Elder Nessen got his Visa! After 14 months of waiting. We dropped him off at the airport at 4:30am Tuesday Morning (see funny picture below). We drove up to Billings on Monday and stayed the night. After we dropped Elder Nessen off, Elder Rasmusson and I got to attend the Temple again! I get something new every time I go! Have you seen the Newest Presentation of the Endowment? After the Temple we had unlimited Pancakes at Denny's. They have pancakes now that taste like cinnabons :D Elder Rasmusson's License expired Tuesday so he had to get an eye exam to renew it. Once all that was taken care of we finally drove back to Powell. Tracy Young (our investigator) called us asking if we could give her daughter a blessing, so we did that when we got home.
Wednesday was when Tawnya told me she wanted to be baptized! I am so proud of her for following the Spirit. It has been fun to write her over Facebook. I enjoy the more difficult questions because we don't get asked them that often :)
Thursday we picled up a new investigator named Todd who lives at the nursing home. He has been very humbled and has kind of a sad story. But he was genuine and was seeking further comfort. He was BLOWN AWAY at the thought of a modern day Prophet. I think we fail to realize that Thomas S. Monson has just as much authority as did Moses or Abraham. In fact, President Monson is of more value to us than past Prophets because he is the current Prophet!
We're doing a competition within our zone to give out pamphlets. President Mecham said he wanted to flood our mission with literature and he would order enough pamphlets for us to stack them to our ceiling...so we did :) The goal is to get rid of all of them by the end of April. To do that, each companionship would need to give away 4.17 pamphlets a day. Whichever district gives out the most, gets to host a zone preparation day and not have to use miles to go to the other District (which is a big deal).
General Conference was the bomb. The themes of this conference seemed to be faith, keeping the Lord's standards despite worldly views, and handling temptation. We watched each session with a different Less-Active couple every time save 1! One was a dinner with the Young's. One of the most delicious meals I've had on my mission. Twice baked potatoes, broccoli with cheese, and ribs. So good. Priesthood session was my favorite as always. President Monson gave a fantastic talk on courage versus compromise. I realized that I have done a lot of compromising in my life. My number 1 fear in this life is disappointing people. So I have always tried to please both sides. But in a compromise, neither side is fully satisfied.
Then I realized Satan is ALL ABOUT COMPROMISE. He will tell you everything you want to know, truth and all, if it means one lie. The Lord requires clean hands and pure heart. He is totally okay with a 99% pure heart if it means you hold on to that one sin that prevents your Exaltation. That is evident in the Garden of Eden, "Eat Drink and be Merry,...if we are guilty the Lord will beat us with a few stripes and we will enter in to his Kingdom"...ALL FALSE. We pick and choose commandments and say, "that's just the way I am" or "at least I'm not doing THAT." Putting yourself as being more righteous than another is worthless and has no credibility. The worlds standards continue to drop. Therefore, so will you as you hold yourself only about someone else's worldly standard. The Lord's standards never change. It is obedience or nothing.
Zone leader Training is this week and that is going to be my topic. Compromise. It's exciting to hear you got a new job Dad! That will be a good change. Sorry to hear you are sick Mom :( I think you overwork yourself often. You need to sleep more! :) Wait...Jesse will be at Geronimo for a MONTH?! I thought it was for a week? Hope you have a great week! Things are warming up here.
Love ya!
Love ya!
