PROVO, Utah — The heart of a missionary’s purpose is to help people live the doctrine of Christ, said Bishop L. Todd Budge to training missionaries on Oct. 21.
“When you invite people to do anything that helps them turn to Jesus Christ or take a step towards Him, you give them the opportunity to exercise faith unto repentance,” he said.
In a Provo Missionary Training Center devotional, Bishop Budge — second counselor in the Presiding Bishopric — encouraged missionaries to extend invitations with love. He was joined by his wife, Sister Lori Budge, who spoke on how and why missionaries serve.
The Father’s love and the Savior’s sacrifice
Why does God want His children to learn and live the doctrine of Christ? “Because He loves us, He wants us to experience the joy that can come in no other way than by living the gospel of Jesus Christ,” said Bishop Budge.
This love is so great, he added, that Heavenly Father was willing to sacrifice His Only Begotten Son, and the Savior was willing to sacrifice His life.
Doctrine and Covenants 18:12 explains that Jesus Christ “hath risen again from the dead, that he might bring all men unto him, on conditions of repentance.”
Bishop Budge highlighted that while immortality is a gift to all, “eternal life is conditioned upon repentance.”
4 steps to extending commitments
Chapter 11 of “Preach My Gospel” — titled “Help People Make and Keep Commitments” — explains that “when you invite people to make commitments as part of your teaching, you are inviting them to repent.”
It then gives a four-step process missionaries can use to help others live the doctrine of Jesus Christ: extend invitations, promise blessings, bear testimony and help people keep their commitments.
Bishop Budge followed this pattern as an Area Seventy when he invited a less-active Church member to return to the temple.
When the woman said she was unsure if she should marry her boyfriend, then-Elder Budge first invited her to pray in the celestial room after receiving a temple recommend; second, promised she’d receive answers; third, expressed his own experience in the temple; and fourth, wrote her a letter of encouragement weeks later.
This invitation ultimately led the woman to regain her desire to live the doctrine of Jesus Christ, said Bishop Budge. “You see how normal and natural it is just to invite people to do things that will help them come unto Christ and to experience the doctrine of Christ themselves?”
An invitation to church
Inviting people to church is a key way missionaries can help people come unto Christ, Bishop Budge said, even leading to covenant-keeping after baptism. “No one passes through the doors of the temple without first passing through the doors of the meetinghouse.”
Friends who attend church the first week they’re taught are 10 times more likely to be baptized than those who don’t, he added.
“When people attend church, they feel the Spirit deep in their heart,” said Bishop Budge, “and they see for themselves the fruits of the gospel in the lives of the members.”
After the devotional, Sister Chloe Christophersen — a missionary from North Ogden, Utah, assigned to the Japan Tokyo South Mission — said she recognized greater significance of the simple invitation to attend church.
“If we can get them to church and help them meet the members and feel the Spirit when they go to church, then they’ll be more likely to stay,” she said.
‘I was able to feel the love of God’
When Bishop and Sister Budge presided over the Japan Tokyo Mission a decade ago, they met a missionary who struggled with Japanese but had a fluent companion.
Despite the language barrier, “he learned that his talent was to love people,” recounted Bishop Budge. “One of the investigators told him, ‘Your companion taught me the gospel intellectually, but through your love, I was able to feel the love of God and became converted to the words of your companion.’”
This example of loving others when inviting them to Christ resonated with Sister Regan Haynie from Saint David, Arizona. Assigned to the Japan Sendai Mission and having spent only three weeks in the MTC, she found hope in Bishop Budge’s remarks.
“Today was a really hard day,” she said after the devotional. “Japanese is hard, but I can love the people, and that’s what the Lord wants me to do.”
The why and how of service
Sister Budge quoted the scriptural invitation to serve God “with all your heart, might, mind and strength” (Doctrine and Covenants 4:2).
“I think it is significant that the first words to describe how we serve are ‘with all your heart,’” she said. “Can we serve with our might, mind and strength without serving with all our hearts?”
Asking the missionaries to consider the “why” of their service, Sister Budge said, “I trust that we are here because we love the Lord, because we want to serve Him and because we want to help others to come unto Him.”
She added that missionaries can recognize the “how” of their service as they serve with the Savior. When Sister Budge was stretched beyond her comfort zone as a mission leader, “the shift in focus from my lack to His strength made all the difference.”
Sister Budge ended with a promise: “As we serve the Lord with all our hearts, and as we serve others with Him, we will truly find joy and success in our efforts, and we will be able to lead others to the Savior in genuine, effective and sincere ways.”
