Dinkytown week 14

Wowza it is August apparently.

 

We had a pretty good week! It was a little quiet, though. Most of our investigators decided to take summer vacation the same week so we had a lot more time this week on campus.

Tuesday we had a leadership meeting where all the leaders in the mission were in attendance (this happens once every 3 months). President Forbes announced some policy changes and it got western at one point. He was trying to emphasize the rule that we work till 9, then drive home instead of working till 8:45 and then driving home to get home by 9. we can be out till 9:30 if we are teaching. Well the way he emphasized it confused us and we all thought he meant we need to work until 9:30 and be home at like10:00 or something, but still be in bed by 10:30. the room broke into pandemonium and lots of disagreements and dropped jaws and a lot of craziness. I was pretty shocked. But after a pretty big discussion we realized we misunderstood president and he was just emphasizing what was already in place. so much stress.  haha

 

We taught our Liberian investigator MW a few times this week as well. He is seriously so solid. He is still set for the 16th. We taught him the law of chastity and he told us that he really needed to hear that because he had struggled with that in the past and he was confused about it and we basically answered a few prayers. He told us how every time he prays and asks a question we usually answer that question during the next lesson. Weird how that works, huh. :D We also had a fantastic lesson with him after churchsunday in which we taught him the Gospel of Jesus Christ. He told us he has felt a cleansing effect in his life the last few weeks and we explained that the Gospel of Christ is what will allow us to feel cleansing for the rest of our life. Our joint teacher linked our purpose in life (to draw closer to God) to the Gospel and how it is how we can accomplish what we have set out to do. All in all, quite the powerful lesson.

 

I also went on exchanges with a spanish missionary who has been out for only 2 months in his area. We visited this old spanish guy in a retirement home who didnt know a lick of spanish so i just sat there looking pretty and all that good stuff. He fell asleep during the lesson, it was pretty amusing. I was quite impressed with the new elder. He has been out a few months and he handled the spanish that day with ease. We taught there investigator, who will be baptized soon, at a members home and it was pretty tight. He used to be a pro wrestler so he showed us some moves. We taught him to follow the prophet and at the end I felt inspired to leave him an article from the ensign about President Monson and how to follow his example. The joint teacher spoke up and told us he too had felt impressed to talk about the ensign. Later that night Elder McFarland told me that in his personal study he had felt impressed to bring up the ensign in the lesson. All 3 of us got that impression. Pretty cool!

 

We also had the opportunity to go to a Baptist bible study thursdaynight. It was pretty interesting. We agreed with a lot of what was said and we could tell that the person was trying to teach to our beliefs (well, he was trying to teach to what he thought our beliefs were) and help us "see the truth" so to speak. He was shocked when we told him we believe the same thing as him. After the study we stayed after a little and he asked us some pretty ridiculous questions about some crazy Anti stuff he had heard. We briefly taught him about the Gospel of Jesus Christ (faith, repentance, baptism, the gift of the holy ghost, and endure to the end) and he was shocked. He said: "i have read a lot about your church and everything you have told me just now is completely different than what I have read." It was a cool experience. the next day he sent us an audio file where he had learned a lot about what we apparently believe and it was essentially a persecution sermon against the church. I heard the nuttiest things you could imagine on that file. I cant believe he even believed that stuff.

 

Saturday we went over to a less actives home and he told us that a few nights ago an evil spirit invaded his room at 3 in the morning. He told us he was paralyzed and could not speak. We read from Joseph Smith history with him right before the First Vision and he told us that was similar to his experience. It was eerie and pretty creepy. So we dedicated his apartment. I havent had to cast any devils out yet, so hopefully we wont have to go back and do some laying on of hands action on unhappy spirit folk.

 

Thought:

The importance remembrance has really sunk into my soul throughout my mission. It is strongly correlated to gratitude. Often when we are unhappy it is merely because we have forgotten how merciful God has been to us. Lets look at Mosiah 4:11-12

 11 And again I say unto you as I have said before, that as ye havecome to the knowledge of the glory of God, or if ye have known ofhis goodness and have tasted‍ of his love, and have received aremission‍ of your sins, which causeth such exceedingly great joy inyour souls, even so I would that ye should remember, and alwaysretain in remembrance, the greatness of God, and your ownnothingness, and his goodness‍ and long-suffering towards you,unworthy creatures, and humble yourselves even in the depths ofhumility, calling‍ on the name of the Lord daily, and standingsteadfastly‍ in the faith of that which is to come, which was spokenby the mouth of the angel.
12 And behold, I say unto you that if ye do this ye shall alwaysrejoice, and be filled with the love‍ of God, and always retain‍ aremission of your sins; and ye shall grow in the knowledge‍ of theglory of him that created you, or in the knowledge of that which isjust and true.

We need to remember the greatness of God! If we do this we will always rejoice and be filled with the love of God! How often does the Lord give us blessings, both big and small, and a few days later we are mumbling about something or the other which in the long scheme of things is quite trivial anyway? This is not conducive to happiness. Not only that, but is this the attitude that will bring additional blessings from the Lord?

I love you all! Have a miraculous week!
Elder Damron