The battle of the back seat

One night a few weeks ago, I got a call to pick a lady up at one of those not so good hotels around 72nd south and the freeway. It took a minute and a few texts but finally they came out. They had a dog with them. It wasn’t a service animal and I had the right to refuse it but I felt the impression not to reject it, so against my better judgment I let them in with the dog. I told them they had to keep the dog on their lap because I didn’t want it walking on my leather.

We started driving down to Salt Lake and they were trying to decide whether or not to have me wait for them and put in another stop or what to do. Not knowing what it was that they were going downtown for I just figured that I could wait for them and give them a ride back. I would just have them pay me so that’s what we decided to do. We talked and they were happy but it was mostly just chitchat.

When we pulled into downtown they got out and went into the Hampton Inn. I hate taking people that seem like they may be drug people from one fleabag hotel to a slightly better fleabag hotel. It usually means you’re going to get drugs but I had already committed to them that I would wait so I sat there. I sat there for 30 minutes. In an industry where time means rides and rides mean money I could see dollar bills just flying out the window and was getting a little ansi. The security guard asked me what was going on I said I had no idea I didn’t know where they went. He was very concerned and started looking on his monitors. I felt like what I wanted to do was just leave and I thought about it a couple of times but I was constrained by the spirit to stay and so I did.

Finally after what seemed like a lifetime the guy came out carrying the dog and said he didn’t know where she was and he started texting her to get her there. He was clearly a little bit annoyed but was trying to get her away from there. Finally after a few more minutes she came and I was excited to get going. There had been a change in her demeanor and the situation. It was clear to me that she had been given drugs or purchased drugs while she was there at that hotel and probably both.

I just decided to get them back to their hotel so we started back. When we started going I looked at him and said “tell me about your family.” He told me that he had an ex-wife with two children and that he had just broken up with another girlfriend. Clearly this relationship that I saw in the car was one of convenience for other purposes. I asked him if he missed his little girls and we talked about being a father. He got a bit emotional and mentioned that he missed them a lot. I talked to him about the church and how we believe in families and how they’re the most important thing.

He said “that’s the thing I love about the Mormon church. That feeling of family”. I said, are you a member of the church? He said no, well, maybe, I guess I used to be. I said what do you mean by that? He said I don’t have any reason not to believe but I just haven’t been an active member. I started talking to him about his life and how the church could bless his life. Just as I started talking about that I had the impression to ask him why he left the church. He said, “no one has ever asked me that question and I’m not sure if I know the answer”.

He said that it was really off-putting to him that people were hypocritical, judging and that there didn’t seem to be too much love amongst the people in the wards. I said to him “you know, it’s funny that usually when people say those things what it means is that they have been sinning and not living like they should. They feel judged because they’re judging themselves and they figure everyone else must be as well.” I told him that people go to alcohol and drugs and riotous living to try to bury the guilt they feel. They go in a downward spiral. I said to him that I felt this is where he was. I told them that I felt like at some point in his life, when he was a young child he had been abused and he felt abandoned by God. I told him hat he was being a little bit petulant.

His question? How could a God that loved me allow this to happen to me. I told him that he should know that God allows people there agency but he expects the rest of us to step up and be his hands to relieve suffering and make things right for others. There was stunned silence from him and the spirit was working. It was touching us both. I could tell he knew that the only way I could’ve said and known those things was by the power of the spirit.

I told him that every person in the Church hears the whisperings of unworthiness, inadequacy, being judged and Satan is the one that puts them there. Satan is the one whispering these things in our ears. We need to have more faith in Christ and his power from his atonement than we have belief in the word Satan whispers in our ears. In the end the church is a hospital for sick people not a museum for perfect people. I told him that Satan is a liar, an insidious liar and that he has perfected the art of lying to the extent that people believe him that shouldn’t. This is how he catches them in his snare.

About this time the girl who I previously thought had been his girlfriend started getting very fidgety and putting off an anger vibe. It just felt very dark in that corner of the car. It felt like pure evil over there. It was almost as if I could hear spiritual screaming and anger although nothing was audible to the human ear. It reminded me of weeping and wailing and gnashing of teeth.

I kept going and talked to him about Elder Renlund’s talk from conference https://www.churchofjesuschrist.org/study/general-conference/2021/04/25renlund I talked to him about how this talk helped me realize the importance of the atonement and that the atonement is how God makes it all right. Life isn’t fair but God will make it right if we have faith in him and his Son’s atonement. He was clearly moved and the girl was getting more and more agitated and it felt darker and darker on that side of the car.

Finally we dropped her off and it was like the sun coming over the mountain. The car lit up and the spirit was unrestrained.

I told him, “you know, she plays for the other team don’t you” he said, “I know but I try to see the best in people”. I told him that she was there to drag him down. It was almost like an assignment from Satan and that he needed to turn this around now if he wants to be with his girls. That’s why God had sent me there today. I told him that God puts people in my car to help them and that the spirit was telling me that this is why he was here.

As we drove to his hotel I talked to him more about the atonement. I talked to him about how Christ suffered everything so that our problems, our angst, our embarrassment, our sins, our pain, and our infirmities could be swallowed up and he could help us and lift us. The power of the testimony of the atonement clearly resonated with him. He said he had never been taught about it like that. He had been a foster child and in and out of several homes. He had been abused and passed around. He had never understood how God could allow that to happen.

I told him again that God will not take away the agency of a person but will use the atonement take away the pain/anger and send people who listen to his call to lift those who are struggling. These are the people through which he blesses his children.

I told him about the uneven cups and the atonement analogy of how God doesn’t even them out, he fills them all up. This leads into being fulfilled or filled as a person and that is impossible without Christ snd the atonement.

By this time he was crying, it turns out he’s from Mapleton and his mother had sent him a message two days earlier saying that he was always welcome at home and that they wanted to help him. He said first that and now this. I said there is no such thing as a coincidence. There’s a reason why this all happened in a short period of time and it’s because God wants you back.

I told him God sent me because he was going down a path that he would not recover from. He sent me to stop it. We talked about how powerfully we were feeling the spirit and identified it. I asked him if he could feel the evil on the other side of the car when the girl was in there, he said it was amazing that he could see the evil and feel it as well.

I asked him if he prayed, he said “not for a long time”. I told him that he needed to pray. I asked him if he would promise me that he would go pray right now. He said yes! I told him that he needed to go to church. I asked him where he would go to church. He said he would go back to Mapleton and attend with his family. I told him that I felt like that would make them so happy.

I asked him if he was willing to do it,throw away this lifestyle he was pursuing and return to God. He said he would do it. I asked him if he would promise God that he would do it and he said yes.

I bore my testimony of the Book of Mormon to him. The spirit was so strong, we knew God was there with us and I knew he felt it. I told him that if he would read the Book of Mormon it would give him the power he needed to overcome the temptations and make the changes he needed to do. I told him that he should leave this place and go home to his family and to the church. I asked him if he would go and read a chapter in the book of Mormon tonight and pray and he said yes.

I texted him some information and asked him to please call his family in the morning so that he can get this process started. He said he would!

I left. The next day I got this text after asking him if he prayed yet.

“I’m good thanks im headed home actually as much as didnt want to admit it to myself everything you said was true . thank your for caring because my girls are the reason to keep pressing on no matter how hard life gets “

What a great decision! God is good.