August 11, 2014

Elder Ni, Elder Miles and the mission truck

We didn't have any meetings this week, so we got to do lots of proselyting. Two weeks ago we visited a less active member of the ward and his non-member girlfriend was there. Her name is Rachel and she actually lives in Massachusetts, but was down here for the summer. It turns out she took lessons from the sister missionaries before (starting about a year ago). We asked if we could start teaching her and she said we could. Last Sunday was our first lesson with her. She said the biggest thing keeping her from being baptized was her mom. She had never prayed to receive an answer either. The reason she never prayed was because she was afraid of receiving the answer! So pretty much she already had a testimony of the gospel but was nervous to act upon it. We came back for the second lesson and committed her to be baptized. She is going back to Massachusetts on the 24th, so she is actually getting baptized this Saturday. The sister missionaries taught her most of the lessons already and she has been to church a bunch, so all we had to do was review and teach a few things. After committing to a date, Rachel said she must have gone easy on us because it only took two lessons and the sisters were trying forever (haha). She is prepared and ready for Saturday! We have already been in contact with the bishop in her home town, so the transition will be as smooth as possible.

Besides that we did a lot of visiting less active members. Our bishop has asked us to share the 2014 April First Presidency Message titled "A Firmly Set Anchor" with the members of the ward. One of the paragraphs that I like from it says this:

"Adversity can come as a great storm to blow us off course and threaten to cast us against the rocks. But sometimes we are also in danger when everything appears to be safe--the winds soft and the waters smooth. In fact, we can be in the greatest danger when we are drifting and movement is so slight that we scarcely notice it."

If we aren't "anchored" in the gospel we can "drift" and not really notice it until we realize we've gone way off course. Doing the simple things like reading scriptures, praying, going to church, and others will keep us anchored, but when those things are not in our lives that is when we are in danger. I have seen this so much and I know it's true!

We have four Zone Conferences this week so it will be busy again. Elder Ni and I are doing as much proselyting as we can, even when we are busy, and we have seen the blessings come from it. Sacrifice truly does "bring forth the blessings of heaven"!

Love,

Elder Miles