Well, I've been transferred! (2/17) And let me tell you, I am going to miss this last Ward. They said some incredibly kind things to me on Sunday, and a lot even over the pulpit! Then a family threw a huge farewell dinner with all you could eat tri-tip steak and salmon and... Yeah. That dinner made it into the journal entry. I love that ward so much and will miss the wonderful people I met there dearly.
I will also miss my companions. Elder Acox was a wonderful addition to our companionship for those last 6 weeks, and he was a great example of humility. He totally changed his attitude towards mission culture and things like that that I was pridefully worried about (lesson learned) and he just... Yeah. Humble is the best way to describe. And hard working.
Elder Russell I won't see until I'm home since he's going home in just a few short months and we're far away. He really has changed me a lot. I'll miss his guidance and insight dearly. He just understood charity. And that was usually the center of both our goals and most of our discussions. How could we love people more, how could we show them, how could we feel the love our Lord has for us more in our lives. He gave selfless service often to me and Elder Acox, and never found fault in us. Always after an argument he would take the blame and apologize and make restitution, even if it wasn't his fault. A truly great missionary.
But onto bigger and better places! Elder Jones is my new companion, and he goes home at the end of this transfer. We're in the Parkview A ward, in Victorville. I'm officially in the desert, and apparently it's a different world up here! He's a very wise and experienced missionary. He's a small town Idaho boy (Moscow Idaho) and played varsity football all 4 years so the guy knows how to work! I'm really looking forward to hitting the pavement hard with this guy and just tearing up this area!
Thought for the week:
So there's this family in the Terra Vista ward named the Eggets (Yeah, Rebekah Egget's cousin for those of you who know her) and he's awesome. Him and his wife: super spiritually in tune. It's so cool to be around them. Anyway, he was talking about how the Gospel is like a Rubix cube. (Bear with me, this analogy is cool) A rubix cube is simple, 6 sides and 6 colors. For those of you who know how they work, it's like a 3 step process that you repeat over and over again to solve it. No matter what state that cube is in, you repeat the 3 steps and eventually it will be solved.
He then compared that the gospel is simple. 1 plan, 1 destination, 1 Savior, one purpose, and a simple process of Faith, Repentance, making and renewing covenants and enduring to the end to solve it all. This process is all that matters. But too often, we rely on our own wisdom and our own knowledge to try and figure it out for ourselves. Have you ever tried figuring out a rubix cube without the steps? It's a mess. And the cube always ends up worse then before. As soon as we try to "Figure out" the gospel and delve into the weeds of deep doctrine and all the fluff, we assume that we can produce a process better than the one already provided. And our testimonies will suffer. The gospel is simple, and as soon as we over complicate it we end up with a weaker testimony. Read the Book of Mormon. Pray to know it's true. Act in faith on the Commandments of the prophets. It's these simple things that will get us to return to live with our Heavenly Father, even if it seems as mundane as a 3 step process you repeat over and over.
Cool stuff, huh?
Church is true. Wish me luck in the new area. I love and miss you all!
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