Ah man I cannot believe that we're ending week 5!!! The more time that goes by, we get more used to living missionary life and that makes time go sooo fast! And to reply to your e-mail about it being monotonous here, it's great to be able to learn so much but we all feel like dogs chained to a gate - we're just so stoked to get out and go convert some people!!!
Probably one of the best parts of this week was general conference! I just remember everyone getting so amped about it and by the way this has got to be the first time that I've woken up before General Conference started! I just remember getting super super excited when we had personal study time before it started, wrote down the questions that I had, and then we finally got a couple districts to ride the elevator down to the auditorium where the MTC would watch Conference. When we got in, Elder Lanham just broke into "Ye Elders Of Israel" and everyone, (which we probably broke the weight limit on the elevator), joined in singing at about 5 times the normal speed with a pause......doors opened at floor two....doors closed again.....and break right back into finish it! I don't really think that I can sufficiently explain what it felt like to hear "This is the 182 Annual General Conference of the Church of Jesus Christ of....", It truly put any premiere I've watched to shame. I totally got the chills! Another exciting announcement, which is kind of a sad thing, but this was the first Conference that I didn't fall asleep in! And going in as a missionary, it was so awesome to hear any talk that had to do with the work and at the end I had like 20 some pages of notes!
It made me think of the quote by President Kimball when someone asked him what you do when you're in a boring sacrament meeting and he said, "I don't know, I've never been to one." I could talk forever about conference but my favorite talk was probably Elder Scott's on revelation. It is so amazing here at the MTC how it just sets the scene for revelation! Sometimes I'm just thinking "Ah slow down haha I can only write so fast!"
Another awesome part of the week was when we were meeting with our Progressive Investigator. Now I know that this is only a prep Investigator, but even so this guy that we have been working with has been a "real piece of work" (which President Shumway said that we should probably refer to our investigators with different names haha.) But anyway, the background on Pablo is that he is from Cordaba, Argentina, just about half of his family was baptized and he's meeting with us to try and understand why his family was converted as fast as they were.
I remember our first meeting with him about two weeks ago when we asked him about his religious backround he said "I was born Catholic and I'll die Catholic." So as you can see, it took quite a while to get on the same page as him, but this past week we decided to speak with him about the plan of Salvation, but mainly the Atonement. We had just gotten him to start saying personal prayers so we thought that it would be a miracle if we could even get him to come to church with us! So as we get into our lesson, I really can't explain exactly what happened there, but the Spirit just took over. The language stopped being a problem and as we were explaining what the Atonement promises us, we were able to connect why his family made the decisions that they did. The Spirit was so tangible in that room! One crucial thing that I learned through these examples is the importance of the Book of Mormon. Now imagine that you are in a house, and the Spirit is represented by the outside air. If you try and accommodate your investigator's beliefs with the Bible (which is still a great tool), it's like opening a window. If you use the Book of Mormon, it's like kicking every door open and shattering every window! As John Bytheway says, "A good missionary uses the Bible, a great missionary uses the Book of Mormon." I will never forget the feeling and look in Pablo's eyes when I had him read 2 Nephi 2:6-8. I then had him read Alma 11:40 and turned to Elder Johansson and said in an excited whisper "We're baptizing him!" (about 30 times!) So we did as prompted and invited him to follow the example of Jesus Christ and be baptized. To our shock, he accepted!
While praying on our knees, I remember I had a smile that I just could not keep off my face, and I truly felt the joy of missionary work! Well I could talk so much more about stuff here but my e-mail time is up. But, I wanted to give a shout out to Uncle Scott and you guys for the packages this week! Better than Christmas!! Love you guys so much and it was such an awesome treat to be able to call you this week for "immunizations." Tell all the other prospective missionaries that they need to forget their immunization papers at home and then they'll get extra e-mail time along with the opportunity to call the family! Wish I could be at baby Davey's blessing but give everybody my love! This Easter sunday we'll get three General Authorities for sacrament meeting and with the talk and hype about it you would think that Jesus might even show up. love you all!
Elder Wilson
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| Justin's plaque. Hanging on the wall outside the Bishops office |
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