Hey all!
Thanks for always sending the letters and Dear Elders, I love them. Keep them coming when you have time! Thanks for sending my pouch service address also!
Hey Pop - could you send me the addresses of President Teshima and Bishop Leavitt so I can write them please? Thanks a bunch man. I had President Teshima's address in my scripture case, but I misplaced it and can't find it now. You also sent me a Dear Elder yesterday, but you put it in Hermana Denker's name hahah. She opened it and was like "uhh...Elder Moore? I think this is for you haha" it was funny. She is doing better, getting some letters now I think. She appreciates your sending her letters.
Conference was great! I really loved it. We all just went into the gym and they put it on the huge projectors and tvs. It would have been cool to shuttle down to SLC to see it, but that's an extra 2,104 seats that I don't think the conference center can hold haha. My favorites were by Elder Scott who talked about personal revelation and Elder Holland who talked about the Book of Mormon. He is such a stud, Elder Holland. We all love him here. President Uchtdorf also gave excellent talks, I really love hearing him too. Did you finish all the sessions? If not and they're not recorded, all the sessions can be watched on lds.org if you just search the conference talks. They're great, anyone who hasn't seen them should really watch.
Spanish update - we had another all-Spanish day yesterday and are having another one again tomorrow. I actually like them. It's crazy how much I actually know how to say. I speak pretty well now. We had our first TRC in Spanish 2 days ago also, it was great! We taught the whole lesson of the restoration in Spanish. It's crazy how after only 5 weeks, we can already have a conversation with and teach someone for 45 minutes straight. In high school, the 2 years I took Spanish, I could barely talk for 45 seconds in front of the class. It amazes even myself. There's tons of grammer principles and stuff that I never knew about that we're learning, and now that we can put them all together we can actually talk to each other and make sense lol. I'm really enjoying it!
How is Julie doing? How did the surgery go? If I remember the Dear Elder you sent, she's out of the hospital now. Is she recovering ok and everything? I hope all is well. Love you and miss you Jules, get better soon!
Elder Sellers' family lives like 45 minutes away, and he gets a package of food/goodies every single week that he always shares with us. They send a LOT of food, they're really nice. They're gonna make me fat! I had gained 5 pounds so far, but I lost about all of it as of yesterday lol.
I got new scriptures yesterday! I wanted some ones that were my mission scriptures and that I could go through and mark up and everything as I read. They're blue with the silver-edged pages. I'll get them engraved today, it's only like $2 so it's really sweet. Now I have Spanish ones that they gave me when I got here with "Elder Tim Moore" engraved on them, and I'll have English ones now too.
It was funny yesterday, one of the Elders in our Zone was coming around asking if anyone wanted candy and I was like "Whoa Tim does" and it felt really weird haha. It's weird hearing myself called Tim instead of Elder Moore. I don't like it! Lol. Weirded myself out there for a minute.
I don't think you're allowed to visit at the airport, but I'm allowed to call you. If I'm wrong, I'll let you know asap so you can plan a trip up here, but for now I wouldn't plan on it. I'll keep you posted.
Everyone in my district going to Paraguay also leaves on November 2. The 2 Hermanas and 2 Elders going stateside leave on November 4th. They way they do it with us going to Paraguay is they'll put us all on the same plane, and Hermana Sargent will have an Elder on each side of her to make sure no creepers come sit by her or anything, and the other 4 Elders will be scattered throughout the plane so we can talk to everybody haha. Its pretty cool.
We heard this really good talk about faith also by Kevin Pearson of the 70. It's about faith, and online if you wanna read/hear it. Faith is not a choice, it's a gift of God. It's a principle of action, not just a belief in something. Faith is obtained by a constant pattern of obedience. The higher the measure of our obedience, the more faith we will be blessed with. You have to pray for faith, just like with any other blessing. How hard we want to work to be blessed with faith IS our choice though. It was really good, it changed my whole outlook on faith and what it is, why I need it, and how to get it.
He also talked about what he calls the 6 Destructive D's. Doubt, Dsicouragement, Distraction, Lack of Diligence, Disobedience, and Disbelief. Those are the very antitheses of faith and will never be a part of the Gospel. You will never hear or see a time where Heavenly Father has said "be discouraged" or any of the other ones. They are some of Satan's most effective tools, and take away from our faith.
Also, I thought of something really neat the other day. I was doing personal study, and thinking about something that I have wondered about for a while now. In the scriptures (as well as in other places where this story is referenced), it says that when Adam hides himself from the Lord and the Lord asks "Adam, where art thou?". Why would the Lord ask him that? God knew exactly where Adam was, so why would he ask that? I came to find out that it was because Adam needed to know where Adam was and why he was there. By asking him that question, Adam had to think about where he was and how he got there and why. If God had just said "Adam, thou hast hid thyself from me because thou wast naked", it wouldn't have been as effective as making Adam think about it for himself. God asked him because he used his agency to think about it and learn for himself. This is how we learn. It's really cool that essentially, Adam taught himself and that's how we are supposed to learn also. Kind of a hard concept to explain through an email, but it makes sense in my head. Basically, we are supposed to learn from our own experiences and thinking rather than just being told what to do, when to do it, and why all the time. It's more effective, we use our agency and learn from our own experience. Just a cool thought I think.
Anyway, time's a ticking away, so I gotta go. I love you and miss you all! Until next week!
Love,
Elder Moore
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