Message of the day!!!

"Teaching People Not Lessons"

Elder Clark and I wished to expound more upon what was taught in the Zone Conferences this week. Here is the example that came to mind.

Picture this, your talking to three men. Prior to beginning to talk with these three men you were commanded by God to let them know that the worlds best sport was restored to the earth. If you played this sport you would be the most happy you could be and you could even play it in Heaven with your family!! You try the sport out for a while and come to know that it's called Football. You enjoy playing Football so much and doing what God asked you to do you realize that this needs to be shared with others! Coupled with that though God even commands you to go out and share the message about how playing Football is a commandment from God and that if we all learn to play that we reap eternal salvation. 

So now your back to where we began. You begin to talk to the first man and you say Hello Brother, I've got a message for you from God! And the man says o.k. let's hear it. You just throw all the good news at him as fast as you can. "Football is amazing! It's brought me so much joy, and I know if you play it you'll have eternal joy too!!" and then you go onto say something like this " I know that Football is the only true sport from God on this earth today and Football is God's sport." . . . . . All of a sudden you see the brothers eyes get big and his face turns a little red. All of a sudden you realize he has been holding a tennis ball behind his back the entire time. 

This man loves tennis!! He plays it every day and in fact his family taught him about tennis and it's so comfortable for him. After feeling diminished and thrown down on, he looks at you and says, you know I think your doing a good thing getting people to play football. But I'm not interested myself. 

ALRIGHT PAUSE!!!

Can we understand now how key the first moments are of talking to someone and if we throw too much out there then people won't be able to connect and feel comfortable making small changes, "line upon line, precept upon precept?" 

Alright, now an Angel comes down after this experience and gives you some advice. The angel says try connecting first asking questions about them and what they hold dear. Ask them why they do or don't believe in God. Ask them what questions they have about life. So now your thinking "Oh ya I got this!"

You walk up to the second brother and say "How's it going my friend?" . . He says, "Fine" . . . then you say "I have a question for you" . . . "What are your hobbies?" . . . He says "Well, I love Basketball!" and then you say "What has happened in your life that has caused you to play sports and basketball?" he says "Well I think just the principle of team work. I've really learned how to make friendships and work hard because of basketball." and then you say "Wow! That is amazing my friend, I know that friendships and unity and working hard is of God!" then you say "If you could talk with God in person for 30 minutes, what would you ask him?" . . . then he says "Hmmm. . . . that's a good question! I'd probably ask Him what the point, I mean I love life and playing basketball is fun, but, I don't honestly know what happens after that or why I am even playing it." then you say, " That's interesting, so what your saying is that you would ask what is the purpose of life? Is that correct? . . . "He says yes definitely" then you say, we have a message that might answer that question for you, were missionaries for our church, may we share that message with you right now?" . . . . . . . . 

Elders and Sisters we would love your input!! 

The point we are getting across is that these people are special and all are unique no matter how they present themselves they are special and have learned different things from God that is helping them draw unto Him. People are drawn because of simple truths and kept because of the atonement and healing words of Christ!! The spirit will step in as we ask questions and then navigate from there. Here are some started questions if you get stuck. . . 

1. If you had one week to have Christ walk with you on earth, where would you take Him, and what would you ask him?
2. If you had 30 minutes to talk with God before returning to the world what would you ask him?
3. What has happened in your life that has caused you to believe that there is a God?
4. Have you ever felt like your prayers have been answered? Have you ever felt like you received direction before?
5. Why do you think it is that there are so many different Christian denominations on the earth today?

Some Elders in Ocala have gone around doing a survey even, asking people simple questions as these. And it's working!! People are so much more responsive and able to open their hearts to the message when they are forced to face reality when they don't have the answers to questions of their soul they either kept hidden or never even knew they had!!

I know that as we help people to ponder as Christ did, and as we teach like the prophets did of old we will be so much more effective. We don't go out boastful throwing down on others religions, but we go out with the truth treasuring it as a pearl and not casting it before swine. We had one brother, after explaining how to go about this, he said, this is how I was softened and converted!! After watching a heated debate between a member of the church and another man, the member of the church looked at him and said, "brother, have you even wondered where our spirits were before this life?" Brother Henderson said at that point something hit him hard, the spirit literally pierced his soul, for in fact, that question wasn't just a question, but it was a statement that caused him to remember. That question enabled the spirit to come in and around his soul to the remembrance of a time beyond the veil when we were all in the presence of our Father and Savior Jesus Christ.