Executive Decisions...
I've come to a decision! I would much rather be a wet from sweat... than soaked from rain! At least with sweat i have a general idea when I will dry out... but when its raining... man you are just wet til you get home :( It rained like crazy this last week! We got to bike in it too! My poor greenie! I think she might have reconsidered a little if someone would have explained to her how hot it gets, how much fun biking in a skirt is, and how miserable it is to bike in the wet and cold... Yup that was a fun lesson for both of us to learn this last week! But I know that we are stronger because of it!!! And my greenie never complained this week :) She's a trooper for sure! A real blessing from the Lord sent to the people here in our area and to me for sure!! :D
Adventures of the week! Well! On monday night we got a call telling us we were having a meeting with President Maluenda on tuesday! yikes! we panicked that it was zone conference and that we should be preparing our dying testimonies... (in your last zone conference you bear your testimony infront of EVERYONE. yikes! no worries its on the 5th of June!) So we got there and found out it was just an animo meeting! Animo meaning.... actually there isn't an english word for animo... but like... it was a meeting to animate us! to get us more excited about the work. man! i was pumped to go out in the rain afterwards! It was cool to just sit down and have our mission president tell us how much he really does care about us and wants us to work hard and help people. He pointed out that the mission is the best place for us to learn and grow, but its not about us. We are here for everyone BUT ourselves. So we need to get our priorities straight and be doing what the Lord wants!
One of the Elders asked President how we can feel like we are being successful when we are doing everything we can and still not having any baptisms. President asked him "elder. why are you here?" and the elder told him "to serve the Lord". Next question "What were you called to do?" and the elder just sat there confused and said "baptize" President told him no. Our purpose as missionaries is clearly stated in preach my gospel and our call letter "Invite others to come unto Christ by helping them receive the restored gospel" (side note, i dont' know how to say the purpose in english, i just translated that from spanish in my head!) Our purpose is to INVITE!!! and do all we can to help those people receive the gosple. Whether they choose to accept or reject, thats their decision. But we better do all in our power to help them know how important the decision they are making is!
My greenie and i had a great realization moment on that this morning by the way! I was role playing to her how to teach the Plan of Salvation. As we were talking about the Terrestrial kingdom she just stopped and looked at me with wide eyes and asked "so wait... all the people that we teach and they don't accept... they go here? even if they are good people?" Yup. They sure do. Missionary work is fun and exciting and hard... but its also very serious! I don't think that realization hit her until that moment. Its pretty amazing actually! The Lord has prepared ways for everything to work out. Learning more about the plan of salvation has really strengthened my testimony that Heaven Father LOVES us!! He knows the moment when it would be best for us to accept the gospel and I'm grateful that I got it right from the beginning from my wonderful parents! :D He knew that was exactly what I needed, and right now, there are people here in south Texas that need Sister Tovar and Nielson to bring them the restored gospel! Whether they accept it right now with us or we plant the seed that leads to the conversion, I'm game for whatever the Lord has in store!
So those are some of the things I've learned this past week :) On a sad note, my memory card on my camera malfunctioned this last week and i've lost ALL my pictures from Christmas until now... Many tears have been shed... but i know i've emailed home a lot of my important pictures so thats given me a lot of peace! :( But... yeah that was not a happy realization! Then on saturday i realized that the flash drive i keep with all the rest of my mission pictures is currently missing... Yep... I'm feeling pretty sick about that one.. so if you could send an extra prayer my way that the memory card will start working again and i didn't lose the pictures.. or that i find my flash drive, i'd be exceedingly grateful! Other than that, life is good! Its always a good day to be a TEXAS MCALLEN MISSIONARY! The Church is true! God loves you! Love you all!!!
Hermana Courtenae Nielson
No comments:
Post a Comment