Spreading the Good News

One of my thrills is seeing the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints streamlining itself. Example: Years ago I sat on the front row in the Salt Lake Tabernacle the night President David O. McKay inaugurated the "Every Member A Missionary" program. The directive: "ask Golden Questions." "What's that," you ask? It means you asked each stranger, "How much do you know about the Mormon Church?" Next question: "Would you like to know more?"

I lived in Utah then, and asking those questions there was futile. But traveling abroad I asked them, and noticed they carried the same soft touch as a sledge hammer. But at that early date, how better could one communicate such a needed and sensitive message? Now-a-days, we approach people with printed "pass along" cards, and they are more discrete.

Accordingly, this very day while shopping, Ranelle and I passed along some "Pass Along" cards. Result: at least one tangible and positive response! The missionaries will soon be calling on that person. As to the others, "who knows?" But as Elder Marion D. Hanks used to say, "You can count the seeds in an apple; but how can you count the apples in a seed?"

And thus the work goes tirelessly along--offering the masses the priceless opportunity, but teaching and baptizing them one-by-one. That's the Lord's plan, and we rejoice so to be involved.