Hastening the Work: When All Else Fails, Just Love!

This week was my companion's birthday. We went over to a member family's home in our area. They are deaf so they taught us the "Happy Birthday" song in sign language than we sang to her in America Sign Language (ASL).  It was really fun!  Later, we enjoyed a nice cake.

Our English ward is the official deaf ward in the area, so during church, there is an ASL translator.  It's super fun to watch during meetings.

I gave a talk on Hastening the Work in the English Ward.  It was short and sweet, and went really well.  I shared Alma 13:24 and talked about how we have seen evidence of God preparing the hearts of his children.  For example, God uses the members to prepare his children - a few weeks ago, we knocked on the door of one house and the people who answered the door were super excited to see us because they had known several members of the church throughout their lives. They immediately let us in, gave us Cheetos, Cheez-Its, fruit snacks, trail mix, and water.  It kept us going for the next week!  We were able to talk to them about the Restoration and they were touched by the message.

Then, I talked about what we needed to do to prepare ourselves to take part in this work.

1) We need to start with ourselves - it's like personal study hour for missionaries

2) We need to help out our families - it's like companionship study for missionaries

3) We need to help out others - it's like when missionaries go out to work each day

Three other missionaries and the Ward Mission Leader also spoke.

A success we had this week:

We stopped by to visit a family, within the first five minutes we were "reprimanded" for asking too many questions.  Things weren't looking so great, but we decided to just listen to them for a while.  The tension eased, then we sang them a song and shared a scripture with them.  We ended with a prayer and told them we loved them. The lady of the house responded that she loved us, too. She also gave us some delicious cookies and little pies to take with us as we walked out the door.  Mission Accomplished.

Moral of the Story: When all else fails, just love.

Dedicate and Consecrate Yourselves!

Elder Ballard's final point:

Dedicate and consecrate yourselves - We've all been given different talents and gifts that we need to use to build up the Kingdom of God.  We should be generous in giving it all (D&C 4:2). We need to be willing to give God not only our talents, times, and resources, but also our hearts.

Seek First the Kingdom of God

Elder Ballard's third point:

Seek first the Kingdom of God - Don't get so caught up in life that you forget the things that are most important.  Yes, it is very important to have a stable job, to make a living for your family, to get a good education, or to become a contributing member of society, but what is just as important (if not more) is that we stay close to God throughout all our lives.  Make time in your busy schedule to read the scriptures, pray, go to church, serve others, and do home and visiting teaching.  Throughout my mission I have learned that the best way to combat stress, worry, doubts, exhaustion, or any other negative feelings is to work and serve others.  You begin to see that things more in an eternal perspective rather than focusing on the stresses of the here and now.  Doing the small daily things living the gospel requires will help us focus on what's most important and will improve our outlook on life and give us lasting happiness.

Do Your Part!

Elder Ballard's second point:

Do your part - As members of the church - people who know the true and complete gospel of Jesus Christ - we have the responsibility to give others the same opportunity to partake of the blessings of the gospel.  We know that this is our responsibility and the only way for us to be truly happy in the gospel is when we know we are doing the things the Lord wants us to do.  Even if our part is small, it can have profound effects in the future (Alma 37:6-7).

Replace Fear With Faith!

My sacrament meeting talk was about amidst all the turmoil in the world, we can still look to the future with faith and hope as we live the gospel.  It was really good.  Elder Ballard highlighted four things we can do to have optimism.  The first point was:

Replace fear with faith - There is still much good in the world.  God has promised that his gospel will spread throughout the entire world and God always fulfills his promises (Alma 37:16-17)

Enfrenten el Futuro con fe y Esperanza

Last Sunday, I gave a talk in church on an article by Elder M. Russell Ballard called "Enfrenten el futuro con fe y esperanza."  It was completely in Spanish!  My talk was about 10-15 minutes long.  Afterwards, everyone told me I did great and that I sounded like a true hispánica.