"Man Must Hope" (Ether 12:23) - April 10, 2023

Spiritual Thought 

The Book of Mormon teaches of the important relationship between faith and hope.  In the midst of his people being utterly destroyed the prophet Ether taught the importance of possessing hope.  In Ether 12:32 we read: "Wherefore man must hope of he cannot receive an inheritance in the place which thou hast prepared."  Why is hope so essential for our eternal progression?  The importance of faith is generally understood,  but why is hope such an interconnected and crucial element of faith?

From the New Testament we read that it is impossible for faith and fear to exist in the same moment.  These two are opposites and one will always triumph over the other.  It is impossible to possess the deep and abiding faith we must have while also being filled with pessimism and dread for the future.  If the future fills us with gloom then we are either allowing fear to overcome our faith or we do not fully understand the plan of our Savior.  As we spend our days longing for the past then the signal we send to our Savior is that we do not trust his plan and we do not believe he has the ability to work miracles in our lives.  

We are covenant children of a loving Heavenly Father.  Our privilege is to be in the service of his Only Begotten Son, the very literal embodiment of hope.  As we approach this most sacred time of the year may I ask each of us to more faithfully remember the purpose for this Easter season.  The events we commemorate are the reason we can and must hope for bright days ahead.  As we reverently commemorate our Savior's solitary, redemptive sacrifice may we allow our faith, even our hope, to be increased more than ever.  I testify of hope because I first testify of the Hope of the World.  I testify of peace because I first testify of the Prince of Peace.  I have faith in bright days ahead because I first have faith in he who is "An High Priest of Good Things To Come."

In the name of Jesus Christ, Amen.

 

Weekly Update 

Hello everyone,

Good things come to those who wait!  This week all of you are blessed to not only receive an email about this week but also last week’s email that I wrote then was too busy to actually send.  In lieu of thanks for this incredible blessing please make a donation to your local chimpanzee literacy shelter.

The first week of the transfer is always incredibly busy.  This week was no different.  Just like last transfer Elder Razafimanantsoa and I spent most of the week driving missionaries to their new areas and doing the start of transfer meetings.  We had a total of eight new missionaries enter the mission this transfer.  Five of them are from the United States and Canada and three are from the Philippines.  I love being around new missionaries.  Their energy and excitement are contagious.  It’s so refreshing to see the idealism and hear them talk about how many hundreds of people they are going to baptize.  I still feel like I should be one of the new missionaries starting their training so it’s a weird feeling to be on the going home side of this.  The good part about that is I get to be one of the older missionaries they (hopefully) look up to.  I still remember those missionaries when I was in my first couple transfers.  It’s exciting in a different way to be in the position I’m in now.

It’s a good thing I’ve always been a shopaholic because we were able to do some unexpected deal hunting this week.  Four of the five new Americans came on Wednesday night (we’re going to have to teach one of them how to clip his toenails because he was delayed while he had surgery for an ingrown toenail).  Unfortunately their bags did not leave Paris with them.  President Rakotoarivelo asked us to take them shopping to buy a change of clothes to wear while they waited for their bags to get here.  Let me tell you, Malagasy malls are just as enjoyable as American malls and by that I mean that I each one of the 74 minutes and 36 seconds inside of it dreaming of a cold and lonely death deep in the mountains of North Korea.  Imagine all of the aspects of the mall-shopping experience the males in your life are fond of.  Then imagine if all of the prices were 100% negotiable but because of your skin color they were also all immediately tripled as soon as you asked about them.  The employees also yell at you and wave various items in your face as you walk past.  Occasionally they will follow you shouting about how if you really loved Jesus you would buy their clothes.  The new missionaries of course didn’t know enough Malagasy to haggle over prices so Elder Razafimanantsoa and I spent a considerable amount of time debating how much men’s pants cost to make and trying to find flaws in order to lower the price.  Good times!

We also were able to make another day trip down to Antsirabe like what we did for Elders Galbraith and Ethington.  This time it was with Sister Razafindravoasy and her trainee, Sister Lua, as well as Elder Laglaganon.  Sister Lua and Elder Laglaganon are two of the Filipino missionaries we received this transfer.  They had to do visa work in Antananarivo but there were also reasons we needed to send the rest of the zone down to Antsirabe without them.  It was another fun little surprise to get to drive to Antsirabe.

I’m running out of things to talk about for this week.  Basically it was a lot of driving and meetings.  This transfer will be busy like last one so stay tuned to hear about what shenanigans I get into.

I hope you all have a great week!

Elder Payne 

 

Elder Razafimanantsoa and I decided to take a picture in our suits after one of the meetings.  Elder Lewis was taking pictures without us knowing while we were getting into position.  I like to think I look like James Bond in this one.

We’re practicing our confused Dad looks in this one.  The practice is going to pay off when in a few years we have kids and, like all fathers throughout history, think we’re fairly competent, knowledgeable people until we decide to spend some quality time with our small children and spend most of it looking at our wives in a “help me” kind of way.

Finally we got around to taking the real picture.

The mission office/mission home from one of the missionary apartments.

With four of the new missionaries.  We rented an apartment for them since there wasn’t any room in the current apartments.  It had a TV in it so we had to make sure that was in the picture.

At dinner with the new missionaries.  Clockwise from me: Elders Andrianajafimalala, Shumate, Nydegger, Bertrand, Kunkel, Stapley, Rosenlof, Mahadidy, Razafimanantsoa.

There’s a word in Malagasy, “voay”, which translates literally to “crocodile” but is used in a slang way to talk about a guy who is always trying to get more women.  The English slang equivalent would be “player.”  I call Elder Razafimanantsoa voay as a joke.  Voay can also be used to talk about someone who’s a “lady’s man.”  The truth is that Elder Razafimanantsoa is the heartthrob of the Madagascar Antananarivo Mission.  Without fail, sisters call him multiple times a day because they have a “problem” that quickly turns into questions about what he looks for in a future spouse or how many children he would like to have and he has to diplomatically find a way out of the conversation.  This picture is a perfect example of what I mean.  The sister closest to the camera legitimately needed his help with visa documents so she could go to Mauritius.  As soon as he sat down there was suddenly a group of five women who had problems with their visas.  Weird since only one of them is actually leaving the country.

This is what Madagascar will do to your tires.  I don’t know how this didn’t pop.

With Elder Razafimanantsoa and Sitraka, the mission secretary.  Sitraka is also Elder Razafimanantsoa’s uncle.