I have several friends who live close that I have had the privilege of teaching. I love going over to one of my friend’s house because it has became quite a good way to do missionary work. They rent rooms in their house and have lots of nonmembers around there all the time. It is a pure baptizing environment!
Along with the renters, from time to time members of their family live with them. They come from all over the US and Latin America. They stay with them sometimes for up to a year. This was the case for the mother of my friend”s wife. Her name was Maria. She had come to stay with her daughter and was one of the most friendly and engaging people I’ve ever met. As per usual, I went over and started talking to her. Eventually we started talking about the church.
One day early on as we were talking she said that she hadn’t gone to church much for many years. She said she had lost faith in religion but never in Jesus. I told her that this can happen but through Christ we can heal and be part of his church.
She said her problem was pretty specific and had to do with following the teachings of the Bible. She said that she had been dismayed at the lack of obedience to the Bible shown by the Catholic Church. I perked up and was all ears. She said that one particular question had pushed her away from the Catholic Church. I asked her to tell me what that question was. She paused for a moment and said, OK. If you can answer this question I will listen to what you have to say.
The question was, do you have idols in your church houses? I explained to her in no uncertain terms that we do not have idols, crosses or any other objects that we worship. When I told her this she insisted on telling me why she had the question.
Some years before she had been a very active Catholic. She went to church twice a week and participated to the fullest extent with her church. She always wondered why they didn’t encourage people to read the Bible and one day she decided that it was time for her to read it. She started reading from the beginning. I have to say I have admiration for anybody who sets out to seriously read the WHOLE Bible. I have done it multiple times and it is a huge undertaking. These people want to know the word and will of the Lord.
When she got to Exodus 20 it changed her life. Many times people just read over the Ten Commandments, just blowing by. We know those already and think “nothing new here”. For Maria, it was different this time. She read verses 3,4 and 5 where it says,
3 Thou shalt have no other gods before me.
4 Thou shalt not make unto thee any graven image, or any likeness of any thing that is in heaven above, or that is in the earth beneath, or that is in the water under the earth:
5 Thou shalt not bow down thyself to them, nor serve them: for I the Lord thy God am a jealous God, visiting the iniquity of the fathers upon the children unto the third and fourth generation of them that hate me;
She was shocked! She realized that in the Catholic Church, she had been bowing down before graven images her whole life. She knew, after reading this, that doing so was in direct conflict with the teachings of the holy Bible.
She was so moved by the spirit testifying of this principle that she got up from her chair, went to the kitchen drawer, grabbed the hammer and went to the corner of her living room and decided to rectify her situation. .
In that corner of the living room she had what can best be described as a shrine to the catholic saints. She had idlos she had called statues for many of them, each on their individual shelf in her shrine.
Hammer in hand, she attacked each one of these statues smashing it into a million pieces. She gathered up the broken glass and threw it out of the window into the alley. She didn’t want it in her house. When her husband returned home, he was shocked. Out of concern for her mental state he took her to the psychiatric hospital for evaluation.
From that day forward she never set foot in the Catholic Church. She told her family that she was waiting for the day that God would send her the truth and that the church of God would not worship graven images or idols.
I need to take a minute here to say that I know God prepares people and that there are some amazing people waiting for this light and truth, but WOW!
Once I told her that we did not have idols in our church she was excited to attend with us. She wanted to see for herself. That next Sunday she went to church with our family. When we arrived, she walked around the church in and out of many rooms. She was very impressed and felt the spirit very deeply. She was so touched that when we sat down for Sacrament meeting about 15 minutes before the meeting was to start, she asked me if it would be okay if she prayed. I said yes. To my surprise she knelt right there, on the floor at the bench and began to pray. She asked God to let her know if this was his church. She prayed out loud for about 2 or 3 minutes. When she got up she looked me right in the eyes and told me that the spirit told her that she had finally found the Church of God, the church of Jesus Christ.
I was very excited and went to call the missionaries. I wanted them to come over and meet her. I wanted to get this going. They were over the moon with this news and said they would be there to meet her when the meeting ended. As I finished the call there were two women from our ward who cornered me.
They said that they had seen something that I needed to address with my new friend. I was concerned and asked, what is it? They said that they saw her kneeling in the chapel praying. They said that they wanted me to take care of it. I said, oh my! You are right! We can’t have people praying at church! What would this place be like if everybody prayed!
I don’t think they would have ever asked me in the first place if they had heard the words come out of their mouths like I did. They walked off with some new ideas and things to consider. These sisters quickly figured it out and became her friends in the end.
Needless to say The discussions went rather smoothly. She loved the Book of Mormon and felt the truth in its words. She even noticed places where they taught not to be idolatrous with great joy. She loved the Joseph Smith story and had a testimony of modern prophets. Three weeks later she was baptized. I will always be touched by the faith of this woman who read the word of God, felt the spirit testify of its truth and then had the strength to hold her ground and wait for God to bless her with the fullness of the gospel. She is now very old and lives in another country. They recently announced a new temple in her city. She is very excited to have that new temple close to her
By the way, my granddaughter Sophie got baptized today the 12th. It was awesome. She invited non member friends and they loved it. Their parents commented on the strong spirit they felt. She is already a great missionary even though as a toddler she called them misheronies
Sometimes God sends you a lift 