Another Week in Paradise

Oct. 5, 2015

Well I receive a lot of strength and happiness from your comments on conference so thank you for that! I also loved it a lot but I'll get to that later on. I don't have time for a full week analysis so I'll just give a few highlights! 

We started interviews and did two zones last week. They were both really prepared and it went as smoothly as these things can go! We are teaching all of the missionaries about keeping the Sabbath day holy and working with the members teaching them from Preach My Gospel. So far so good on the interviews!

I had my last leadership meeting and it went pretty well. We ordered different food, noquis instead of the usual milanesa, and they all seemed to like and welcome the change! We talked a lot about needs of the mission and I have a really good feeling about the direction this mission is heading. Just as General Conference gives us a wake up call in our lives to get better; the mission has had quite a few "wake up calls" lately but we are taking advantage of the situation to help our missionaries be even more obedient and dedicated than ever. I think one of the reasons I came back on the mission was to learn what I am learning now as an assistant and especially with the trials that are going on and how to handle them.

Thursday we picked up a new missionary that came 10 days late because he had an ingrown toenail operated on, Elder Jacobson from Orange County, California! He seemed a bit out of things and nervous as most new missionaries do but he has a really good trainer from Tegucigalpa, Honduras!

We are finding a lot of really good future investigators. We still haven't been able to get a teaching rhythm going with them but they have potential and we are seeing the blessing of the Lord that we feel like He is giving to us for our diligence.

General Conference was wonderful!!! It is just another testimony to me that the church is true because every conference that I see is the BEST conference I have ever seen in my life! These are men and women of God who really are inspired with the messages that the world needs right then in that moment. I have about ten goals that I set for myself and sometime this week I will work on making plans to accomplish them. I have already kind of been Ponderizing scriptures and I testify of the power that it giving against Satan's temptations. When a bad thought pops in my mind I think of a scripture that I have already memorized or that I am working on and just as quickly as the thought came in, it is completely gone! I want to work of following the Spirit better and really have it as a constant companion. Our purpose on this earth is to learn to do God's will and not ours and ultimately to align our wills so that we are one just as the Father, the Son and the Holy Ghost. I want to be able to do His will because I am doing what I need to to have the constant guide of the Spirit. One investigator of ours came to the Saturday afternoon session and said he felt like Jesus was talking to him through the conference and since he has investigated the church several times without ever coming to a final conclusion said he was going to give it one more go! 

Today as we walked into the offices to do our weekly meeting we quickly noticed that there were things strewn all around. glass was broken, things were all over the floor, doors had been forced, one safe had been ripped out of the ground, opened up and left on its side, the other was just gone... We had been robbed! It was more than a little upsetting but President said that we should start our meeting anyway. As we finished talking about the business he had each of us share what had impacted us from Conference. The Spirit filled the room as we each shared. He assured us that these things like robberies are bad but that they will not stop the work of God. I know with all my heart that no unhallowed hand can stop the work! Tempests may rage, armies may combine and the very gates of Hell can be opened up against us but they can have no power over the Kingdom of God. His cause will go forth triumphantly until his purposes have been fulfilled! I love Him and am so grateful for this time I have left to serve Him with everything and really live a consecrated life! I am not thinking of home in any way trunky. The Lord is giving me strength to finish Strong and how He and I want me to finish the mission.

I love you all very much and know that our Heavenly Father is looking out for you,

Elder Benjamin Andrew