La Diferencia

This week was another solid week in Ensenada. I never cease to learn the principles of missionary work here. The longer I stay here, the more attached I get. Leaving this place in three weeks is going to be a heartbreaker. There´s always the chance I´ll get a third transfer here, but it´s unlikely.

At the very least, I´ll be baptizing Karen possibly the last week I´m here. She has truly been the story of Ensenada. I guess what you have to understand about her to understand why I keep referencing her is she truly did receive a mighty change of heart. A few weeks ago she couldn´t even believe in God, all of the sudden she has one of the strongest testimonies of the Gospel I´ve ever seen. She´s firm and unshakable in her faith. Me and Elder Bushman sit back in our meetings and marvel at what the Lord has done with her.

Additionally, we took out another baptismal date with a woman we found last transfer. Angela. I think what´s so special to me about Angela is I was there when she was found. I can´t say that about many others. She was a grandmother coping with the death of her husband. When we came to her house this week we found that she had read all the way through Mosiah in the Book of Mormon, and told us that she knew it had come of God. We subsequently committed her to be baptized.

This week we did a lot of contacting in the poorer areas of Ensenada. There´s poor and then there´s third world poor. The villa. It´s a field off to the side of Ensenada with a bunch of wooden boxes springing up. At first glance, you think their stables for animals. Then you realize their houses. I was more humbled than I’ve ever been. I have been so blessed in my life. So incredibly blessed.

We found a woman there, Liliana, who immediately let us in. We left a copy of the Book of Mormon, and upon returning she told us she knew it was true. Even though she couldn´t understand it, when she read it she felt peace in her dire circumstances. We testified that was the Holy Ghost bearing witness of the truth. We´re going to set a baptismal date with her in about fifteen minutes.

This and other circumstances have reiterated a powerful quote from preach my gospel. "Regardless of circumstance, all people are best helped as they come to receive the restored Gospel."

Contrast the above experiences, with the following.

We ran into an old investigator while contacting close to the forest side of Ensenada. His name was Marcos, and was eager to let us in. To our dismay, we found out quickly he was more interested in talking about U.S. politics than he was talking about the gospel. We managed to get a flimsy commitment to read and pray. When we returned, he told us how he had read the introduction and how fascinating the historical origin of the book was. He wanted to know where he could find the gold plates so he could verify if it was true. We explained that the gold plates had been taken back into the heavens by the Angel Moroni, and the way we can know if the book is true is by asking of God. He became very doubtful, and lectured us on the implausibility of it all, telling us that if there really was a prophet of God on the earth today, he needed a sign to believe it. He refused to read and pray, so we told him that we couldn´t pass by until he was going to make an effort to find out if these things were true. He had no interest in them. No desire to change. He said he was content where he was spiritually, and we were ignorant and being deceived.

The irony is, the Book of Mormon speaks directly to men like him.

I realized about then, the great wisdom of God. Because if people could feel the gold plates, if they could see with their eyes the mysteries of God without searching, they would look with their eyes. Look for their reason for assurance. There is only one way to know if this message is true, and that´s through God Himself. And those who are learned and prideful will never receive a witness of spiritual things. Even if the signs were laid out before their eyes they still wouldn´t believe. The Book of Mormon teaches us many times that seeing is clearly not believing. (Alma 5:40-46 (I´m pretty sure it´s somewhere in there), 1 Nephi 3 (end of the chapter).

The truth is everyone has doubts. We don´t have a perfect knowledge. We´re not supposed to. The difference comes between the ones who are humble enough to suspend disbelief and tred into the dark, and the ones who choose instead a God after their own design. A religion that tells them what they want to believe, not what they need to become.

Regardless, I´ve received a considerably greater witness of the truthfulness of the Book of Mormon. It feels like this week especially I´ve had to defend it. And I love doing so. I know it´s true. I love that book. I love the precepts and the testimonies. I love the prophets and the doctrine. And especially, I love the testimonies of Christ, and more specifically the atonement. It is central to missionary work. Truly the keystone of our religion.