Do you ever walk around in your neighborhood on a nice warm evening, and think about the lives being lived inside? We never really knows what goes on behind closed doors. I was thinking about my neighborhood, and my ward that I live in. It’s a small ward as I’ve mentioned before, and it is surprising how small it is considering that I live in Salt Lake, not too far from temple square. But, many families have moved to the suburbs, and I guess they don’t like the city life as much.
But, as I’ve been in this ward, I have found out that some of my neighbors that I have known as casual acquaintances are members of the church, but are not attending. I wonder about these people. I wonder what they think about the members that they see walking to church on Sunday. I wonder if they just wish that someone would say, “hey! come to church with me on Sunday.” I wonder that if someone tried to reach out to them, if it would make a difference in our ward.
I also wonder about the active members in our ward too. Recently, my husband was out with my daughter taking her for a bike ride in the neighborhood. He was passing by a less active member’s house, and had a prompting to go knock on the door and say hello. He is a single man, that lives on his own, and is in a wheel chair. I don’t really know his whole story. But, he broke down in tears and told my husband how glad he was that he and my daughter had stopped by. He told my husband how lonely he was. He called my daughter by name, after only meeting her a handful of times at church.
I was touched by this story. My heart broke as I thought of this man just wanting a visitor that didn’t judge, but that would just love him the way he was. Imperfect and hurting. I couldn’t help but think about how in my ward, we have members of the church living all around us that are not attending, and yet, maybe we are just sitting by and not doing our part. We are supposed to be the Lord’s hands on this earth. We are supposed to love our neighbor as we love the Lord.
I don’t have the solution. I am a Mom to two young children, and feel that many days my plate is full and it is hard for me to serve those outside of my own home right now. But, I long for the day when I have more time to reach out to those around me. Even if it is just a simple visit to say hello.
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