12/01/08 A Letter From Elder Wiltbank's Dad

Landon
One night as I walked through my bed room I glanced at the TV as I walked by and saw two missionaries on the screen. I was prompted to watch as I lay there and watched I thought well I will get back to what I was doing but I couldn’t pull away so I continued to watch it was a talk at a BYU women’s conference by Brian K. Evans titled [He Does Not Take Counsel From His Fears] I realized that I had fears in life that directed me in the wrong direction at times but with faith in Christ I can overcome and have strength as I learn and put my faith to work. As I look back I realize that a lot of my faith was built on my mission by putting it to the test like you are. Landon I still draw strength from those experiences.
I hope I can catch the spirit of this talk and share it with you.
Elder Evans shared this experience from his mission he called it a first contact approach called Harvesting the field. He would knock on the door and ask for the head of the house hold and say we are representatives of the Lord Jesus Christ and he has sent us here to leave his peace and a blessing in your home may we come in and do that? When we were aloud In we would say this blessing is for the entire family. Would you mind gathering the family together? After the family assembled we would again explain we represent Jesus Christ and he has sent us to your home to leave his peace and a blessing. Then came the hard part we would kneel and invite the family. Will you kneel with us while we do this? There we were on our knees in a strangers home looking up and inviting them to join us in prayer. If we hesitated when we knelt there was usually uncomfortable giggling or laughter . And the response no perhaps another time. If we didn’t hesitate and demonstrated our resolve there was a good chance the family would kneel with us. Then a prayer and a priesthood blessing for the family would be pronounced. Many times this was a powerful spiritual experience that paved the way for teaching the gospel. I have never had a more intimidating experience as a missionary than when we were harvesting the field. This made street contacting seem like Child's play. As you might expect spiritual preparation for this approach was critical. We would pray earnestly for the strength of the Lord and to be filled with his courage. On one occasion after an evening of Harvesting with one of the assistants to the president he said Elder Evans that was incredible I have never done that before. I was surprised I assumed he was an old hand at these things. As we talked that with out an endowment of courage from the Lord this experience would have never been possible. It also illustrates to me that fear need not be connected to a specific problem or crises it can just as easily arise from challenging church calling or other significant church responsibility.
Elder Wiltbank as I listened to this talk on fear and realized how I could use it for my benefit I thought of how this tool could make it possible for you to use your faith and conquer your fears and totally rely on the Lord to bless the lives of others and have super strong spiritual experiences to build your faith. As I am sitting here thinking of the opportunity of this for us as your family and for you and a family. We would love to fast and pray with you this next Sunday for faith and courage to harvest the field. What do you think? Me Mom Macie Brayden and Jaxten Will be excited to Fast and Pray with you and put our faith to the test to help you share the Gospel with our help. Think of how this experience would help Macie Brayden and Jaxten as they see that they were able to help you. I am so excited will you do this with us?
We love and pray for you night and morning. May you have a great day and a wonderful Holiday as you serve in the field. Always know we are here for you for ever!!!
Love your Dad