Baluut!!

This week has been a great week!!!

Not much really happened, but we did get a great dinner this week where they fed us Balute (pronounced beh-loo). It is a Filipino meal where they fertilize a duck egg and then cook it kind of like a boiled egg. It is an interesting meal, and I took pictures and videos so all of you can experience it with me hahaha! 

This week I read a great scripture in the Doctrine and Covenants that hit me pretty hard. It is in D&C section 105. A little background: Jackson County Missouri, the place where the Lord told the Saints to gather for Zion, has faced much persecution and most of the saints have been driven out. In Secton 103, the Lord told the saints to form an army battalion later called Zion's camp. These 200 men, after marching almost 1000 miles from Ohio to Missouri, recieved revelation in section 105 telling them that they should stop the March and go back. Many men did not like this, but the Lord told them this to help ease that:

"19 I have heard their prayers, and will accept their offering; and it is expedient in me that they should be brought thus far for a trial of their faith."

That is the context of the scripture, but it hit me very powerfully. Elder Wood and I have been working hard and praying even harder that we will be able to find the elect for Heavenly Father. This scripture seemed to me to be an answer to our prayers. Heavenly Father has accepted the work which we have given Him and he has consecrated it for our good. 

Anyway, I hope you all have a great week!                                                            

Love,

Elder Francis

9 months already!?!?

Yep, if I was a sister, this would be my halfway point. With that in mind, I hit 9 months last week and I can't believe it! It doesn't even feel like I have been out that long, though I'm sure if you asked my mom she would say it has been an eternity hahaha.

This week was also transfers week, neither Elder Wood nor I got transfered! We are staying in Washington, together, and on bikes for another transfer! And no, I am not really that excited about the bike part but I'm staying optimistic.

I want to share a scripture from Ether 12, "6 And now, I, Moroni, would speak somewhat concerning these things; I would show unto the world that faith is things which are hoped for and not seen; wherefore, dispute not because ye see not, for ye receive no witness until after the trial of your faith."

I share this scripture because of the living proof we have of the principal. Last transfer, it seemed like everything was falling apart. Elder Wood and I were praying and working so hard trying to get things going, but everything kept falling through. We fasted, prayed, and knocked more non-member doors than you would think there are down here in Utah hahaha. We felt as though we were being tested, that our faith was being tried.

This week, being the start of this new transfer, has been amazing! It seems as though all of our hard work is paying off and we are able to run into all the people we have been trying to contact. The Lord is showering down a multitude of blessings upon us, and I know that it is, at least in part, due to our continual faith during our trials.

I don't have any pictures this week, but I do want to tell you all something. Don't give up. As Christ says to Joseph Smith in his furnace of afflictions, "7 My son, peace be unto thy soul; thine adversity and thine afflictions shall be but a small moment; 8 And then, if thou endure it well, God shall exalt thee on high; thou shalt triumph over all thy foes." (D&C 121) 

Fortunately, none of us have to go through the amount of adversity and afflictions that Joseph Smith had to, but our trials, in light of our own circumstances and lives, can be just as serious and in as much need of divine help. I invite all of you to, when you are suffering your own few steps on that way to Calvary, to turn to him who walked the whole path even Jesus Christ. I have done so and I know that he can help.

Have a great week everyone!

Love,

Elder Francis

Wait, the transfers almost over?!

That's right everyone. My first transfer with Elder Wood is almost at its end. It has been an amazing transfer full of miracles and growth on both of our parts. We have no idea whether we will stay together another transfer or get moved to a different area. We find that out tomorrow.

I want to talk to you about my experiences this transfer. We are on bikes which has increased my health quite substantially. Because we are on bikes, every day is physically demanding and I have truly learned the meaning of working hard and being diligent. Elder Wood and I have worked incredibly hard knocking doors, making contacts, teaching people, and just trying our hardest. 

What I want to talk about is discouragement and how it has no place in this work. Though we have worked very hard, prayed and fasted often, and been the most efficient we can be, our numbers continue to spiral downward into an all-time low. Many a missionary believes in the saying that "Obedience brings blessings, exact obedience brings miracles" but I am worried they do not truly understand what that means. I know I didn't. 

We have the tendency to think that it means we will convert everyone. We will be a star missionary with the best numbers in the mission and the most "success". This is not true at all, and it is something I have been learning my entire mission so far. Our blessings do not always come in a physical or temporal manifestation. Looking back on the start of my mission however, I can see how those blessings have brought me to where I am. I have been able to grow exponentially spiritually and I attribute that to the ability to repent as well as my sincere desire to be obedient and diligent.

Does this mean I am perfect? Yes. Hahaha just kidding!! I am very far from perfect. There is and will always be only one perfect person.

Other than that thought, I just wanted to give a Mother's day shout-out to my mom. I'm sure most of you reading this can claim to having the best mom in the world, but my mom is the most perfect person I know in this world. No one has shown me more Christlike, unconditional, unwavering love. Even when I am far away, I can feel her love through many wonderful memories and experiences. I pray often that my future family can have a mother as great as mine was to me. I ascribe any success I have in my life to her who truly deserves that credit, my mother. Thank you mom for everything you do.

I hope you all have a great week! Sorry for the long one this week.

Love,

Elder Francis

Pictures:

We had a baptism this Saturday for Braxtyn. Even when everything else seemed to be falling apart, there was light in that moment.

I found an albino Ladybug!

LARPing

This week has been super great! It's also flown by! We did not have any super cool experiences this week, but we did have zone conference!

President Smith will be finishing his time as mission president and will be released in early July, so we only have a couple more zone conferences with him. Man, I am going to miss him. He truly is such an inspired man. 

The highlight of this zone conference was Role Plays. To any of you who have served a mission, you know how awkward role plays can be. You either love them or you hate them. I am one who loves role plays and see the great value in them. My companion hates roleplays and doesn't like to do them hahaha. A good chunk of zone conference was devoted to how to have a successful roleplay. Elder Wood and I are excited to try and implement this into our teaching.

I do have a cool story about role plays that actually happened in my last area Richfield. We were talking to this active member family who had a next door neighbor who had an unbaptized 9 year old in the home. The member was telling us how she was nervous to talk to her neighbor because she didn't know what to say or how the conversation would go. A thought then popped into my head that we should tell her about role plays. We did and she and her husband practiced a few times before she went over. The unbaptized 9 yr old got baptized last week due to, in part, role plays.

A role play is where you act as someone, a non-member or someone else, and then your companion acts as a missionary and you practice a conversation. It does feel kind of awkward at times, but I have a great love for role plays and I know that they prepare us to feel the spirit. I can't count how many times we have done a role play in preparation for a lesson and had the lesson go exactly like the role play.

Anyway, that's all for this week! Keep on keeping on! Have a great week!

Elder Francis