Elder Andrew Black of Holladay, Utah, had only been in Korea about six months when he and his Korean companion, Elder Yoo Rae Soo, set up a board on a busy street in Taegu, Korea, and began talking to anybody who would listen.
Only a handful of people had gathered when Jun Jin Geol, a man in his early 20s, stopped to listen."He was looking at us kind of strangely as if he had seen us before," recalled Elder Black, an assistant to Pres. Mark Peterson of the Korea Pusan Mission.
Jun asked the usual questions: What were the missionaries doing? What Church did they represent?
"He seemed really interested and excited to meet us," Elder Black said. "My companion gave him a Book of Mormon, and he began looking through it."
The missionaries set up an appointment to meet with Jun two days later. However, on that day, the elders were extremely busy and missed the meeting.
"We were at our house when the phone rang," the missionary said. "It was Jun. He was wondering where we were. He was almost mad at us."
They met Jun at the ward meetinghouse and began teaching him. Jun had already begun reading the Book of Mormon. The copy he had received only a few days before was marked, and Jun had begun going through the index and studying the book by subject.
"As he looked through the index and studied the Book of Mormon, he said the thing that really stood out in his mind was that the gospel wasn't for special people, but for everybody."
On the next discussion, Jun accepted a challenge to be baptized.
"He was continually reading the Book of Mormon," Elder Black said.
During the third discussion, Jun said the first time he had met the missionaries, he felt as if he had seen them before. That feeling caused him to stop and talk to the missionaries.
In February 1988, Jun was baptized. He has since become an elder, served in the Young Men presidency of the Taemyong Ward, Taegu Korea Stake, and taught seminary. He's also preparing to go to the Seoul Korea Temple and hopes to serve a mission.
He wants to share the precious truths contained in the passages he has marked in his well-worn Book of Mormon.