EIGHT

“I grew up baptist and my mother would take my brother and I to church and all of the youth activities .Doing this helped me to come to know that I have a loving Heavenly Father and a savior Jesus Christ.

I had a very typical “non-LDS” college experience. I did what other people my age were doing, partied, drank, and participated in that very worldly college life. But something was missing. I found myself wanting to “grow up”, go to church, and stop drinking. I searched, and attended a few churches and tried to stay home on the weekends. Then I had a coworker (my now husband) introduce himself. He told me how he just got back from serving an LDS mission. I personally had never heard of a “mormon” before, but I was intrigued. His example, and the idea of the word of wisdom was inspiring to me. He was able to introduce me to the missionaries where I began taking lessons.

As I was praying and found myself unsure if I wanted this big of a change, I didn’t receive an answer. Lessons went by and I had a non member friend reach out explaining that she too had been through the missionary lessons, and proceeded to provide me with scriptural reasons as to why she chose not to be baptized. I found myself disagreeing with her and wanting to find verses in the Bible to counteract her thoughts. At this point I realized that I did believe, I did agree, and I did need to make the life altering decision to be baptized into the church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints. It’s hard at times to go against what you know. To go against what is “normal”, and to fear judgement. And although I received judgment after deciding to be baptized, never once did anyone leave my side. Slowly but surely this became the new normal. I am now a proud member and am so thankful I met a young returned missionary while searching for the unknown, who brought me into the church and gave me a beautiful family to raise with the same standards.”