Source: “Receive My Word” from the blog at tech.lds.org

The Lord and His church have embraced technology to hasten His work and this blog generally talks about the ‘doing’ of that. But the ‘doing’ doesn’t do much good unless there is someone on the receiving end. In their own words, this is the story of exactly how one brother and one sister, through the use of technology, did receive.

“My name is Viviane de Sousa Epperson. My conversion story is very closely related with that of my brother’s, Vitor, because we became aware and visited the church together.

“Ever since infancy we had been taught to have faith in Jesus Christ. We were raised Catholic by our parents, but always felt as if something was lacking.

“When we became teenagers we had the desire to find and choose the correct path to follow but didn’t have a clue how we would find it, and if we found it how would we then know that it was the right path to follow. We had many doubts and we didn’t even think that there could even exist a true church in our day.

“When we reached high school an LDS chapel had just finished being built in the city. Almost every day we passed by this chapel on our way to the bus stop that would take us home. One of these days when we were passing by with some friends we decided to enter the opened chapel to see what it was like inside.

“There were missionaries and we even gave our address to them but they couldn’t visit us because the community where we lived was outside the ward boundaries. This moment was the beginning of our curiosity of the church. After that we began researching online at home.

“We found LDS.org and some Mormon messages on YouTube. As we continued researching I remembered a school friend and her sister that were a member of the church. I sought them out at school and began asking questions about the church. At the same time, Vitor posted a question on Yahoo and was responded to by a young man in Sao Paulo who was preparing for his mission.

“After that, I had the opportunity to speak with one more member of the church through Facebook who became one of my best friends and she gave us our first Book of Mormon. I remember one of our first conversations on Facebook where she expressed her feelings about the Temple.

“I had never seen someone speak with so much love about their religion. Vitor and I researched about the church during the day and at night before going to bed we spoke about the new things we had learned. We learned about prayer and that through it we could know what church was true.

“We read The Book of Mormon and every time a question arose we tried to search for an answer on the internet. One night while we were talking, I remember our eyes full of tears after receiving an answer that The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter day Saints was the true church.

“We felt we should go to the chapel but we had a few challenges to work out first. We lived about 40 minutes away from the chapel by car and there wasn’t any public transportation on Sundays.

“At home we didn’t have any reliable transportation. We decided to pray as we had already learned, trusting that Heavenly Father would make it possible in some way to get to the chapel and attend the church meetings.

“In response to our prayers two friends and members of the church invited us to sleep over the weekend at their house. We felt very blessed and knew that that was more proof that Heavenly Father had answered our prayers.

“When we arrived at the chapel we attended all meetings and received all of the missionary lessons within two visits to the church. Not too long after that we were baptized. I remember feeling the Holy Ghost very strong. It was an unforgettable moment in our lives.

“The internet continued to bless my life. Eighteen months after baptism, my brother was preparing to serve a mission. At the same time I found my future companion on a dating site for members.

“He lived in the U.S.A. when we first met and we were only able to speak through Facebook messages and Skype video chats for four months. He had served a mission in Brazil and therefore was fluent in Portuguese.

“After four months he was able to visit and by the end of the visit we were engaged to be married. Unfortunately, he had to return to get things in order for the wedding. We spent four more months communicating only by Facebook and Skype.

“In March 2013 he arrived and in April 2013 we were married and sealed in the Recife Brazil Temple.

“Heavenly Father knows each and every one of us. He knows our needs and is a loving Father. He has a special way to touch each of our souls. The internet for me was one of these ways.

“I feel so blessed. I am so grateful for him having responded to Vitor’s and my prayers. Today we know that the Gospel of Jesus Christ is true and for this reason my brother is serving as a missionary in the Brazil Sao Paulo South Mission.”