I used to take The Book of Mormon for granted

For your talk (I'm speaking in church so I asked him what I should talk about), tell them to spend as much time as they can with their families and make memories, and read the Book of Mormon and take the challenge in the second to last paragraph of the introduction.  It's amazing how powerful that book is.  90% of the missionaries here are recent converts to the church, I never realized how much I took the Book of Mormon for granted until I came here.  Promise them, that if they prayerfully read it, then they will discover things, and gain knowledge, faster and in greater quantity than anything else.  I have been studying this thing called the "Ricciardi Letter" recently, you should read it to prepare for your talk, it talks about why the heck would the Lord send 18-21 year old kids to share such a critically important message.  Think about your life in segments of ten beginning at 8, 8-18, 18-28 , 28-38 and so on.  He said that the one that the most stuff happens in is the 18-28, and Heavenly Father knows that.  So he gives us the opportunity to serve him and gain more knowledge than we could anywhere else.  I remember before I left, I asked you if this would help me in life more than reading and studying success would, you said yes and I didn't believe you, but because of peer pressure mainly, I left anyway.  I can now say that I have learned more in these four months than I think I did in all of high school and in all my reading.  The letter says that you get 10 years + of wisdom packed into 24 months that you could not get at any university in the world, I testify that that is true.  If people in our ward are debating whether they should go to school first, tell them no, it is a waste of their time and money, they will be far more ready for it and get a lot more from it, after their missions.

I have a cool story,  about a month ago, this guy from California came on a vacation here for a week.  Some other elders found him and brought him to church, they were trying to teach him the first lesson, but he couldn't understand their broken English and they couldn't understand his lisp.  So they found me, I taught him the first lesson by myself, invited him to be baptized, gave him a Book of Mormon and then he left back to Cali.  I hadn't heard about him since until yesterday.  They found me and told me that he just got baptized in Cali on Saturday!  Its amazing how the Lord works right!