"Man Without God is Nothing" (Ruyker) - March 21, 2022

Spiritual Thought

Perhaps the most primary and basic truth in eternity is the reality that we are made in the image of our Heavenly Father.  This concept is widely known but rarely fully comprehended.  You and I are the children of a loving Heavenly Father.  Our pedigree reaches far beyond mortal parents to the creator and ruler of the universe.  Our birthright is nothing less than everything Our Heavenly Father possess and the life he lives.  We are children of divine royalty.  As such, dependent upon our faithfulness, our destiny is a throne.  What an absolutely astounding truth!  When we view ourselves through this lense why would we ever question the glorious prospects which are stretched before us?  A plan has been laid by our Heavenly Father to feed the spark of divinity we possess and build us into what we are intended to become.  Our responsibility and privilege is to never lose sight of our goal.  Our future is too miracle laden and our potential to immense to ever content ourselves with subpar achievement.  Similar to the parable of the Prodigal Son, the feast is being spread in our honor, so to speak.  What a travesty if we choose to console ourselves with a few husks thrown from the Master's table.  

I stand in awe at the confidence our Heavenly Father has placed in each if his children and the eternal blessings which he is anxious to bestow upon us.  As we sing "I Am A Child of God" my prayer is that we will more fully strive to comprehend what that entails and live in a manner that we may qualify for all which is in store for us.

Recently Sis. Johnson shared one of the writings of Ruyker.  I leave this as my testimony of and witness to the divine nature we each possess.

"When God wanted to create fish, He spoke to the sea.  When God wanted to create trees, He spoke to the Earth.  But when God wanted to create man, He turned to Himself and to Jesus and said 'Let us make man in our likeness'.  If you take a fish out of the water, it will die, and when you remove a tree from the earth, it will also die.  Similarly, when a man disconnects from God, he dies.  God is our natural environment, we were created to live in his presence.  We have to be connected to Him because it is only through him that life exists. Water without fish is still water, but a fish without water is nothing, the soil without a tree is still soil, but a tree without the soil is nothing.  Likewise God without man is still God, but man without God is nothing."  Ruyker from Coventry, England

In the name of Jesus Christ, Amen.

Weekly Update

Hello everyone,

We received transfer news last night.  I am leaving Clearfield and will be going down to Bountiful.  My new companion's name is Elder Anderson.  Our ward covers the area I was in for my first two transfers.  I already know several people in that area so I will be going back to my roots.

Andrés is so close to baptism.  We talked with him yesterday after church and he told us the Sunday School lesson was a message directly from Heavenly Father to him.  I wish I were going to be staying here to see his progress but I know Elder Porter will do very well with the Rosales family.

Life with Elder Porter is never boring.  Let me start this email with a story.  The coach in our apartment has been through a lot.  It is threadbare and torn after at least five years worth of missionaries living here.  On Tuesday Elder Porter decided we needed a new one.  He found one being given away for free (not sure how but he did) and arranged a time to pick it up.  Elder Porter was confident we could fit a couch in the back of our Equinox so we went over to a nice elderly woman's house to pick it up during lunch.  The couch was bigger than we expected, much bigger.  Just the armrest was too big to fit in the Equinox.  As we stood at the side of the road reevaluating our decisions in life we saw two teenage girls come out of the house across the street and get into a Ram 1500.  Elder Porter looked at me mischievously and said "Follow me".  We ran up to the side of the truck and asked if they would mind driving our monster of a couch to our apartment.  They were confused but said yes.  The couch was so big we had to rest it on top of the tailgate.  After driving two miles to our house and laughing at the ridiculousness of the situation we unloaded the new couch onto the driveway.  We were far from safe however.  No matter how hard we tried this couch could not even fit through the door.  Through a series of unfortunate events one of the armrests ended up being broken off.  There are now two worthless couches sitting on the side of the road in Clearfield with "Free" signs taped to them.  If you're in the market just send me an email!

I hope you all have a great week!

Elder Payne

With Elder Porter

My injured finger while trying to get our couch through the door.

Last district council picture. 

After exchanges with Elder Jorgensen.

This was my first time filling out a March Madness Bracket.  I didn't even really know what that was until this week so I just picked the team from the place I liked best in each game.

Elder Burgoyne fell asleep on the couch one night so I put a meat mallet in his hand.

The girls with a truck following us to the apartment.