Hope of Israel
Hope is patient waiting upon the Lord. Faith brings hope. Charity is acting on that faith and hope!
I really loved general conference!! The great topics that stuck out the most for me were the power of the Book of Mormon, Repentance, and the influence of the Holy Ghost.
Dad, thank you for always being a great father by loving my mother! I thought of you during that talk, you have been a wonderful influence on my life. Your example is impressed in my mind!
Thank you all of my leaders and teachers of my juventude, youth. Seminary, YW, classes at church and at school, all of the family gatherings. laughter and tears. I am and always have been completely surrounded by so much love. This is the love of the Savior. This is the gospel of Jesus Christ. His infinite atonement, so that I can repent and move forward.
Moving forward. At the end of everyweek, we give a report of our numbers, lessons taught, people baptized, investigators that are progressing, and so forth. On monday, President Torgan has a meeting with the assistants and they discuss what is going on in the mission. dad or russell, you may have been part of this process. But they don´t discuss numbers, they discuss people.
It was interesting to me to hear one of the church leaders to talk about the number of members in a south american country, including argentina, where the growth of the gospel has been incredible in just under 85 years! We had a zone meeting this week where we read a card from the europe area presidency that talked about the rapid increase of members in portugal in this past year. They expressed excitement for the magnificent growth. They also expressed that in order for this work to keep pressing forward, we need to work together with the members. Together it is possible. Alone, we can do nothing. They attatched an excerpt from a talk by Elder ballard about the importance of the members in the missionary work. He shared 2 stories of success where a bishop in a small branch in maine, through faithful prayer, and humility, and work, the small branch of under 100 people had over 400 baptisms in just one year. The humble bishop simple said that he taught the members how to be missionaries.
This had a great impact on me. I have thought so many times and felt in my heart the importance of the members in this work. we cannot do this alone. And it is not designed to be so. I feel a bit uilty because i do not yet know many of the members of our ward here in Porto. When i arrived, i was shocked by the great number of members. We had a reunion with the bishop, (who was called last week) and gratefully, he is fully supportive of our work, which we are really grateful for.
Our problem recently, well, this transfer has been helping investigators progress! We have talked to lots of people, and invited some to be baptized, but they have not been taking the next step, to act and keep commitments. We are excited that it is a new week to help the people here progress so they can receive the wonderful blessings of the fulness of the gospel of Jesus Christ!
I am so blessed to be here in Portugal, where the elect listen to the voice of the Lord, and have the desire to make changes in their lives and enter the waters of baptism!!
Saturday, we assisted the first session of conference with an investigator from Ghana. His uncle is a member, less active in our ward. We talked with him on the street a week ago and invited him to hear more. WE then passed his house another day and found his uncle there too!! It is so great how Heavenly Father is always guiding us to the elect. After conference, the elders of another area had a baptism, so we invited Eric to stay. He enjoyed it greatly!
On sunday, none of our investigators showed up to watch conference, so we were a little sad, but we enjoyed conference the same. I am grateful fo rthe opportunity to make changes, as our leaders taught truths and principles that we are invited to apply in our lives. I especially enjoyed Elder Matthew Richardson´s talk about teaching by the Holy ghost so that the Holy Ghost can carry the message unto the hearts of the people. Elder Richardson was my D&C teacher at BYU, he always taught by the Holy Ghost. We as missionaries are simply the vessel so the Spirit can teach. Many times i think i was so worried about what to say, or how to say it that i often forgot that the most important words aren´t words at all. It is the feeling that each person has as they pray for themselves, or read the book of mormon for the first time to feel of its power in their lives.
i love you all so much!!
Have a fantastic week filled with the spirit of the Lord!
xoxo
Irmã Michael
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