We live in a world of miracles. And more specifically, we live under the blessings of a gospel of miracles.
I want to share with you all one such miracle, and, in a nutshell, why I have the courage to leave everything I've ever known and cross the ocean to share the gospel of Jesus Christ with the people of Spain.
Last night I went out with Sister Moreno (my mini-mission companion) and Sister Susu (her new trainee) to visit the people we had taught during my mini-mission. I've mentioned a little about Gona and Sirvan, but let me explain the whole situation.
Gona and Sirvan, a young Muslim couple, moved to the Houston area around mid-October from Iran, on an educational visa to get PhD's. They happened to move into the same apartment complex as the sister missionaries, on the same day, and they met while collecting their mail. The sisters asked if they could visit later, and they came with the mission president to get permission to teach the gospel to Gona and Sirvan.
When they started teaching, Gona and Sirvan knew very little about Jesus Christ, and the sisters had to start from scratch to teach them the restoration and the plan of salvation. They found a copy of the Book of Mormon in Persian, since both Gona and Sirvan are just learning English. As always in the first meeting, they challenged them to baptism, but they declined since if they were baptized they wouldn't be able to return to Iran without being killed. Nonetheless, they were very interested in learning more about the gospel.
When I taught them on my mini-mission, I saw right away that there was something special about them. Sirvan started the first lesson with a deep and thorough question that clearly showed he had been thinking and studying the principles of the gospel. In the second lesson both Gona and Sirvan thanked us for answering their questions. Gona told us that when they had such questions for their Islam leaders, they would avoid the questions or just simply not answer them. They both expressed that they loved the answers we gave because they made sense. Then Sirvan said that the plan of salvation was something that he especially loved because it felt so right to him to know that we lived with God before coming to earth and that He had made a plan for us to come back to Him. They were eager to pray and continue to study the Book or Mormon. They come to church almost every week and have met a lot of couples their age and made a lot of friends. We introduced them to another Irani family in the stake, and they became instant friends. They've been watching a lot of the Mormon messages videos on youtube, especially the ones for kids or youth, because the language is simpler and they can understand it better.
Last night I was thrilled to be able to teach them again for the first time since finishing my mini-mission. Our lesson was on recognizing the Holy Ghost, and I felt its presence strongly in the room from the very beginning. We shared some scriptures on how the Spirit speaks to us, its roles in teaching, testifying, protecting, and guiding. Sister Moreno asked them how they had known they should come to the United States from Iran, and what they described was the Spirit touching their hearts and guiding them here. Then Sister Susu asked if they feel a similar feeling when they watch the church messages online, and they nodded, then Gona told us that as she reads the Book of Mormon, it fills her with peace and makes her want to change certain things in her life.
(Sister Moreno and I exchanged a contained-scream expression across the room.) We read with them again Moroni's promise and I started talking about how it invites the Spirit when you want to make changes in response to what you're learning. My heart was screaming "TALK ABOUT BAPTISM!" As soon as I finished my previous thought, Sister Moreno asked them for the second time if they would commit to be baptized on February 23. Instead of the flat-out refusal from before, Sirvan said "That's a little soon. I want to study more and prepare more." Gona expressed her concern about the risk they would be taking and we each bore our testimony that this is a gospel of miracles. I shared an experience my uncle had getting into a prestigious law school just days before semester started, in spite of having only decent grades, because he had received guidance from the Lord that he needed to go there and had trusted that God would provide the way. We promised them that if they continued to study and came to know for themselves that the gospel was true and that they should be baptized, the Lord would bless them and protect them against the dangers they would face.
When we closed the lesson, we could still feel the incredible power of the Spirit, and we knew that they could also feel the truth of our words.
As soon as we got in the car, the sisters and I, amid tears, offered a fervent prayer of thanks. All of us had felt strongly about extending a baptismal date, and we were still in awe of the testimony they had both borne of the Lord's direction in their lives and the blessing the Book of Mormon has been in their lives. Even though they didn't accept the date, I know they could feel what we felt and that was what mattered.
I don't know that I have ever felt so happy in my life as I did last night in that lesson. THE GOSPEL IS TRUE! The Lord is preparing people to hear it, and He will not abandon those who trust in Him. The Book of Mormon is here to bring peace to our lives, to change our hearts, and to bless us abundantly.
and that is why I need to serve a mission. To offer those blessings, that peace, that hope to as many people as I can touch. It doesn't matter to me how hard it is, because I know this is a gospel of miracles, and the people who are prepared will come to know the truth as long as I am diligently striving to find and teach them.
Sirvan said yesterday that being baptized was not a choice of the mind, but a choice of the heart. I think that is what the gospel is, in the simplest terms. It's something you know deep within you, something that fills you with all the good things that can be found in this world, and something that touches you powerfully enough to last forever.
I am a witness of Jesus Christ, of His mercy, His reality, and His gospel; and His gospel is indeed a gospel of miracles.
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