Monday, October 3, 2016

Transferred

Good morning everyone! I hope you enjoyed the holiday weekend as much as I did!

Real quick before I start the weekly: transfer calls came Saturday...
And I'm getting transferred sad day. I've really enjoyed the work
here in Tidwell. I'm not gonna lie, this area has never seen so much
success. The companions were good, the work was great, and the Ward
was good too. It's hard to leave areas where it's almost perfect. But
I definitely trust in the Lord wherever I go! Tidwell was such a
blessing to my mission. The hard part was since we're a bike area, we
couldn't go drive around and say goodbye to members. And it was
General Conference so most people stayed home. So I settled for using
the phone a lot to tell the members goodbye. I'm going to miss a lot
of them! Hopefully I get to come back in a couple weeks for a baptism
that should be happening here soon.

Besides transfer calls, we had a pretty bomb.com week. We had some
HUGE finding miracles. One that comes to mind is we have this super
golden and prepared investigator that we found back in June, but after
teaching her the restoration, a few days later she got a job that
forced her to work from 11-7 seven days a week. But we felt like we
needed to check up on her. And to our surprise, when we knocked she
answered the door! It was a huge miracle. And on top of that she's not
working anymore so we get to keep teaching her!! I'm so excited for
Elder Durtschi and his new comp to teach her. So many prepared people.

Another super cool guy we found has had some
interesting experiences with missionaries in the past. But he's
looking for change! He's kinda extreme, like he texts us interesting
stuff but he's already halfway through 1 Nephi and he came to the
morning session of conference! So he's coming along. As soon has he
gets a testimony of the Book of Mormon he will be more consistent.

And not to mention GENERAL CONFERENCE! So many good talks!! There were
a couple that stood out to me. President Uchdorfs opener was amazing!
I was focused on every word. So much emotion was there. Elder Cook
gave a great talk on those stumbling blocks. There is a quote that the
great stumbling block to Zion is pride. I've seen that on my mission.

Priesthood was amazing. Holland gave another wonderful talk that
hopefully was taken note by bishops and leaders everywhere. Not every
Ward is super fluent and functioning close to perfection like what we
sometimes see in Utah. I hope church leaders will act in his counsel.
And I LOVED President Monson's talk on the Word of Wisdom. I've
reflected a lot on this talk. I would like to share an excerpt from
D&C section 89:

"4 Behold, verily, thus saith the Lord unto you: In consequence of
evils and designs which do and will exist in the hearts of conspiring
men in the last days, I have warned you, and forewarn you, by giving
unto you this word of wisdom by revelation--"

So by knowing the plans of the adversary to degrade our bodies
(something Satan doesn't have), the Lord gave us some counsel. He
named things we shouldn't consume (coffee, alcohol, tea, tobacco, and
other substances [we teach investigators it spells CATTS]) and things
we should consume (grains, fruits, veggies, and meat sparingly). But
this is basic info that most people know. However in D&C 58:26 it
states

"26 For behold, it is not meet that I should command in all things;
for he that is compelled in all things, the same is a slothful and not
a wise servant; wherefore he receiveth no reward."

So I've been thinking about other things President Monson might be
thinking of that aren't mentioned that I could stay away from or
consume more of. Energy drinks come to mind. I don't consume them, but
I think making the commitment to not to use them would be beneficial.
We all know they're bad. Other things we could do to be more obedient
in this commandment are things like not drinking too much soda, eat
more veggies (I'm gonna do this one better) etc.

Anyways I realize this is getting really long, so I'll mention the
other talks I liked.

Lynn G. Robbins
The one on gratitude (I can't remember the speaker)
The farmer guy who talked about gears
Neil L. Anderson
Bednar
Rasband
Renlund

So practically all of Sunday's sessions I liked haha. Linda S. Reeves
gave a great talk. We heard a portion of it when they did a broadcast
to the southern region a while ago.

I hope y'all saw the main topics of the conference. This is what I got:
Sincere repentance
Book of Mormon importance and testimony of
THE CHURCH IS TRUE, NOT THE INTERNET

Let's all have testimonies y'all. Until next time!

Love,
Elder Blackburn

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