Hey, President Callan said that I can email with my grandparents as well. So I need Gaga and Papa´s email addresses. I think only Gaga would have one, but whatever it is I need it haha. They can just write me an email for next week and I can save their address into my contacts so I have it. Neat :)
This week was excellent. We had a training meeting in Asunción last Tuesday, Wednesday, and Thursday. Oh my goodness...it was phenomenal. It was all the District Leaders, Zone Leaders, and trainers there. President Callan trained us on 8 lessons that the Bretheren have implimented in all the missions over the world. In 1 year from now - July 2011 - the 8 lessons we learned in the training will be taught in the MTC as well, so the missionaries coming in will already know them. We have 1 year to get this working in the mission so the new missionaries will come to a mission who already applies what they learned in the MTC. I´ll explain more about them next week. I´ll let you all know how it goes teaching this stuff to the other Elders in my district.
So Guarambaré needs a little help. They´re really unmotivated to do anything. They´re in a huge slump, and the branch president isn´t a very motivating person lol. We´ve started them reading the Book of Mormon as a branch, and that is having very little effect. Now we´re trying to impliment branch activity night again like they used to have, see if we can´t get some motivation out of that. We´ll keep seeing what we can do. Missionary work is very difficult haha. We have to take a branch from rock bottom enthusiasm and build it up with little to no help. But if there´s anybody to do the job, it´s Elder Moore and Elder Martinez. Who is doing well, by the way :)
This week was excellent. We had a training meeting in Asunción last Tuesday, Wednesday, and Thursday. Oh my goodness...it was phenomenal. It was all the District Leaders, Zone Leaders, and trainers there. President Callan trained us on 8 lessons that the Bretheren have implimented in all the missions over the world. In 1 year from now - July 2011 - the 8 lessons we learned in the training will be taught in the MTC as well, so the missionaries coming in will already know them. We have 1 year to get this working in the mission so the new missionaries will come to a mission who already applies what they learned in the MTC. I´ll explain more about them next week. I´ll let you all know how it goes teaching this stuff to the other Elders in my district.
So Guarambaré needs a little help. They´re really unmotivated to do anything. They´re in a huge slump, and the branch president isn´t a very motivating person lol. We´ve started them reading the Book of Mormon as a branch, and that is having very little effect. Now we´re trying to impliment branch activity night again like they used to have, see if we can´t get some motivation out of that. We´ll keep seeing what we can do. Missionary work is very difficult haha. We have to take a branch from rock bottom enthusiasm and build it up with little to no help. But if there´s anybody to do the job, it´s Elder Moore and Elder Martinez. Who is doing well, by the way :)
So, as time is short (again), here we go with Article of Faith number 5.
"We believe that man should be called by God, by prophecy and the laying on of hands, by those who have the authority, so that they can preach the Gospel and administer in it´s ordinances."
This AoF teaches us 2 things - the conditional circumstances and requirements of service in the Lord´s kingdom and the rights and responsabilities of that calling. The conditions are the first part of the statement. Man first needs to be called by God. In the book of Hebrews in the Bible, it says that no man may take this honor upon himself save he be called of God as was Aaron. How are we called by God? By prophecy and by the laying on of hands by those who have the authority to do so. By prophecy means that the calling has to be revelation from God, not some random selection process or popularity competition. Those who call him or her must give them the authority and power to carry out the duties to which they are called by the ordinance of the laying on of hands. Those who call him must have the authority to do so. They receive the authority by having somebody else confer it upon them by the same placement of hands on the head. Jesus Christ places His hands on the heads of His apostles to give them authority, who in turn did the same to Joseph Smith, who in turn gave it to his apostles and others, which are the means by which we today have the authority given to us personally. When all these requirements are met, the person called is authorized to preach the Gospel and administer in the ordinances of salvation thereof as far as his office permits him to do. For example, a Priest cannot administer in the ordinances of an Elder. His calling does not permit, so he is not given that authority. In this way, everybody that has a calling or duty in the Church is called by divine revelation and receives the power and authority of God to carry out his or her duties. Nobody does anything by their own standards. This way, the standards of God are always recognized and met.
Until the next week - when I´ll have 11 months in the mission! If anybody has any questions or comments, feel free to write me or have my parents mention them to me in an email so I can answer them. Love and miss you all!
-Elder Moore
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