Day 112 –Opposition in All Things- July 18, 2006
We taught S today. No, that’s a lie. It’d be closer to the truth to say that we saw S today. Not a lot was taught to her, but I learned something today. There is opposition in all things. Satan’s power is great. (“Great” meaning “large” or “immense”, we use it in the pejorative sense!” – ‘Homer: Bad Man’, The Simpsons)
I’m not going to repeat what happened. If you want to know how it went, just read our troublesome meeting with S on {Day 108}. It was more of the same. All of the progress we’d made on {Day 98} and {Day 106} was gone. S had a number done on her. The damage done by her church ‘elder’ (that’s what he called himself) was greater than I first assumed. S was basically told by her ‘quote-unquote’ “elder” from her ‘quote-unquote’ “non-denominational” church that if you can’t find it within the Bible, it’s not from God. So, bye-bye pre-mortal life. I tried to share Jeremiah 1:5 with her. S said, “I know you showed be that scripture before, but it doesn’t say we all lived with God in some spirit world.”
That’s when I saw it. It was a piece of paper. A piece of blue paper that was sticking out of S’s Bible. During our whole meeting today, S kept glancing at it. Written on that blue paper were lies and misrepresentations so great that they might as well have come straight from Satan himself. It’s almost as if the Devil spat directly onto the page to form those false words. Anti. Lucifer’s loogie. The purpose of those pages is to keep people from investigating the church further, or at the very least, to slow their progression to a standstill. The Spirit couldn’t be felt at that meeting. It might have had something to do with the fact that we didn’t meet in the H’s home. Sister H is very busy this week, so we got an exchange and met in S’s home. It was the first time I’d met with S in her home since our first contact, with Elder Buttars, on {Day 26}.
We didn’t talk about the Atonement of Jesus Christ. We didn’t have time. The whole hour was taken up hearing all of the questions S had. She told us a little about her meeting with her “elder”. He told her, “S, the Mormons believe that they can be equal with God. They believe that they can become Gods. Did they share this with you?” Poor S, sitting there with a “deer-in-the-headlights” look on her face answers timidly, “N-no; no, they didn’t.” “Hmm….,” he said, “I wonder why they’d keep that from you. Why don’t you ask them?” Actually, I doubt he would’ve told her to ask us. He probably just gave her all of those scriptures in Isaiah about how there is only one God and how there’d never be another one. He hoped she’d read those and then that would be the end of S’s interest. If that’s the case, he didn’t know S very well.
We didn’t watch the Bruce R. McConkie talk either. We plan to correct this mistake the next time we meet with S. We didn’t have control over this meeting. As much as I like to answer S’s questions, Elder Pierce and I agree that we should lead with Elder McConkie’s talk right out of the box at our next meeting. Invite the spirit early. Bear sincere testimony. Commit her to read from the Book of Mormon. That’s what we’ve got to do. S is never going to truly progress until she gains a testimony of the truthfulness of the Book of Mormon. No more messing around. Next time, we’re going there to teach!
For those of you who thought you’d heard the last of N, you are sorely mistaken. After our disappointing, (yet optimistic for the future), meeting with S we headed home. On the way home, we had some people we had planned to contact today. So we were going to check on them, taking a short cut through N’s apartment complex. N actually lives in a nice town home. The complex is set up with a ring of apartments on the outside, with nice town homes on the inside. We met N on his way to the Laundromat. We talked with him for a while. It was agonizing. N is a “card-carrying” Jehovah’s Witness. He’s so happy. He can’t wait until he’s certified, then he can go out as an official Jehovah’s Witness spreading the word. The line that N said to us that really stuck out to Elder Pierce was, “I don’t have a chance for heaven.” That sent up a red flag in our minds. Question: “Let’s see, who is it that wants us to think that we don’t have a chance of getting into heaven?” Answer: If you answered “Jehovah,” that is incorrect. The correct answer is “Satan.”
I’m not going to repeat what happened. If you want to know how it went, just read our troublesome meeting with S on {Day 108}. It was more of the same. All of the progress we’d made on {Day 98} and {Day 106} was gone. S had a number done on her. The damage done by her church ‘elder’ (that’s what he called himself) was greater than I first assumed. S was basically told by her ‘quote-unquote’ “elder” from her ‘quote-unquote’ “non-denominational” church that if you can’t find it within the Bible, it’s not from God. So, bye-bye pre-mortal life. I tried to share Jeremiah 1:5 with her. S said, “I know you showed be that scripture before, but it doesn’t say we all lived with God in some spirit world.”
That’s when I saw it. It was a piece of paper. A piece of blue paper that was sticking out of S’s Bible. During our whole meeting today, S kept glancing at it. Written on that blue paper were lies and misrepresentations so great that they might as well have come straight from Satan himself. It’s almost as if the Devil spat directly onto the page to form those false words. Anti. Lucifer’s loogie. The purpose of those pages is to keep people from investigating the church further, or at the very least, to slow their progression to a standstill. The Spirit couldn’t be felt at that meeting. It might have had something to do with the fact that we didn’t meet in the H’s home. Sister H is very busy this week, so we got an exchange and met in S’s home. It was the first time I’d met with S in her home since our first contact, with Elder Buttars, on {Day 26}.
We didn’t talk about the Atonement of Jesus Christ. We didn’t have time. The whole hour was taken up hearing all of the questions S had. She told us a little about her meeting with her “elder”. He told her, “S, the Mormons believe that they can be equal with God. They believe that they can become Gods. Did they share this with you?” Poor S, sitting there with a “deer-in-the-headlights” look on her face answers timidly, “N-no; no, they didn’t.” “Hmm….,” he said, “I wonder why they’d keep that from you. Why don’t you ask them?” Actually, I doubt he would’ve told her to ask us. He probably just gave her all of those scriptures in Isaiah about how there is only one God and how there’d never be another one. He hoped she’d read those and then that would be the end of S’s interest. If that’s the case, he didn’t know S very well.
We didn’t watch the Bruce R. McConkie talk either. We plan to correct this mistake the next time we meet with S. We didn’t have control over this meeting. As much as I like to answer S’s questions, Elder Pierce and I agree that we should lead with Elder McConkie’s talk right out of the box at our next meeting. Invite the spirit early. Bear sincere testimony. Commit her to read from the Book of Mormon. That’s what we’ve got to do. S is never going to truly progress until she gains a testimony of the truthfulness of the Book of Mormon. No more messing around. Next time, we’re going there to teach!
For those of you who thought you’d heard the last of N, you are sorely mistaken. After our disappointing, (yet optimistic for the future), meeting with S we headed home. On the way home, we had some people we had planned to contact today. So we were going to check on them, taking a short cut through N’s apartment complex. N actually lives in a nice town home. The complex is set up with a ring of apartments on the outside, with nice town homes on the inside. We met N on his way to the Laundromat. We talked with him for a while. It was agonizing. N is a “card-carrying” Jehovah’s Witness. He’s so happy. He can’t wait until he’s certified, then he can go out as an official Jehovah’s Witness spreading the word. The line that N said to us that really stuck out to Elder Pierce was, “I don’t have a chance for heaven.” That sent up a red flag in our minds. Question: “Let’s see, who is it that wants us to think that we don’t have a chance of getting into heaven?” Answer: If you answered “Jehovah,” that is incorrect. The correct answer is “Satan.”
posted by Garden Anywhere Box | 5:39 PM
0 Comments:
Post a Comment
<< Home