Sunday, January 14, 2018

1/08/2017

Family and friends do I love all of you!!! Thanks for all the supportive emails and awesomeness I have received the past 2 weeks and just throughout my mission it has been awesome. This week I had so many crazy experiences and some very very spiritually moving moments! There are 4 people I want to talk about today and so I will keep my week at that! 

President Thomas S Monson: Our beloved prophet as you all have heard has passed away this week at the age of 90. It was quite expected on my part and I am glad he is rejoined with his wife and Savior!! It is strange to think that the teachings in which he has shared have affected me nearly my entire “childhood” life ranging from 6th grade to now. He is the prophet that called to me to be a missionary. It was really neat to see the world react to his passing over social media and in the community. All positivity from my viewpoint was derived from my observation of those areas, I did however have an amazing experience last night with the Spirit. There Is a “party” which we go to every Sunday night with this investigator family. They have a taco night every Sunday and so of course we go if we can. On this particular night, they had me take the “16 Personality Test” (super famous online, do it!) and my results came out that I was an ESFJ. Look it up. It is pretty spot on. But anyway we were talking about our personalities and we started talking about how we need to enjoy the moment more in life. It is SO easy for us to think in the past or even n the future; but staying focused on the moment is a tough task that requires practice. We talked about how the most humble people are the most grateful. We came to this conclusion talking about pride and what considers someone to be a prideful person. Many people associate Pride with someone who boasts a lot, talks a lot (especially about themselves), etc. Which is true but there are also other forms of pride. And going off of the statement above, there are also a lot of very humble people who tend to talk a lot or even dominate social situations, doesn’t mean they are prideful because they talk a lot or even about some things they’ve accomplished/done/ seen. It is almost a feeling. But anyways he told me about how Moses called himself a “meek” person. Called himself that. So does that make Moses prideful? Well, now lets look at Jesus...he called himself the Son of God and proclaimed salvation comes through him (though fact, from perspective of the Pharisees/ Sadducees/ etc it was prideful of him). But really being meek and humble has a different sense and vibe to it. Moses and Jesus were very humble and very meek especially in their expressions of gratitude. I promise y'all this conversation made more sense in person but through this I was able to talk to him about living prophets and the passing of Thomas S Monson because I distinctly remember reading something by the Huffington Post about Monson being the “nicest man in the world”. Now categorizing him as that may be biased, may or may no be accurate, but I am so grateful for his life of meekness, humility, and service to the Lord. He has taught me so much about what it means to be a follower of the Lord and how I can best honor my priesthood. He has taught me how crucial it is to follow the Spirit. Loor al Profeta! Service is what life is all about!:) 

Angela Soumastre: I know I have talked about her so much but I am going to give you her full story today! She is dating on of my homies in the ward, Brian Green, and moved from FLorida after te hurricanes to live closer to Brian and to get a new start in life. In the moving process she was having a HUGE problem with finding an apartment. She literally applied for like 50+ apartments and had no luck because she has a dog. She really wanted one that was super close to Brian but she got denied. After that, she was super stressed on finding a place that he had the impression to “pray over the Book of Mormon” that she had. She did. And immediately afterwards she received a call from the landlord of the EXACT apartment that she wanted confirming her request!! That was insane. Our first lesson with her was amazing and I remember walking out the door with her and she did the “air guitar” with me because that’s just her hahaha. It has been such a blast teaching her. Her ultimatum to being baptized was that she really wanted to go visit the Washington DC Temple. During the holidays her and Brian went on a trip. At first though, Angela went home to Florida to visit her family. She ended up seeing a lot of the “old crowd” of friends and even went to hang out with one of the girls she considered to be her best friend at a social swing dance club. Her friend, being a Jehovah’s Witness, then took her sweet time in attacking her with Anti-Mormon facts and trying to talk her out of following the Savior. This really was hard for her, because she had never faced opposition like that before and it was fro someone that she considered to be her best friend!! Doubt and confusion crept into her heart and she even told Brian she didn't think that she wanted to join the church. After Florida, they went to DC together and on the way to the temple she was praying for a confirmation of the things we had been teaching her! As they were going she remember the temple creeping over the horizon as she was on the freeway and a spiritual bomb just engulfed her entire being. She said she had never felt that way in her life and was almost moved to tears in the car! She even thought for a moment that like the AC was on but they had heat on full blast. Anyways, she had a wonderful experience and has come to know for HERSELF that this is the only true and living church of the Lord Jesus Christ. She got up and bore her testimony in Sacrament meeting yesterday and seriously it moved me to tears. Edna (the Nigerian) bore her testimony as well and so everyone was on a spiritual high note all day! Angela is such an awesome example to me and even to others whom I will talk more about now!

Brandon and Elizabeth: Brandon is probably my favorite dude on this Earth. They said I could be there children’s Godfather haha. Anyways, at this moment they are fully committed to joining the church and having a temple marriage and eternal family. We have had some really great lessons the past two weeks. They are in a tough spot currently...We are trying to help Elizabeth out a ton. She has been smoking for more than 10 years and she told me after church (after hearing the testimony of Angela) that she was going to quit “cold turkey”. Pray for her that she may have the strength to get rid of this addiction in her life! Also, she has not been divorced from her previous marriage so we are working hard on how we can get that cleared up. Brandon cannot move out because they are incredibly unstable financially so that isn’t an option; however, with the help of the ward and the Lord I know they will be able to have the blessings of the Gospel in their lives soon!! They absolutely love church and the Lord. Pray for them! 

I spent some good time setting some goals for myself spiritually, physically, and mentally. I like where I am heading. I am so thankful for the Lord! A quote from a talk I studied this week really stuck out in my studies: “The Savior’s Atonement is a conduit for the constant flow of charity from our Father in Heaven. We must choose to abide in this love in order to have charity for all.”

Love yall les amo mucho ciao 

Elder Mac. 






No comments:

Post a Comment