So I have been thinking about how many YEARS I have been writing these emails, how many weeks I have shared and how many memories I have. It's 2017 and the typical saying is "New Year, New Me", what a worldly saying. This very saying takes God out of change. Repentance isn't real until it is done through Jesus Christ. It is good to recognize change but we shouldn't have to wait for a whole new year to have that desire to change.
Of course, I have set goals for 2017, but I have goals every week. Granted I am a missionary, I should have goals every week. We have goals on people we want to see, on things we want to do that week. We have milestones we want to accomplish. You can do this as well. Set weekly goals. If you have a goal to lose weight in the year of 2017. How do you wish to obtain that goal? Well, you probably will go to the gym during the week and eat certain types of foods, but how far into 2017 will you forget these goals, maybe you already did! Maybe in a month or two from now. The statement "Out of sight, out of mind," is true in this scenario. You have to stay focused, you have to keep your goals at the forefront of your mind. You need to have reminders everywhere, you know you are going to most likely give up on those goals. Constantly push yourself. It’s okay to be discouraged, you many not reach every goal the exact day you want to. That's why they are goals, it’s not life or death. Goals push us to something greater.
This is what our mission president is vocalizing to us as missionaries. We are often discouraged about how many people we didn't see or how many people we didn't talk to. We are too focused sometimes on the glass half empty instead of looking at it half full. Look at the things we have accomplished, look at the weight you have to lose, look at how far you have come. Not about how far you have left. That’s a poisonous way of thinking. Because it doesn't just now effect your weight lose goal, it spreads throughout all of your other goals and feelings you have. I see this with every missionary that becomes discouraged. I see this with our Investigators who being to doubt if they can stop smoking. It’s because they are looking at what they haven't accomplished or what they haven't done yet. Then it begins to affect them in obedience, diligence, and that doubt starts to work like a poison through their missionary work.
It has been a while since I have had the opportunity to email. We have had a slower week because of the holidays.
We are starting this week on a good note, we have a few lessons set up and had a lesson last night with Teresa. Sister Adkinson came with us and they were perfect for each other because Teresa is trying to stop smoking and drinking coffee and Sister Adkinson has recently stopped. Perfect. We had a great week last week. It was fun with the holidays and skyping home but we really wanted to go see more people.
We found a new investigator named Joel, he is awesome! He wants to come to church and be baptized. He is so gung-ho, we are seeing him at 2 pm today which will be great. We meet with him on Tuesdays, Thursdays, and Saturdays. We are focusing on the power of prayer today and we have a recently baptized member coming with us. I love Recent Converts they are awesome. Last week we saw Jimmy a few times. Jimmy is interesting, he thinks he is a prophet, so it’s interesting when he starts to say how hard it is to be a prophet. I often think "Is this how Moses felt"? We love Jimmy, he is always feeding us pizza that he makes. He feeds us just about every other day for lunch. We have a great friendship with him and we try to bring in the Plan of Salvation as much as we can. He loves the Pre-Earth Life.
Wednesday we had an exchange with Elder Vinda’s and Black, they are in the Farmington Ward, they are fun guys. We love them. We helped some of our recent converts do family history work. We saw Teresa that night, it went well, but she was in bad spirits. Elder Black is a little heavier set and so I think he made 3 batches of brownies in an 8x8 pan. They were good brownies. At night Elder Hermann and I do this thing where I pretend I am his dad and tuck him in and leave the room and shut off the lights. It’s pretty funny, so we did it with Elder Black and Vinda’s when they were with us. We had a blast working with them.
Thursday they left and went back to Farmington. Elder Hermann and I went and helped Jimmy make cookie dough, it was fun. He has some back problems so he can’t do things like that. So we helped. We found a new investigator, his name is Joel. We taught him Thursday mid-morning and went back in the evening. We had a really good lesson with him. He read some of the Book of Mormon with him, Mosiah 3: 3-13 to be exact, and he just sat there and said: "I think this is the right way for me". So we got in his car and went to the church and took him around and showed him things, it was really cool.
Friday we planned and saw Libin Haung. Can you guess where he is from? Shanghai China. He is super analytical. We are trying to help him have a faith in Jesus Christ but he already believes in God, so it’s a good building block to work off of.
Saturday we had a Ward Waffle Party in the morning. We helped cook. It was fun, they were doing Family Feud and one of the question was "what physical feature distinguishes the church from other churches?". Someone said, "Feed the Elders!". I started clapping super loud and cheering it was funny, everyone laughed at that one. After the waffle party, we went and gave a blessing and saw some people. We collected information for missionary work. We didn’t stay up for New Year’s Eve.
Sunday we were supposed to have like 6 people at church and no one came. That was tough, but it was my first official Sunday in the ward, it was great. We saw Joel again and a recent convert. This guys name is King Lincoln, I don’t know his real name, but he is chill. He is a black man and he was cooking some chicken and brought us some grape Kool-Aid and when he handed Elder Hermann his, Elder Hermann made the comment "Of course." right in front of the guy, we all started laughing. Sunday was good.
I love you all everything good obtained in life is gained through desire. I have been on a Gordon B. Hinckley kick. He was talking about desire and obtaining good things in life through it.
Love you all have a great week.
Love,
Elder Washburn
Elder Washburn and Hermann's Zone Statistics Board |
Setting GOALS. |
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