I Have Learned...

What can I say for my last official communication as a full-time missionary? The only thing I can think of is referencing scriptures that I have thought about these last weeks that have helped me push through the rest of my mission.

Scripture #1: Jarom 1:3-4. I was reading through this scripture while we've been having a hard time finding people in my current area. I read verse 3 and thought, "That's EXACTLY how I feel."...then I read verse 4, and it struck me. I hadn't been focusing as much on the people we had already found, which have had many revelations already, "for they are not all stiffnecked." It made me think of one of the families we have been teaching. The Spirit is beginning to be in their home. It is a wonderful feeling to see them progress. It's crazy how a book written many thousands of years ago could still have relevance today.

Scripture #2: 1 Corinthians 15:55/Hosea 13:14. As I was in District Meeting one day, the last scripture came to me. I was thinking about bearing testimony on faith and repentance when this happened, which is all that Hosea is about. When I read that verse, I immediately thought of the verse written in 1 Corinthians. I turned to that real quick, then read the footnotes. I replaced one of the words in the verse with the footnote so that it reads, "O death, where is thy sting? O hell (or spiritual death), where is thy victory?" I thought about how that applies to us. As we have "faith unto repentance", we can say as Paul said.

Scripture #3: D&C 61:3. Don't remember how I found this scripture. But as I thought about this scripture, I thought of Pocahontas singing "Just Around the Riverbend".....Those were the only words I could think of to that song, but I remembered the main message. Anyway, as we choose the harder right/experiencing trials, we must remember that there are others who are "perishing in unbelief." As we share the gospel, we will feel the joy that comes through doing so.

Scripture #4: Isaiah 63:1-3....I thought about this scripture during the last part of Elder D. Todd Christofferson's talk "'Abide in My Love'". What stuck out to me especially about this scripture was verse three is partially in past tense, partially in future tense. As you think about that and think about how Jesus Christ was in the place of the winepress when he suffered for our sins, it makes Elder Christofferson's and Isaiah's remarks seem cooler (for lack of a better word).

Scripture #5: Daniel 3:16-18. This scripture has had an impact on me again and again during my mission. Throughout my mission, I have had a couple friends/family members die, despite all the prayers. This past transfer, it has helped me as I thought about it with a couple of words of wisdom from a wonderful sister, whose husband died 6 weeks ago. She said, "We have faith in the Savior, not in the miracles." This matches perfectly with Shadrach, Meshach, and Abed-nego's remarks: "If it be so, our God whom we serve is able to deliver us from the burning fiery furnace, and he will deliver us out of thine hand, O king. But if not,...we will not serve thy gods." Now, they were delivered from their afflictions, but some in scripture have not been for a time (namely, the women and children of Ammonihah, Jeremiah, Nephi, Mormon, Moroni, Joseph in Egypt, Joseph Smith, Jesus Christ, etc.)

Last Scripture: D&C 20:17-35. What glorious things we know about because of the Book of Mormon. Enough said. :j

Old Testament Insights...

I have a reading recommendation. You should read the Bible, or the Doctrine and Covenants...or the Pearl of Great Price. All are great books. If you have not read them all the way through. I recommend doing so, especially the Old Testament..

The Old Testament is the most neglected book of scripture, but it is probably one of the most marvelous. It was given by God to us to bring about his work and his glory. It benefits us today. It's Christ-Centered. It reveals many things about his mission here on earth (both in the first and in the second coming...see especially the books of Isaiah, Jeremiah, Ezekiel, and so on.). The Old Testament does have a lot missing from it, but if you think about it, it is still super intact despite all it's been through. We still get the account of Adam and Eve, we still see the Abrahamic covenant in there, we even see many prophecies of Joseph Smith and the restoration (see, Isaiah 29, Joel 2:28-32, Malachi, Deuteronomy 30, etc.). In fact, the fulness of the gospel can be found within the Old Testament. It may be very symbolic and very hard to understand, but as you study this, you will find many great things in there. For example, I found a great scripture about temple work in Isaiah 22:20-25.

Transfers went smoothly, My new companion and I left a little later than the other missionaries because we had a couple of things to do at the transfer point. We were extremely busy. We have senior missionaries that worked with us a lot these past four days. We helped them with a baptism.

As Zone Leaders, we also organized exchanges with missionaries in our zone. The Assistants also texted us and told us we're exchanging with them, so we're going to be traveling to the mission headquarters this coming week. We also had to collect indicators from our zone.

During transfers, everybody, including me, was surprised I was called to be a Zone Leader. One of my previous companions, when he heard that I was going to be a Zone Leader, exclaimed "That's my boy!" It was pretty funny.

We have a baptism scheduled for this week. The investigator getting baptized is super cool.

Have a great week! Read the Bible! It'll do wonders.

Because He Lives!

We asked one of our branch members to create a sign for the Because He Lives Initiative.  It is awesome. We're going to show the rest of the missionaries in our zone.

Happy Easter!

Have you seen #BecauseHeLives. helives.mormon.org ? You should watch it. It's awesome. We've started using it and we've had success with getting members invigorated with it.  We've been trying to find more people to teach, and haven't found success yet, but it'll come with this Easter Initiative.

Feasting on Scriptures: Ancient and Modern!

I bought a 32 gig flash drive, and put a ton of General Conference talks on there, the scriptures, and Jesus the Christ.  I have been listening to a bunch of these talks. I still have a couple of talks that I am going to download, but I already filled up half of my flash drive with about 2000 tracks of talking.

Missionary Traveler and New Investigators!

We went on exchanges in Missouri, and I realized that so far I have spent at least a day in three of the four states in my area. I spent a day in Oklahoma in the mission home. I spent a couple of weeks in Arkansas, obviously. Lastly, I spent two days in Missouri. Just need Kansas, then I could say I have been in all four states in my mission :D. 

I was with one of the Zone Leaders,  It was fun. We were able to find two (maybe three) potentials investigators in the area that day.

We also received a new investigator this week. Previously, in the last two weeks, we have been putting "He is the Gift" cards around in laundromats. This week, we were traveling in our car when my companion decided to go to a laundromat that we haven't been to before. We didn't put any "He is the Gift" cards anywhere, but we went "OTMing" (Opening our mouths, basically) and we found this man who is from Hawaii. He came to Arkansas to stay with a family member. His family member died two months later, and he has been trying to travel back to Hawaii. He was once a Jehovah's Witness, and he has some interesting beliefs.

"He is the Gift"

We went clover tracting a day or two ago and we found a potential investigator who loved the video we shared.  It is called "He is the Gift".  It has been our prime tool since Thanksgiving). We came back to meet her husband, too. He wasn't interested, but that's okay.