Three Years of REAL JOY Part One
It was in November of 2014 that I began to investigate the Church. I was on the Vic Park 24 bus and I make eye contact with an Elder Missionary. He smiled and asked how I was and I asked what was the point of serving a mission.
"Do you score points with the Lord for every convert you bag?" I joked.
He didn't take offense but saw the humour and we started talking seriously.
"I mean, I'm already a Christian but the stuff you guys believe is too weird for me, " I stated.
"How so?" he inquired.
"Oh, man! Polygamy, living on compounds, worshiping Joseph Smith. "
In the ensuing conversation he managed to explain none of that stuff is true and asked if I wanted a home visit. I replied I love a good theological debate and would enjoy a visit very much but if he was hoping to gain a convert he was barking up the wrong tree.
The following Saturday, as we planned, three Elder Missionaries came to visit me.
The first thing that I was impressed by was that anybody could be so cheerful and happy at the ungodly hour of ten o'clock on Saturday morning. I was nursing a hangover and at first I was regretting having agreed to the meeting.
There I was at the door about to ask them to just leave me some literature and go away but they looked so sweet and sincere. The Holy Ghost spoke to me in that quiet tone of command:
Invite them in, Diane.
They knew I was already a believer in Jesus Christ and I immediately started on the Book of Mormon. We have the Bible, why do we need this book? What evidence supports it? Doesn't Revelation 22:18 forbid other so-called holy books?
The first thing they asked me to do was read Helaman 5:12 http://classic.scriptures.lds.org/en/hel/5/12
As I read that Scripture aloud my spirit tapped into a wellspring of intense joy that burst out all over me. The Elders were watching me with evident delight, since it was obvious that this was getting to me in a good way.
"Diane, what are you thinking?" Elder Fjelsted asked me.
"This is the foundation of everything I believe." I stated simply, but I could barely catch my breath. I had never had my faith in The Anointed Jesus expressed so simply, yet so eloquently.
There was something else as well though. The Elders had something about them for which I simply hungered. I know now that it was the gift of the Holy Ghost.
We agreed to meet again that week but as they were leaving I was going out myself and I wanted to get in as much time as I could with them. I mean, I walked to the bus stop with them and I was deeply disappointed when I realized we had to part company there.
I never doubted The Book of Mormon. I did have doubts about how to interpret certain passages, or why dumb rumours got started, and things like that, but almost as soon as I began reading I knew the Book is what it claims, another testament of Jesus Christ.
I also have to admit, this is where I began to get convicted of sins I had been with which I had been complacent. I was under the impression that the more I sinned, the more opportunities I was giving God to show grace and mercy. I was shoplifting regularly, since I felt society owed me for the poverty, neglect, and abuse I had endured all my life. I was also prostituting to support my crack habit but I was working on recovery. In 2002 I hated God, I was homeless, involved in petty larceny, and was supporting a $300 a day habit but by this time (Nov-Dec 2014) I was down to a few hundred a month in drugs and alcohol.
After several meetings I was getting attached to them in a way I could not explain or truly fathom. One time in late November as they were preparing to leave after prayer I burst into miserable tears.
"I hate when you leave," I told them. "I don't know why, but when you're here its like there's extra light here and the things I fear don't seem close any more and the shadows recede but when you go the shadows and the dark comes back and all the chains of the things that keep me bound in spirit are back rattling at my heels! I HATE IT WHEN YOU LEAVE!"
They all three told me that was the gift of the spirit and I could have it if I were willing to be baptised and confirmed... but back then I had too many questions. We prayed together and I felt better.Saturday 8 December 2014 they invited me for a Christmas party at the Church. I was still pretty unrepentant back then. I got there late and no one was in the foyer. As I looked around I thought I wonder if these people are naive enough to leave their wallets in their coat pockets but I guess even then there was a new spirit growing in me because I decided that since I was getting free food from them I didn't need to try top take their money. The Primary kids put on the most adorable Nativity Play, then the Elder and Sister Missionaries did a skit about a family trying to keep up with the image of the "perfect"family. A huge Christmas tree had "gifts" underneath it, a DVD of a fireplace crackled merrily away as we sang Christmas carols and ate a huge festive Christmas dinner.
It was the kind of Christmas you see on The Waltons or Little House. It was the kind of Chrsitmas I'd only dreamed of and learned to bitterly dismiss as impossible outside of television and other fantasies.
"You don't belong here, " satan whispered suddenly. "You're an outsider. You have no place here."
"I do so belong," I answered aloud. "They invited me."
I was suddenly so moved that I burst into quiet tears. I stopped myself from sobbing out loud but my Elders were right by my side in a second to comfort and console me. I told them what I was feeling, everything I just wrote here and how the the adversary wanted me to feel I was out of place because my family never had things like this, being the bunch of dysfunctional alcoholics we were.
"So the devil was trying to make me feel like I don't belong here because I didn't come from a happy family but then I said 'No, you don't, satan. This is my family now...or they could be, if I choose to make them so..."
At that point the Spirit of Adoption was on us all. All three of my Elders had tears of joy in their eyes.
A few days later I was in a bad mood and complained I hated Christmas because I had no family to love and indulge me. Elder Fjelsted stopped me mid-sentence and said "Oh, yes you do. We're your family now."
"Don't make me cry," I answered tremulously but I was moved with joy, not sorrow.
However, I still had so many questions!
Christmas Eve the Elders and a sister who had met me at the Church Party invited me for hot chocolate and desert. By now they were teaching me the Word of Wisdom and I was determined that I would just have to be the exception to those rules!
I had very sophisticated arguments, arguments based on the Scripture.
"After all, God made all those things. The coca leaf that makes cocaine, the tobacco weed, the grains that produce alcohol, opium poppies, all those things were made richly to enjoy, like it says in 2nd Timothy. And The Gospel of John says without Jesus nothing was made that was made. So there's no sin in indulging that stuff!"
"Right," Elder Fjelsted observed wryly. "God also made poison ivy and I didn't hear you plead for your right to roll around in that."
I looked at him in stunned disbelief, feeling both put in my place and stunned at how with one fell swoop of humour he had undone all of my sophistry and I burst into laughter that bordered on hysterical. Soon all of us were roaring until our sides hurt. I couldn't breathe and Sister R. asked if I was okay. I said it was Elder Fjelsted's fault for making me laugh myself into an asthma attack.
However, I was determined to make my argument for coffee!
"Look, " I told them, "if you make me give up coffee you will reap the whirlwind. I mean, the first thing in the morning I'm stomping around the apartment in a rage just from being awake. I wake up hating everyone. I go stomping into the kitchen cursing blue fire on all creation. That first cup of coffee is as black and bitter as the mood I inevitably wake up in. Then I start to think of reasons to have gratitude as I drink it. Now by the time I'm on the third cup of coffee and lit my first cigarette of the day I'm all (singsong) This is the day the LORD has made! I will rejoice and be glad in it! but until that third cup and that cigarette I'm something less than human."
Again I was met with laughter and humour, and again Elder Fjelsted pointed out the blindingly obvious.
"Diane, I say this with love and respect, but you're describing a pretty intense addiction."
OH DAY-UM!!!I remember early January when Elders Smith and Gullart were visiting me for a lesson. I was sitting out in the corridor of my apartment with them (without a third male they could not come into my apartment) and I suddenly felt overwhelmed with trust and humility for these two boys (Yes, I know they were young men but since I am old enough to be their mum to me they were boys!) who were teaching me so much and guiding me so patiently!
Near tears I rolled over onto my stomach and refused to meet their gazes as I blurted, "You don't know me. You know nothing of what I've done or the person I really am."
They were both looking at me with loving kindness and that got tears sliding down my face.
"If you knew the kind of person I really am you wouldn't be inviting me to join up with nice people like you guys. You'd be planting land mines and stringing up barbed wire to keep the likes of me out of there!"
Rueful, sympathetic laughter met this outburst but I was almost inconsolable.
"I feel so dirty," I said softly. "I feel so dirty."
"There's something that can wash away that dirty feeling, Diane." Elder Gullart told me.
I nearly leaped on him for the chance to know what could possibly take away this feeling of despair and self-loathing.
He gave me one word that would end up changing my life and startting me on the road to that true change of heart and spirit known as repentance:
BAPTISM
"Do you score points with the Lord for every convert you bag?" I joked.
He didn't take offense but saw the humour and we started talking seriously.
"I mean, I'm already a Christian but the stuff you guys believe is too weird for me, " I stated.
"How so?" he inquired.
"Oh, man! Polygamy, living on compounds, worshiping Joseph Smith. "
In the ensuing conversation he managed to explain none of that stuff is true and asked if I wanted a home visit. I replied I love a good theological debate and would enjoy a visit very much but if he was hoping to gain a convert he was barking up the wrong tree.
The following Saturday, as we planned, three Elder Missionaries came to visit me.
The first thing that I was impressed by was that anybody could be so cheerful and happy at the ungodly hour of ten o'clock on Saturday morning. I was nursing a hangover and at first I was regretting having agreed to the meeting.
There I was at the door about to ask them to just leave me some literature and go away but they looked so sweet and sincere. The Holy Ghost spoke to me in that quiet tone of command:
Invite them in, Diane.
They knew I was already a believer in Jesus Christ and I immediately started on the Book of Mormon. We have the Bible, why do we need this book? What evidence supports it? Doesn't Revelation 22:18 forbid other so-called holy books?
The first thing they asked me to do was read Helaman 5:12 http://classic.scriptures.lds.org/en/hel/5/12
As I read that Scripture aloud my spirit tapped into a wellspring of intense joy that burst out all over me. The Elders were watching me with evident delight, since it was obvious that this was getting to me in a good way.
"Diane, what are you thinking?" Elder Fjelsted asked me.
"This is the foundation of everything I believe." I stated simply, but I could barely catch my breath. I had never had my faith in The Anointed Jesus expressed so simply, yet so eloquently.
There was something else as well though. The Elders had something about them for which I simply hungered. I know now that it was the gift of the Holy Ghost.
We agreed to meet again that week but as they were leaving I was going out myself and I wanted to get in as much time as I could with them. I mean, I walked to the bus stop with them and I was deeply disappointed when I realized we had to part company there.
I never doubted The Book of Mormon. I did have doubts about how to interpret certain passages, or why dumb rumours got started, and things like that, but almost as soon as I began reading I knew the Book is what it claims, another testament of Jesus Christ.
I also have to admit, this is where I began to get convicted of sins I had been with which I had been complacent. I was under the impression that the more I sinned, the more opportunities I was giving God to show grace and mercy. I was shoplifting regularly, since I felt society owed me for the poverty, neglect, and abuse I had endured all my life. I was also prostituting to support my crack habit but I was working on recovery. In 2002 I hated God, I was homeless, involved in petty larceny, and was supporting a $300 a day habit but by this time (Nov-Dec 2014) I was down to a few hundred a month in drugs and alcohol.
After several meetings I was getting attached to them in a way I could not explain or truly fathom. One time in late November as they were preparing to leave after prayer I burst into miserable tears.
"I hate when you leave," I told them. "I don't know why, but when you're here its like there's extra light here and the things I fear don't seem close any more and the shadows recede but when you go the shadows and the dark comes back and all the chains of the things that keep me bound in spirit are back rattling at my heels! I HATE IT WHEN YOU LEAVE!"
They all three told me that was the gift of the spirit and I could have it if I were willing to be baptised and confirmed... but back then I had too many questions. We prayed together and I felt better.Saturday 8 December 2014 they invited me for a Christmas party at the Church. I was still pretty unrepentant back then. I got there late and no one was in the foyer. As I looked around I thought I wonder if these people are naive enough to leave their wallets in their coat pockets but I guess even then there was a new spirit growing in me because I decided that since I was getting free food from them I didn't need to try top take their money. The Primary kids put on the most adorable Nativity Play, then the Elder and Sister Missionaries did a skit about a family trying to keep up with the image of the "perfect"family. A huge Christmas tree had "gifts" underneath it, a DVD of a fireplace crackled merrily away as we sang Christmas carols and ate a huge festive Christmas dinner.
It was the kind of Christmas you see on The Waltons or Little House. It was the kind of Chrsitmas I'd only dreamed of and learned to bitterly dismiss as impossible outside of television and other fantasies.
"You don't belong here, " satan whispered suddenly. "You're an outsider. You have no place here."
"I do so belong," I answered aloud. "They invited me."
I was suddenly so moved that I burst into quiet tears. I stopped myself from sobbing out loud but my Elders were right by my side in a second to comfort and console me. I told them what I was feeling, everything I just wrote here and how the the adversary wanted me to feel I was out of place because my family never had things like this, being the bunch of dysfunctional alcoholics we were.
"So the devil was trying to make me feel like I don't belong here because I didn't come from a happy family but then I said 'No, you don't, satan. This is my family now...or they could be, if I choose to make them so..."
At that point the Spirit of Adoption was on us all. All three of my Elders had tears of joy in their eyes.
A few days later I was in a bad mood and complained I hated Christmas because I had no family to love and indulge me. Elder Fjelsted stopped me mid-sentence and said "Oh, yes you do. We're your family now."
"Don't make me cry," I answered tremulously but I was moved with joy, not sorrow.
However, I still had so many questions!
Christmas Eve the Elders and a sister who had met me at the Church Party invited me for hot chocolate and desert. By now they were teaching me the Word of Wisdom and I was determined that I would just have to be the exception to those rules!
I had very sophisticated arguments, arguments based on the Scripture.
"After all, God made all those things. The coca leaf that makes cocaine, the tobacco weed, the grains that produce alcohol, opium poppies, all those things were made richly to enjoy, like it says in 2nd Timothy. And The Gospel of John says without Jesus nothing was made that was made. So there's no sin in indulging that stuff!"
"Right," Elder Fjelsted observed wryly. "God also made poison ivy and I didn't hear you plead for your right to roll around in that."
I looked at him in stunned disbelief, feeling both put in my place and stunned at how with one fell swoop of humour he had undone all of my sophistry and I burst into laughter that bordered on hysterical. Soon all of us were roaring until our sides hurt. I couldn't breathe and Sister R. asked if I was okay. I said it was Elder Fjelsted's fault for making me laugh myself into an asthma attack.
However, I was determined to make my argument for coffee!
"Look, " I told them, "if you make me give up coffee you will reap the whirlwind. I mean, the first thing in the morning I'm stomping around the apartment in a rage just from being awake. I wake up hating everyone. I go stomping into the kitchen cursing blue fire on all creation. That first cup of coffee is as black and bitter as the mood I inevitably wake up in. Then I start to think of reasons to have gratitude as I drink it. Now by the time I'm on the third cup of coffee and lit my first cigarette of the day I'm all (singsong) This is the day the LORD has made! I will rejoice and be glad in it! but until that third cup and that cigarette I'm something less than human."
Again I was met with laughter and humour, and again Elder Fjelsted pointed out the blindingly obvious.
"Diane, I say this with love and respect, but you're describing a pretty intense addiction."
OH DAY-UM!!!I remember early January when Elders Smith and Gullart were visiting me for a lesson. I was sitting out in the corridor of my apartment with them (without a third male they could not come into my apartment) and I suddenly felt overwhelmed with trust and humility for these two boys (Yes, I know they were young men but since I am old enough to be their mum to me they were boys!) who were teaching me so much and guiding me so patiently!
Near tears I rolled over onto my stomach and refused to meet their gazes as I blurted, "You don't know me. You know nothing of what I've done or the person I really am."
They were both looking at me with loving kindness and that got tears sliding down my face.
"If you knew the kind of person I really am you wouldn't be inviting me to join up with nice people like you guys. You'd be planting land mines and stringing up barbed wire to keep the likes of me out of there!"
Rueful, sympathetic laughter met this outburst but I was almost inconsolable.
"I feel so dirty," I said softly. "I feel so dirty."
"There's something that can wash away that dirty feeling, Diane." Elder Gullart told me.
I nearly leaped on him for the chance to know what could possibly take away this feeling of despair and self-loathing.
He gave me one word that would end up changing my life and startting me on the road to that true change of heart and spirit known as repentance:
BAPTISM
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