From: Camille Weller [mailto:camille.weller@myldsmail.net]
Sent: Monday, June 09, 2014 10:49 AM
To: Melissa Wheatley;
Subject: Luz trae Luz (:
This week felt like the shortest week of my life! Maybe
because we went to arequipa or because we were jammed pack with activities but
it sure flew by! (: Well monday we had a FHE again and it turned out soo good.
We had lots of members and investigators show up and me and hna stone gave a
lesson about putting on the armor of God which the kids all loved and then we
played some fun games. Its cool because most of them are the only members in
their families or only a few are so having family home evening with all the non
members is kind of hard, its nice for them to have the oportunity to do it with
our little branch family.
Tuesday we were off to Arequipa, we got some things done we
needed to, had a yummy lunch and then met up with a big group of high
school kids that were here for a service trip from misouri and got to help them
with some translating here and there, it was cool to see how far our spanish
has come and how we really can speak another language... cool moment. haha then
that night we got to eat at TGI fridays with our district and zone leaders...
man that was the best meal ive had in a while. Good ol american food.. never
gets old. Then we had a sleep over with Hna Bazan and Hna Flora and got to
catch up and just talk for a while, it was cool to see my "daughter"
be a "mom" haha kids... they grow up to fast (:
Wednesday we had our zone conference and it was exactly what
i needed to hear. We talked a lot about obedience and the blessings that come
from it and also about just having a possitive attitude. President Zobrist even
came at the end and talked to us about Either 12:4.. one of the questions he
asked was "What are the anchors in your life? " loved that. Some
other things i wanted to share from my notes are.....
Focus on what you CAN change and not on things that are out
of your control.
Obedience brings blessings... everytime.. disobedience
brings negative consequenses.. everytime.
Your attitude is contagious.. possitive or negative.
What comes out of your mission is what you put into it. (can
be the same with life.. what comes out of your life.. is what you put into it.
)
If your always doing good, there wont be time to be
disobedient or to sin.
Darkness brings darkness... Light brings light.
The Lord is perfect.. his ways are perfect.. therefore his
results are perfect.
Anyways it was a good conference, then again they all are(:
plus when we were down in arequipa i got the package mom sent me!!!! full of
the best treats ever!! there goes the diet... haha and with national triube
bands cd for missionaries.... which is SOOO GOOD. i think we´ve listened to it
everyday since.
After the bus ride home wednesday night we finally got back
to work on thursday. We had weekly planning and then planned out all of the
activities we had planned for the week with the elders. I have so much respect
for all the leaders back home.. planning and making all those activites happen
isnt as easy as it looks! We had mutual that night but had one kid show up so
we just ended up watching mormon messages instead of the service race we had
planned... better luck next week eh?
Friday we had our big branch activity, BBQ night (: that one
was actually a success! we had about 40 people there and there was just all
sorts of fun. Hamburgers, hotdogs, homemade french fries made by yours truly,
the youth were all playing ping pong, the moms and adults just chatting away,
and then all the kids were playing hide and seek. It was awesome!
Saturday we got a suprise call from some of the RS
presidency and they told us they were coming up with big bags of clothes to
hand out to the poor kids here. IT turned out to be such a cool experience.
They announced it on the radio and we went around to some of the poorer areas
and knocked doors to let people know, they litterally dropped whatever they
were doing to go get their kids free clothes.. it was so fun to see them get
new sweaters and clothes and see the smiles on their faces. We even got some
new investigators and some came that night to the movie night we had.
Sunday was the best day of the week!! We had 35 people at
church... a huge jump from the 20 or 25 we usually have! 6 of which were our
investigators.. those are the best sundays ever. Me and hna stone took all the
kids to primary... and man 9 kids in a small room was really teaching us
patience (: props to all the newlyweds that get stuck in nursery (: We talked
to Brenda who had told us her dad said she could get baptized this saturday so
we had everything planned but she said he changed his mind and is back to the
end of june. we could definately use some prayers his way... Coincidentally his
name is Angel.. haha Victor is super excited for his baptism, we didnt end up
having it on saturday, he still had a few questions but now he is ready so were
excited for that this week.
At church on sunday i gave a talk on obedience and used the
talk from Elder Robert D. Hales called "if ye love me, keep my
commandments." from last general conference. I think i learned more than
what i actually taught or spoke about. One thing that stood out for me is that
every week when we take the sacrament, we arent only recieving forgiveness for
all the things we did that week if we truly repented but we are also promising
that we are going to be obedient and keep His commandments. in the talk it
says...
When we are baptized, we “take upon [us] the
name of Christ” and enter “into the covenant with God that [we will] be
obedient unto the end of [our] lives.”7 Each
Sunday we renew that baptismal covenant by partaking of the sacrament and witnessing that we are willing to keep the commandments. We
seek forgiveness for any thoughts, feelings, or actions that are not in harmony
with our Heavenly Father’s will. As we repent by turning away from disobedience
and by beginning to obey again, we show our love for Him.
Another thing i loved was..
As we live the gospel, we
progress in our understanding of obedience. At times we may be tempted to
practice what I call “natural man’s obedience,” in which we disobediently
reject God’s law in favor of our wisdom or our desires or even popularity.
Because this is widely practiced by so many, this perversion of obedience
diminishes God’s standards in our culture and in our laws.
At times members may
participate in “selective obedience,” claiming to love God and honor God while
picking and choosing which of His commandments and teachings—and the teachings
and counsel of His prophets—they will fully follow.
Some obey selectively because
they cannot perceive all the reasons for a commandment, just as children do not
always understand the reasons for their parents’ counsel and rules. But we
always know the reason we follow the prophets, for this is the Church of Jesus
Christ, and it is the Savior who directs His prophets in all dispensations.
my favorite part is that we ALWAYS know the reason that we
should follow the prophets and their teachings... because this IS the Church Of
Jesus Chirst and He is the one that leads and directs the prophets and the
things that they instruct us to do.. we know the reason why we should be
obedient..
Obedience is something every missionary is familiar with.. i dont think any of
us ever had soo many rules in our life before becoming a missionary. But
because of that we have more oportunities to prove our obedience and to recieve
more blessings. I beleive that serving a mission is hard... that its the
hardest thing ive ever done, but that because of it i have learned so much and
learned that in this time i need more rules... because more rules means more
blessings and man do i need those blessings. Obedience is the first law of the
Celestial Kingdom.. and as hard as it is we have to learn to understand the
importance of it and truly understand the phrase.. "If ye love me, keep my
commandments." If we truly love God, we will do our best each day to keep
the commandments and be obedient to what the prophets have taught us. We wont
be Selective obeyers.. but we will put the love we have for our Maker.. our
Father in Heaven before all things, small or big. I know that obedience isnt
always easy and that the natural man is always there with reasons of why being
disobedient would be better but i know that that is not true.. no matter how
much we try to find happiness in disobedience it wont come.... disobeying Gods
divine laws will never bring true happiness. i know this from personal experiece.
One more part from this awesome talk..
In choosing whether we will obey, it is
always helpful to remember the consequences of our choices. Did Lucifer and his
followers understand the consequences of choosing to reject Heavenly Father’s
plan? If so, why did they make such a terrible choice? We might ask ourselves a
similar question: why do any of us choose to be disobedient when we know the
eternal consequences of sin? The scriptures provide an answer: the reason Cain
and some of the children of Adam and Eve chose to disobey is because “they
loved Satan more than God.
That might sound a little harsh but its the words of the
scriptures therefore the words of God... If we love god we will obey.. if we
choose to disobey we love satan more than God.
Well i hope that everyone had an amazing week like we did
and that this week will be even better! Love you all! Always remember how much
you love God and live your life according! (:
Love,
Hermana Weller (:
