This week has been great. Lots of things happened. Last Thursday, we had a worldwide conference with the General Authorities (these are the leaders of our church) about some changes to the mission. They have given us a lot of freedom. We can pick when we want to have companion study, proselyte, language study, lunch and dinner, as long as it is between 11:00 in the morning and 10-10:30 at night! And, our P-Day(his day to do laundry, email home, grocery shop and play soccer) was extended from 9:00 in the morning until 7:00 at night!! So, there have been some great changes for us missionaries.
This past Thursday we had our interviews with President Gwilliam, which are always awesome! We set goals for this quarter. I have specific mission goals, and personal goals; a goal to read the New Testament and to write in my journal daily for my studies and for my personal journal.
The rest of our week was really good. We met an investigator who moved to a new home which is in our sector and is so receptive. We taught her our first lesson which is on the restoration of the Gospel which basically explains the basics of what we believe. She new all of it and is just waiting to turn 18 to be baptized. Her dad is telling her that she has to wait until then. She already reads her scriptures, is saying her prayers and is now coming to church!
Also, this past Sunday, the Mantana family came to church! They were the family that Elder Murphy and I felt prompted to contact that day in the street. Two weeks later they are now coming to church and their 11 year old daughter wants to be baptized! !Milagros! And to think that all of this started from the prompting to stop by their home. We are really excited to continue to stop by and teach them.
This week I want to share with you a frustration that I had in one of my lessons this past week. We were with a family of recent converts (people who have been baptized within the past 12 months) who haven't been coming to church lately. They talked about how another family that was really active are now beginning to not go to church very often. They compared themselves to this family saying, “ok,ya they are not going now, so we wont either. They were consecrated, we aren’t, so why should we go?”
In Preach My Gospel (manual that we study and teach from) it teaches us that as missionaries, we should never compare ourselves to our companion or other missionaries. We are taught that we need to have a more introspective viewpoint. We should look at ourselves and ask ourselves what can we do to grow closer to Him. I want to help this family to learn that they too should focus on what they can do to grow closer to Jesus Christ and not focus on what others are doing. This may be difficult to do at times, but I am up for the challenge.
May we each focus on what we, individually, can do to grow closer to Christ this week and every week.
Elder Hendrix
***Mom note*** Elder Hendrix's Spanish must be getting better because his letters are starting to make less sense each week. :) Enjoy!
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