Week 24: Memb 70, More Miracles
Elder Craig A. Cardon was our guest speaker at zone conference on Wednesday. I was fortunate enough to hear from him while I was in the MTC, so now I've had the chance to hear from him twice!! Elder Cardon loves referencing scriptures to back up his talks. He'll often give us a scripture to locate, then he'll make a comment or two and find another scripture to reference, which I quite like because you're never bored and it's interactive and provides opportunities for you to participate. Today he talked a lot about the Abrahamic Covenant which is something I know very little about. It's basically a promise that the descendants of Abraham (whether blood related or adopted) will inherit eternal life, which not only includes being able to live with our Heavenly Father, but gives us an opportunity to become more like him. The purpose behind discussing the Abrahamic Covenant was to answer the question of "Who are you, and What does God expect of you?". Unfortunately, the best I can do is summarize, but basically as missionaries, we are not only God's children but we have been found worthy as one to represent Him despite our weaknesses. According to the Abrahamic Covenant, we've been promised eternal life and are considered to be an extension of God's arm. SO that's pretty cool if you ask me.
Elder Cardon also talked about the Spirt and being able to recognize it's influence. One story that he mentioned imparticular, I found to be quiet spectacular. He was describing a time when he got to shadow/observe one of the general authorities while assigning missionaries to their called missions. He said there was a room with two monitors; one screen had a missionary application, while the other had a list of all the missions. The general authority would greet the missionary as their picture pulled up. One of the employees would then read out loud the application until the general authority would interrupt with the assigned mission ex: "Hamilton, New Zealand". Then that employee would record the assigned mission and move on to the next missionary. While reading one of the mission applications, the employee managed to read the entire application without being interrupted by the general authority. There was a moment of silence and the general authority said "move on to the next application." The employee then started reading off the next application when they were inturrputed with "Hamilton, New Zealand". Confused the employee asked "for this missionary we just read?" "No," stated the general authority "for that last missionary." As the employee was juggling with assigning the missionary, the general authority turned to Elder Cardon and said "Sometimes it's just as important to know when the Lord doesn't speak, as it is to know when he is speaking." He continued with "I will not make an assignment until the Lord speaks to me."
The Elders had a baptism on Friday and we got to help with leading the music. During the baptism, one of the Birch girls (7ish years old) was sitting next to me and wanted a pen and paper to entertain herself. I was trying to help her draw a CTR shield. Then she drew everything from a sun to a flower to a fish. After the closing prayer, she put her artwork in my planner and she told me that there was a surprise. I opened up to the page with her drawing and looked for the "surprise" but I didn't see anything. I then asked her what the surprise was and she pointed to the edge of the drawing where she had written the words "I love you". I wanted to cry and I gave her a big hug!! Sometimes miracles are right in front of us, but we need the Lord's help to be able to give us the eyes to see the miracles.
The best part of the night was when we went to one of our less-actives, Tom (named changed). As we were leaving the baptism, we talked with Brother John Doe (name changed). I felt impressed to ask him what he had planned for the rest of the night? He told us that he was going fishing. I then told him we were going to visit Tom and he surprisingly volunteered to come with us. Bro John Doe followed us there. As a last minute decision we decided to watch a talk by Elder Juan A. Uceda of the 70, "The Lord Teaches Us To Pray" given in this last conference Nov 2016. After a couple mins of catching up with Tom I could see both my companion and Bro John Doe wishing they were elsewhere. We then opened with a prayer and watched the talk we had chosen just before the lesson. as I watched the video I thought to myself "Tom already knows all this, he's not gonna like this talk at all, why did I decide to watch this one?" These thoughts were cycling through my head throughout the entire video. Once the video ended I looked up to see Tom with tears in his eyes. Then I looked at Brother John Doe and my companion and they all had tears in their eyes. It was such an amazing experience and you could definitely feel the spirit. We found out later that Bro John Doe and Tom went to the same ward growing up and he has a picture to prove it. Turns out Brother John Doe had prayed "Lord I love serving thee, surprise me" and he ended up at that lesson with us.
I know the Lord really is look after us. I know that miracles happen everyday we just have to have the eyes to see them. You all mean so much to me and I'm grateful I get to spend 18 months serving the Lord. He has done so much for me and this is the least I can do to return the favor. I know my Savior lives and he loves each one of us. I know Heavenly Father has a plan for us and that the Book of Mormon is another testament of Jesus Christ.
Thanks for all the love, support and prayers. Hope you all have a good week and I'll talk to you again soon.
Sister Mandy Welker
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