Hey Yall! Things are sure kickin down here. This week has been very busy! Elder Haderlie and I are really enjoying the work. We had some really neat, but sad experiences this week. We got one more baptismal date, our investigator Catherine Wheeler has still been without coffee and cigarettes! She was interviewed Saturday by mission president and she is worthy and ready! She came out so excited! We got a new stake presidency yesterday. Elder Christiansen and Elder Booth (I beleive is what it was) they are general authorities and they were down here for stake conference, and that was awesome, but turns out our Bishop, is now the 2nd counselor in the Stake presidency as well as the Bishop (until next week) so we will be getting a new bishop! how cool! I really hope and pray the new bishop understands and is into missionary work. They all gave great talks and the old presidency and the new presidency shared their testimonies and when Bishop Tindall(our bishop) stood up he simply said, "I know Jesus Christ lives....He lives....He lives....He lives..." it was so powerful, pure truth in that statement, He truly does live and we celebrate and remember His ressurection not just yesterday, but everyday. I am reading through Alma right now and we learn from Amulek and Alma teaching the people in Ammonihah that through Christ we will be ressurected and brought to stand before the bar of God to be judged. It is so true, my faith, my testimony, my hope and desires are centered within my Savior Jesus Christ, He truly has suffered for our sins, He has borne our griefs, ,"the chastisment of our peace was upon Him, and with His stripes we are healed" Mosiah 14 has become one of my favorite chapters, so short, but so much within those 12 verses. I know God loves us and we are His children. We are of divine worth. Jesus Christ lives, I know He lives. Those experiences I spoke of that I want to relay happened Saturday evening and yesterday afternoon, Saturday evening we were going through Part Member family names and we went to visit the Collier family, we got there knocked and rang the doorbell, and no one answered, it took about 2 minutes for someone to come, and she was surprised we hadn't left yet. Well she was the member, and we were just talking and getting to know her, and then I shared with her I fell away from the church, so had she, and related with me, and then she opened up, and shared with us that her husbands family was Catholic and her familiy still all LDS they butted heads, but her husbands family asked them to take a class to just simply learn about the Catholic church, turns out though, its like missionary lessons, at the end you're supposed to get baptized, well she found that out and we found out that she was planning on being baptized that night into the catholic church. She was uncomfortable we could see and didn't want to she expressed, she shared that she didn't know if it was right, and she began to tear. We testified of God's love for her, and blessing of answering prayers, we told her we are unable to tell you not to join, but to pray and ask what God wants for you. We left feeling like we should have done more, as to what we could or should have done I don't know, but we drove away and i was touched with guilt that I didn't do as much as I could have, I felt rebuked that I didn't follow the Spirit and "do something" what a horrible feeling I had, but I knew as well I had testified I had acknowledged. We exchanged numbers with her and told her we would contact her later to see what happened, at about 10 or 10 30 she said she was still at the church and had gone through with it. I was sad because I felt that I didn't share enough of my testimony of the restored gospel, I testified of Christ but that is all. Not of the church or anything. I hope I learned my lesson to follow the Spirit, but the next day, yesterday, we went to visit a potential investigator after stake conference and we parked and saw a young man walking down the street, he was about to pass and I told Elder Haderlie to talk to him, he jumped out said HEY and by then I had gotten out as well and we shared slight conversation with him, he didn't seem interested so I was about to say have a good day, but I kept talking and he walked towards us. We tried to set a time to come by and visit him and he said right now would be fine, we stood on the side of the street talking to him, and turns out his name is mike and he is 21 he used to "walk with God" and live a good life, but fell away, he was walking to the store to purchase alchohol when we had stopped him. He had shame and guilt in his eyes and actions as he told us. I shared with him that when we follow God we feel His light and love, but when we drink and go against what God has asked we feel darkness and unhappiness. I knew again the Spirit wanted me to do something, as to what, I am not sure. I wanted to drive him to a members home and have dinner or something but there was no one to do that with. Our time was over with mike and we told him we would come by again, he was close to tears as were we, I wanted to reach out and hug him and tell him don't go, stay with us. I felt rebuked again, that I didn't do something more. I felt so much love for Mike and Terry Collier in the past two days, I got to see them maybe close to how God's sees them, I was sorrowful as God may be when we use our agency to go against His will. That was a hard experience, but I know still God loves them, you and I. Let us resolve to not let God down. So we don't bring that sadness upon Him. It is like in the Book of Moses where in the vison is seen, God looking down and crying and Satan looking up and laughing. These are just the experiences I have had but to end on a happy note, we met two new investigators that night who seem sincere in their interest to learn more, we are returning wednesday to do some service. :D Great things happen! Love you all, have a great week! Happy late Easter!
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