The training we've received has been extremely enlightening. People are not converted by the message; they are converted by having spiritual witnesses or experiences regarding the message. 1 Cor 2:1-5, "And my speech and my preaching was not with enticing words of man's wisdom, but in demonstration of the Spirit and of power; That your faith should not stand in the wisdom of men, but in the power of God." We cannot answer all their questions. I don't believe this Gospel because I know it perfectly. I believe it because the Spirit continues to tell me that it is true. That's the only way that they will know, because they received a spiritual witness. And throughout the whole Bible and Book of Mormon we see evidence after evidence of the Spirit being the primary resource of knowledge and direction for people. But this aspect is thoroughly ignored by Christendom. I aim to change that.
To receive a spiritual witness, one must have a desire to receive one. The best way to give someone a desire to receive one is to describe the blessings of it, within the Bible and in your own life. It's really refocused the way that we teach.
The most interesting thing that's happened has been talking with the Jewish father of the part member family. I've talked a lot about them. We went over to practice teaching their family, but they had it in their heads that they were feeding us dinner, and we had just come from our dinner appointment with the another family, who fed us tamalies, which were really good, and I had eaten three of them with refried beans. And then the next family graciously fed us a really really good lasagna and salad. But it was good, we had a long gospel discussion afterwards, where we covered everything that we wanted to teach anyway. He's had a bad experience with missionaries in the past, so the fact that he truly opens up the way he does to us is really good. But he doesn't want to be converted, so we just told him of course we'd love him to convert, but we really love him and his family. No sneakiness. And I told him if he reads the Book of Mormon and prays to know if its true then he will receive a spiritual witness.
