Path of Happiness

This week has been kind of crazy, because we're making a big push with the systems we are developing!  It looks so cool!

 Apart from that, we had a super cool experience this week!  We were contacting everyone, and nobody was really listening, and as we were walking, we saw this kid.  He came up to us, and said, in English, "You guys are from The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints, right?"  We answered, kind of shocked and amazed that a random Peruvian knew the name of our church so well in English, and told him that we were.  He then told us that he wanted us to visit him, and practice his English.  So, we went to a nearby park, and began to talk to him.  He was super cool!  He knew a lot about the Restoration, and had been receiving the missionaries in Tumbes, another province of Peru.  He wanted to understand what and why we believe what we do.  It was so cool, and I was able to bear testimony as to what I knew to be true.

I really do know that we are God's children, and that he gives us commandments to help us become like him, to enable us to return to him.  That is the reason I am here.  To help others understand the way back to God.  As we realize what the commandments are, we feel the separation from God caused by sin.  We then want to repent, and to be clean, we begin to desire to be baptized, so that we can really change and become like him.  As that baptism is done by the proper priesthood authority, and we continue in partaking of the Sacrament every week, we find ourselves on the path, that will imbue us with happiness and joy, even in the hardest of trials, and we learn what is really important.  I love the gospel so much, and I love you all as well!

Have a wonderful week!
Dallin

Visual Tiles and Fasting

This week has been a little crazy!  We are implementing a new database system, so we were doing a lot of data collection on Wednesday, and it's a really cool system!  You basically collect all the data you want, and then all that data is represented in tiles, with icons and colors and everything, so that you can get a really fast overview of the state of things all at once!  It's from President's old company called VisualCue, which does the same thing, but for sales reps and such.  It's really cool to see President applying his skillset to his calling to make everything more efficient!  It's the best!  So I've spent a lot of time this week on that.

This Friday though, we had a lesson with a referral, and she was so excited to read the Book of Mormon, it was incredible to see.  She was absolutely enthralled!  She is a referral from the Rebaza Family, who are going in June to Trujillo to be the mission president there, so he's super excited to be able to help with the lessons and the work in general!  It's absolutely the coolest!

I also got to study fasting this week, and it was so fun!  It was interesting to see that the fast offering is an integral part of the fast, and as we really turn away from our selfish desires, our body submits to the spirit, and we are able to do what God would have us do.  It was also interesting to read that after 24 hours, the body changes what it's using for energy, and releases some chemicals that stop the hunger.  So, quite literally, after 24 hours, the body submits, and we emerge masters over our body.  It is then when we can unify our spirit and our body in one purpose, and in so doing, "receive a fullness of joy."  The law of the fast is very powerful!  But it also has to be voluntary.  An imposed fast does absolutely nothing.  Maybe make you skinnier, but that's it!  But when we choose to exercise and feed our spirits by fasting, the blessings listed in Isaiah 58:6-11 are incredible!  The Lord will make us like a spring of water, whose waters fail not.  It's absolutely incredible, and has many promised blessings, but Joseph Fielding Smith warns against excessiveness in his October 1912 address, saying that the "Lord will accept that with is enough, with a good deal more pleasure and satisfaction than that which is too much and unnecessary.”  I know God loves us, and I know that Christ lives, and does everything he can to help us every day, to become one with him and Father.

I love you all!  Have a good week!
--Dallin

P.S. Here are the talks I was reading:
https://www.lds.org/general-conference/2015/04/is-not-this-the-fast-that-i-have-chosen?lang=eng
https://www.lds.org/topics/fasting-and-fast-offerings?lang=eng
https://www.lds.org/ensign/2009/04/fasting-with-power?lang=eng

Power to Change and Talking with Father

This week has been kind of crazy!  We had leadership council this week, and it was super cool, because we baptized and confirmed 158 people in February!  To put that in perspective, a couple of months ago, we were struggling to make a hundred.  That's an average of about 16 converts per stake, more or less 3 per ward!  What's even crazier, is the goal for our 10 stakes in March is 376!  It's so cool to be able to meet these people that are getting baptized, and seeing the strength of their conversion, and the happiness in their eyes!  It's incredible to see the power the gospel has to change people!  People are getting married after living together for 30 years, people are overcoming addictions that have plagued their lives, and people who felt a little like a hamster stuck in its wheel, are beginning to broaden their vision.  To think that in March, we have the potential to bring those blessings to 376 people, is absolutely amazing!  We were all super, super excited.  To celebrate this historic moment in the mission, President took us out to Rodizios, all the leaders of the mission.  It was even better the second time!  It was just the coolest experience to really see the growth of "the Lord's Kingdom" (Intro to The Book of Mormon), and to be a part of it!  It is so much fun!

This week I read a BYU speech by Truman G. Madsen, talking about who we are, and it had some very interesting ideas.  It related how Heber C. Kimball, one of the original latter-day apostles, prayed.  It talks about how he prayed with love and warmth, talking "with Father," not talking to "the Father," emphasizing the trust and warmth in the relationship between us and God.  He talks about how Elder Kimball would occasionally burst out laughing in prayer, when praying for a specific brother, and the continued the prayer with: "I’m sorry, Lord, but I just can’t help laughing when I think about Brother Brown."  That's when we have real trust in the Lord, and know he exists.  It was such a beautiful reminder of what we really are, and where we are going.  It was so cool to read that, and analyze my own prayers.  I'm definitely working on making my prayers more sincere, less of an email, and more like an actual, in person conversation.  It is something that helps us immensely to really feel the spirit in our lives.  It was absolutely awesome!

I love you all, and I hope you have a good week!