Week 37: I love training!

What a week! Possibly the best week of my mission yet! I love training so much! Especially training my companion elder Sanchez! He's super super awesome and we're working super hard! He's pretty much the perfect missionary and is super obedient. We get along super well and have had a bunch of great moments this week. You're all probably interested to hear about the earthquake. Yes. We did feel it. It was the most bizarre feeling in the world. We were sitting there studying in the morning when suddenly I felt like I got really dizzy because the whole room started swaying back and forth. But once I saw my companions face I realized that I wasn't the only feeling seeing it. I grabbed my camera and we ran outside the house. You can't really see how much it was moving in the video I took, but it felt like we were on a boat rocking back and forth. They reported that it was a 7.2, I expected that a 7.2 would feel a lot bigger... But I can now say that I experienced my first earthquake, I must admit that it felt way cool. The rest of the day my companion and I were saying that we wished we could feel it again. But it's probably better that it doesn't happen again, it shook up some of the people here pretty bad.

So I've talked about how making contacts has been something hard for me to do in my mission, well not anymore! We have practically talked to every person we see all this week! It's so wonderful! Now we just hope that we can find where some of the people live this week so that we can start teaching them! It's taking a bit of work to get the area up and running, but we're already seeing differences in the ward and we have a lot of potential investigators. Elder Sanchez is super humble and ready to serve the people here. He's constantly asking me what I think we can do to help specific people and it's clear that he already has developed love for the people in the mission.

We've discovered that we've been sleeping with our little friends again. At this point I almost don't even care that there are bed bugs in my bed, when we get home I'm so ready to sleep that it's the last thing on my mind. But my companion was a bit squeamish so we ended up putting chairs by my bed and both sleeping on my bed with our legs out on the chairs. It's wasn't the most comfortable night, but like I said, sleep is sleep and that's all that really mattered ;)

I've learned a lot about how to follow the promptings of the spirit this week. A lot of the time we try to express how we feel when we feel the spirit with our five physical senses. But the more that I've come to recognize the spirit, the less it's associated with how I physically feel. In Doctrine and Covenants 9:8 it says:

"But, behold, I say unto you, that you must study it out in your mind; then you must ask me if it be right, and if it is right I will cause that your bosom shall burn within you; therefore, you shall feel that it is right."

The way that it says that we will receive an answer or feel the spirit is that our bosom will burn, but more importantly, we will "feel" that it is right. First it compares it to what we physically feel, but then that it's a feeling of truth within us.

In Heleman 5:30 it says:

"And it came to pass when they heard this voice, and beheld that it was not a voice of thunder, neither was it a voice of a great tumultuous noise, but behold, it was a still voice of perfect mildness, as if it had been a whisper, and it did pierce even to the very soul—"

The people in this story first relate it to something that they heard like a voice (Physical) but then go on to say that it pierced "even to the soul". To really learn how to listen to the spirit we must learn to listen with our spiritual ears more than with our physical. When we really learn how to recognize the spirit that is how we can truly be converted as it says in D&C 6:23

23 Did I not speak peace to your mind concerning the matter? What greater witness can you have than from God?

When we pray for an answer or seek the guidance of the spirit, it may not be some grand vision that we receive as an answer. More likely it will be peace that we feel, this is what we need to learn to recognize as the spirit working in our lives. Once we're able to learn to recognize that simple peace we will find the guidance to do great things. As it say in D&C 2-3

"2 Yea, behold, I will tell you in your mind and in your heart, by the Holy Ghost, which shall come upon you and which shall dwell in your heart.

 3 Now, behold, this is the spirit of revelation; behold, this is the spirit by which Moses brought the children of Israel through the Red Sea on dry ground."

Moses in these moments most likely didn't have some sort of grand revelation. He had learned how to recognize and listen to that simple peace by which the spirit speaks and was able to free the children of Israel. 

If we learn how the spirit speaks to each one of us individually and that most likely it isn't some grand manifestation, we'll be able to find that perfect guide in our lives. I have greatly felt the influence in my life this week. I'm excited to see where it will lead me through my life :)

Love you all!

Elder Twede

Changes

The things the sisters make us elders do ;)