Moment #586. Amharic at grocery store parking lot. Mon, May 22, 2006.

05/22/2006. Two ladies were ahead of me in line at the grocery store. I couldn't tell their ethnicity or what language they were speaking. It didn't occur to me to approach them in the store.

But by the time I got outside, they had put their groceries in their car, and one of them was crossing directly in front of me to put their cart in the cart corral. So by the time I got to my car, we were only like 6 or 8 feet from each other. Which was a perfect distance, close enough to be sort of justified in speaking, but far enough away to be respectful and non-threatening. It worked out perfect, as I did nothing to create the encounter or its timing. It just happened. All I had to do was speak up.

They were from Ethiopia and spoke Amharic. The lady I spoke with gladly accepted an Amharic and English Book of Mormon. She said they already had Amharic and English Bibles.

I probably should have showed her the Amarhic New Testament I had in the car, just to illustrate that we do believe in the Bible. Sometimes I wonder if by offering just the Book of Mormon, we give the impression that we are offering it in competition to the Bible, instead of in conjunction with the Bible.