Studying and Becoming One

Hi All!

We had a baptism on Saturday, and it was incredible! There were a lot of people, and they were being friendly, and they brought a ton of food! It was awesome! And now we are teaching her cousin, and her brother! One of our biggest resources is our converts, because they are super excited to share the gospel, and have a lot of friends that are ready to hear it! It's the coolest thing!

This week, I was talking to one of our Zone Leaders, Elder Laichi. He knows the Bible super well, and knows a whole bunch. So I asked him what I could do to improve my handling of the Bible and the scriptures in general, as well as my understanding. He recommended that when you read a scripture, you need to focus on every word. You need to find a question in every verse, and because symbolism is so prevalent in the church, you need to try to find symbols. So if you're studying the atonement, and you hit the word blood, that obviously has a lot of significance, so you research blood, and so on and so forth. For the computer scientists reading this, you basically do a depth first search, if I remember correctly, on everything you're studying. It's incredible how much you can learn like that, with the spirit helping you!

One lesson I learned this week is that on the mission, we aren't two missionaries. We're one companionship. Everything we do, we should be together. I think this is part of what President Hinckley was talking about when he said, "forget yourself," because it's not you anymore. It's a really interesting thought, and echoes what it says in the Bible about marriage, that we should cleave together and become one flesh. It makes sense because our leaders are always telling us that the mission is preparation for marriage, and how we act in the mission is a good indicator of how we will act in our marriage. Super interesting!

Well, that's about all I have this week, but the internet is super slow, so I don't know if I'll get many photos up, although I have photos.

Love you all!

Recognizing the Spirit

Yeah, so my companion is Elder Martinez. He is a convert of 1 year and 10 months, and his whole family recently joined the church. He is 25 years old, was a PE teacher before the mission, and is really good at everything sports. He is also really humble, and wants to be an amazing missionary, and is definitely becoming one! He has no fear, and talks to everyone, and we always set baptismal dates for our investigators in the first lesson, and he does it without a problem! It's so cool! He also loves to joke around, and learn English. He asks me how to say things all the time, and also says "What's up man?" a lot, because he's still working on his vocabulary! I am also reducing his ties for him, and they look pretty great! I'm getting much better at sewing, and I'm pretty confident now.

My pensionista's family is super cool! They have 3 children and one of them reminds me of Lydia a lot! It's really cool! Our pensionista is studying English, and teaches in an elementary school at the same time, which is crazy. Her husband teaches English at a college, but it's British English, but he knows it really well!

We had three baptisms on Saturday, of a single mom with her two kids, and the son asked me to baptize him, which was super cool! They are super intelligent and learned everything super well and quickly! I'm always humbled by the displays of faith that changes lives. I was thinking this week about being born in the covenant. It's something that I value a lot, but also, it sometimes makes it difficult to learn to recognize the spirit, because it's something I've always felt. We always teach in Galatians 5:22-23 that "the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, longsuffering, gentleness, goodness, faith, meekness, temperance." I finally realized that that's what I feel! A lot! It just seems to be easier to recognize the lack of the spirit than the presence of the spirit. Another thing that I've been working on is following the promptings of the spirit, which is very important to receiving more promptings. Sometimes we have thoughts about good deeds we could do, and then we justify not doing it. This prevents us from feeling the promptings in the future. This is what I'm applying right now, and it's amazing to see the results!

I love you all very much!

Dallin

A Plea for Help and Tears of Love

Hi All!

We went to the temple last week, and it was incredible!  I love going to the temple, and I always get to learn a ton of things!  It also gives me more things to study, and I love it!

We have a breakfast as a zone tomorrow that I'm in charge of, and we were looking through my cookbook to decide what to make, and I was reminded of all of the amazing food it's possible to make!  Tomorrow we're making Orange Julius (modified), buttermilk pancakes, and creamy syrup!  I hope it goes well!

The baptism that we had the other week?  We are teaching his sister and nephew.  His sister is amazing!  She is really excited to be baptized and is learning everything super well!  We were also teaching his niece, until Friday.  She told us on Friday that she wasn't going to attend the lessons anymore (we teach them all together) and she wasn't going to come to church either.  There is a lesson here.  We can do all we can, and in the end, everybody has their agency.  I imagine this is a little how a parent feels when their child chooses wrong decisions.  We need to trust in the Savior enough to know that he can comfort us, and that the teachings and the guidance that we have given to others will not be forgotten, but will resurface at some point.  There are a few things that faith and prayer can't change, including the will of God, and the agency of others.  Also, her stated reason for leaving was that the members of the ward weren't very inclusive.  So I include in my letter this week a plea.  You will soon have three new members in your ward, and I urge you to remember the words of Gordon B. Hinckley, when he said that the three things a new convert needs are a friend, a responsibility, and to be nourished by the good word of God.  The largest reason people go inactive is the lack of one of these, most likely a friend.  These are people, who feel very different than you, who want to be like you.  Help them!  It helps you to grow that relationship with them if you can go to the lessons with the missionaries.  You can see their growth over time, and how hard they work to change, and that inspires love.  So please, help those who are trying to come unto Christ, that are different than you!

We are also teaching a single mom with two kids, and I had a really sweet experience.  I've been thinking over the past 6 months about the story from my primary teachers that I started crying merely because of the power in the story, and the display of love.  I was wondering what had changed in me, to prevent me from crying in almost any circumstance.  We were watching On the Lords Errand, the movie about Thomas S. Monson, and there's a story about President Monson being prompted to shake the hands of all of the primary children. The primary teachers had promised the children that if they prayed in faith, President Monson would want to shake their hands.  As I watched the video, and saw the rendition of all the children running up to shake his hand, in answer to their prayers of faith, I felt tears in my eyes, and I knew that I was still the same boy, who could feel the impact of that love.  It was such an amazing experience!

We find people by knocking doors, talking in the street, talking in the stores, references from members, basically everything!  It's pretty fun!  We eat with our pensionista for lunch and dinner, and she is amazing!  Her husband teaches English at a college, but it's British English, and she is taking American English classes right now!  She was the Relief Society President until I got here, and now she is Young Women's President!  She works super hard, and her food is really good!  They make juice here by blending up fruit with a little water, which is way healthier than juicing the fruit, and tastes awesome!  So we get juice/smoothie every day, every meal!  I don't eat breakfast most days, because I don't need it due to all the food I eat here, but we all eat together for the most part, for every meal, because the 5 of us share the same apartment, and our schedules pretty much line up.  Elder Huaman is still here, he extended his mission until the 28th of February, so we won't have any changes until the end of the transfer.  It's a little difficult being in a trio, because we talk a lot less, which means it's easier to get distracted, but we're getting better!  The members here are great!  We usually have people to accompany us to lessons when we need them, and we have people introducing us to their friends, and everyone is very friendly!

I love you all, and enjoy everything you're doing!

Revelation, Purity, and Change

This week I have learned a lot! I learned that the purpose for companionship study is really powerful! When we share what we are learning, and our personal revelation, we can receive more revelation! So, when we share, we aren't just helping our companion learn, but we are inviting more revelation! It's something that Elder Cook talked about as well, that when we are able to have discussions about what we are learning, we learn more! It's awesome! I also was thinking about the word chastity. It means purity, specifically sexual purity. There is also the word chasten, which we usually take to mean something like punish. But these words are obviously related! So I think chastity literally means purity, and chasten means purify! It is so cool! I also learned about reverence, which is not just an attitude we have when we are praying, but a personal characteristic. You guys should read in True to the Faith about it, because it has some powerful promises and very enlightening insights. Also the section on revelation is super cool!

This weekend we had a baptism, and the coolest thing was, when he was confirmed the next day, he told us, "Only one year until the sealing!" This is a person who really has the end goal in sight. I am constantly impressed by the changes people make in their lives to come closer to Christ. The interesting thing is that we are called to cry repentance. Repentance literally is change. We are here to bring more happiness, but we can't give people more of anything without a change. It's fundamental logic! So our purpose is literally to bring change to the people. This is so important, that it is the first doctrine discussed in the Book of Mormon, in 1 Nephi chapter 1. It's something absolutely wonderful, that we can change to become more like our Father in Heaven. It's not easy, but it's definitely worth it!


Love you all!
--Dallin