Genesis, Part Two...

So there I was, trying to live two different lives. On the one hand, I had a deep desire to learn more about the gospel - if not from Sam, then from someone else who could teach me. But at the same time, I was living my life the way I wanted, or so I thought. By this point, I was an alcoholic. From the age of 18, I had been having at least one drink a day. And, more often than not, I drank to get drunk. I rarely had one glass and then put the bottle away. It was all or nothing and I wasn’t slowing down for anyone. And so, I slowly drifted away from Samuel Black. Oh, he still tried to stay in touch. He came over to my house a few times, even went to my birthday party. But it just wasn’t working out.

Being a military family, we all got accustomed to moving every three years or so. And, with our three year requirement complete, my family decided to move again. I wasn’t as willing to leave as they were, but after a few months of living alone, I decided to join them in Northern, California.

Now, being the Bay Area, I had expected to find a lot of other men like me. In fact, from the way everyone talking about the Bay, I half expected gay guys to be falling from the skies or something. I was somewhat disappointed when I actually had to go looking for them. But all too soon, I was right back in the same destructive pattern I was in before: drunk every night and usually spending the night.

Having lived in the apartment a few months before I showed up, my parents naturally made friends with all the neighbors. One apartment, in particular, held a house full of girls and my mom wanted me to make friends with them. The catch was they were all either deaf or hard of hearing. One girl, Elaine, was my interpreter. She was only hard of hearing and was very good at reading my lips. Through her, I began to learn how to sign and, eventually could communicate to the other girls as well.

Elaine and I became the best of friends and we practically hung out all the time. We went clubbing. We went drinking. She was completely straight but was always very eager to set me up with her guy friends. And since I have never had much luck in that department when left on my own, I usually took what she gave me.

July 4^th 2006, Elaine and I were driving around, killing time until the evening when all of the fun stuff we had planned would begin. As we were driving, we passed an Asian grocery store. Neither of us had been there before, and since we really didn’t have anywhere else to be, we decided we might as well give it a try. Now I’m sure that you all have had Asian cuisine at one point in time, right? Well, that’s not what this was. This place was selling the raw forms of things that I never would have imagined would have been used in Asian cuisine. A little taken back by the "naturalness" of it all, I politely told Elaine that I would wait in the car.

On my way to the exit, I saw a handsome, young man enter the store. And when I say handsome, I mean drop dead gorgeous. Oh, and there was one more small detail: he was wearing a nametag. Yep, he was a Mormon missionary. I’m not sure what I was hoping to achieve, but I tapped him on the shoulder and said, “You’re a Mormon, right?”

He turned towards me and smiled. “Yes, I am.”

“Well, I don’t know anything about you guys,” I told him. It wasn’t the complete truth, but then morality wasn’t exactly my strong suit at this point in my life. “How about you tell me a little about yourself.”
He told me that he didn’t have the time right then but, if I gave him my number, he’d call me sometime.

‘Sweet!’ I thought. ‘I’m in!’ But my friend saw who I was talking to and quickly came to rescue me from the devilishly handsome missionary.

I honestly don’t remember anything about the rest of the day. The next vivid memory I had was getting a call from the missionaries inviting me to Church. Certain that I would be reunited with that same missionary from the Asian grocery store, I readily agreed.

I don’t think I ever told anyone this, but when the missionaries told me where the Church building was, I forgot to write the address down. I knew a vague description of the place, but I didn’t know any street names. Unwilling to just simply call them back and get better directions, I checked the phone book for all of the Mormon Church buildings in the area (of which there were many) and spent all Saturday driving around till I was certain I had found the right one.

So there I was on my first day of Church. I was wearing a dark suit with a purple dress shirt and plum colored tie, the likes of which, I hoped, would impress any church-goers. But when I showed up, everyone was wearing simple suits with plain white shirts. Slightly embarrassed, I sat myself down in a row that, I hoped, would allow me to blend in with the crowd. But I wasn’t surprised when the missionaries found me after the service was over. I mean, purple in a sea of white kind of sticks out. What I was surprised about was the fact that my missionary, the one from the grocery store, was not one of the two who were looking excitedly at me. But these two seemed nice enough. They invited me to a meeting with them later that evening and I agreed before I even thought it through.

Almost at once, I could feel myself rebelling, trying to find a way to get out of my agreement. I mean, I knew what they wanted to talk about and I didn’t want any part of it! Sure, the missionaries might be nice to look at, but I wasn’t about to drink the kool-aid. I mean, I used to have fun picking on Mormons, even laughing at guys on bikes who even resembled missionaries. There was no way I was about to become one of them.

But then I heard my mother’s voice in my head telling me, “You made a promise. Now you are going to keep it.” So, reluctantly, I decided to show up. The missionaries, Elders Monte and Fielding, were very happy to see me. I was not as pleased, but we started the discussion anyways. I don't it needs to be said, but I was not in the right mind frame to be there. Even so, the missionaries were undeterred. They began talking to me about the Pre-existence, and I remember thinking, “Yeah, yeah. I’ve already heard this one. You guys got anything else?”

Apparently, my disinterest was pretty obvious to Elder Monte who decided to change gears and talk about the First Vision. Immediately, my peripheral vision seemed to narrow until all I could see was the missionary and all I could hear was his words. In fact, I could barely even hear that. It was like I was feeling what he was saying more than I was actually hearing it. But one voice, that was not Elder Monte’s, kept saying the same thing over and over in my mind. “It’s true, Michael. It’s all true.”

“No. It can’t be,” I thought. “They can’t be right. They’re… Mormons! They’re crazy! Sure, they’re friendly, but they are definitely not right!” But no matter how much I tried to argue it, the feeling was so soothing to my soul that I somehow knew that what these two missionaries were telling was the truth.

Seeing the inward war that I was waging, Elder Monte leaned in and asked, “Michael, would you like to be baptized?”

I heard a voice, my voice, respond, “Yes.” And I became confused because the voice was so certain. It was so sure that this was the best course of action. But I felt like wherever that voice had originated from, my head was definately straggling behind.

“Good,” Elder Monte said. “Then in four weeks, you’ll be baptized.”

Two weeks later, after taking a lot of missionary lessons, I was talking to the missionaries and they invited me to an out-going missionary fireside. I had never heard of such a thing before but they explained it like this. When a missionary is called, he serves for two years. At the end of the two years, he goes to a Church building and stands in front of a lot of people with all the other missionaries who are going home, and they all share their testimonies on what they’ve learned during the time they've been missionaries. And, in the audience, everyone who has had the chance to know them comes to hear them talk. Old members, new members, those who haven’t been baptized yet like me… all are welcome.

“It would be good for you,” Elder Monte had explained. By this time, I had stopped trying to argue with the missionaries; they always won every argument we got into anyways. So I went.

While I was there, I heard a lot of really amazing testimonies and stories of how the missionaries changed so many people’s lives by their diligence and hard work, and also how their lives had changed. They always brought it back around to the Spirit and that the Lord had helped them every step of the way, but I knew that He only works with the willing and that humility is no easy task.

And as I sat there listening, something happened to me. I got the feeling that I wanted to serve a mission. Two weeks earlier I hated Mormons, and year before that, I couldn’t live without my family. Now, I want to be on a bike away from everyone I knew for two years! I had caught Mission Mania!

When my Elders went to say goodbye to their departing friends, I walked around and guess who I should find? The same missionary that I had met at the Asian grocery store! Elder Arlington, as it were. And, just like the first time I met him, I tapped him on the shoulder. When he saw who it was, I said to him, “What are you doing here?”

Laughing, he countered, “What are YOU doing here?”

“I’m here with the missionaries. I’m going to be baptized in two weeks!” I told him.

“No way! That’s awesome, buddy!”

I didn’t have much more chance to talk as at that moment, before my missionaries found me saying that they had to get home before a certain time. Something about turning into pumpkins. So I said goodbye to Elder Arlington and the three of us made our way to the car. We got no further than the parking lot before Elder Arlington came running out of the building calling my name.

“Wait!” he said, and I could tell that he had been crying.

“Hold on a second,” I told him. “I just left you ten seconds ago and you weren’t crying then.”

“No,” he said. “I just realized something. The day that I met you was my first day out on my mission.” He said, “I had been praying the entire plane ride over that, if I were to speak with everyone I saw that day, I would get a baptism out of one of them. And I had a clear image of you in my head, I just forgot about it until this exact moment.”

I was speechless but I realized that I was crying too. ‘Wow,’ I thought. ‘This Elder has so much faith.’ So, I asked him, “Would you like to be the one to baptize me?”

He said yes and we hugged. Looking back, I remember being so full of pure joy that it didn’t even occur to me that we were embracing. I was so full of the Spirit at that moment that I was not being tempted by the adversary at all.

Two weeks later, as planned, I was baptized.