I’m sitting outside on a grassy hill, overlooking a large pond. A family of ducks just swam by. It’s about 80 degrees outside... a perfect day. :) I’m thoroughly enjoying my break from work. Not even thirty minutes ago I was upstairs at my desk taking back-to-back inbound sales calls. Since I have two hours to kill before I start my overtime for the night, I’m going to tell you guys my story of how God brought me to Utah. :)
It all started about ten years ago. I was probably twelve or thirteen years old, and it was during the summer, in Redondo Beach, California. My best friend Krystal (A.K.A. “Ceeg”), my brother Ian and myself would hang out at the house while my mom was at work. One day, we were lounging around in the living room and we heard a knock at the door. We opened it up to find two caucasian ladies in their early twenties dressed very properly, and very modestly, both wearing nametags. It was very hot outside (a perfect beach day), but they had long, dark, ankle-length skirts on and long-sleeved shirts buttoned all the way up. They looked really uncomfortable. They introduced themselves as “the sister missionaries”. They said they went to the “ward” down the street, on Serpentine. We all looked at each other, then realizing what the “ward” was. It was the place that was known only to us as the “Church Parking Lot” (or “C.P.L”, when we were talking in code.) It was our secret hangout for skateboarding, hellraising and spy training. (We had a spy team back then. Long story.)
The sisters proceeded to tell us that they were from the “Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints”. Already, we had a gut feeling that this was not the same type of church that we attended with our Mom. We didn’t know what Mormonism was exactly, but we were about to find out. The sisters asked us if they could come in and share their testimonies with us, and share the “gospel”, along with some scriptures. We said “sure”. None of us felt threatened in the slightest. The Holy Spirit totally prepared us for what we were about to hear. Because we were saved, we were able to distinguish between what was truth, and what was not. The first thing that really got me was when they drew a diagram on a blank white sheet of computer printer paper. The diagram depicted the three “heavens”. They even went into the fact that everyone could become gods and goddesses someday. All you had to do was realize that Joseph Smith Jr. was a real prophet, the Book of Mormon was true, you’d get baptized into the church, live a holy life, get married in the temple for time and all eternity, (because without a woman marrying, she’d have no hope to become a goddess) and stand at the Great White Throne Judgement before the Mormon Jesus, Joseph Smith Jr. and Elohim, and only then could you possibly make it to the Celestial Kingdom, if you were “good enough”, and you did “all you could possibly do” on Earth.
Dang.
I have a feeling the sister missionaries shared a little bit too much with us that day. I know they weren’t supposed to go into that much doctrine on the first visit.
When my mom got home from work that day, we could not wait to tell her what happened. She wanted to know all the details. We told her everything the missionaries said, as well as what truths we instilled in them. My mom was proud of us for giving a defense for the faith. We obtained her permission to continue these “meetings” with the sisters while we had the house to ourselves.
Months passed. They kept coming over. We’d eat together, chat together (girl stuff), and really got to know each other. We swapped stories and found out about each other’s families, crushes, and hobbies. It was sad, because every six weeks or so they’d cycle out one of the missionaries. One girl had been with us from the very beginning. Her name was Sarah. (We stopped calling them Sister So-And-So after awhile because we asked them what their real names were.) We wanted to get to know them. We loved them.
I felt a connection with Sarah from the very beginning. She was so sweet, warm, open, and honest. For someone who didn’t have the Holy Spirit, she had such a good, caring heart. She’s the one I related to the most. I think she was 22 at the time… so about 10 years older than myself. I remember she told me she grew up on a farm in Missouri. That’s where her family was, waiting for her to come home after a year and a half. She also told me that she’d eventually move to Salt Lake City.
Honestly, I can’t stop thinking about her. I still remember her face even though it was more than ten years ago. I hope to God that I see her again. I hope and pray that God brings her across my path.
Needless to say, the missionaries’ goals were to eventually convert us to Mormonism and have us baptized in the church. At first, we weren’t very straightforward with them. We’d ask a lot of questions about their religion, which probably misled them into thinking we were interested in converting. After awhile, we really felt the need to preach the true gospel to them, so we did. I think both of us reached a point where we realized that there was no converting the other.
Pretty soon, they stopped coming. We’d wait around the house until 3, 4, and 5 PM… but nothing. Sometimes, we even skipped going to the beach just to see if they showed up. Once, I even went to look for them at their ward on a Sunday morning after their service got out. Nothing. No sign of them. I don’t know what happened. I guess God had another plan for their lives, or another plan for them to get saved.
Anyway… that’s where it all started. They left a blue paperback copy of the Book of Mormon with us, along with the Doctrine and Covenants, and Pearl of Great Price. We read through them a lot in our spare summer time. We didn’t read those books because we were interested in the religion, we just read them because we knew that if we ever ran into more missionaries, we’d want to give a better defense for the faith by knowing their own material. It helped.
As a kid, the way I felt while ministering to and loving on those sweet sister missionaries… I knew it was from God. I knew He had a plan for that in my life.
Anyway… I will stop writing for now. This post is becoming rather lengthy. God bless you all... I will finish the rest of the story later. I am only about 25% done explaining how God brought me to Utah. I love each and every one of you, and may God’s blessings forever be upon you. We are all such sinners, and we ALL need Jesus!
For the Kingdom,
Meaghan
