Rats! The Seed of Testimony

While taking my son to BYUi, I asked him when he felt he knew the church was true. The twelve hour car ride made him a captive audience and I decided to use the time to my full advantage.

His reply was an interesting one. He said that when he was in second grade he brought home the school rat for the weekend. I wasn't aware of it until he showed up in the car with the cage, but I figured what could one weekend hurt. Well, he invited over a little friend to come play and they were jumping on the bunk beds when his friend decides to jump off the bunkbed and lands right on the rat.

I came running when I heard the screaming and saw the dead rat on the floor. It was totally squished. But my son asked if we could pray for it. We knelt down and did so and when we opened our eyes, the poor thing was moving. It couldn't walk but its legs were twitching. I called the vet and told him we had NO money but since it belonged to the school, could he take pity on us and see what could be done. (I assumed he put the thing out of its misery.)

By the time we got loaded in the car with all my preschoolers, the rat was at least alert. The vet took the creature, x-rayed it and came in the room with a large smile telling us that he couldn't see a thing wrong with the rat. Brian believed it was healed and the experience became an anchor to his testimony. The part I'm not sure he knew was that the next fall when I went back to the class, the poor creature had lost most of its hair. I'm sure from the trauma of being squished.

Anyway, I thought I'd use the story in my next visiting teaching adventure. It's just too good not to.