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Converting Miss Téa

(a somewhat lengthy account of my journey to the waters of baptism)

I’m not sure when exactly I first realized that there existed such an organization as the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. I can look back now and see that I had childhood friends who were members of the Church, at the time I recall thinking that they were Catholic and that the people they greeted as “Brother Jones” or “Sister Smith” were nuns and monks, without the distinctive robes and habits.


I grew up believing that church was a nice place to go to meet good people, but it didn’t really matter what you believed about God. By the time my junior year rolled around, I was a devout atheist. I actively worked to enlighten other people by exposing their wrong beliefs about God and religion, and thus freeing them from the bondage of the traditions of their fathers. I used my speech and debate skills to the best of my ability, and even created mixed tapes of “anti-God” music to distribute to my friends.

At the beginning of my senior year, my life began to change. The circle of friends I had drifted out of my sphere of influence, each for varying reasons and my boyfriend had inexplicably dropped off the face of the earth and hadn’t been heard from in 2 months.

I took The Book of Questions with me on a date with a friend I’ll call Jim and we talked over coffee. One question that I asked Jim went something like this: “God appears to you in a series of vivid and moving dreams. He tells you to sell all that you own, move to the Red Sea and become a fisherman. What do you do?” He replied that he would do just that.

“But how would you know if it really was God?” I asked.

“I would know,” Jim said quietly, “I would just know.”

Jim’s parents advised him to lend me various books from their home library so I could become acquainted with the Church and its beliefs. As any debater will tell you, researching both sides of an issue is crucial to be well informed of both the strengths and weaknesses of either side. Believing this to be an opportunity to strengthen my arsenal, I agreed to read a book he brought over “A Marvelous Work and a Wonder” by LeGrand Richards.

As I read it, it made a strange amount of sense to me. I pushed that feeling away, concentrating on just learning the material rather than analyzing it. Soon my bedroom was filled with stacks of LDS books from Jim and a copy of the Book of Mormon they gave me.

Jim’s mother arranged for us to go to Idaho Falls Temple Visitors Center and view some films. I don’t recall exactly what we watched that day, but as I watched “Christ in the Americas” I was touched. I filled out the card asking them to have the missionaries contact me. The next week in January, the missionaries showed up on my doorstep.

The first discussion I had with them I was at my adversarial best. I peppered them with all the questions and inaccuracies I had found in the Bible, or with God and organized religion. To my surprise, they were able to answer most of them, and promised to research others that were not readily found as they were scrambling through their scriptures. I agreed to meet with them the following week, and to keep reading the materials I had, including the Book of Mormon and to try praying about it.

I was really struggling with the information I had at this point. If it was true, then I was wrong, and had been wrong about nearly everything in my life up to that point. I hate to be wrong. I wrestled with these feelings, not wanting to be wrong and yet feeling a childhood love of the truth driving me on to explore more.

The second discussion started off well enough, the missionaries were talking to me about something from the Book of Alma, and I remembered reading something similar in the Marvelous Work and A Wonder. “Oh yeah,” I commented, “I really like what SHE had to say about that.”

*Awkward silence*

The elders look at each other, and one of them speaks up. “Actually, Alma is a man. In our church, only men hold the priesthood. Will that be a problem for you?”

Now, to give you a little background that the Elders didn’t know, anyone else who knew me at that point would have choked, imagining my response to such a question. No man was going to hold a door open for me and pity the poor person who referred to me as a lady. I was a woman, and had even experimented with spelling it W_O_M_Y_N to remove the man from the picture completely.

What happened next is still hard to find adequate words for, even ten years of pondering later. I think it’s best described as direct spirit-to-spirit communication, because it was so instant and so clear. Suddenly, I knew

  • that there was a God,
  • that Jesus was who He said He was,
  • that I was loved,
  • that there was a plan for me
  • that I was in no way less esteemed or less eligible for salvation because I would not hold the priesthood. I understood I would know it all someday, but this was enough for now.

What may have seemed like and should have been a very long and awkward silence was followed by the absolutely honest and sincere declaration from me, that No, it would not be a problem. From that point on, the elders said that I was a golden contact. The missionaries invited me to child’s baptism that week, and when we went around the room introducing ourselves, I indicated that I too hoped to be baptized someday.

My senior year was extremely busy, as most are, and comparing calendars with the missionaries, I had one open Saturday between the end of January and June. February 12, 1994. We set that date as my baptismal date and worked to fit in the rest of the discussions and interviews in the three weeks left. Prior to my baptism, I was able to finish the Book of Mormon, The Pearl of Great Price and about 90% of the Doctrine and Covenants

Few people knew I was taking the discussions., and even fewer knew I intended to be baptized Three friends, Jim and his family attended that day, along with the Young Women leaders and most of the girls in the ward. I remember being amazed at seeing so many grown men crying after I was confirmed a member of the Church and given the gift of the Holy Ghost.

Word spread slowly about my joining the Church. The reaction was generally one of incredulity—Téa?? Baptized??? Seriously???? Is this an April Fool’s thing????? But I read and studied everything I could about the church, starting my own library thanks to the local thrift stores, and grew in my testimony of the truthfulness of the Gospel.

I know that the decision to be baptized was the best one I ever made.

This entry was posted on Sunday, April 2nd, 2006 at 10:25 pm and is filed under Whisperings. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. Both comments and pings are currently closed.

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