Some accounts state that the first copy of the Book of Mormon he found had a torn title page, so it was a few years before he learned who had published it. He was fascinated as he read it and invited others to study it with him. Sometime around 1968 Mahlangu's friend Piet Mafora saw an LDS Church building while driving a delivery truck in Johannesburg, South Africa. Mafora told Mahlangu, who went to see the building himself. The building was locked when he first arrived but he was given contact information for the mission president on his second visit. When Mahlangu went to the mission home, the missionaries met with him. It was not until he had been coming to the mission home for three weeks that mission president Howard C. Badger gave missionaries permission to teach the gospel to Mahlangu. Later Badger himself was involved in teaching. Despite this Badger decided the current situation in South Africa meant that Mahlangu's baptism should be delayed.Turley and Cannon, p. 33
