Sunday, February 19, 2012

13 February 2012 Israelite Congregation


Queridisimo Familia (My dear, dear family),
 
Wow... como se me va el tiempo. (How the time flies!)
 
This week we grew. We found more people who are really great. I hope we can help them to progess. I really want them all to be able to progress well. I want the world to progress. We aren't talking about a change of religion, we are talking about a change of heart that all must do. We were talking in our weekly inventory about how we can improve. We are going to love more, work more, go through the Missionary Handbook looking for rules that we aren't completing to the 100%, receive the ability to make the time work.
 
Sometimes we, as people, start thinking that the only way to do things is the way we know. We need to think outside the box. With one lady who was struggling with the idea of not working Sundays, we compared paying debts by working Sundays, with frying an egg on a piece of slate in comparison to keeping the commandments as frying the egg with the big brand name pans (Peruvian brand "Reinaware") haha. It was interesting but she seemed to understand. The natural man has a tendancy to trust only in their own arm. The Lord wants her not to have debts, and has given her commandments to be able to "prosper"- vease (see) Alma 36:1. The BEST way to prosper isn't to pay them off now and later keep all the commandments, but keep the all the commandments now and receive the help of the Lord now too. I'm thinking I can apply this to myself too.
 
This week we have almost 10 baptisms in the zone that could take place Saturday. Let's see what we can do. Jorge will be getting back (the one who almost got baptized about 20 days ago) and a little brother of a member wants to get baptized too in our area. His uncles just got here, although his parents were fine with him getting baptized and have already signed the sheet, his uncles (we hear from his brother) are not happy at all about their nephew being "mormon". We will just have to teach them too.
 
 Oh we had a sweet contact in interchanges with one elder. We contacted a man who was sitting with his drunk compañion who couldn't stand up. They were guitarists and apparently had just left a gig from the night before. We got to talking with the not-drunk one. A man of 60 years more or less. He is an Israelite pastor. The religion of the Israelites is a Peruvian christian church who name themselves asi (this way) because they say the people of the Lord have always been called Israelites. Anyway, he was very friendly and asked us what we thought of the biblical predicion of a restoration of what was on the earth before, like profetas (prophets), and His true Church. Haha. I don't think he knew before he said that, how much we happen to know about that predicion (prediction). He was very suprised as we explained the scriptures and happily accepted a Book of Mormon. We testified to him about how it is the instrument that the Lord has revealed to gather Israel that goes to Jews and Gentiles to convince them that Christ is the Lord and is evidence of His marvelous work in these latter days. I like how all the scriptures jointly testify of our message so succinctly. Turns out he lives pretty far away, but he voiced the idea that we can visit his church and teach them all. I would love to. We have his number and will be following up on his reading and the prayer we invited him to do to gain his own testimony.
 
It was a sweet.

I'm worried a little for the zone.... I need to figure out how to do something better.... sometimes there are murmurations [how's that for a spanglish word?] when some in particular ask us permision to do things that the missionary handbook suggests shouldn't be done. Simply we have to try to help them know why. So we shall be trying to do that better. The good thing is that all things that are convenient for the Lord can be done with faith, and this is definitely one of them.
 
Love Elder Johnson

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