Yes, yes, it's my birthday month. (and Chrissy's!)
This week has been incredible and incredibly exhausting! You know how Joseph Smith was so physically worn out after the first vision (and after all of his spiritual experiences)...I now understand why! I received so much revelation throughout the week and I'm wiped, but it's good!
We had a meeting with Elder Cook and that was so good!!! We woke up at 4:30 to drive down to Sydney...cold, dark, early mornings are bu hao, but so worth it to see an apostle of the Lord. We got to shake hands with him and his wife. The area president, Elder Pearson was there as well along with Elder Leota (another seventy) and their wives. It was pretty cool. They emphasized our role as missionaries. One of the main things that Elder Cook pointed out is to be a ward/branch builder. We are here to build and strengthen the branches and wards we serve. Not just find people and baptise them, but to really work with the members. Without the members, missionary work is ineffective. We had a Q&A session and there was a lot of revelation received from the answers of the leaders.
- Converted unto the Lord means that when we come off our missions, we will endure to the end. We will not go back to the person that we were before the mission...not only that, but we will not look back. We will come home and do all that we can to serve the Lord in our communities. We won't think twice about being married outside of the Temple.
- Being a consecrated missionary means that we will take the habits and the schedule of the mission and apply it to our lives back home. Being perfectly obedient to the Gospel of Jesus Christ and fulfilling every calling that we are given.
I also had a pretty unique experience. I know that we're supposed to go into these meetings with a question in mind, but I honestly couldn't think of anything until right before the conference. We were given time to study before Elder Cook arrived, and as we were doing so, I was going through my Patriarchal Blessing and got my questions from there. Then throughout the conference, EVERY single one of my questions got answered. It was a huge testimony to me that Heavenly Father is very aware of us individually and he has called Prophets and Apostles to lead us, and give us revelation today.
We had zone conference on Thursday and that was also really good. We talked a lot about 'feeling' our purpose, not just knowing it. It's important that we act on the things that we know we need to do as disciples of the Lord. We also talked a lot about the transitioning of mission presidents...sad. But I'm super excited to learn from President Checketts. I know that he's been called by God to serve here and I am called to Him to serve the Lord.
On the teaching side of things, the work has been a tad slower. Unfortunately, Shulin doesn't quite feel ready but please pray that he will continue to progress. He has such a great desire to find the truthfulness and reality of our Saviour. We are so incredibly proud of him and the progress he's made so far.
We also finally have meal roster going around the ward haha. It's not filled out much, but we're still so grateful that the members are willing to work with us.
This leads me to my next point that I talked about earlier. Missionary work is ineffective without the members. Missionaries in your respective wards are called there to serve YOU (and the Lord of course). Look for opportunities to do missionary work. Pay attention to your peers, family, etc. around you. Heavenly Father has prepared people for the members to find and for the missionaries to teach. Fellowship them, as well as reach out to the less-active and struggling members of the ward. Let them know that you care, even if they don't want anything to do with the church. As you do so, you will see the Lord's miracles even more.
That's about it...
2 more weeks in the transfer!! crazy! This week, we have another zone conference with Elder Pearson, and Shulin will be baptised!! yay!!!! :) :)
I love you all heaps!!!! Have a great day and stay warm! (I am freezing…)
Love,
Sister Lew
Good morning, how are you?
ReplyDeleteMy name is Emilio, I am a Spanish boy and I live in a town near to Madrid. I am a very interested person in knowing things so different as the culture, the way of life of the inhabitants of our planet, the fauna, the flora, and the landscapes of all the countries of the world etc. in summary, I am a person that enjoys traveling, learning and respecting people's diversity from all over the world.
I would love to travel and meet in person all the aspects above mentioned, but unfortunately as this is very expensive and my purchasing power is quite small, so I devised a way to travel with the imagination in every corner of our planet. A few years ago I started a collection of used stamps because through them, you can see pictures about fauna, flora, monuments, landscapes etc. from all the countries. As every day is more and more difficult to get stamps, some years ago I started a new collection in order to get traditional letters addressed to me in which my goal was to get at least 1 letter from each country in the world. This modest goal is feasible to reach in the most part of countries, but unfortunately, it is impossible to achieve in other various territories for several reasons, either because they are very small countries with very few population, either because they are countries at war, either because they are countries with extreme poverty or because for whatever reason the postal system is not functioning properly.
For all this, I would ask you one small favor:
Would you be so kind as to send me a letter by traditional mail from Australia? I understand perfectly that you think that your blog is not the appropriate place to ask this, and even, is very probably that you ignore my letter, but I would call your attention to the difficulty involved in getting a letter from that country, and also I don’t know anyone neither where to write in Australia in order to increase my collection. a letter for me is like a little souvenir, like if I have had visited that territory with my imagination and at same time, the arrival of the letters from a country is a sign of peace and normality and an original way to promote a country in the world. My postal address is the following one:
Emilio Fernandez Esteban
Calle Valencia, 39
28903 Getafe (Madrid)
Spain
If you wish, you can visit my blog www.cartasenmibuzon.blogspot.com where you can see the pictures of all the letters that I have received from whole World.
Finally, I would like to thank the attention given to this letter, and whether you can help me or not, I send my best wishes for peace, health and happiness for you, your family and all your dear beings.
Yours Sincerely
Emilio Fernandez