Clayton M. Christianson - The Power of Everyday Missionaries: The What and How of Sharing the Gospel

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

Christensen, Clayton M., author.

The power of everyday missionaries : the what and how of sharing the gospel / Clayton M. Christensen.

pages cm

Includes bibliographical references.

ISBN 978-1-60907-315-2 (paperbound)

ISBN 978-1-60907-316-9 (hardbound)

1. Evangelistic workThe Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. 2. Mormon missionaries. 3. The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day SaintsMissions. I. Title.

BX8661.C43 2013

266'.9332dc232012043321

Printed in the United States of America

Publishers Printing, Salt Lake City, UT

10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1

Proceeds from the sale of this book will be donated to the general missionary fund of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints.

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We invite you to visit frequently our website

everydaymissionaries.org

as you read this book. Tell other readers what you learn as you follow the principles for sharing the gospeland tell your stories that will inspire the rest of us!

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INTRODUCTION: MY PURPOSE

Introduction: My Purpose

The Blessings That Come from Sharing the Gospel

My purpose in writing this book is simply to offer my witness that being a member missionary can be a source of deep happiness. It need not be hard. You will pull wonderful friends into your life because they will be able to feel your love for them when you invite them to learn more about their Heavenly Father. And every time you take someone figuratively by the hand and introduce him or her to Jesus Christ, you will feel how deeply our Savior loves you and loves the person whose hand is in yours.

I have spent a very large portion of my life working to build the kingdom of God through missionary workand in so doing have worked hard to understand what God told Isaiah: For my thoughts are not your thoughts, neither are your ways my ways (Isaiah 55:8). Among other things, I have learned that Satans work to slow our missionary efforts is not just manifest in tempting us as individuals to break Gods commandments. He also tries to guide us to depend upon the thoughts and ways of man as we share the gospel.

Many of us know people who seem to be natural missionaries, almost as if they have an innate gift that makes sharing the gospel easy for them. My wife, Christine, and I certainly are not naturals at this. We found the work to be uncomfortable and intimidating at the outset, which I recognize in retrospect was because we were following many of the thoughts and ways of man. Learning and following the principles summarized in this book have helped us share the gospel in ways that have become natural and energizing because, I believe, we are following more completely Gods ways in doing missionary work.

In a vision of our time, Daniel saw that in the days of these kings shall the God of heaven set up a kingdom, which shall never be destroyed: and the kingdom shall not be left to other people, but it shall break in pieces and consume all these kingdoms, and it shall stand for ever (Daniel 2:44).

There are currently more than 14 million members in the restored Church of Jesus Christso we must be doing something right. There is cause for concern, however. The Church is indeed growing rapidly in some parts of Africa, Latin America, and Southeast Asia, in what economists call the developing world. But many of us in prosperous nations have concluded that the kingdom in our homelands is done growing. In a stake near Boston, for example, nearly seventy-five members of two adjacent wards moved out of the area in a time of economic downturn. The two wards were subsequently merged to continue the feeling among the remaining members that the ward was strong. Somehow, the leaders and members didnt seem to seriously consider a second option, which would have been to find seventy-five new members who might accept the gospel from among the 100,000 not-yet-members who lived in the areas of these wards.

Was Daniels vision little more than wishful thinking? I dont think so. Indeed, the Lords statement that the world is white already to harvest (D&C 4:4) doesnt have an expiration date. The world is still ready.

I have observed that when we do not magnify our callings, much of the time it is because we dont know how to do so. Most of us are very anxious to be great member missionaries. The problem is that we just dont know how to follow Gods thoughts and his ways. I hope that this book will help those of us who want to wield our sickles with our might to become great member missionaries.

Feeling the Spirit of God Again

Let me describe how sharing the gospel has been such a source of happiness for me. After I finished business school at age twenty-seven and began my career, in imperceptible increments I began to feel the Spirit less and less in my life. I was serving as a counselor to Bishop Kent Bowen in Boston, and I was spending a lot of time and energy to magnify that assignment. I was praying and studying the scriptures regularly, and yet despite my doing all these right things, I just felt that the Spirit was not with me as much as I had felt it when I was on my mission in Korea.

Then we moved to Washington, D.C., where I was to work as a White House Fellow. All of a sudden, we lived and worked and commuted with new people, and I found myself with many more opportunities to discuss the gospel with my new friends. In short order after our move, two of my colleagues accepted my invitation to come to our home and take the missionary discussions.

Before one of our lessons with them, we were scurrying around to clean things up. I put a tape of the Mormon Youth Symphony and Chorus into our stereo, and the choir began playing their rendition of The Spirit of God (Hymns, no. 2). I was in the dining room when they began the third verse:

Well call in our solemn assemblies in spirit,
To spread forth the kingdom of heaven abroad,
That we through our faith may begin to inherit
The visions and blessings and glories of God.

As I heard those words, a powerful and sweet spirit entered my heart, and I realized what had been happening in my spiritual life. With our move to Washington, I had begun again to do my part in spreading forth the kingdom of heaven abroad. And what I inherited as a result were the visions and blessings and glories of God. I had begun feeling the Spirit again on a daily basis. My dreams were about spiritual things, and I was singing the hymns of the Restoration as I walked to the bus stop.