Our week was awesome. In addition to watching Conference, we were sworn at, cat-called, and bashed with. A solid week in the life of a missionary in a college town. Gotta love it! We also had a few other things happen, which I will devote the length of this email to instead of the formerly mentioned incidents...
This week we had our zone conference. Much of it was focused on member-missionary work. That was great, because that seemed to be one of the themes of General Conference as well. Elder Uchtdorf and Elder Cook both gave wonderful talks about how we can all be good member missionaries. (Many others mentioned things related to that topic, but theirs were my favorite). Being a missionary is not that hard. We don't have to do anything extravagant to work gospel topics into our conversations with those around us. If we are studying the scriptures regularly, and participating in "Come, Follow Me" like we should, it will not be difficult to share our experiences and our testimony with our friends. In fact, it will be very natural. Plus, it is an awesome and rewarding experience knowing that we shared something that has blessed our life with another. So let us all, as Elder Uchtdorf said, "participate in the Commission."
This week we were able to continue to teach William. Though his reading and reading comprehension skills are about those of a third-grader, he really understands things well when we sit down and explain and teach them to him. He loves meeting with us. He is learning a lot, and he is even sharing what he's learned with his co-workers. See, everyone can be a missionary! This week we have been sharing the Plan of Salvation with William, and we had the opportunity to teach him about the Atonement of Christ. The doctrine that surrounds that event is truly the most important doctrine that exists. I love testifying of the Savior and His power to heal, uplift, strengthen, forgive, and change us. He is the Savior of the World. It was awesome to be able to teach William about those things. Tad R. Callister also gave an amazing talk on this subject at Conference.
The other day as we were heading in for the night, we were stopped by a guy in our apartment complex parking lot. I don't really know the reason that he stopped us, and I regret not asking him, but we ended up talking for about 45 minutes about all kinds of stuff. I really enjoyed the visit, though I left it feeling kind of sad for this young man. There's a lot that was discussed, but I'll summarize what I can here. The gist of our conversation was this: in a manner that was not confrontatious, he told us that he has had some experiences that have led him to believe that God doesn't exist. He said that he would be open again to the idea that God did exist, if he were to be shown some type of sign - if God would speak to him. Since God has not, He can't be there. He was looking for evidence of God inside a box that God does not operate inside of. This young man told us that there are answers to many questions that he will never know, and that he can't know until the afterlife - if an afterlife even exists. He told us that he believes that he should "eat, drink, and be merry," and at the end of this life, that would be that. It was a conversation that we don't have often here in the Bible belt, and it was an unfortunate one to have. We did our very best to explain to this man our beliefs and we shared many scriptures with him in order to teach him the truth. Though he wasn't rude about the things we offered, he rejected them. We assured him lovingly that one day, he would stand before God and know that God is. That he would one day stand before God and know that God loves him. We promised him that that would be a wonderful day, but would be exponentially more wonderful if we chose to follow God now. After all, this life is the time for men to prepare to meet him. The part about this conversation that left me feeling sad for this young man, was that his decisions had already been made. He had already decided that there was no God. He had already decided that living in the world was the way to happiness. He had already made his decisions. He seemed to be at a point, like Laman and Lemuel, that he was "past feeling." I felt the spirit as we testified to him of truth, and I hope and pray that he felt some sliver of it too. I'm sure there are several lessons to be learned from that experience I had, but I want you to know biggest lesson I learned. As we ended that conversation and parted ways, and as I prayed that night, I felt love for that young man. I knew that God loved him. The Savior's words came to my mind, "Father, forgive them, for they know not what they do." Though he was making some wrong choices, and though he rejected our offer of true happiness through the Atonement of Christ, I wanted him to feel that God still loves him. Because He does. At this point in his life, this man had closed himself off to that love. However, there is nobody so far gone that the love of God and the Atonement of Christ cannot reach. God lives. We are His children. He loves us. He reaches out to us - always. When we "have ears to hear and eyes to see," we will know of those truths for ourselves. I learned of those truths more deeply the other night. It was a neat experience.
Oh, one more awesome thing that I forgot to mention last week. I don't even know if you'll know who I'm talking about because I don't remember how much I mentioned them, but whatever. Back in Montgomery lives a member family by the name of Villalobos. They are some of my favorite people I've met in this great state. There was a girl named Harley who is from Texas, but she lived with them because she was dancing in the Montgomery Ballet Company at the time. He parents weren't super on board with Harley being part of the Church, though she attended each week with the Villalobos fam. Well, a couple weeks ago Harley turned 18, and so on March 30 she got baptized! It made me so happy! It was so awesome! "Has the day of miracles ceased?" Not in the slightest.
Alrighty, I'm sure there were some more things that happened this week, but I guess that's the highlights. I hope y'all have a great upcoming week. Make sure you are on time to church this Sunday or Elder Holland might find you and slap you into next week so you can try again and do it right haha! Love y'all! Thanks for the thoughts and prayers, you're always in mine!
Love,
Elder Beach
#RollTide
This week we had our zone conference. Much of it was focused on member-missionary work. That was great, because that seemed to be one of the themes of General Conference as well. Elder Uchtdorf and Elder Cook both gave wonderful talks about how we can all be good member missionaries. (Many others mentioned things related to that topic, but theirs were my favorite). Being a missionary is not that hard. We don't have to do anything extravagant to work gospel topics into our conversations with those around us. If we are studying the scriptures regularly, and participating in "Come, Follow Me" like we should, it will not be difficult to share our experiences and our testimony with our friends. In fact, it will be very natural. Plus, it is an awesome and rewarding experience knowing that we shared something that has blessed our life with another. So let us all, as Elder Uchtdorf said, "participate in the Commission."
This week we were able to continue to teach William. Though his reading and reading comprehension skills are about those of a third-grader, he really understands things well when we sit down and explain and teach them to him. He loves meeting with us. He is learning a lot, and he is even sharing what he's learned with his co-workers. See, everyone can be a missionary! This week we have been sharing the Plan of Salvation with William, and we had the opportunity to teach him about the Atonement of Christ. The doctrine that surrounds that event is truly the most important doctrine that exists. I love testifying of the Savior and His power to heal, uplift, strengthen, forgive, and change us. He is the Savior of the World. It was awesome to be able to teach William about those things. Tad R. Callister also gave an amazing talk on this subject at Conference.
The other day as we were heading in for the night, we were stopped by a guy in our apartment complex parking lot. I don't really know the reason that he stopped us, and I regret not asking him, but we ended up talking for about 45 minutes about all kinds of stuff. I really enjoyed the visit, though I left it feeling kind of sad for this young man. There's a lot that was discussed, but I'll summarize what I can here. The gist of our conversation was this: in a manner that was not confrontatious, he told us that he has had some experiences that have led him to believe that God doesn't exist. He said that he would be open again to the idea that God did exist, if he were to be shown some type of sign - if God would speak to him. Since God has not, He can't be there. He was looking for evidence of God inside a box that God does not operate inside of. This young man told us that there are answers to many questions that he will never know, and that he can't know until the afterlife - if an afterlife even exists. He told us that he believes that he should "eat, drink, and be merry," and at the end of this life, that would be that. It was a conversation that we don't have often here in the Bible belt, and it was an unfortunate one to have. We did our very best to explain to this man our beliefs and we shared many scriptures with him in order to teach him the truth. Though he wasn't rude about the things we offered, he rejected them. We assured him lovingly that one day, he would stand before God and know that God is. That he would one day stand before God and know that God loves him. We promised him that that would be a wonderful day, but would be exponentially more wonderful if we chose to follow God now. After all, this life is the time for men to prepare to meet him. The part about this conversation that left me feeling sad for this young man, was that his decisions had already been made. He had already decided that there was no God. He had already decided that living in the world was the way to happiness. He had already made his decisions. He seemed to be at a point, like Laman and Lemuel, that he was "past feeling." I felt the spirit as we testified to him of truth, and I hope and pray that he felt some sliver of it too. I'm sure there are several lessons to be learned from that experience I had, but I want you to know biggest lesson I learned. As we ended that conversation and parted ways, and as I prayed that night, I felt love for that young man. I knew that God loved him. The Savior's words came to my mind, "Father, forgive them, for they know not what they do." Though he was making some wrong choices, and though he rejected our offer of true happiness through the Atonement of Christ, I wanted him to feel that God still loves him. Because He does. At this point in his life, this man had closed himself off to that love. However, there is nobody so far gone that the love of God and the Atonement of Christ cannot reach. God lives. We are His children. He loves us. He reaches out to us - always. When we "have ears to hear and eyes to see," we will know of those truths for ourselves. I learned of those truths more deeply the other night. It was a neat experience.
Oh, one more awesome thing that I forgot to mention last week. I don't even know if you'll know who I'm talking about because I don't remember how much I mentioned them, but whatever. Back in Montgomery lives a member family by the name of Villalobos. They are some of my favorite people I've met in this great state. There was a girl named Harley who is from Texas, but she lived with them because she was dancing in the Montgomery Ballet Company at the time. He parents weren't super on board with Harley being part of the Church, though she attended each week with the Villalobos fam. Well, a couple weeks ago Harley turned 18, and so on March 30 she got baptized! It made me so happy! It was so awesome! "Has the day of miracles ceased?" Not in the slightest.
Alrighty, I'm sure there were some more things that happened this week, but I guess that's the highlights. I hope y'all have a great upcoming week. Make sure you are on time to church this Sunday or Elder Holland might find you and slap you into next week so you can try again and do it right haha! Love y'all! Thanks for the thoughts and prayers, you're always in mine!
Love,
Elder Beach
#RollTide
Zone Conference. Can you find me?
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