It was great to talk with the family on Christmas. It's really just kind of a surreal experience at this point to talk with your family who haven't seen in 18 months. Nothing feels normal or weird anymore. It's just like a strange dream. You just accept whatever happens. Haha. This is a really great ward where I'm serving right now. There are some especially strong and faithful families here in the ward. They treat us like General Authorities. Christmas was really calm here. We visited a few investigators and less active members. Not much noteworthy happened.
Skyping with the family on Christmas
Lunch with the Members
Our Christmas lunch! Just for the two of us!
We had a zone meeting this week. We gave trainings on how our attitude makes such a big difference on our lives. I used the examples of Nephi and Moroni (excuse me interrupting myself and commenting on how much I have grown to love and cherish the Book of Mormon as a missionary. This book was written for our days. It has the inspired words of God. We would all be wise and extremely blessed to make a daily reading of it a habit in our lives. I stand by my claim that a member of the church who reads the Book of Mormon every single day will never fall away from the church nor lose the fullness of the blessings of the Gospel.) Their attitudes stick like glue on my mind. I can only imagine the faith and trust that they had in the Lord. Not all those who listen to our trainings embrace them. We serve among a few "Laman" and "Lemuel"'s here, but it's all good. They give us the opportunity to more fully serve them.
As far as our future "Bishop" investigator, we are scared to death that his wife is going to throw him off the tracks. She wasn't very supportive of his investigation of the church. Manoel's niece had some kind of accident this week and we weren't able to meet with him this week. You arrive at a point as a missionary where you excessively worry about what an investigator is thinking about the church, but you have to find comfort in knowing that what he is examining is true, and that our Heavenly Father loves him very much and wants more than any other thing for him to enter into the church. I don't know if we are going to be able to baptize him or not, but I trust that the Lord will help us to do what is expected of us.
We are going to try and work on Jeniclea and Elizabete this week too. They could be baptized as soon as this Sunday! Ana is scheduled to be married and baptized next Saturday, then we have transfers! I'm excited to help these special people enter into the church before my time to move on comes! This work is true my friends. I know it is. I'm here because I know I can make a difference. I know I can learn, grow, and change and help others to do the same. Happy New Year to all!
Until next time,
-Elder McKinley
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