Family and friends,
This
week has felt slow to me, actually. There were multiple days in which
my companion and I just felt wasted and tired.
But
hey, we saw two miracles yesterday! The first was at Sacrament
meeting - we attended University YSA for the first time - which a person
we teach attended. He seemed to enjoy it, and afterwards the new bishop
got to talking with him a bit himself, unprompted (go, Bishop!). Scott,
the guy we teach, texted us afterwards, "I fought them back but Brother Terry put tears in my eyes you will be seeing me again". That blew our
minds! He had never been one to display much interest before, but he
confessed that that conversation with the Bishop brought tears to his
eyes! We were blown away.
Second
miracle: a young woman we still have never met agreed yesterday to a
baptismal date, which baptism would be for the YSA ward! The Elders of
Holmes Lake told us about it last night, and we were shocked. She had
told them that she watched the baptismal service of a friend and
immediately felt the Spirit and wanted to be baptized herself. There's
nothing more to it! She just asked to be baptized and is extremely
excited to learn more. We will have the pleasure of meeting her
tomorrow. That surprise was especially welcome because last week nobody
in the ten areas in the zone had committed to baptism; but this week
three people have committed to it! God is still moving this work along,
despite any and all efforts against it. It will continue "until the
great Jehovah shall say, The work is done."
We
have also been teaching a young man named Liem for a long time. He
knows a LOT about the Bible, and so has his strong convictions and
biases, and sometimes our discussions become heated. We actually just
talked with him this morning, though it's P-day (wow, look how
consecrated I am 🤣), and it went quite poorly. He wanted to bash
against certain of our beliefs on the nature of the Godhead and its
Members. This past week I have been particularly bothered by such
conflicts, as well as the constant debate over faith and works and
baptism. It honestly hurts to see the world in such deep apostasy that I
can explain something perfectly, expounding the meaning of the
scriptures by the gift of "words of knowledge", showing them clearly why
is is that a certain doctrine is sensible by the Bible, and yet they
still choose to ram their heads against the brick wall of their own
biases instead of taking the true path. This morning, he implored us to
put our biases aside so we could talk reasonably about things, but he
doesn't understand that without reading the Book of Mormon in the same
way he reads the Bible, he will never comprehend our reasoning in
anything. I wish that I could open his eyes and show him everything;
"Yea, I would declare unto every soul, as with the voice of thunder,
repentance and the plan of redemption, that they should repent and come
unto our God, that there might not be more sorrow upon all the face of
the earth. But behold, I am a man, and do sin in my wish; for I ought to
be content with the things which the Lord hath allotted unto me" (Alma
29:2-3). That is my only sorrow right now, and my biggest frustration:
not being able to convince them myself. It has been a hard lesson in the
fact that if I don't teach with the Spirit, the teaching is not of God
(D&C 50:17-18).
I am
mostly just grateful that God forgives me my big head. It's never a
conscious pride, but whenever I begin to contend to try to prove why
we're right, I unconsciously try to assert dominance over God; the
Spirit is grieved, and my priesthood power is lost, so I cannot convince
anybody (D&C 121:37). But I can say again and again, with faith and
certainty, that as I go to God and lay my weaknesses down, I continue
to find forgiveness and grace. God is better to me that I can express,
because He has saved me from a worse fate. I'm eternally overjoyed with
His mercy amid all my error.
In short, my life is so good, and I am happy with what God has done with me. He is so good.
Love,
Elder Hill
No comments:
Post a Comment