10/1/12

Meu Familia amada!

Announcements: Thank you to mom and dad for your e-mails and letters, and dad I got your other letter this morning just before we came to the library. Thank you so much. Mom I am sorry about the nasty protien story that happened to you, but I will be more than delighted to share it with Elder Fukuyasu. Dad I am sorry you didnt get to see the trees you wanted to in mount charelston. I am also happy to hear that you got quite the kick froms mom protein bar story. Elizabeth, Olivia's pictures and videos this week were the best! Kudos to you for those! My goodness what a cute little girl she is becoming! Thank you for all the e-mails you sent me. By the way, I get a couple of different answers from people about the temperature during winter here in washington. Seems like the most common one is "Below 0" So I guess going with that, preparation never hurts anything. Thanks so much for thinking about that and I am excited to see your Christmas Present. Mom and Dad, I got your package! I've not had time to figure out what everything was yet. But I do know it is a lot of Halloween Decorations!!! Cool! Thank you! The Guanana is fantastic as usual. I esspecially loved the address labels. Those were much needed. Thank you!

This last month, the Washington Seattle Mission Baptized 101 of Heavenly Father's Children. Wow, yesterday was a great day for the mission. President Larkin is going to climb Mount Si (Really a mountain in the mission) and post our Ensigns from each zone to the Washington Seattle Mission. It was just another addition to my testimony that God of Isreal leads the camp. I was able to witness the 101st baptism. It was lovely. It was an emergency baptism though so Elder Fukuyasu was called in haste to interview the baptizee. It was a really cool experience. Esspecially because I got to run some quick errands with my Zone Leader, Elder Hampton, who I love. He is the coolest missionary in this zone. I had a great day when I exchanged with him.

This week was a tough one. Seemed like no one wanted to meet with us. Our investigators have gone stagnant. Recently I have felt much like the people of Alma when Amulon, the cheif wicked preist of noah, came to take over their little land of Helam. It seems like we prosper, and then to try our faith and patience the Lord lets us suffer a little. We are not finding any investigators who will meaningfully find their way to the waters of baptism. Most people just want to hang out. And that just makes me tired and bored. A lot of people love arguing, but thats not what I am here to do. Some days, my favorite people are the honest ones, who like us, but just aren't interested.

A miracle I saw this thursday was while I was tracting. This will feed into my spiritual thought for the week. Earlier thursday morning during personal study, I was studying a talk by Elder Bednar on how to be a preach my gospel missionary. He said something along the lines of Listen first, Observe next, Discern, and finally, Speak. I needed to hear that. Now doing those steps dont mean that we are going to know what to say, in fact I feel led to believe that we shouldn't really have anything to say. Bednar suggests we open our mouths, with the promised blessing that they will be filled and we will not be confounded before men. Wow does that work. While no one was interested in what I had to say, except maybe two people, everyone thanked me sincerely and said that I was doing the right thing. I felt like I helped them in a small way on their spiritual progression. I LOVED them. This is something that is not coming easily for me. To love the people that I meet while tracting. But with the admonition of Elder Bednar I am growing.

My spiritual thought for the week is to do with scriptures. I feel dumb for having this as my thought, but I want someone to know that the scriptures are not guidelines that teach us how to have the spirit with us so we can baptize more people. Does that make sense? It hit me like an ongoing train this week. I have been reading the scriptures so I could feel good and then go and conquer the world. That has never happened. What has happened was when I opened my mouth, I was filled with comforting words for others and the ability to express my love and concern for them. The scriptures are here to help us be more like Christ. I can easily see now how that could be regularly a confusion with missionaries. Sometimes I have thought, if I could just read the right verse and make myself feel good, I could go out and make others feel good! But it just doesnt work that way. Esspecially as a missionary. I need to find something that will make someone else feel good. I feel good when I help someone else feel good. I have been confused for the longest time. And I am still catching on. Being a missionary is hard. I am begining to learn, that the techniques to teaching, commiting, and baptizing come very much secondary to the love that is found within the scriptures. I have a LONG ways to go. 

Anyway, thats my thought for the week. I love you all! 

-- 

Elder William Lloyd Lovell
Washington, Seattle Mission
10675 NE 20th Street
Bellevue, Washington 98004

  

D&C 6:36 - "Look unto me in every thought; doubt not, fear not"