Moses on a Motorbike

Okay, I seriously feel like I just barely emailed home. Where has the week gone?
But we were so blessed this week. Really. We found some incredible people.

My favourite? A man named Keith. He lived in the US for a long time, and his wife and two children were killed by a lorry driver. Kind of as a result, he become a Jesuit. And then it wasn’t enough and he couldn't cope and he became an alcoholic. (I guess I could make a quip about teaching an alcoholic priest, but this is one of the most gentle men I have ever met. He’s gone through a lot of hard things, and he has a lot of character.)
And he’s met missionaries and been taught a few times before; apparently his nickname is Moses on a Motorbike. J
Anyway. He told us why the Catholics can never fire a priest—because in the Old Testament there is a verse that says Melchizedek will be a high priest forever. And then he went to explain who Melchizedek was. And we said “Yeah, actually, we know and it’s a term we use quite a lot.” We pulled out the Resto leaflet, explained the differences between Aaronic and Melchizedek priesthoods, and pulled out Matthew 16:5-19 and explained how that sealing power had been restored, and explained temple marriages. We told him that in a temple, we don’t say ‘till death do you part’, but rather we say for ‘time and all eternity’, because that authority to do so has been restored.
The Spirit was so strong I almost couldn’t breathe. He just stood there, and looked at the picture of Peter, James, and John giving Joseph Smith the Melchizedek priesthood and then back at the “timeline” in the Plan leaflet. He just got it, in a way no one other than a Catholic Priest could. You could see the hope come into his eyes.

 And then he asked if we could answer his questions that no one had ever answered before.
The answer to that is yes. It has always been and will always be a yes. The restored gospel can answer all of the questions of our souls.

Isn’t he just incredible? I can’t wait to teach him. He reminds me so much of Steven from Harborne.



And our other major miracle this week was Maqsood. We met him on the street,  and he told us we were an answer to a prayer that had been unanswered for seven years. He came to church, and then we taught him a few times this week. The first lesson, when we invited him to be baptised, he said:
“Okay. Alright. When will this happen?”
I’ve never had someone ask for a baptismal date before!

And then our next lesson, he told us he had asked for all Sundays off of work ,and had asked for his baptism day off as well.He is resolving his own concerns and progressing so well.  And he said my fave thing ever: “What time will it be?”
That’s what I get for mocking step three in weekly planning each week when it says to prepare them for a specific date and time for a baptism.

We went to go over his reading, and he hadn't read the chapter we had marked for him. He’d only read the title page. At first I was like how can I talk about that? There isn't too much there.

But then he said, oh my goodness, he said: “From the title page, I prayed. And God has told me this Book is true. I know this is the word of God. But it has to be, because I already know that Joseph Smith is a prophet.”
And then he went on to bear testimony of Joseph Smith, and how the restored gospel will bring the needed healing to the world, especially the persecution in Pakistan to the Christians. (He’s a Pakistani Christian, and there are terrible things going on there right now.)

I can’t even tell you how much Maqsood has touched my heart. And what a contrast between last week and this—Mike read the whole thing and knew it was true, and Maqsood read the title page. I am so grateful for both of them. Both taught me so much.


I am learning so many simple things as a missionary, but they are the powerful ones.

xx
Sister Miller

Pics:Okay. So I am sending you guys some weird ones this week. sorry. I just feel like it.

The first one is kinda for Sister Roscher. Did I send the picture home where I papoosed her? An investigator taught us how to do that. And guess what I saw this week! (Yes, this is a totally creeper pic. haha.)

This right near our flat. I LOVE this thing. It says land of my fathers. :)