I Knew Best
I Knew Best
By Charlotte Hilton Andersen

What man of you, having an hundred sheep, if he lose one of them, doth not leave the ninety and nine in the wilderness, and go after that which is lost, until he find it?
Luke 15:4

I knew best. Or at least I thought I did. The sister my visiting teaching companion, Melissa, and I were about to visit lived in the same apartment complex I did and I had seen her around a couple of times. Since Melissa hadn’t even met her, I figured that pretty much made me the authority on all things Jen.

“Now, I don’t even know if she still considers herself a member,” I said to Melissa as we crossed the icy parking lot, “and if she does, she’s not active.” Despite seeing Jen in the laundry room, the game room and the parking lot, I’d never seen her at church even though it seemed like our entire apartment complex emptied every Sunday morning at 9:30 a.m. “We should probably just start out with getting to know her and save the message for another time.” In my mind, I was thinking if she even lets us in the front door.

Melissa looked doubtfully at me, “Aren’t we supposed to at least try to share the Visiting Teaching message at every visit?” I suppressed a smile as I knocked on the door and waited. Melissa was only a freshman, a rookie compared to my all-knowing senior self, so I could forgive her.

“What?” The door flung open, warm air rushing out around us. I watched as Melissa’s wide blue eyes bugged out in surprise and her mouth dropped open. “Can I help you?” Jen ran a hand through her spiky hair and glared at us through heavily lined eyes. Her scant clothing made no attempt to protect her from the winter cold and her multiple piercings glittered in the lamplight.

“Hi, Jen,” I said, forcing a friendly smile. “We’re, uh, your visiting teachers. You know, from church. We just wanted to come by and say hi.” Suddenly I wished we had a plate of cookies to offer or at least a bag of M&Ms. There was no way she was letting us in now.

“Oh, okay,” she replied, stepping back from the doorway to let us in. Now it was my turn to gape.

Melissa and I walked in and tentatively sat on the edge of her sofa. “So, this is Melissa and I’m - “ I was cut off by a loud call from the back room.

Jen shrugged, “That’s my boyfriend. Just a minute.”

As soon as she had disappeared down the hallway, I turned to Melissa, one eyebrow already raised. “Does he live here?” she whispered as we took in the elaborate TV setup, boots kicked over by the door, and pair of matching beer bottles on the coffee table where the rest of us proudly displayed our wedding scrapbooks.

“Yeah. Think so.” I muttered as said boyfriend appeared in the living room, rubbing sleep out of his eyes.

“Hey,” he nodded to us and plopped on the couch, not waiting for a reply as he flipped the TV on.

“He works nights,” Jen said by way of an apology. “So, what did you say you wanted?”

“Well, we just wanted to come over and say hi,” I started but Melissa interrupted me.

“Yes, and we have a quick message to share with you if that’s all right.” I glared at Melissa as she finished triumphantly. Was the girl crazy? The message for this month was on temple marriage. If we shared this message, the best we could hope for was to be laughed out of their apartment.

“Sure, whatever,” Jen said as her boyfriend turned the game up louder.

“Well, go on,” Melissa nudged me.

“What?” I hissed through clenched teeth.

“It’s your month to give the lesson, remember?” She grinned, “I’ll give the prayer.” Right. Like this girl was even going to let us get that far.

“I don’t know,” I hesitated. “If we try and give her the lesson we’ll probably just end up offending her and then she’ll never want us to come back! Maybe we should just wait a couple of months.”

“Sister Auman said in Relief Society on Sunday that the messages are inspired and we are supposed to deliver it to every sister on our route each month.” Melissa handed me her Ensign before I could muster another excuse. She was right too, our lesson on Sunday had indeed been on this very subject.

I sighed and turned to Jen who was staring at us like we might be crazy. “Um,” I stammered, my face heating up, “we just um, would like to talk to you about temple marriage.” The boyfriend glanced away from the TV to stare at me. “We, uh, just have a few quotes and stuff about why it’s important.” I looked quickly down at the magazine in my hand, knowing I was doing a bad job of it and just started reading. I read quickly through each quote, from the first to the last, waiting for someone to yell or laugh or at least interrupt me with a quiet no thank you but instead when I finished it was to complete silence. It was only then that I noticed the TV was off.

Carefully I looked up and was shocked to see Jen with tears streaming down her face. “How did you know?” she whispered. “How did you know that is what I’ve always wanted?”

I was too stunned to reply. Too stunned to move. Thankfully, Melissa was not so paralyzed and went across the room to wrap her arms around Jen. Several tissues and an hour later we had learned that Jen had been baptized as a little girl but had lost touch with the church after her parents had divorced and she had moved away with her father. She had met her current boyfriend, Ben, in high school and afterwards they had moved to Utah for a job. The job fell through but they had stayed for reasons even they weren’t quite sure of. They had talked about getting married many times but were afraid of making the same mistakes their parents had and of the ephemeral nature of marriage in today’s society. What they were looking for, Jen explained, was something permanent, something that would allow them to be together forever. They wanted an eternal marriage.

Ben nodded in agreement as he held Jen’s hand and I found that as I looked at them sitting together, I no longer saw the nose rings or the tattoos or the clothing. I only saw a couple that loved each other deeply and were searching desperately for what was missing from their lives. My heart overflowed as I saw they were truly my brother and my sister.

A year after that fateful night, I stood with a humbled heart in the quiet elegance of the sealing room in the Manti temple as Jen and Ben were sealed together for time and all eternity. They had got the desire of their hearts and I had learned an important lesson about my own heart. It turns out that it is the Lord who knows what is best for each and every one of his beloved children. Including me.
- posted by Charlotte @ 8:55 AM