Hiking With Lena

On June 16th I decided to go on an organized hike in Millcreek Canyon.  It was an organized hike, meaning there would be a guide to lead us and anyone that wanted to sign-up to go on it could.  I tried to find someone to accompany me, but couldn't.  Everyone was either busy or just didn't want to go.  So, relentlessly, I went by myself to hike with complete strangers.  I wasn't very happy about going by myself.  It had me thinking if any of my 178 Facebook friends were really "friends" at all if none of them could make the time for me.  I was a little bitter.

It turned out to be a good thing that none of my friends came with me that day because I got to meet Lena.  Lena is a woman from Russia who is super friendly.  Her and I talked all the way up the mountain and all the way down.  I learned a ton about her.  We talked about everything from cancer to religion.  Eventually, on the four hour hike, it was brought up that she was a convert to the LDS church.  I immediately perked up when she mentioned it, because we hadn't discussed religion thus far.  She said to me "my conversion story is actually a really good one."  She then proceeded to tell me all about it.

Back in the 1980's, Lena was living with her family in Russia.  She wasn't happy living there and she didn't get along with her parents.  She was in search of a way out.  Lena decided at a young age that a family was not in her future.  She had seen how children were treated in Russia and it had turned her off to the whole idea of ever having children herself.  An opportunity was presented to Lena to come to the United States to work as a translator.  She gladly accepted.  She was brought to New York City for some time, but had to return to her native Russia every so often to renew her working visa.  After returning to Russia one time Lena decided it was time for her to look for God.  She began attending an Orthodox church in Russia and was eventually baptized.  When she came back to New York again, she couldn't find an Orthodox church that was similar enough to the one she attended in Russia.  They were all so different.  So, she stopped attending church in hopes that the right one would find her.

One Tuesday afternoon there was a knock on Lena's door.  Lena said that when she heard that knock on her door, she just KNEW that the message the people on the other side of the door were bringing to her would be very special and something that she needed to hear.  She opened the door to two LDS missionaries.  "Hello, would you like to hear another testament of Jesus Christ?"  Lena said her heart filled with joy and she gladly said "Come on in!"  These missionaries visited her on a Tuesday and by that following Saturday she was being baptized as a member of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints.  She hadn't even had a single missionary discussion.  They all came AFTER she had been baptized.  She said after she finished reading The Book of Mormon for the first time, it just re-confirmed to her that the decision she made was the right one.

After Lena had been a member of the church for a while and seen the way families interact in the church, it inspired her to have a family of her very own.  She now has two beautiful daughters.  She was very glad her mind changed on that aspect, because she was initially very adamant about not having children.  Now she doesn't know what she would do without them.

What an amazing conversion story.  By the end of my four hour hike, I felt like I had just made a new lifetime friend.  I was so grateful for the time I got to talk with her and the opportunity I had to listen to her stories.  It made me feel silly for being so upset about going on this hike by myself because you never know who you're supposed to meet.  God brings certain people into our lives for a reason and I think Lena was there that day to be a friend to me and a strong witness of faith.

I will be forever grateful to her.