Get thee away from the University of Utah and rescue my sheep

I was downtown by the University of Utah when I got a ride at 45th South by the freeway at a gas station. That should never happen because there are many drivers between me and there. It should always go to the closest driver but it chose me. At first I was going to let it go and I really debated it and then I got the impression that I needed to be doing this ride so I took it.

When I got to the place, the rider was just getting off work and she had to count out her till. She asked me if I would wait and I waited for 17 painful minutes. We’re supposed to leave after seven because time is money. Finally she came out and she thanked me.

She was bubbly and happy and confident and seem to be sharp as a tack. We started having the discussion about where are you from and things like that. Then the spirit told me to ask her what she felt here. I said, what do you feel here and she said well, there’s work and it’s easy to get work and I like it.

Each night when I bless my car I pray that the Spirit of God will be in my car so the people will feel it and their hearts will be touched. I want people to feel something different in my car.

I said, let me try again, what is it you feel in your heart living here that’s different than where you came from. She started to get emotional and she said I feel peace. I feel like I can relax here. I really like it here. She said, I really feel it here in your car. I feel safe and peaceful and protected.

I asked her why she thought it was peaceful here and she said she didn’t know. I said it’s because the many of the people here obey the commandments of God and when you obey the commandments of God you have peace. It is disobedience to those commandments that destroys your life and takes away your peace. Because the Church of Jesus Christ of latter-day Saints is here and many people belong to it and obey they take within them this peace that everybody feels.

She said that makes sense. I love how it feels. Then I had impressions about her and I asked her if it was OK for me to say the words that are in my heart and she said yes. I told her that she has a confident look but she’s had a rough time. I said that she had been hurt and suffered tremendous losses. They were almost more than she could bear. I told her that she felt like she escaped and that she was here but it still hurt. I told her that she felt lonely and like she been abandoned. I thought this was particularly curious because she’s been talking about her little girls and I thought I was taking her home to them. Why would she be lonely I thought?

I told her that she’s missing a big part of what God would have her enjoy and that she knows it and she’s looking for it. I looked back in the mirror and she was crying.

I told her people had hurt her, people ahead abused her people and taken advantage of her but that she was a strong woman. God had put me there tonight because she needed help tonight.

Through her tears she started to tell me her story about her how children had been taken away from her. She had been in jail when she had been coerced by a DA to plead guilty for something she didn’t do so that she could get out of jail and be with her kids. Then the court used that conviction to take her kids away from her. She said she felt like she had lost everything.

She said she had her children stolen, she had been robbed, she had been raped and she was broken and no one had ever offered to lift her up. This was not the confident happy illusion that she portrayed but God knew different . She asked me, how did you know this and I told her that when we’re baptized we get the gift of the Holy Ghost and God whispers to our heart to things to say. I told her that the gift of the Holy Ghost gives us the ability to say the words that God knows will touch people. I asked her if there’s anyway I could’ve known the things I said and she said there’s no way. I said who is the only person that would know that and she said God. I told her that God had given me those words so that she would know that the other things I said to her were also true.

I talked to her about Jesus Christ and the atonement and about how Jesus suffered for all of the injustice, iniquities, infirmities and pain in our lives. He did that so that he could lift us so that he could help us. God puts other people here to be his hands and do what he would do.

She talked about her time in jail and how she felt like she was still in jail in her life. She said that tonight in the car was the first time she felt the spirit of God was there for her. She said that in her heart she felt this. I told her that if she wanted to feel the spirit of God she could do that by reading the scriptures and going to church.

I gave her a Book of Mormon, one of the Book of Mormons prepared by the Secrists and discussed with her the questions of the soul. She said I have all of those questions. I told her that this is where you’ll find your answers.

I told her that God loves everyone in the world not just the people in Jerusalem and that he sent his son to other places in the world like America. There were prophets in America and they wrote their prophecies. I asked her if that would be important information to have and she said yes. She believed in the Bible and if there is more she said she would like to have it.

I told her that this is the Book of Mormon is the writings of those prophets that lived here in America and that it contained the visit of Jesus Christ to America. Then he went to other places because God loves all of his children not just the ones in Jerusalem.

I said that when Jesus Christ was here in America he invited everyone to be baptized with his baptism, by his authority so that they can become clean and holy and walk with confidence before God. She said she would love that.

I asked her if she knew that she was a daughter of God and if God was aware of her. She said she never considered that and she felt that was true. she felt like this had been a missing part of her life. I asked her what she felt right now and she said tonight she felt his love.

I told her that God loves her and he will put people in her life to help her. I told her that is why I was there and why God had sent me. I told her that I had rejected rides like hers before and I was considering rejecting this one but God intervened on her behalf. I told her God sent me to rescue her.

I told her about Joseph Smith and I bore testimony that he was a prophet. He was called of God and that the Book of Mormon was true. The spirit burned in the car and I asked her again what she could feel. She said, I feel the power of God and I feel that what you’re saying is true.

I told her that she has a bishop and that he could help her. We looked up her bishop‘s info and I called him right after she got out of the car. I told her that we could have sister missionaries stop by and teach her of the gospel. She said that’s exactly what I need. I need that in my life.

I told her that this is exactly why she was brought to Utah to live. She was brought out of that pain and suffering to a place where she could feel peace in her life so that she could bring peace to her soul and be baptized. She agreed.

I told her where her church house was and the church meetings were there at 10:30 Sunday morning. She went to church, met the bishop and the missionaries.

This woman’s story is just now being written but God is moving his hand to help her recover her life. This wat she can be the mother to her children that she wants to be.

PS

For members of the church, in the tools app under the “more” setting on the lower right hand side under missionary you can submit a referral. Once you put in the name and address of your reference and submit it, the app will give you the option to see the missionaries assigned including their phone number and email addresses as well as all ecclesiastical leaders.

This is a new (or at least new to me) function of that app and will make it easier for all of us to be involved with and updated on the teaching of the people that we refer.

I used this function of the app in this case to contact both of Bishop and the missionaries. It worked amazingly well! Good job missionary department!