Yep, we got rained out from our hike this pday, but luckily it's the only day in the past week and a half that it's been cold and rainy. Spring is finally here!
While working at the visitors center this week, I realized just how weird people think that our religion is. The following is a list of questions we've gotten asked and their respective responses:
"Are Mormons very serious?" (Please, you should come participate in one of our family home evenings. It's anything but serious.)
"Why do Mormons wear black?" (Well, it is the most slimming color...)
"What does a typical Mormon day look like?" (You know we're not aliens right?)
"Another name for your church is The Church of the House of the Lord, right?" (Wrong.)
It took me ten minutes to help a man understand that the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints is a religion, not a private community.
Outside of trying to show to people that we're normal, we actually get to spend a lot of time teaching. Yesterday a middle aged couple walked into the visitors center and asked us to give them a little tour around and explain more about who we are. I think the best way to describe them is "artsy". They didn't fit what most people might think of as a typical Christian. But we took them to the model of the temple and talked to them about what we do inside temples. They loved hearing about eternal families! We continued walking through the center towards the rotonda with the statue of Christ and the 12 apostles. They stopped the second the crossed into the room and the woman started getting ready. "There's something very very special in this room." We bore testimony of the Savior and of His infinite love for us. We told them that they could got a closer to Him by reading the Book of Mormon and praying about its teachings. They gladly accepted and asked if the missionaries would stop by to tell them more about it. So we got their address and successfully sent off our first referral!
We also saw the first wedding at the Rome temple! It was so beautiful. We were all peering through the windows trying to get a better look. While Sorella Decker and I were trying to sneak around the door to poke our heads out for a second, we got stopped by a British man asking us for some information about the center. As we got talking he told us his conversion story;
He was a 15 year old hooligan who was stealing cars, motorcycles, and money, and swearing so much that he didn't talk for his first three weeks in church because he was afraid he of offending people. He had absolutely 0 interest in religion. Meanwhile, two elders were having very little success, to the point where they went to a members house asking her for any advice she could offer about new places to go tracting. She told them that the night before she had had a dream about an apartment complex near her neighborhood. The elders went over and faithfully knocked every door, but they only left a single Book of Mormom. It just so happened to be with this boys father. He took it and left it on the table in the front room. Everytime this boy walked by the table, he picked up the book, read a couple verses, decided it was garbage, and put it back down. One day he picked it up and couldn't stop reading. A few weeks later, the missionaries came back to do a follow up and he made the decision to be baptized.
He later went on the be bishop 3 times, and stake president. Each of his children went on missions and he sent huge groups of youth out on missions while he was a bishop and stake president. After years, he finally got in contact with the missionary who baptized him and found out that this missionary had only baptized one person during his whole two years. So this man sat down and counted all the people who had been brought to the church because of his own baptism: himself, his kids, the people they found on their missions, the people those converts found on their missions, the people that the missionaries he sent off on their missions had found, etc etc. The total as somewhere around 1200! So he made it into a family tree and sent it as a present to the missionary who changed his life.
He later went on the be bishop 3 times, and stake president. Each of his children went on missions and he sent huge groups of youth out on missions while he was a bishop and stake president. After years, he finally got in contact with the missionary who baptized him and found out that this missionary had only baptized one person during his whole two years. So this man sat down and counted all the people who had been brought to the church because of his own baptism: himself, his kids, the people they found on their missions, the people those converts found on their missions, the people that the missionaries he sent off on their missions had found, etc etc. The total as somewhere around 1200! So he made it into a family tree and sent it as a present to the missionary who changed his life.
I understand this story might have a bit more meaning as a missionary than it might for those who haven't served a mission, but to me the message is this: by small and simple things are great things brought to pass. Our small daily acts that to us maybe seem insignificant can become great. Heavenly Father can magnify our simple efforts in whatever it is we may be doing. So when we feel as though we're never doing enough or that what we do will never be great in God's eyes or anyone's for that matter, remember that even our smallest efforts are recognized. Our small acts, or seemingly small acts, can bring to pass great things!!
I love you all so much!!
Sorella Maxfield
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