Midnight thoughts on a book I love

This past weekend, we drove up to Idaho for Mother's Day, and after church I was greeted with a special request: the Sunday school teacher's daughter was teaching a Hungarian woman in Italy about the gospel but was having a hard time communicating with her because of the language barrier. I was asked to write my testimony in Hungarian and send it her way.

So tonight, I sat down at the computer to type up my feelings on Christ, the plan of salvation, eternal families, and other wonderful things that have brought me hope and taught me to love. I struggled a bit to remember that language that came to me so easily five years ago, and finally decided to reach over to our bookcase and pull down my Hungarian Book of Mormon from the shelf.

The cover is worn completely away, and the pages are soft with well used edges. That book was my constant companion during my year and a half in Hungary. Its pages still carry the marks of my mission--there was the occasional smashed bug,* language notes made in my earlier months, highlighted scriptures, and spiritual commentary on verses that spoke to my soul.

I loved that book. I once tripped and fell in the rain, and, rather than use my hands to catch myself before hitting the unforgiving cobblestone street, I held my hands high in the air to protect this book from hitting a puddle. (And today I have a rather unattractive scar on my knee to prove it.)

As I opened it again tonight, for the first time in quite some time, my heart was flooded with a feeling of familiarity. Of love. Of power and strength. I flipped through it, remembering how many of my prayers had been answered within its pages. I felt incredibly grateful. I know that it is another testimony of Christ. It is a second witness to the Bible that He is our Savior. I know that prophets taught of Christ hundreds of years before his birth and made records of their people. And the testimonies they wrote have strengthened my own.

With these things on my mind, I typed up my testimony in Hungarian, sent the email, and crawled into bed next to my sleepy husband. "I know it's true," I whispered to him. And what my words can't always explain, my heart confirmed.


*The summer always brought hoards of extremely fragile, microscopic bugs. All you had to do was walk into one--slowly even--and you'd find it smashed against you. So they inevitably made their burial grounds on my clothes, in my hair, on my face, and--when I shared a scripture outside--inside my Book of Mormon.

For your own free copy of this special book, or to read the text online, click here.