"When ye are in the service of your fellow beings" (Mosiah 2:17) - October 25, 2021

Spiritual Thought

The greatest demonstration of love you or I can show or Heavenly Father is to strive to bring his children, on both sides of the veil, back to his paternal embrace.  We are the beneficiaries of the restored Gospel of Jesus Christ.  As such, it is our profound duty to lead those with whom we associate along the path which will ultimately help us become joint heirs with the Savior of the World Himself.  Such a path leads into the waters of Baptism, stretches on to the sacred ordinances of the temple, and reaches its culmination as a son and daughter of our Heavenly Father kneel at a sealing alter. 

As you and I do all within our power to invite all to “Come unto Christ” we too often face rejection, contempt, and disdain.  We will inevitably be asked why.  Why are we so persistent in our efforts?  Why do we consistently try to draw others closer to the Savior?  Why do we continue to knock on the same door during summer shine and winter snow even when it seems that our effort is in vain?

Well, the answer to these questions is that over 200 years ago a young boy entered a grove of trees with a simple question to ask of his Heavenly Father.  Unbeknownst to this young man generations of prophecy and prophetic longing were moments away from being fulfilled.  Upon kneeling in humble prayer Joseph Smith, a humble boy raised on a farm in a small town, became the prophet of the dispensation of the fulness of times.

Why do we strive with all that we possess to invite others to come closer to the Savior of the World?  The answer is that in 1820 two beings appeared to young Joseph Smith.  One of them said, pointing to the other, “this is my Beloved Son, Hear Him!”

I testify of our Savior Jesus Christ.  He is the Redeemer of the world and the Savior of all who will come unto him.  He has burst the bands of death and eternally banished the shadow and stain of transgression.

“Wherefore, how great the importance to make these things known unto the inhabitants of the earth, that they may know that there is no flesh that can dwell in the presence of God, save it be through the merits, and mercy, and grace of the Holy Messiah.”

That this may be the deepest desire of our hearts I humbly pray. 

In the name of Jesus Christ, Amen.

 

Weekly Update 

Hello everyone,

This week has been much busier than the last one.  It is good to feel busy, especially when you are a missionary.  We were able to meet with Marshall on Saturday and commit him to be baptized.  He wants his father-in-law to baptize him so we have not chosen a specific date yet because we do not know when his father-in-law will be available.  However, he committed to be baptized and to talk to his father-in-law about when he could come into town 

I was also able to do exchanges with Elder Hurley and Elder Brown.  It was fun to get to see new areas and new approaches to missionary work.  For some reason I don't quite understand Elder Hurley chose to end the exchange with him at 9 o'clock at night at his house.  Normally this would be fine except we are supposed to be back to our apartments no later than 9:30 and Elder Hurley's house is an hour walk away from my apartment.  None of us have cars and Elder Holdaway's bike is being fixed so walking was the only option.  To make things more interesting Elder Holdaway and Elder Feilzer (Elder Hurley's companion) were caught by a very talkative member and weren't able to get back to the house until 9:30.  We had to speedwalk back to the apartment and managed to turn an hour long walk into forty-five minutes.  It made for an eventful end to the exchange!

The other exciting piece of news is that my first companion, Elder Divelbiss, received an email this week asking him to begin working on his visa paperwork.  He was not told a date that he may be leaving but Madagascar opened to Americans on Saturday.  I have not received a visa email yet but am hopeful that it may come this week.  Stay tuned!

I hope you all have a great week!

Elder Payne

 

With Elder Pennington last p-day.  We came here the same day and I knew him fairly well my first transfer.  Now he is in Morgan (lucky) so it was fun to run into him again.  He is from Tennessee and is also into hunting so we are already planning on trading a Whitetail hunt in Tennessee for a Mule Deer hunt out west.

We had a mission-wide p-day last week.  We did service harvesting pumpkins as part of that.  This is just some of the pumpkins we harvested.  The pile was at least twice this big by the time we were done and we maybe harvested a quarter of what was in the fields.

Elder Hurley, the district leader, has an entire house to himself.  We call it the Woods Cross mansion.  The homeowner stores his jet skis in the garage.  Talk about being spoiled!  We aren't even allowed to use jet skis but they make you district leader and suddenly I guess that no longer applies!

I was being obnoxious one day and took a picture of Elder Bringhurst while he did personal study.  I timed it just right so that it looks like I caught him red-handed.  What makes it even better is the way the desk lamp is hitting the piece of paper it looks like there is a laptop or iPad screen.  I promise, no rules were being broken when this picture was taken.

Next to the "Welcome to Woods Cross" sign

On exchanges with Elder Brown.  I was able to live the life of a zone leader for a day and I kind of hope the mission president never dislikes (or maybe likes) me enough to punish me that way.

The original four-man from my first transfer met up again last p-day.  From L-R: Elder Divelbiss, Me, Elder Marchman, Elder Schiel.  Elder Schiel goes home in three weeks.  When I first made it here I kind of doubted whether I could make it until November.  Now here we are!