" And now I say unto you that this is the order after which I am called, yea, to preach unto my beloved brethren, yea, and every one that dwelleth in the land; yea, to preach unto all, both old and young, both bond and free; yea, I say unto you the aged, and also the middle aged, and the rising generation; yea, to cry unto them that they must repent and be born again."
Alma 5:49

Sunday, October 26, 2014

Becoming a Better Missionary



Well, I just got a new companion today. Elder M. got sent to Ibara (it´s in the mountains close to Quito) to be one of the zone leaders there. My new companion´s name is Elder P.. I haven´t met him yet, but everything I´ve heard about him is that he is a really great missionary and that he has a ton of experience being a trainer. My companion called him "gordo feliz" when he was telling me about him. (That translates to about "fat happy"). Oh, and he happens to be a gringo, which means that I´ll really need to focus during my language study time :)

The baptisms went well. Fortunately, Alexander was one of the two that we were able to baptize. It was an absolutely amazing experience to help him enter the waters of baptism. It is amazing to see the light that the Gospel of Jesus Christ can bring into the lives of those who accept it. 

This week was a litte different. On Tuesday I did divisions with one of our zone leaders (Elder G.), and we spend the entire day in his sector. On Wednesday we had a meeting with President for all the missionaries in the coast. That night, one of the assistants came with us and spent the night in our house. It was really great to learn from him and also to see that you don´t have to be perfect to be an assistant (even they burn the rice sometimes :). The next morning Pres. and Sis. Richardson came to inspect our house. They were really impressed and said that we were doing a really good job on keeping it clean, etc. We then had our weekly district meeting and then afterwards we left for Quito for the new missionary verification. That was Friday morning (it was more for the trainers than for us), and then we returned late Friday night. Saturday we had the baptisms, so pretty much Sunday was our only "normal" day. 

During the meeting on Wednesday, President gave a message about an article that was written by an old mission president called the "Fourth Missionary". It talks about four types of missionaries. The first is disobidient and is sent home. The second is also disobedient, but he does just enough to stay on his mission for all of the 2 years. The third missionary is obedient, does everything right, etc. The only problem is he does not really want to be doing those things. He is constantly focusing in the past or the future (the times when he doesn´t have to be doing missionary things). As a result, he does not change nor receive many personal blessings from his mission. Only the fourth missionary wants to be there, wants to be working, wants to be changing and improving. He wants his will to be the will of the Lord. He is the only missionary that will personally benefit from his mission. The mission president also reminds us that our most important investigator, our most important project, is ourselves. If we are not changing from the work we are doing, we are not being successful missionaries. 

This message has taught me that I need to always be searching for ways to better appy the teachings and example of Jesus Christ in my life (whether they be about charity, humility, faith, how to teach, etc.).

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