The worth of souls and the worth of families (Feb 13, 2008)

Hello again everyone! This week we had a really cool experience. In fact, it's probably one of the best experiences of my mission to this point.

We have these two investigators, Oksana and Ruslan, who are a young married couple whose marriage was entirely on the rocks--so much so that Oksana was close to buying a second apartment, and divorce was looming very near on the horizon. We really wanted to help them, but we had no idea how; so, while writing my weekly letter to President Davis (we write these each week to update him on the area, our investigators, our companionship, etc.) I asked him for advice. On Friday morning we received a phone call from President Davis himself in response to my email. He told us to talk about how a marriage is like a triangle, with the husband and wife each being one of the two corners at the bottom, and the corner at the top being the Lord. The closer they come to the Savior, the closer they come to each other, and visa versa. That same evening we stopped by and caught the entire family at home. Before we began, they spoke about divorce as though it was a definite and unalterable certainty; after we finished our lesson, they were talking about ways they could save the marriage, including a commitment from us to read the Book of Mormon and have family prayer every day (with their son, Yulian, in charge of making sure they do it). We ended with each of us taking turns and saying a prayer on our knees; I believe it may have been the most spiritual lesson I’ve had so far (in fact, the feeling I had afterwards I could compare only to being in the celestial room in a temple). We returned on Saturday to find the situation tangled up again (Oksana was planning on going on a date with someone who wasn't exactly Ruslan), but thanks to another very spiritual lesson where we sang hymns and prayed in turn again, the tangle was—thankfully—released. On Sunday we went on exchanges, so Elder Lewis and I went to a little village for the day while Elder Palsky and Elder Hokanson stayed behind. The entire family went to sacrament meeting, and then Elders Palsky and Hokanson visited them to find that they were doing very well; in fact, during the lesson Oksana and Ruslan promised each other that they would stay married. I've realized just how important families really are through this experience. If the Lord loves this family enough to have poured out His Spirit as strong as He did, as often as He did, then the importance of families must be significantly large, far larger than I had considered previously.

Things are going great here! I love you all, and I hope you all have a good week!

--Elder Hurst