Hey mom!!!
How are you doing? Things are going great here! I hope spring break is going great for you guys, or went great, I guess. We have transfers next week, so I will write on Tuesday! Mom, you don't have to worry because things are winding down with high school and then you've got me coming home and well, that is going to be a full time job! You may have to like teach me English again and all f those good things, ha. So I decided that I want to take classes in the winter, so I will just wait until then:) And then, I am going to tell them that I want to go the Durango airport! Yay, I made a decision! Those were hard though, maybe I will just stay out in the mission, it is a little easier! :) Wow, sounds like everyone has great plans for the summer! I hope it all goes well! Can you believe it is already Easter? I found this and I really like it so I wanted to share it with you:
The Atonement and the Missionary
Almost everything I have said here has been and is directed toward the missionary process, ultimately toward the investigator. May I close with an extended testimony about how focusing on the Atonement helps full-time and member missionaries and mission leaders.
Anyone who does any kind of missionary work will have occasion to ask, "Why is this so hard? Why doesn’t it go better? Why can’t our success be more rapid? Why aren’t there more people joining the Church?" It is the truth. We believe in angels. We trust in miracles. Why don’t people just flock to the font? Why isn’t the only risk in missionary work that of pneumonia from being soaking wet all day and all night in the baptismal font?
You will have occasion to ask those questions. I have thought about this a great deal. I offer this as my personal feeling. I am convinced that missionary work is not easy because salvation is not a cheap experience. Salvation never was easy. We are The Church of Jesus Christ, this is the truth, and He is our Great Eternal Head. How could we believe it would be easy for us when it was never, ever easy for Him? It seems to me that missionaries and mission leaders have to spend at least a few moments in Gethsemane. Missionaries and mission leaders have to take at least a step or two toward the summit of Calvary.
Now, please don’t misunderstand. I’m not talking about anything anywhere near what Christ experienced. That would be presumptuous and sacrilegious. But I believe that missionaries and investigators, to come to the truth, to come to salvation, to know something of this price that has been paid, will have to pay a token of that same price.
For that reason I don’t believe missionary work has ever been easy, nor that conversion is, nor that retention is, nor that continued faithfulness is. I believe it is supposed to require some effort, something from the depths of our soul.
If He could come forward in the night, kneel down, fall on His face, bleed from every pore, and cry, “Abba, Father (Papa), if this cup can pass, let it pass,” 16 then little wonder that salvation is not a whimsical or easy thing for us. If you wonder if there isn’t an easier way, you should remember you are not the first one to ask that. Someone a lot greater and a lot grander asked a long time ago if there wasn’t an easier way.
The Atonement will carry the missionaries perhaps even more importantly than it will carry the investigators. When you struggle, when you are rejected, when you are spit upon and cast out and made a hiss and a byword, you are standing with the best life this world has ever known, the only pure and perfect life ever lived. You have reason to stand tall and be grateful that the Living Son of the Living God knows all about your sorrows and afflictions. The only way to salvation is through Gethsemane and on to Calvary. The only way to eternity is through Him—the Way, the Truth, and the Life.
I testify that the living God is our Eternal Father and that Jesus Christ is His living and Only Begotten Son in the flesh. I testify that this Jesus, who was slain and hanged on a tree, 17 was the chief Apostle then and is the chief Apostle now, the Great High Priest, the chief cornerstone of His Church in this last and greatest of all dispensations. I testify that He lives, that the whole triumph of the gospel is that He lives, and because He does, so will we.
On that first Resurrection Sunday, Mary Magdalene first thought she saw a gardener. Well, she did—the Gardener who cultivated Eden and who endured Gethsemane. The Gardener who gave us the rose of Sharon, the lily of the valley, the cedars of Lebanon, the tree of life.
I declare Him to be the Savior of the world, the Bishop and Shepherd of our souls, the Bright and Morning Star. I know that our garments can be washed white only in the blood of that Lamb, slain from the foundation of the world. I know that we are lifted up unto life because He was lifted up unto death, that He bore our griefs and carried our sorrows, and with His stripes we are healed. I bear witness that He was wounded for our transgressions and bruised for our iniquities, that He was a man of sorrows acquainted with grief because upon Him were laid the transgressions of us all. 18
I bear witness that He came from God as a God to bind up the brokenhearted, to dry the tears from every eye, to proclaim liberty to the captive and open the prison doors to them that are bound. 19 I promise that because of your faithful response to the call to spread the gospel, He will bind up your broken hearts, dry your tears, and set you and your families free. That is my missionary promise to you and your missionary message to the world.
So that is just the end of the talk, but you can apply it not just to missionary work, but to life in general. That talk is called Missionary Work and the Atonement, so if you want to go read the whole talk you can:) It doesn't get crazy here around Easter time, well it didn't last year, they just eat fish. But I know in other countries it is wild. This week was a little slower, but it was super hot for a couple of days and then it started to rain. I left my umbrella in the collectivo... so I am going to have to get another one. And then yesterday we went to this family that lives forever away, walking, I told you about them last year because I went and saw them when I was on splits, I am going to have to send a picture, they don't have much! Thank you for the pictures!!! Everyone looks great in their green! Oh yeah, we also went and did an interview for some sisters in our zone, and their chapel is so cool, it is like and American chapel, but the lady they baptised was super, super awesome! It is so great to see great people! Mom, I love you and I hope that you guys have a great Easter! I want you to know that I know that our Lord and Savior did in fact pay for our sins!!! I know He lives and because he lives we can find a new life, I know that with all my heart! Love you mom, have a great week!!!
Love Elder Grover
