Keep replying to my emails! I want to keep hearing about how it's going over there!! Let's not be strangers when we meet again in a year--rather family.
This week has just been more amazing than any before it.. and I always say that, but it just is always true. I really mean it. All of our converts are strong and sharing their fire with their whole neighborhoods and people are just flocking to the Savior's light. I am especially proud of Shameer. He's 15. He comes out with us to all the people who knew him before he was Baptized, and they hardly recognize him because of the light he has and how powerful his spirit is. There are sooo many people that are on the path to exaltation now. We have been given a grander vision for our area, than we had ever known before. We now know how to reach 60 people per week and help each one progress toward the Temple and become eternal families and live joyfully and connected to the life and happiness this restored Gospel brings.
The Unity and Service:
On Thursday, each of our companionships had searched for Service and found nothing--so the Spirit whispered to me: lets all get together and have a district lunch where we write encouraging letters and testimonies to one another's most promising and struggling investigators and recent converts and returning members. It was simple and SO fun. We all had the time of our lives! We LOVE this District. We love working together. This is more of a team than the Fiji Ruby Pro's are! We had a prayer and had a nice simple lunch which each of us had contributed to, and began writing away to all these Saints. The Spirit was strong and the unity was as if it were literally felt in the air. We finished writing each companionship's saints, and then wrote letters to one another's families. For example: Everyone except for my trainee, Elder Datoon, wrote his family, thanking his family for who he is and what they see in him--and so on with every individual in the District.
The Result of it:
Each of these letters proved to be VERY helpful and deeply meaningful. Our saints read them every day and have expressed how deeply meaningful they were to them. They have made a big difference. Some of them have even taped up all our letters onto the walls of their homes and keep them as reminders to stay strong on the path and that they're not alone in this.
The effect of that service was at least 3fold. It made our unity, just unbreakable-rock-solid as a District, it touched and continuously touches our saints, and it will continue to do good and re-affect them every time they will ever need the lift and strength in the future.
I know the Lord inspires us with all we need and more, just by worrying about following one prompting from the Spirit at a time. (:
I know that the Savior is looking upon you at this moment, and you should acknowledge Him. Your spirit remembers being with Him, and you are his best friend---that's real. As real as all the prophets have ever testified, I so testify that your personal bond with Jesus Christ and your personal and loving heavenly Father is real and it is up to you whether you'll become the fullness of what They are. That is their vision for you. And you taking action on that vision is all it takes for it to happen, because They are eager to reach you to it.
There hasn't been a more Celestial time in all my life. I look forward and realize that in a year I'll be married and starting my own eternal family. And that right now, I'm able to harness the fullness of my divine potential to it's maximum. I never fathomed that life could be so rich, so fully fulfilling. It all comes from looking the Savior in the eyes. Looking Him in the eyes and stepping behind them, to turn and see yourself in the light that you never considered. The light behind His eyes. Let it reach out to you and reach your soul and bear you to visions of His highest visions for you. Because you're destined to do it. You're destined to be your fullness--and He'll reach you to it. If you look Him in the eyes and follow the path they see you'll walk. if you'll walk the Covenant path with all your heart and form from Him a new heart in His own heart's image, you'll be gone--and His best version of you will finally be in full vitaliant life. You need to see Him and let His spirit rise you to a higher version of you, every day. That is your whole job, to becoming all you came to earth to become--even as He is. He is real. I know that, for I have seen Him. I have seen His works in my life as if there were no veil. Just as you may. Your spirit remembers all your days you spent preparing to come to earth and prove yourself to your Father in heaven. Now is your day to act. Will you rise higher? Will you let Him give you a vision of how to do it? I pray you see Him as clearly as He sees you. I testify of Him as a living personage of perfect love-- your brother. He is more real than me, He is more involved in your life than even you yourself are. I have seen what His Atonement does to sinners, for I saw what it did in myself, then I went 12,000kilometers to watch it do the same in the lives of so many others everywhere I go on this island. I have seen His Atonement work, and must testify of it. I know it is real.
I will be here for you, whenever you call on me. I love you, because you're part of my family. We all are. We are literal children of the divine. The time to live according to that knowledge fully, is now.
love,
_Elder Howard
This week has just been more amazing than any before it.. and I always say that, but it just is always true. I really mean it. All of our converts are strong and sharing their fire with their whole neighborhoods and people are just flocking to the Savior's light. I am especially proud of Shameer. He's 15. He comes out with us to all the people who knew him before he was Baptized, and they hardly recognize him because of the light he has and how powerful his spirit is. There are sooo many people that are on the path to exaltation now. We have been given a grander vision for our area, than we had ever known before. We now know how to reach 60 people per week and help each one progress toward the Temple and become eternal families and live joyfully and connected to the life and happiness this restored Gospel brings.
The Unity and Service:
On Thursday, each of our companionships had searched for Service and found nothing--so the Spirit whispered to me: lets all get together and have a district lunch where we write encouraging letters and testimonies to one another's most promising and struggling investigators and recent converts and returning members. It was simple and SO fun. We all had the time of our lives! We LOVE this District. We love working together. This is more of a team than the Fiji Ruby Pro's are! We had a prayer and had a nice simple lunch which each of us had contributed to, and began writing away to all these Saints. The Spirit was strong and the unity was as if it were literally felt in the air. We finished writing each companionship's saints, and then wrote letters to one another's families. For example: Everyone except for my trainee, Elder Datoon, wrote his family, thanking his family for who he is and what they see in him--and so on with every individual in the District.
The Result of it:
Each of these letters proved to be VERY helpful and deeply meaningful. Our saints read them every day and have expressed how deeply meaningful they were to them. They have made a big difference. Some of them have even taped up all our letters onto the walls of their homes and keep them as reminders to stay strong on the path and that they're not alone in this.
The effect of that service was at least 3fold. It made our unity, just unbreakable-rock-solid as a District, it touched and continuously touches our saints, and it will continue to do good and re-affect them every time they will ever need the lift and strength in the future.
I know the Lord inspires us with all we need and more, just by worrying about following one prompting from the Spirit at a time. (:
I know that the Savior is looking upon you at this moment, and you should acknowledge Him. Your spirit remembers being with Him, and you are his best friend---that's real. As real as all the prophets have ever testified, I so testify that your personal bond with Jesus Christ and your personal and loving heavenly Father is real and it is up to you whether you'll become the fullness of what They are. That is their vision for you. And you taking action on that vision is all it takes for it to happen, because They are eager to reach you to it.
There hasn't been a more Celestial time in all my life. I look forward and realize that in a year I'll be married and starting my own eternal family. And that right now, I'm able to harness the fullness of my divine potential to it's maximum. I never fathomed that life could be so rich, so fully fulfilling. It all comes from looking the Savior in the eyes. Looking Him in the eyes and stepping behind them, to turn and see yourself in the light that you never considered. The light behind His eyes. Let it reach out to you and reach your soul and bear you to visions of His highest visions for you. Because you're destined to do it. You're destined to be your fullness--and He'll reach you to it. If you look Him in the eyes and follow the path they see you'll walk. if you'll walk the Covenant path with all your heart and form from Him a new heart in His own heart's image, you'll be gone--and His best version of you will finally be in full vitaliant life. You need to see Him and let His spirit rise you to a higher version of you, every day. That is your whole job, to becoming all you came to earth to become--even as He is. He is real. I know that, for I have seen Him. I have seen His works in my life as if there were no veil. Just as you may. Your spirit remembers all your days you spent preparing to come to earth and prove yourself to your Father in heaven. Now is your day to act. Will you rise higher? Will you let Him give you a vision of how to do it? I pray you see Him as clearly as He sees you. I testify of Him as a living personage of perfect love-- your brother. He is more real than me, He is more involved in your life than even you yourself are. I have seen what His Atonement does to sinners, for I saw what it did in myself, then I went 12,000kilometers to watch it do the same in the lives of so many others everywhere I go on this island. I have seen His Atonement work, and must testify of it. I know it is real.
I will be here for you, whenever you call on me. I love you, because you're part of my family. We all are. We are literal children of the divine. The time to live according to that knowledge fully, is now.
love,
_Elder Howard
No comments:
Post a Comment