We meet at our broken edges

Melissa Dalton-Bradford (author of Global Mom that I posted about earlier) came to town to visit the Patch family and to give a lecture at ASB.  She also spoke at an informal Youth fireside for the kids in our branch.  I went with Kaleb and Noé, while Leonard stayed home with Gavin, Teague, Hiram, and Ali.

I think us grown-ups enjoyed the evening just as much than the youth did!  It was a great spiritual boost.  Melissa is currently living in Germany and spoke of her work with the Syrian refugees there.  She shared how she has made so many connections with them as they share the losses they've had, our "broken edges" as she called them.  One man was showing her pictures on his phone of his home that was reduced to a pile of rubble and his family members that have been killed.  With limited ways to communicate (she's helping to teach them German) she drew a picture of her family with stick figures and shared how her oldest son has passed away.  In that moment, she and he connected over their loss and saw each other as brother and sister.

I remember speaking with a Temple president once about his youth in Alberta after WWII.  There were some "refugees" that had moved in and he remembers not being very kind to them.  They called them DPs for displaced persons.  Now as he's grown he thought that maybe Heavenly Father moved them to Canada so they could hear the gospel there since they couldn't in their homeland.  I asked Melissa if there was any missionary work happening with the refugees she knows.  She said the short answer was yes.  Then she said that she isn't helping the refugees in an effort to convert them, she just wants to help them transition to their news lives better.  However, she said the refugees are drawn to the gospel.  The missionaries can not keep copies of the Book of Mormon in Farsi and Arabic because as soon as they receive new shipments, investigators ask for them.  Every Sunday in her ward in Frankfurt there is a Sunday School class in Farsi.  This is a miracle to me!  These people are my brothers and sisters and they couldn't hear the gospel message in their homelands.  They have suffered so much and have traveled 4,000 miles on foot to begin a new life.  This new life also affords them the opportunity to hear the gospel!  Heavenly Father loves ALL of His children and He is preparing ways for them to hear His truth!