Newsletter Success

     Last week we delivered nearly 40 letters to the chaplain to get to our soldiers.  We decided that we needed to have more contact with our soldiers, especially the ones that we meet on their first day, then never see again till graduation.  So we wrote the first edition of our newsletter, "Latter-day Soldiers".  Then I added a personal note to each soldier, according to his situation, inviting him/her to join us on Sundays.
     We were delighted to see three soldiers who appeared to be attending on Sunday because of the newsletter.  
     First is a returned missionary who just needed to get better organized and do his laundry and stuff at times other than Sunday during church.  He always has good intentions and a little nudge in his direction made a difference.
     Second is a new member who was baptized in Basic Training, so he  barely knows what the Church is about.  He came out for a while, but we hadn't seen him since November. He needs to have the new member lessons taught to him.  He has helped with the blessing of the Sacrament but needs more teaching before he can advance in the Priesthood.
     Third is a man who was baptized 3 days before he left home.  He knows very little about the Church and wasn't even sure if he held any priesthood.  We were able to contact his bishop and learn that he had been ordained a Priest at the time of his baptism.  His wife had been a less active member and is becoming more involved in their home ward.  The bishop was happy to know that  he will be getting some teaching here.  The soldier said that he was nervous about trying to do anything with the sacrament because he didn't know what to do.  We told him that we can arrange for him to learn all of that and he seemed pleased.
     Today at In-Processing we asked for any church members or anyone "interested" to raise their hands.  One man raised his hand.  We took him aside and learned that he is a non-member who had an LDS "battle buddy" in Basic that he attended meetings with.  He was very impressed with what he saw and with the missionaries that he met.  He wants to learn more.  Since we only have about 3 minutes to talk with these soldiers in this situation, we get their contact information and give them ours.  We will follow up with him and hope that he can attend church on Sunday so we can introduce him the the full time Elders.  He seemed very sincere and genuinely interested.   It was such a cool experience.
     We've been kind of sad as we've seen some of our most faithful soldiers graduate and move on, wondering if we would get anyone to take their places.  Some of those holes are being filled and we are excited. What a great experience to work with people at all levels of faith and experience.  What a joy to see people choose righteousness in challenging situations.
     I am always encouraged when soldiers have the courage to raise their hands and identify themselves as members of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints.  We sometimes know which soldiers to look for, as we receive emails from missionaries at other military bases.  Some soldiers don't raise their hands and don't step forward.  Are they afraid of the reaction of their peers?  Are they in the Army to get away from church? Sometimes.  Once in a while we get a soldier who raises his hand and as we talk with him it becomes obvious that he has no idea who we are, or thought we represented a different group, so he isn't really that interested.   Some, like today, know who we are and are glad to be invited to join us.

     If we are here to make a difference in the life of only one soldier, it is worth the sacrifice.