Also, Ashley´s birthday is coming up. Whoop! Shout out to my awesome sister.
-Mom, the Brazilian I sent a picture home of eating peanut butter is probably the greatest cook to ever walk the planet... Haha we made a deal that if I gave him some peanut butter, and you sent me a recipe, he would make a peanut butter cheesecake free of charge. Oh yeah. Please sent me a recipe of how to make a peanut butter cheesecake. That would be an awesome cheat day food... Haha
-DUSTIN OR MATT, please send me some workouts over email. This week is my last week of air alert. I know you may have sent some in the next package but it takes a really long time to get here. It would be awesome to have a fresh sheet of some body weight workouts to do next week.
So, this week was awesome. In the back of my journal I started a `Transfer Summary` of each transfer on my mission. Throughout each transfer I will write the biggest things that I learned on that short summary. Anyway, the reason I write that is because of the principal I have learned and gained a testimony of now in the tenth week.´´Enduring to the End.´´ Holy cow, it stinks but its so awesome at the same time.
I´ll be honest, when I got off the plane here ten weeks ago, I was really arrogant. I thought I had missionary work down. I felt like I knew how and when to work and use members, how to utilize the ward leadership, when to get the mission leaders involved, and how to teach and listen to investigators according to their needs. MAAAANNNNNN has this not only been a humbling experience, but a time where I have made a lot of growth. I love the principal of Enduring to the End.
Last week´s letter was probably pretty bad. I tried to write it as fast as I could because it was profound to me. So, with the limited time I had, I tried to send it. I hope it made some sense. The purpose of the email was to confirm that this truly is His work. So many people start programs to break bad habits or throw loads of money at companies to help them make changes, when in reality, all we need to is understand Christ´s restored Gospel - His Doctrine.
For the first time on my mission, I feel like I have really done what I have been called to do. We have an investigator right now named Eduardo. He has had a lot of really difficult problems in his life that have kind of messed him up. Drugs, deaths, addictions, etc.. But that´s why we´re here, right? To help others come unto Christ and be perfected in Him.
Mom´s package included this quote from Elder Bruce R. McConkie:
´´By revelation I have been selected as a personal representative of the Lord Jesus Christ. He is my Master and He has chosen me to represent Him. To stand in His place, to say and do what He Himself would say and do if He personally were ministering to the very people to whom He has sent me. My voice is His voice, and my acts are His acts; my words are His words and my doctrine is His Doctrine. MY COMMISSION IS TO DO WHAT HE WANTS DONE. TO SAY WHAT HE WANTS SAID. TO BE A LIVING MODERN WITNESS IN WORD AND DEED OF THE DIVINITY OF HIS GREAT AND MARVELOUS LATTER-DAY WORK.´´ WhooooOO! If that doesn´t get you pumped up, there´s something wrong with you. I love it. Absolutely love it. I keep this in my shirt pocket every day and think that I literally stand in the place and minister to the people that He would be if He were me. Man, that´s powerful.
So, how´s this apply to Eduardo? If the Savior was sitting across from Eduardo during a lesson, teaching him about the word of wisdom, how would He do it? Simple, he would teach the doctrine behind this commandment and then invite him to live it. Why? Because this is the only way to true happiness. He wouldn´t, for example, teach him to slowly cut back on the amount of cigarettes each day - because in reality, He would be teaching him that breaking the word of wisdom is okay. He would tell him to live it right now. But he´s addicted and his body would go in to shock, right?... No, the Lord always provides a way to accomplish commandments.
So, what we did with Eduardo was first teach him about repentance. What it means to repent, why we need to repent, and the blessings... Then, we taught simply the Word of Wisdom. Knowing he smoked, we then invited him to repent and quit now. After about 20-30 minutes of him not believing in himself, he handed us all of his cigarettes (man he smoked a lot) andcommitted him to living the word of wisdom.
The following day came and the expected temptation came to smoke. He immediately began to pray and ask for help. Boom, temptation went away. The next temptation came a little bit later, and a little bit stronger, but boom! He prayed and the Lorddelivered. Third time. Fourth time. Fifth time. Unfortunately, he gave in toward the end of the night and went to the drug store to buy ONE single cigarette. (Haha this story is awesome.) He was trying so hard. He repented of his past transgressions of smoking and had a desire to keep God´s commandments.
As he put the cigarette to his mouth, his tongue swelled up, his mouth filled with spit, his throat tightened and his stomach started to growl. WHATTT?? He told us it was the nastiest taste he has ever had in his life. He put the cigarette to his mouth again a couple hours later and the same thing happened... After each time of putting the cigarette to his mouth, he repented. After these two instances, the temptation to smoke didn´t come back. It´s been almost 10 days and the desire to smoke another cigarette has vanished.
We saw him yesterday and marked his baptismal interview for this Friday. I´m so happy for him. The atonement of Jesus Christ has completely changed him.
This is incredible. This is the happiest time of my life. I literally represent Jesus Christ. My voice, my acts, my words... are His! My commission is do what He would do - That is Preach His Gospel. I´m striving to teach the doctrine simply so the Holy Ghost can testify. When this happens, all I do is invite them to repent!
These 10 weeks have really humbled me. I´ve tried and tried and tried again. I did contacts holding a picture of Christ´s baptism, I´ve shouted on a soap box and invited people to church, I have even carried around pictures of my family and invited people to hear why I´m so happy. Nothing has worked. It wasn´t until a prayer of faith (during Pday by the way), that we found Eduardo and scheduled a time to teach him.
Nephi was right. I should´ve just entered Jerusalem following the Spirit, not knowing before hand what I should do.
This is His work. Christ Lives! And I have been called of Him, by a living prophet today.
Elder Welch
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