Emily Jane Zeigler knew she wanted to join the Church at age 14, but it took four long and trying years before she entered the waters of baptism.
This week's “Deseret Book Live!” video is centered around a scripture found in Helaman 3:29: “Yea, we see that whosoever will may lay hold upon the word of God, which is quick and powerful, which shall. . . lead the man of Christ in a strait and narrow course." Zeigler shares her conversion story in the video.
Zeigler explains in the video how reading the word of God—especially the Book of Mormon—aided her conversion. When she had just finished her freshman year of high school, she was struggling to understand her place in her community and where she wanted to go in life. A friend shared with her a story of another 14-year-old boy who was searching for truth—Joseph Smith.
“When he gave me a copy of the Book of Mormon, I took it and I began reading it that night—and I loved it,” she says. “It made so much sense to me and I kept reading. I kept growing more curious and I actually ended up reading it in six months, cover to cover, because it was so meaningful to me.”
Zeigler knew she wanted to be baptized, but her parents did not agree with her new beliefs and they didn’t want her to be baptized. The next four years were filled with a sense of longing to belong, and once Zeigler turned 18, she was finally baptized.
“Looking back, I think I was introduced to the gospel at the perfect right time, even if the timing didn’t always feel right to me,” she says. “I think that I was placed perfectly in the situations I was placed in and I wouldn’t trade the past four years for anything.”
Watch the video on Facebook.
Lead image: Facebook screenshot
