Your Message Changed My Thinking

I was called as a member of the Seventy in 1977. Since then I have had the privilege of visiting hundreds of stakes. After one priesthood leadership meeting in Taylorsville, Utah, a large man approached me and whispered that his brother had been killed during World War II and that he hated Japanese people. Following the stake conference, however, this same man approached me with tears in his eyes. Crying for joy, he gave me a hug because I had shared my conversion story and my love for Americans and it had touched him.

On another occasion a sister approached me at a stake conference in Georgia, USA, and said she had lost her father in World War II. But after the meeting she said to me, "I have to apologize to you. Because my father was killed by Japanese people, I have harbored hatred in my heart." Then she said, "You told us that your father was also killed during the war, but later you accepted the gospel, which changed your life. And now you are telling us that you love us. I am ashamed of myself. Though I was born in the Church, I have felt hatred toward your people even to this day. But your message has changed my thinking."

I have had so many similar experiences. I have been able to meet many people, and because of the gospel, we are able to love and understand each other.