Churches

When I was a girl, growing up in Richmond, Kentucky... I lived on Tates Creek Ave, maybe a quarter mile from Main Street. We could walk to Main street and from there, we could walk anywhere. Tates Creek Market... Westover... Sunset... Downtown to JC Penney's, the Glyndon Hotel, Jett's (Men's shop), even the Town Cinema, with it's one movie screen. On the way to "town", you passed many many churches. St. Mark's Catholic church, a Lutheran Church, the First Presbyterean church, The First Methodist Church, the First Baptist Church ... It seem like there were at least 6, if not 8 beautiful church buildings. Every Sunday, the church bells rang, the parking lots were full. Many of these church buildings were older, but with beautiful stained glass and ornamental trim and of course, the church bells. When we went to church, we drove past all these beautiful buildings to 2nd Street or Water Street, I can't even remember now, but some dingy side street, across from the Richmond Register building to an old Pizza joint, where we held church every Sunday morning. The building was old, smelled bad, had raggedy carpet, but it had been loved into being a Mormon church building.

One day, I asked my mom, why don't we go to one of these other churches, with their pretty buildings and bells and windows? She replied, "Because our Church is called the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. The Church we go to has Jesus' name in the title because it is His church. None of these other churches bears the name of Jesus Christ."

That made sense, I guess, to a seven year old. But one day, wonder of wonders, a new building was started right across from the end of Tates Creek on Main Street. A sign was placed in front of the building. My friend Sabena and I had walked up to the Tates Creek Market and could read the sign. It said, "Future home of The Church of Christ". We were so excited! Sabena wasn't Mormon, but she knew I could only go to a church with the name of Christ in it. "You can go to church right here, now," she said.

We raced all the way home to tell my mom that a church with Jesus Christ's name in was being built at the end of our street. That's when I learned that there was more to our church than just the name (no offense to my Church of Christ friends). The church I belonged to was literally the gospel of Jesus Christ, restored to the earth in these latter-days by the boy prophet Joseph Smith. It was organized the same way Jesus Christ organized the Church when he was on the earth, with prophets, apostles, teachers, evangelists. My church taught charity and love, service and kindness, just as Jesus Christ had taught in the New Testament. My church taught that there was an additional record of scripture, called the Book of Mormon, that was another testament of Jesus Christ and his dealings with the people here in the America's. Of course, much of this I didn't really understand as a child. I had to take my Mother's word for it.

But as I grew, my testimony grew. I learned more about the gospel, which in turn increased by knowledge of the truthfulness of the things my mother taught. I have had my own witness that the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints is Jesus Christ's church restored, through fervent prayer and study of these things.