GOD WHO?

August 8, 2010 Saturday

We finished up at the library and were out of there at noon when it closed. It seemed like we’d been there forever instead of just one week. But it was a good week, and we hope some good will come of it.
We taught a lesson this afternoon. Orson had contacted a lady a week or so ago who said her 5 year old son had been asking her some questions about where he came from (in a spiritual sense). She had no religious background at all and didn’t know how to answer him. She originally wanted us to come when her partner wasn’t home and had set up for us to come at 2 today. So we went and sure enough, her partner was home as was a family friend who works with him.
They were all sitting out on the porch drinking beer recovering from a garage sale they’d had in the morning. Narin, the mom, was nursing her youngest, a little guy named Brumby. (Have I mentioned that women are very casual about nursing—no cover-ups for them!) We chatted for a while about general stuff and then leaped ahead into the first lesson. When we asked what interested them the most from the brief overview, the husband explained he was a devout Roman Catholic until he was 14 when something happened and he decided he could worship just as well from home as in a church. Then Luke, the 5 year old, said he wanted us to explained stuff so he could understand it.
So I started out very basically and asked if he knew who Heavenly Father or God was. Nope. Did he know who Jesus was? Nope. Wow, I don’t think I’d ever run into somebody who was so “Gospel illiterate.” So we talked about Heavenly Father a bit and then went through the song, “I Am a Child of God.” We told them about Primary and the Friend magazine. Narin seems to really want her kids to know about God—she was never taught.
We borrowed some old Friend magazines from the branch president’s family today and will take them over. Hopefully we’ll be able to help them out a little. They are planning to move back to Queensland in a couple of months so it won’t be a long term teaching opportunity.