Hello fam!
Phenomenal letter dad. I wish I could make sense of what I write half as good as you do! 100 days eh? That’s scary... I've been reading one section of the Doctrine and Covenants a day for the past 40 days so that I will be able to read the great section 138 when President Smith reveals the true doctrine of how the gospel is preached to those in the spirit world on the last day of my mission. With this, I realized that day 100 was hit on Saturday. It's an emotional feeling to think back over the past 20 some odd months. I never thought I would grow so close and become so attached to so many people in such a short amount of time. Also, I don't know if you remember this, but February 3 was the day that I received my mission call two years ago. Two fetchin' years! I couldn't believe it. And two years ago today (I think) I went through the temple to be endowed with power from on high. What an amazing experience the past two years have been. More experiences that breed growth have come in the past two years than the entire previous 19 years of my life. Just like when the gospel was restored to the prophet Joseph Smith in the early 1800s the world experienced tremendous growth technologically. There's no doubt in my mind that the Lord's hand was in that. There is also no doubt in my mind then when we each personally make the gospel a priority in our own lives that the Lord's hand provides further experiences that forge growth just as He did for the world following the restoration of His gospel. One funny key learning I've had regarding the time the gospel was restored: In the year 1830, the year the church was formally organized, the United States Patent Office in Washington D.C. closed because "everything that ever could be invented, had been invented." The rest is history.
My roller coaster has been up this week. Investigators and teaching opportunities have been coming out of the wood work. We've been really hitting the ward roster hard in attempt to regain the trust of the ward. In our quest to find less-active members and part member families, we have found MANY who have moved away. I know the Lord puts us in places He needs us at specific times and we have found that several of the inhabitants of the homes of the former members have been interested in the gospel. One man by the name of Sean was the most uninviting and uninterested from his outward appearance. He has tattoos from head to toe. Seriously, not a spot of skin shows through on his arms. His neck, chest, knuckles, back, you name it is covered in tattoos. We still talked to him. We found him to be one of the most sincere, humble people who has been searching for truth for quite some time. In a brief, 1 minute conversation on his drive way, we talked about the Church of Jesus Christ being restored to today in its fullness to a prophet. His friend who wasn't very into the conversation tried to crack a joke by asking, "So why did you guys choose to come to Arizona? Isn't there any other place you could have gone?" In all seriousness, I looked him in the eyes and said, "we have been called by a prophet of God to teach the Gospel of Jesus Christ to the people here. God has sent us and He knows where we need to be and who we need to talk to." I then talked briefly about the process of a missionary receiving his mission call. Sean overheard this conversation. He was amazed that I answered so seriously. For the next several days, he talked to co-workers and friends about there being a prophet on the earth. He would say things like, "Dude can you believe it? An actual prophet. A prophet like MOSES is on the earth...TODAY! It just blows my mind. I love it." We met with him a few days after that first discussion and taught him lesson 1 from Preach My Gospel. He seriously agreed with everything we taught him. We invited him to be baptized and he accepted. He works a lot and wasn't able to come to church but we are very excited to continue to teach him and watch him progress. He is one who will look good in white.
We received a very welcomed referral this past week also. The Lord is really blessing us. A young man by the name of Preston has grown up Catholic his entire life. He began to study the religion and realized that each pope would change basic doctrines taught in the church that he didn't really agree with. Well that didn't sit well with Preston. He began researching other religions and got his hands on a Book of Mormon. He thoroughly read through it. Around the same time he was talking to some girl on a free online chat room. She happened to be from Mesa and is a member of the church. They met up and began dating. Preston continued to research the church and referred himself through mormon.org. When we got to him, he was already in 3 Nephi and could quote certain stories better than most missionaries. He already knew it was true. He brought up baptism and requested that we help him get baptized. Obviously, though the invitation seemed a bit backwards, we accepted. He will be baptized on February 25th. Pretty dang sweet! It's true that angels are preparing the hearts of the children of men.
So we have been trying to find new "fun" ways to find people to teach. Glendale Community College happens to be in our area and we devised the bright idea to go see what we could do when it came to proselyting on campus. We didn't want to make our attempt unwelcomed so we just went and sat on a bench for a little while and said hello to people as they walked by. We had more success sitting on that bench while people came up to us to talk than we have had knocking doors. It was pretty cool. I then thought, "hmmm, I wonder if the administration would be opposed to us setting up a table with pamphlets and pictures to hand out to people while we talk to them?" We went to the administration building. The lady there told us that we would need to go to the Student Life services office and speak with the people there. We did so. The lady there told us that she would need to talk to another man who was able to give permission for such things and that she would call us the next day. She also said that usually it costs $50 a day for people to do such a thing. Well we were discouraged and didn't count on really hearing back so we walked around campus for a little while and then left. The next morning we got a call. It was the lady from Student Life telling us that it was totally fine for us to set up a table and that we would just need to tell them before we set up so that they can inform security before they haul us off. We were stoked! This Thursday we are planning to go do some "Dan Jones'n" at the commons area at Glendale Community College! We'll see what happens. Hopefully we don't start a riot and get killed by anti-mormon students. Gotta stand as a witness of God at all times, in all things, and in all places though right? Yeah...
Last night I was going through some old letters I got from you. One that I pulled out was one that you left on my pillow the night I was set apart as a missionary. As I read through it I realized that I had never answered a question that you raised to me. You said, "What would you like your family to accomplish while you are serving in Arizona?" Honestly, I feel you all have accomplished all that I could ever dream of because of your written testimonies and experiences that you share with me so frequently. I would have said that I would want you to have an experience each month that you could recognize and see how it has strengthened your testimony regarding a certain topic. Without me having to vocalize that 20 months ago, I feel it has been accomplished and continues to be accomplished. Thank you for providing me with such peace of mind that my family is well and that their testimonies are strong. This is a rough world in which we live and I think at times we take our testimonies for granted. I hope we can have experiences that cause us to not take them for granted. One "accomplishment" that I would add at this point in my mission, is to set a goal to do something hard. Do something you wouldn't normally do and work until you can feel successful. A quote I think of regularly is, "Do I do what I'm expected or what I'm capable of?" We are capable of so much. Sometimes it's undesired to rise above the expectations of the world. It's necessary. In my study I wrote this, "Stand up for what’s right when it's inconvenient. Call people out when they’re wrong and invite them to change." President Beck used to always say, "If you don't speak up when you see disobedience the very first time you notice, it's as if you put your stamp of approval on it and the person will never change." I listened to a talk recently and heard this story:
A stake president in Salt Lake City was speaking at a fireside with youth when President McKay walked in and sat a few rows back from the front. Upon making eye contact with the prophet, the stake president nearly swallowed his tie. Halfway through his talk he felt an impression. It had nothing to do with his topic. He followed the impression and said, "Brothers and sisters, before this world was formed each of you need to know that you served as captains and generals in the Lord's army." He kept going on with his talk. Afterwards, he sat down and noticed President McKay grilling him with his eyes. He went and asked him if he had gotten carried away and said anything out of line. President McKay responded, "not out of line, but inaccurate. There were no captains here tonight, they were all generals." He turned and walked away.
If we knew who we were before this life it would scare us. I don't think there is any coincidence that each of us have been born in these last days. We have no right to dink around with the dumb things of the world and not live up to the full potential God would have us achieve. In D&C 38:12 it talks about how angels are waiting the great command to reap down the earth, to gather the tares. At the time of the revelation, I believe we were there among those angels with that same desire, and that our future families are still there with that desire.
I hope you have a great week! I love you all so much! Write some letters!
Love,
Elder Colt Mouritsen
No comments:
Post a Comment