March 1-15, 2010

March 1, 2010

Is it okay to tell you that I had the greatest week ever and I did it while still being excited about going home? I've come to find it's less of a distraction to be excited about going home as long as I let it push the work along. I'm not nervous either because I know as long as I still pray hard, have effective study, and partake of the sacrament worthily, I'll be just fine at home.

I love reading from D&C! My study today in 107 taught me a huge lesson that I've been wondering about well over a year... since McNeil. What the difference between faith and hope is. I understand now that hope is the evidence of faiths past. Kind of like having hope that the sun will rise tomorrow. You have hope because it's always happened. You have faith by doing things. You have faith that the sun will rise by getting up in the morning, dressed, and ready to play in the sun. So, hope fuels faith and you get more hope as you display more faith until it becomes a perfect knowledge. It you want to have hope in the savior's atonement, you must display faith. If you don't have any past experience with the atonement or hope in the atonement, you simply act on your desire to have hope. In a sense, show faith. Faith is an action word of go and do. Being faithful is going and doing. After being faithful, we receive hope as as evidence of our faith. So, things get easier as we do them because we collect more hope to fuel our faith. Make sense? I love the scriptures.

I recently bought a new small pocket size Book of Mormon. I plan on just having it with me everywhere since it's so small. I have a way sweet marking system inspired by an apostle of the Lord. When Elder Bednar came he invited everyone to take an inexpensive Book of Mormon and highlight whenever it talked about or says it the strength of the Lord. He talked about how the atonement gives us strength to win the battles. It was sweet. He also talked a lot about being an agent and not an object. Agents act and objects are acted upon. We must pray as agents for strength, not as objects that pray for our conditions and surroundings to change. So in highlighting everything about agency and being an agent in my new book of mormon it has helped me to help others be agents and gain strength in the Lord as they act in faith until they have enough hope to stand on their own too feet. Confused? It's very intertwined. The fun thing is that I've been showing faith in these two principles as I've highlighted them and I've gained a greater hope and understanding of them since I've been doing it. If you seek after it, you get it. Fun, right? So if you want to understand a principle better, just try highlighting it in the scriptures.

March 8, 2010

I'm so sick, Jami!! Satan is attacking my body full force. I just barely got over a cold, and now I have some sort of flu. Let's just say that in the past few hours, I've used the bathroom 6 times. Fun thing though, God has promised me I would have enough strength to fulfill all my callings. So I'm still working hard. Luckily today is Pday and by tomorrow this will pass hopefully.

This was the week of back to back exchanges. I do not like exchanges so much. I went on one with Elder C for the first one, and he is a struggling missionary. I was basically his therapist for a day. We gained a good relationship and he's doing a lot better now. He's starting to obey the rules and is serious about his mission now. After that we had to drive to downtown San Antonio to exchange with mission creek. By the time we got there, it was 10:30. I was so beat and tired, all to just find out that Elder J took Elder C's phone. So we had to wait up for them to get back and give us the phone. Luckily president OKed us to spend the night there. Once I finally got back in my area, there was a ton of stuff that happened and Elder Hertig was a little grumpy and didn't want to talk about it. So there are a ton of people that I don't know just from missing two days. I guess Ariel just got kicked out of the house and we don't know why. But the rest of the girls came to church. This week was still all in all a good week.

We have 2 main groups of people we are teaching right now. The ABCs and Will and Cami. Will has already been taught by Elder Hertig in Pflugerville and taught by me in Walsh Ranch. Now he just happened to move to our area. Sweet, right? So those were the people that came to church.

March 15, 2010

It's way cool that you are Facebook friends with Steve and Mary Burdette. They are one of my favorite families. They are always willing to help. They know what's most important in life. It's fun to have that connection too. I'm glad that they think I'm a good missionary and that I'm not trunky. I was super sick. I lost 10 pounds! But I'm better now. I went straight from a cold to a flu. I'm 100% better now though, besides being super tired. It feels great. I love the life of a missionary. God totally takes care of you and helps you get better quick. He lets you be sick just long enough to humble you. Anyways, it was a character building experience, but I'm great.

My most "Golden" or elect person that I have ever met on my mission is Mychel. He's a 19 year old black kid we met last Sunday. He walked up to us last Sunday and said "Hey, I need a Book of Mormon and I wanna marry my girlfriend in the temple." He hsa come to church 4x already and we never knew about him. He understands and knows everything too. He is getting baptized this Saturday the 20th. Pretty cool, right? We weren't sure if he was just doing it for his girlfriend, so we prayed about it. Next day they broke up and he still wanted to get baptized. They got back together 2 days later. Cool story, eh?