Just a little quote from Hailey!
"The Simpleness of a different language has also proven to be a blessing. I always have so much to say, that it might scare some people if I said it all at once. :) Power comes with understanding and simplicity."
I love this pure testimony of the power of the Gospel to change lives.
From Elder Wigginton:
Truly, this time here is incredible. I have never felt closer to my Father in Heaven, nor have I ever loved so many people. It is a great blessing. I know it is the work of God, and I do not sit back, but work and watch the miracle of the Gospel change lives for the better. It is amazing to watch how family relationships improve as we teach them to pray together. It is amazing to watch alcoholics leave the poison behind and to see others leave cigarettes. It is incredible to see boys transform into men, respecting the women around them and their parents at home. And it is equally miraculous to be changed for the better by the power of this force. We do have a Father of Heaven and he does listen to our prayers. I assure you of it. His only begotten son, Jesus Christ, makes it possible for us to be forgiven for the errors we have committed. The peace that comes from His Atonement cannot be accounted for by anything else but the divine. I know these things. I see their results each day in my life, and I pray that you all will invite Him into your lives.
Elder Wigginton and a family he taught and baptized
Here's a great story from one of Nate Packer's letters. I love the creativity and the idea that we need to be excited about the work. What can we do to get excited about our missionary work? I know a lot of us were just called to reach out to the singles' in our boundaries who don't attend our ward. Can we think of things that will get them excited to come to our ward?
We had zone conference on Wednesday last week. On the table we had hymn books stacked up making a mount and also an overhang for this WWII 90mm tank shell we got from the Army Navy store. We were over there the other day and I was thinking that for zone meeting the whole idea is to get everybody really excited and to get them amped to go out and work and to baptize people. And I was thinking about how we were all generals in God’s army in the re-existence and so I said, “What if we got everybody a metal of honor and they could wear it? So we snipped off the pins and grinded them off flush and they could be glued to the back of our tags. There’s 28 people in our zone, it’s a huge zone, so we got all the metals and organized them on top of hymn books, all different kind of WWII and Viet Nam metals. But anyway, we had the
cloth over the whole thing. The tank shell is like 3-feet long and weighs about 30 pounds. It’s like a full-on WWII anti-tank missile. It looks like a big bullet. So we asked, “What do you elders now about the war in heaven? “Who were you in the war in heaven?” And they’re like, “we were like lieutenants and officers and stuff.” And I was like, “No, you were all GENERALS. It was really cool and we want you all to remember who you are and who you were.” So we pulled off the sheet and everyone was standing up and looking at this tank shell and these little metals and they were all looking at it and laughing. On the side of the tank shell it’s wooden where the cartridge is, and we put the word “Baptizer” written on the side of it. It kind of works like the Stanley Cup. The best companionship in our zone that has the most impressive week gets the Baptizer for the whole week and they get to write their name on it and they get to have it in their apartment and take pictures with it and stuff. Then every week, each district leader nominates another companionship and then out of the three that are nominated, we choose the one that will get it. So everyone was really excited to get it. So we awarded it to a missionary and his companion. We passed it around to everyone and then gave it to him at the end and put his name on it. It was really cool and it got people pretty amped.
“This is all we have as missionaries. This is really like our power, our testimony. If we don’t have a testimony, we can’t do anything. But if we have a strong testimony, then we will be able to be really powerful.” And I said, “The bullet is like you and the amount of charge you have behind
it is your testimony and you can have as much or as little as you want, but that is what is really going to propel things and like this tank shell that can pierce another tank at two miles away, your testimony will be able to pierce all of the people that you talk to right to their center, just like Jesus Christ did when we came down from Heaven.”
Here's Elder Wigginton's address. Now we can all write him lots of letters! :)
Elder Jared Wigginton
P.O. Box 1052
Pointe-Noire
The Republic of Congo
And a fun picture of him with some bananas.
And Elder Packer's blog with his address and all of his letters.
http://www.missionsite.net/