Babak

Every Monday we would head into town to a little internet café. It was small and a bit dingy but it had cheap internet. We would pay for our hour and then sit down and write our emails home.

One afternoon while finishing up our emails a man came up to us and in English stated for everyone to hear, ‘ you are missionaries with the church.’ Looking at each other both Sister Christopher and I answer yes and asked if he was familiar with the church. He said yes and then told us his story. He was from Pakastan and was kicked out of his country because he became Christian. He had been in Berlin for a while and had met the missionaries up there once. We jumped on this opportunity and set up an appointment to meet.

After our first appointment we knew he was special. He had this deep desire to learn about the gospel. We started teaching him regularly meeting at least once a week. Along with our regular appointments he would attend our English/German class during the week where we either taught German or English depending on who came.

We had ordered him a Persian Book of Mormon and when it finally arrive he was so excited. He started reading immediately and by the next appointment he was half way through. He’d tell us that he loved reading it and he knew it must be true. We were at the church building one afternoon when he proudly informed us that he had finished reading the Book of Mormon. We asked what he thought about it. He paused for a moment looked up into the sky and then back at us and then told us he knew it was true. We invited him to be baptized which he agreed would be good.

He wanted to thank us for sharing the gospel with him so he planned to feed all of us missionaries for Thanksgiving, which he knew was a big American holiday. He made this amazing spicy, Pakistanis food that was…..I loved every savory bite. The elders were very impressed with him and his testimony of the gospel. The Elders taught the lesson that day and talked about baptism and why it was important. Babak looked so happy and so ready.

Our next meeting was in the city. We met at a small ice cream café. I don’t think it was that warm but we ate ice cream anyways. Babak informed us that day that the Spirit had told him he was supposed to marry Sister Christopher. Imagine our surprise when we heard that. We obviously had not taught him enough or correctly about the Spirit and how the spirit works and feels because he thought he was in love with Sister Christopher. And right there over ice cream had proposed.

I should preface this a bit. I had the most beautiful companion every – tall, nicely built, thick blond curly hair, amazing eyes…there isn’t anything wrong with her at all. So the fact that someone was interested in her doesn’t surprise me at all. Just that as a missionary she would be proposed to does because I didn’t know that type of thing happened. Especially while teaching the gospel. apparently he felt that they had been dating since we met. At what was I a chaperone.

We laugh at the experience now but at that moment it was a bit of a blow. We taught about the spirit and how his feelings for Sister Christopher were wrong. We met a few more times with him, but were sure the Elders were present. I actually believe we had them start teaching the lessons and we just sat in.

In the end he stopped meeting with us all together. There was no joyous baptism or confirmation. There are no stories to be told of how he became the next bishop or went on to be a great leader. Instead there is one blog post about this amazing man and how he came to know the truth. There are days as I think back on my mission quietly say a prayer asking that Babak has found the missionaries again. That he is following the spirit and that some day he will once again find the Church and be able to embrace it.

mit freundlichen Grüßen

Jenessa Jensen