General Conference Sunday
Hello Everyone!
Well this week I got sick. Not like throwing up sick, but the sore throat, cough and stuffy nose kinda sick. That's the kind of sick that you never want when you will be speaking in front of lots of people haha. But yeah, Elder Basa had the same kind of sickness last week, and it's kinda hard to avoid him when we are walking side by side everywhere. So I caught the sickness. But I'm doing better now.
So everybody in the leadership positions (ZL, STL) seems to be pretty motivated. At our last MLC, we all set goals for baptisms in the month of October. President said that if we reach our goals, he will take us on a road trip again, but this time to Vigan!! So everybody is working hard for their goals with a trip to Vigan in the back of our minds.
We had the Laoag and Bangui Zone Conference this last Friday. I struggled to talk a bit because of my cough, but it turned out really good.
twinning at Zone Conference
After the zone conf, President took the Office/AP elders out to dinner. We ate at a Chinese place that I've been wanting to eat at for a while, and it was heavenly. Nothing like Panda Express, but it was still nice. Their specialty was chicken feet. Really weird, but tasted real good.
Last week, we remodeled out apartment. Finally got some bed frames for our beds, some cabinets (closets?) and a few couches. So our apartment is now really clean and looking a lot better. A few weeks ago, President surprise visited us at our apartment. haha Long story short, he told us we should remodel the place and that our apartment should be the Celestial apartment in the whole mission. So we got to work.
On Saturday and Sunday, we got to watch General Conference!! It was what we have been looking forward to all week, and it didn't let us down. I was impressed again by how even though no topics are assigned, they all seem to relate to each other and point to the same topic/principle. I feel like the all around topic this year was to be a tool in God's hands and to bless other people's lives. Lots of stuff about faith, trust, repentance. But I love that God's main message to us is that we need to stop focusing on ourselves so much, and to turn outward and help others. As missionaries, that's what its all about. Forgetting yourself and getting lost in the work of helping others. Two talks that stuck out to me were Elder Hollands talk and Elder Hallstrom's. Elder Holland just reminded me that my debt to the Lord is impossible to pay back. It's far too much and absolutely impossible to fully repay Him. Our way of repaying him is by using His atonement every single day, so that we will be able to return to Him and live in His presence. Use the gift of the atonement that He has given to us. Loved Elder Hallstrom's talk about faith and miracle. On a mission, you just want to see miracles. Every day you want to see a miracle. Honestly, I have seen miracles on my mission. But I look back and realize that those miracles only came during those times that my faith and trust was fully in the Lord. That I had actually accepted His will and was at peace with what would happen. The key is to always have that high faith and trust in Him. To be completely humble and submissive to His will. It's hard to have these Christlike attributes every single day. His talk really inspired me and gave me motivation. It also gave me something to work on.
After Conference yesterday, we were teaching one of our investigators, who is getting baptized this Saturday. After the lesson, we asked her who she wants us to share our message with. She broke down in tears, and expressed how much she wants her family to know what she knows and feel what she feels. And how she wants to be with her family forever. I know for sure that families are central to God's plan. In General Conference, the one Brazilian of The Seventy (Elder Koch) talked about unified families. I know that having a unified, gospel centered family is God's plan for us. It is the best way to live, and the way our Father in Heaven wants us to live.
Love you all :)
-Elder Jenkins
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