Mercies on a trip to Ecuador

I packed my bags, carefully placing the 3 Spanish copies of the Book of Mormon so they wouldn’t get crumpled during the flight. We were heading to the place my husband served his mission for The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints 26 years earlier.

As I handed over my passport I realized how little I knew of what my husband had planned. I figured since he spent two years in the country I could trust him to choose sites we should visit and the best places to stay.  Of course his former experience included occasional running water, electric showers that would give you a little shock, stray dogs chasing after you, cockroaches, and chicken foot stew. Maybe I should have given just a little input this time.

The only thing I had done to prepare was pray.  No, I wasn’t scared. Maybe I should have been, but it wasn’t that kind of prayer.  I had been praying that this would be a trip of tender mercies and miracles.   That is when the thought came to my mind to go buy copies of the Book of Mormon in Spanish to take with me and give away during our travels. 

It wasn’t all faith and no fear. I was actually a bit nervous. How many books should I get?  Three?  I had probably given away 3 copies of the Book of Mormon total in my life time and now I was expecting to give away 3 in one week?  And to who?  People who I didn’t even share the same language with?  I guess I would have to depend on my husband’s Spanish for that. He had no idea what I was signing him up for. 

I did my best to tuck my doubts aside and trust that if I prayed for this small miracle for me, the Lord would answer. 

Tender Mercy #1: A missionary

As we went to sit down at our gate a little tender mercy sat right in front of us.  A missionary.  Bright, new, nervous and… all alone?  You always see missionaries in twos. We introduced ourselves and asked where his companion was.  He was supposed to leave with a large group of missionaries two days before, but there was a mistake on his paperwork so he was left behind. 

I tried to imagine how he felt standing at the airport and realizing he would not be getting on a plane with his friends.  Then I thought about his mom.  Having an 18 year old son who will be leaving for a mission in the next year my heart went out to her. I asked him how she was feeling about all this. 

He was the oldest, her first missionary to leave. She was very worried about him traveling alone to a country she didn’t know. I handed him my phone and told him to call her and let her know he was ok. My husband filled the rest of the time with old mission stories that, now that I think about it, probably did little to comfort this missionary. At least they both were laughing.

After the flight we helped him through customs with luggage that was too much for one person to carry. Two more smiling missionaries were waiting for him outside the gate so we snapped a quick picture and sent his mom one last text that her son was safe and sound. 

What a perfect start to our trip.

Tender Mercy #2: Among millions of people.

In Ecuador we met up with two other Elders who served in Ecuador with Shawn and had become good friends.  Us wives stuck together and spoke English as the husbands spoke in the language of their mission. They were so happy to be back with a people they loved. They beamed like eager young missionaries again. 

I think they forgot they were back in Ecuador as tourists because they spoke to everyone as if they were a potential contact for teaching the gospel. Every conversation would lead to how they had served in Ecuador as missionaries for the church, and before you knew it they were sharing pieces of their testimonies. 

What amazes me is that here we were in a country with millions of people of different faiths and yet we came across so many members of the church. Two instances in particular felt like more than just coincidence. 

We had pulled over to view a beautiful waterfall in a small city. There weren’t many members of the church there, you could tell by the small building that held our church’s name. Near the waterfall was a stand where a kind couple was selling jewelry. As the women shopped the men made conversation. 

They discovered that the man who owned the stand was a baptized member of the church whose family had stopped going to church when he was young. He didn’t remember a lot about the gospel but was interested to become reacquainted . We offered him one of our copies of the Book of Mormon and he graciously accepted. 

Tender Mercy #3: Directed where to go.

A few hours later we came to a bigger city where one of the husbands “Elder Brown” had served. When we got there he was disappointed that it had changed so much. He didn’t recognize a thing. We got out of the car but had no idea where to go to get food that would be ok for us to eat. 

After standing on the street corner for a few minutes a thought came to my mind. “Elder Brown” had mentioned that while he was on his mission he was blessed with a gift of knowing where they should turn to stay safe and meet people who needed to hear their message. 

Almost teasing I said,  “Come on Elder Brown! You said you had a gift of always knowing which direction to go. Where should we go?”  

He replied, “You know what! You are right.  We need to walk straight 2 blocks then turn left one block.”

We did as he said. As soon as we turned left we ran into two women. They were a mother and daughter. We asked if they knew of a place we could eat and they asked what brought us Ecuador.  As we walked and talked we discovered they had just moved there to flee from Venezuela. 

They were excited to learn our husbands were former missionaries. They were members of the church but had not been back to church since they moved!  We told them where they could find the church in that town. By the time we had walked the two blocks forward and one block to the left we were standing right in front of a clean restaurant to eat at.  

I guess I shouldn’t have tried to number the mercies we experienced because there were so many more. I’ll have to write another post for those but I will tell you they involved a mudslide in the middle of the jungle and a visit to the beautiful people of Otavalo. 

What about the 2 other copies of the Book of Mormon?

If you are wondering what happened to the other Books of Mormon, we easily gave them away and could have given away several more. 

The family who owned the bed and breakfast we stayed at accepted a Book of Mormon. 

Our driver who got to sit next to 3 former missionaries and learn about the gospel for 5 days straight?  He had no hope!  As we drove to the airport he asked all the questions he could think of about the new temple being built in Ecuador.  He hugged us as he dropped us off. He was grateful for a Book of Mormon and told us he was very interested to read it. Even though I couldn’t understand what was being spoken on that drive I could feel a sweet Spirit in the car. I knew they were speaking about the gospel. 

I’d say my prayer for tender mercies was answered. Perhaps I should pray for them as a travel down my street and not just when I travel to Ecuador. What mercies will you ask for?

Thank you for sharing!

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