Reformed
Church. In fact Bishop Gentry’s top priest, Father Richard Lewis, was
instrumental in causing me to exit Cornerstone as Bishop Gentry had
hoped that I would become a priest in his service as he operated a
part time non accredited seminary school that I attended called
Veritas Bible College and Theological Seminary. The hope of Bishop
Gentry was that his communion that separated from the main stream
Episcopal church would be gathered back in by the Lambeth 2008
conference rejecting the American main stream bishops and thus gaining
the communion of bishops like Gentry. Bishop Gentry become the
moderator of his denomination at the height of his ministry as I had
attempted to bring Bishop Curran into his communion, and Bishop Gentry
was open to such prospects as his communion was constantly changing as
other bishops had been looking to join his communion as a result of
major events in church history that many like Gentry had been opposed
to. Overall, as a result of my dealings with Bishop Gentry, Bishop
Curran, and the Reformed Church thus my apologetic relationship with
Wayne Southerland, that had the evangelical style of John the Baptist,
became challenging for many reasons.

The fact that the Pentecostal table in the university Student Center
often bordered my table, sometimes included the Messianic Jewish
leader John Martin, and was adamantly opposed to the Reformed Church
table offered unique theological problems as two great opposing
coalitions of power could emerge with me situated between the two. I
say this because prior to my gospel table in the university Student
Center John Martin studied with me for about six hours every Saturday
for a few short years while I attended Bishop Gentry’s congregation on
Sunday along with his seminary school as well. John Martin’s help
with the Pentecostal’s apologetics occurred because he was closest to
them compared to anything else, but the specific reason why John
Martin helped the Pentecostals is because he had a lot of extra time
on his hands as a result of the fact that I no longer studied with him
because of a theological dispute that I had with John Martin as he
adamantly opposing the Christian church by saying that they drink the
blood of the Babylonian prostitute of Revelation by participating in
communion (years latter he repented and I forgave him).

My ministry thus at its height become informally connected with John
Martin the Messianic Jewish leader, Bishop Gentry and the reformed
church, Dwight Welch the director of the Interfaith Center, Randel
Auxier the Methodist theologian and philosopher, Bishop Curran who
came away from the Roman Catholic Church, and several others. When my
ministry at Southern Illinois University fell apart as a result of
students that I knew having graduated, I tried to continue keeping
everyone in contact and in dialog with my theological news group as I
have stated before. Overall, although Jesus on the Web started when I
was first underway with my ministry at the university, the news group
grew from the few original core people that I associated with and
recruited with my apologetics table in the university Student Center
to the huge size that it is today as a result of constant efforts over
five years of work.

Jesus on the Web was thus created with three other original owners
that I picked. One of the owners, James Thomas (Jim T), had a huge
following as he was also a minister of a Calvinist Baptist church in
the Carbondale area called Bara Baptist Church, but we had a
theological dispute that separated us. James Thomas thus elected not
to participate in my news group anymore, and we continued to be
friends but have not spoken much to each other since. The theological
dispute that separated James Thomas and I was that he accused me of
having committed a atrocious sin by providing for the needs of a
homeless handicap woman that was in a desperate situation who
requested help from me because I did not share the gospel with the
woman prior to helping her.

The theological dispute that separated Bishop Gentry and I was in
contrast never healed, and he closed his congregation that I attended
and moved to Heber Springs Arkansas and is now called Pastor Gentry as
he now operates Covenant Presbyterian Church. The top priest of
Bishop Gentry now is Associate Pastor of Harrison Baptist Church that
is Southern Baptist but yet reformed. Doctor Gentry is still trying
to plant churches in Southern Illinois, and he continues to operate
his part-time seminary but now it operates out of Harrison Baptist
Church as Bishop Gentry (Pastor Gentry) visits the seminary once a
month.

When I entered graduate school at Southern Illinois University toward
the decline of my ministry, I had a atheist professor named Larry A.
Hickman that required the reading of Nazi philosophy such as Martin
Heidegger for a class in Philosophy of Technology (this was a unusual
subject). Hickman was sort of the inventor of the subject of
Philosophy of Technology as most schools teach Philosophy of Science
instead, and Hickman in class attacked Christians openly as he
believed and stated that Creation Science is intellectual fraud.
Hickman often bragged about his domestic partner in class, and I had
no idea by the subject of the class that the professor was like a
atheist evangelist and a proponent of alternative lifestyle because if
I would have known this I would have never taken his class. I had no
idea what my grade would be in the class until I got my finial grade,
and this was very undesirable for continuing graduate study.

Although at the time that I attended graduate school at Southern
Illinois University I attended the African Methodist Episcopal Church
in Carbondale lead by Pastor Ralph Jackson, I did not have the
confidence or purpose behind the mission of refuting my final grade of
my graduate course with Hickman. The entire reason why I took
Hickman’s course in graduate school as my first graduate course is
because I wanted to later take courses with Auxier, but Auxier had
times that did not work with my work schedule plus he had classes that
semester that did not appeal to me. Overall, Auxier really wanted to
work with me, and I really wanted to work with him but Hickman made
things near impossible in that regard.

Despite my better judgment I eventually moved back to my home town,
and I obtained a position at a local lumber yard called Menards as a
Manager Trainee for preparation for upper level management. I did
this because my parents had convinced me that obtaining a vocation was
my best immediate future given my circumstances and given the desires
of my parents to see me financially become successful with my life,
but I found that the employer used evolutionary models all throughout
the business operations and throughout the company training
literature. Thus more people would be hired than needed, employees
would have their labor hours reduced until they could just barely
survive, and then when the employees would fight over their labor
hours in order to gain a few extra dollars the weaker employees would
be fired and the more dominant ruthless ones would be promoted. I am
not at all in favor of such a system, and I did not realize that I
would be expected to administrate such a system upon hire into a
Management Training program. Overall, my employer had policies
against people of my position associating with other employees even
outside of the workplace, and as a result when I shared the gospel
with other workers I was basically told by upper management that I
needed to be pursuing ministry instead of working at a lumber yard.

Now I attend a church called First Baptist Church of Sterling with
Pastor John Kermott after having visited and investigated many
churches in my area. Overall, the church that I now attend has some
good qualities about it that are hidden under the surface, and people
at the church are certainly not opposed to someone outside of the
local church ministry talking about Jesus unlike many in my hometown
area.

Recently (within the last year or so) I have been approached by a
former Franciscan monastic named Larry Roy Woodsmall, and he has a
group of people that are unhappy with the churches that they attended
in Iowa City as a result of the sincerity being very low in the local
churches. Larry thus found me and suggested that I help lead his
group as he is in the process of organizing his people, and both Larry
and I have an appreciation for Hebrew thought and scripture. I would
feel comfortable working with Larry more if I was involved in a
seminary school such as The King’s Seminary, as we are still in the
development phase. Overall, I believe that the education of The
King’s college may instill in me education that would allow me to use
my creativity to adapt to service of a diverse set of people.

I would go into greater depth about my spiritual pilgrimage, but I
realize that I would have to produce a rather large volume to
encompass the clarity that I desire. I would also for example go into
greater depth as well regarding how Jesus Christ specifically relates
to my life, but in order to do this I would have to disclose so much
of my theological understanding to show the context for how God works
in my life that I would find myself producing a rather large volume
just to deal with all the main points of how God has reasonably worked
in my life. I am thus humbly submitting the most condensed version of
my spiritual pilgrimage, and my hope is that no one will hesitate to
contact the people mentioned in this article for purposes of
interviews. Overall, I must however ask that the theological
dispositions of the people that I mention is taken into consideration
regarding any testimony that such people may give, and I say this
because many of the people that I have written about differ wildly in
their views regarding how they approach God.