Not in the gangster sense of the phrase. We don't have
enough money for that here. Even the pic you will see later of me holding loads
of cash is not much money. Just over a hundred bucks. But at least it looks
impressive right? Na, the only real money we are rolling in here would be
spiritual cash, also known to some as blessings. When you use the phrase
referring to that kind of green, I'm loaded!!
I almost forgot!! Hello hello, one and all!! It's that time
of week again where I send home an email to all my folks. It has been a good
week. Surprise! Not. They always are!! A mission has a way of doing that to
you. Every week just rocks, no matter how hard it sometimes gets. The
awesomeness of the week just seems to weigh out the less fun parts.
So this week. What happened this week? Depends. TONS
happened this week!! We found lots of random people to teach. The wonderful
thing about that is that the Lord just does that. People just show up prepared
sometimes. It doesn't seem to come through anything that we've done. We just
happen to be in the right place at the right time. On a side note, in order for
that to happen, you need to be following all the rules and commandments so that
you can be led by the Spirit. But, anyway, then you'll just run into these
people. And the Lord has prepared them all for you. It's wonderful!! It
happened to us several times this week. It's like having the FedEx man show up
with a package for you that you weren't really sure you ordered. But then it's
there! Merry Christmas!!
We also happened to have a baptism this week. A double. Two
wonderful women that we have been teaching since I got here were finally ready
to be baptized!! One is only 9 and the other is 18. They are both awesome!! We
have 10 people lined up, still on the way to being baptized. Hopefully, I will
be able to see them receive that blessing while I'm still here.
We also happened to be out walking this week and ran into a
lady that I haven't visited for a while. I only visited them once with Elder
Judar. We were going to drop them, but we both felt in the visit that we
shouldn't. But we just haven't had time to go to them. We ran into the wife
this week and she asked why it had been so long. So we got out to them. Man,
they have a baptismal date now!! They are just great!!
We have had some cool experiences this week with being led
by the Spirit. I would like to insert a note here about how important it is to
be worthy of the companionship of the Holy Ghost. As it says in the scriptures,
if you don't have the Spirit, you shall not teach. If we aren't worthy of the
Spirit, we have no guidance. We are left on our own to figure out what we
should do. As a missionary, if this is the case, you are in a whole heap of
trouble. I can't tell you how many times we've walked into a lesson, and my
companion and I immediately know that we need to change the lesson because
there is a different lesson that they need. That comes through the promptings
of the Spirit. When the Spirit is with you, you are golden. You can really help
people. You can teach them according to their needs. If you don't have the
Spirit, that's not going to happen. They have a problem with faith and you are
teaching about service. Without that help on their faith, they don't really
care about service. They are not benefited. Even if you have the right
subject, but you don't ask a certain question, or read a certain scripture; it
all doesn't click. You have to be guided by the Spirit. The Lord knows our
hearts. He knows what all of us need. Down to a certain word of scripture or
testimony that will pierce your heart. We can't do it alone. That is why it is
so important to have the Spirit with you.
I also had a cool experience with my personal study this
week. Personal study is one of my favorite parts of the day. And it is always
awesome. The scriptures are the bomb!! Man, the Book of Mormon is so much
cooler than I knew!! But anyway. We had a zone training this week. The zone
leaders brought up some statistics that showed the numbers for our whole
mission dropping a little and they wanted us to come up with ways to fix it.
One elder was talking about less actives and that being our problem. If the wards
here focused more on their less actives, then we could do more work on
investigators. After all, less actives aren't the job of missionaries! That's
ward stuff, right? I was a little interested in that comment. Missionary work
is all about investigators, right? We aren't supposed to have to go around
bringing in less actives. That's the wards job. Ha. Or not. I put in some study
to it and I found some fun things that got my mind all jumping. I'm going to
lay down a quick scripture chain. If you have time to look it up, sweet! If
not, oh well!! Alma 4:19, Alma 31:34-35, 3 Nephi 18:32, D&C 18:10-16,
D&C 31:10. That was a fun, quick study that put some things into
perspective. In my opinion, Alma, Amulek, and the sons of Mosiah are some of
the best missionaries ever!! And as such, missionaries should probably follow
their example. If they put focus on less actives, we probably should too! And
of course, if we just take a good look at the missionary purpose: to invite
others to come unto Christ...... and so on and so forth. Others. Where in there
does it say investigators? Or to invite people for the first time? It doesn't!!
Woohoo!! Everyone needs the blessings of the gospel! Whether they've had them
before or whether they have not. We all need the gospel in our lives. And
therefore, we should share and help everyone. Anyway. That was a fun time for
me. Don't forget your less active friends. They need the blessings of the
gospel just as much as anyone else. Some times they just need a reminder.
Anyway, I'm running myself out of time rambling about my
personal study, which probably isn't that important to anyone else!! Whoops!
But the work is going well. I am just having a wonderful time out here in the
good old Philippines enjoying the blessings of the Lord.
Pics!! Of course, I forgot my Psych pic last week, so I
included it here. Um, I got some pics from the baptism. Grabbed a pic of me and
a cute little girl. I'm not sure what the other ones are!! But the last one is
me and Broadhead holding some cash, and thus the subject line. I hope you all
have a most fabulous and wonderful week!! Take luck!!
Much love,
Elder Christensen
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