A blooming flower in just one hour

I picked up a girl in Park City with a very different name. I’ve never seen that name before in my life and I was interested about its origins. We were heading down into Salt Lake City, so I knew that I had time to learn all about it.

She got in the car and I quickly realized that she spoke Spanish. She was from Peru and she had worked at several restaurants on Main Street in Park City. We started talking about her job and how she liked it in Park City. I had a very distinct impression that she was a member of the church. I asked her if she was a member of the church. She said no.

We talked a little bit longer and then I started speaking in Spanish. She said that she was blown away by my Spanish and asked me where I learned it. I said, in the streets. In the streets of Argentina! We laughed and then I said, are you sure you are not a member of the church because I get the feeling that you are?  She said no again but she hesitated a bit. She was clearly uncomfortable giving that answer.

We talked a little bit more and then I asked her one more time, are you sure you’re not a member of the church?  She said, well, I was baptized but I haven’t been to church in quite some time. I asked her if  her name had been removed from the records of the church and she looked puzzled. She said, no, I didn’t do anything like that. I just quit going.

I smiled then said, that being the case, the correct way to answer my question is yes!  I am a member of the church but I haven’t gone in a while. We both laughed and I asked her why it had been so long. She said that she had some relationship issues that had happened in her life that took her away from the church and she had just never felt like going back. She said she didn’t want to deal with all of the hassle of explaining everything.

She said, it’s almost irrelevant now because I work on Sundays at these restaurants.  I thought, I know that these restaurants aren’t open at 9 AM so we can find a ward for her for sure. I didn’t tell her that, but I know that.

I felt very impressed right then that I needed to tell her that her problem was that she was looking at this as if the people in the church and their actrions are a barometer that determines the truthfulness of the church. 

I told her that it seemed to me that she was saying that the people in the church might not approve of me therefore, the church is not true. I told her that’s a lot of assumptions and those assumptions were promoted by Satan. I told her that Satan‘s number one goal is to get us to forget that our father in heaven loves us. Satan wants desperately for us to turn our back on God and believe that God has turned his back on us.

 I told her that the real truth is that our father in  heaven loves us and he never leaves us. I told her that he loves us so much and wants to help us. I asked her if father that loves his child, could sit there and watch his child suffer without wanting to help that child. I told her that any good father that loved his child would do anything he could to help his child and be with his child.

I told her that the people in church may or may not act right. They may or may not do the right thing, but one thing is for sure, their father in heaven loves them. The reason why we go to church is not to be seen at church. The reason why we go to church is not to be part of a club or a group of people. The reason why we go to church is to remember our covenants with our father in heaven and to reestablish that connection through which we can feel his love strongly.

She said she hadn’t considered that. I told her that we all have things that go on in our lives. Sometimes we lose our jobs or sometimes even friends hurt us or betray us. Sometimes we have illness or unjust things happen to us.  One thing is for sure, our Heavenly Father always loves us.

Our Heavenly Father sent his son Jesus Christ. Jesus Christ suffered all of those things so that when we were down and hurt we could look to him to pick us up and bind our wounds. I told her that she had blamed God instead of to embracing Jesus Christ and his atonement.

For a second she started to contend with that assertion. She thought about it and then said, you know, I guess you’re right. If you consider that the church is where we meet God, I turned my back on that source of strength and help.

I told her that God could walk with her and help her. I told her that he had been with me and had help me in my car. He had protected me and he had given me the words to say to people. He knew that the best way to help me was to let me serve him.

I told her that Satan would have us turn inward  and worry about how everything affects us and how miserable we are. He wants us to be consumed with what’s going on with us.  What God would have us do is develop a character that resembles the character of Jesus Christ. A character that would turn out to serve and love instead of huddle down and dodge contact.

I told her that God had put people in my car and gave me things to say to them. He had put the things in my heart to say that only they knew. He had shown his power and allowed me to help people. I told her that’s why she was in the car that day.

I shared a couple of stories from my blog with her and the spirit was in the car. I asked her how long it had been since she felt that. She said a long time. She said, my spirit feels like it’s resting. Like it’s been under attack and now it could rest in this car. I told her that this is the spirit of God and she can take it with her if she will.

It was funny how this ride bloomed like a flower.  She was very closed at the start but as we went along, the spirit energized the conversation and she began to bloom. By this time she was opening up to the spirit.

She said, don’t they have meetings for the unmarried people at the church house some evenings? I said, yes.  I knew that this was her way of beginning to look at the possibilities of re-engaging at church rather than turning away. I knew the spirit was whispering this to her right then.

I told her that this idea had come to her from the spirit and that yes, it was true, the groups of young people do get together for activities at the church. She said, maybe I could join them at one of those. I said, I’ll bet they’d love that. We talked a little bit more about the Book of Mormon. I asked her if she had been reading in the Book of Mormon. I already knew the answer but I wanted to hear her say it.

She said, no. I don’t even think I have one anymore. I grabbed one of the Book of Mormon prepared by the Secrists that I have and I gave it to her. I said, here’s a new one. If you want to have this feeling that you’re feeling right now, all you need to do is read this book and pray.

I told her that reading the Book of Mormon would bring the spirit of God faster than anything. In this busy world of hers, she needed to rest.

Then she said, you know the missionaries texted me two days ago. They asked her if they could get together. She told them no. Then she said to me, I can’t even have them over at my house or talk to them because I’m a single woman, right?

I said, well, you can’t have them in your house alone but you live really close to McDonald’s.  You could have them meet you at McDonald’s. You could have them meet you at the church. You could have them meet you at any neutral place and I’m sure they’d love to do it.

She said, with an excited tone in her voice, really? I thought that was against the rules. I told her that the rule was that they couldn’t be alone with her in her home or in a car, but in public, it was fair game.  She could meet with them, she could pray with them and she could learn from them.

She said, hold on just a second while I text them. She started texting the missionaries to try to set up an appointment at the McDonald’s by her house. The missionaries responded back and they set that appointment.

I asked her again to identify what she was feeling. She talked to me about being in a place that she felt like she was floating and resting. I told her that this is how she feels in the presence of her father in heaven. It’s how she felt with him in the pre-existence and when his spirit was there, she would feel like this. I told her that this is how she felt on the day of her baptism and she had been thinking of that in the car. 

She said, you’re good at this.  I told her that God knows her heart and knows what she’s thinking but most of all he loves her and he wants her home. We were pulling into the racquet club down in Salt Lake Valley that I was taking her to. I asked her what she was going to do with this new information and with this new recognition of the spirit.

She said, I think I need to quit feeling sorry for myself, blaming people and blaming God. I need to do what you said, look to Christ and let him heal me. I think the missionaries are a great place to start.

I told her that God had whispered to me from the start that she was a member of the church and that’s why I persisted to ask three times. I told her that it’s important for her to know that God isn’t giving up on her and he didn’t let me give up on her either.

She smiled and said thank you. She reached up and grabbed my shoulder and squeezed it. As I’ve discussed before, it almost never happens that passengers touch the driver but often in these kinds of spiritual experiences they touch me.  I think it’s to have a tangible feeling to go with what they’re feeling on the inside.

After she touched me, she got out of the car, smiled, waved, and went in to play tennis.