A Well-Planned Campaign Bears Fruit
María Isabel is a zealous young publisher in the city of San Bernardo in the South American country of Chile. She and her family are members of the indigenous Mapuche people. The entire family has been enthusiastically supporting efforts to form a new congregation in the Mapuche language, which is also called Mapudungun.
When it was announced that the Memorial of Christ’s death would also be held in Mapudungun and that 2,000 printed Memorial invitations in that language were available for distribution, it made María Isabel think. What could she do to help? She recalled experiences of other Witness youths who had enjoyed success while preaching to classmates and teachers. She spoke with her parents about it, and together they decided that María Isabel would try to think of a plan to distribute the invitations at school. What plan did she come up with?
First, María Isabel asked the school authorities for permission to post an invitation right at the school’s main entrance. They granted her request and praised her for her initiative. One day at morning roll call, the school principal even made an announcement over the loudspeaker about the invitation!
Then, María Isabel asked to visit all the classrooms. After obtaining permission from the teachers, she asked each class of students if any of them were Mapuche. “I thought that there would be perhaps 10 or 15 students from Mapuche families in the whole school,” she says, “but there were many more—I ended up giving out 150 invitations!”
“SHE WAS EXPECTING SOMEONE OLDER”
One woman who saw the poster with the invitation at the school entrance asked whom she should speak to regarding the event. Imagine her surprise when she was directed to a ten-year-old girl! “She was expecting someone older,” María Isabel says with a grin. After giving her an invitation and a brief explanation, María Isabel asked the woman for her address so that she and her parents could visit her to tell her more about God’s Kingdom. How delighted the 20 publishers serving in the Mapudungun-language field were to see that woman along with 26 other interested ones of the Mapuche people present at the Memorial. That group is now a thriving congregation!
Whatever your age, could you take similar initiative to invite fellow students or coworkers to the Memorial, a public talk, or a district convention? Why not do research in our publications to find experiences that may give you ideas on how to make such a project a success? Also, pray for Jehovah’s holy spirit to help you to muster up courage to speak about him. (Luke 11:13) If you do so, you too may be pleasantly surprised and much encouraged by the results of your well-planned effort.