Background: My friend, Elizabeth, was born and raised a Mormon. Carla
and I had lunch with her one day and she shared the story of her
conversion to Christianity. If you ever get a chance and you know who she is, ask her to tell
the story, it’s powerful. At the end of the story, I asked her what I
should do if any missionaries came calling at my house. She said, “feed
them, they only get $10,000 a year to live and have to depend on local
churches and families for food.”
and I had lunch with her one day and she shared the story of her
conversion to Christianity. If you ever get a chance and you know who she is, ask her to tell
the story, it’s powerful. At the end of the story, I asked her what I
should do if any missionaries came calling at my house. She said, “feed
them, they only get $10,000 a year to live and have to depend on local
churches and families for food.”
In July of 2006, we were heading back to Texas from a Kentucky mission trip. We stopped off at Kentucky Fried Chicken for our final lunch; my theory was, if you’re in Kentucky, you should go to KFC*. I know, it’s deep.Anyway, after we were done stuffing ourselves, we headed to the restrooms because we had a long drive ahead of us.
As I was standing in the dining room, waiting for the girls, two Mormon missionaries came into the restaurant. One of them went into the bathroom while the other stayed out in the dining room with me. We chatted a bit and then he switched places with his buddy. I talked with the second guy and then the first one came out of the restroom. Got the picture? Markie was hanging in the restaurant dining area with two Mormon missionaries.
So, as I was standing in the KFC, I started to get an idea. I still had money left over from the mission trip; I could use benevolence money to buy lunch for my new friends.
I asked the oldest one “Are ya’ll here to buy lunch?”
He said, “No, we’re just here to smell.”
After that pathetic response, I knew I had him. I said, “Let me buy you lunch.”
He protested, but his heart wasn’t in it.* We had been talking religious matters, so I used some Christianese and asked him to “not deny me the blessing of buying him lunch.” He said “OK,” and I paid for lunch and a drink for each of them.*
I gave them some righteous platitude about how Jesus loved them, no matter what works they did, and I left them to enjoy their lunch in peace.
*They had buffets!! Shoot me now.
