Dear Family and Friends!!!
Once again another amazing and inspiring week in paradise!! This week we accomplished once again another miracle as a mission, we blessed 1000 homes in a week in South Florida! That is over 1000 people whos lives were already blessed because of the peace that the gospel can bring into our lives. It reminds me of the song the Spirit of God, and the work truly is going forth like a fire is burning! This is a "great and marvelous work" and I am honored to be a part of it. One thing we try to do as missionaries is just like Elder Bednar has said to act and not be acted upon! I have seen that out here in the mission field there is no substitute for hard work. When trials come you just have to push threw them with hard work, something I definetly learned how to do while playing baseball. I heard a talk that really touched me a while ago while I was back home from President Uchtdorf on working hard. He said, "The Lord doesn’t expect us to work harder than we are able. He doesn’t (nor should we) compare our efforts to those of others. Our Heavenly Father asks only that we do the best we can—that we work according to our full capacity, however great or small that may be...When our wagon gets stuck in the mud, God is much more likely to assist the man who gets out to push than the man who merely raises his voice in prayer—no matter how eloquent the oration." President Thomas S. Monson put it this way: “It is not enough to want to make the effort and to say we’ll make the effort. … It’s in the doing, not just the thinking, that we accomplish our goals. If we constantly put our goals off, we will never see them fulfilled.” As stated by two of the brethren just like Elder Bednar said we need to "act, and not be acted upon"! As missionaries we MUST get out, get our hands dirty and get to work. There is no substitute for hard work.
Elder Shaffer and I definetly worked hard this week to bring people closer to Jesus Christ! This Saturday we taught a total of ten lessons and at the end of the day we had 34 total lessons in this week. Elder Shaffer and I looked at each other at the end of the day during daily planning and said let's push ourselves and get 40 total lessons in this week!! "We can do it," we told each other! So we went out on Sunday after church and went to work teaching absolutely anybody about the Restored Gospel of Jesus Christ and blessing their lives because we did so. Around 7:00 we looked at our watches and saw that we only had two hours left in the day and needed to teach four more lessons to reach our miracle goal of 40 lessons in one week. Of course that just meant that we had to work even harder. We knew if we had enough faith and worked hard then the Lord would provide a way for us to reach our goal! So we were led to a former investigator that we havent been able to see in a while. As we were walking to his door he opened the door before we got there and was really happy to see us it was perfect! We asked if we could share a quick message about Jesus Christ and he accepted. So we shared a message about the Atonement and being baptized and commited him to quit smoking and follow the example of Jesus Christ threw baptism! With the rest of the night we taught three more lessons and the Lord allowed us to reach our goal! I know this is only because we had faith that the Lord would prepare a way and we worked hard. We were almost running from door to door cause we were so excited and pumped about missionary work.
Elder Shaffer and I definetly worked hard this week to bring people closer to Jesus Christ! This Saturday we taught a total of ten lessons and at the end of the day we had 34 total lessons in this week. Elder Shaffer and I looked at each other at the end of the day during daily planning and said let's push ourselves and get 40 total lessons in this week!! "We can do it," we told each other! So we went out on Sunday after church and went to work teaching absolutely anybody about the Restored Gospel of Jesus Christ and blessing their lives because we did so. Around 7:00 we looked at our watches and saw that we only had two hours left in the day and needed to teach four more lessons to reach our miracle goal of 40 lessons in one week. Of course that just meant that we had to work even harder. We knew if we had enough faith and worked hard then the Lord would provide a way for us to reach our goal! So we were led to a former investigator that we havent been able to see in a while. As we were walking to his door he opened the door before we got there and was really happy to see us it was perfect! We asked if we could share a quick message about Jesus Christ and he accepted. So we shared a message about the Atonement and being baptized and commited him to quit smoking and follow the example of Jesus Christ threw baptism! With the rest of the night we taught three more lessons and the Lord allowed us to reach our goal! I know this is only because we had faith that the Lord would prepare a way and we worked hard. We were almost running from door to door cause we were so excited and pumped about missionary work.
But overall we taught a lot of amazing people this week and are trying to prepare them to accept the gospel threw the blessings of baptism. A lot of people are SOO CLOSE we just must invite the Spirit to push them so they can accept the step and blessings of baptism. Wellington South is amazing I absolutely love it here! Everything is going amazing and mom everytime you write me please write about something other than how you miss me I'll be home in two years after doing the Lords work! There is one thing I really do miss though and that's shredin the slopes.. Everyone in two years we'll all have to go shred again I love you all!! Oh and one thing I do want from all my family and friends is if you guys would get a blank paperback Book of Mormon and write your testimony in the cover and then send it to me so I can find someone who is prepared by the hand of the Lord and you can bless their life threw your testimony. If y'all would do this I would appreciate it thank you!!!!
This is the Lords work and His church as well! Threw faith and hard work anything is possible, and I testify of that. I love our Heavenly Father and this is absolutely his truth! Anyone, absolutely anyone, can find more peace in and threw the Book of Mormon than anything else in this life! Thank y'all for all your support! We finna go home to catch some fish and hopefully eat them as well! Letters are much appreciated!!!
This is the Lords work and His church as well! Threw faith and hard work anything is possible, and I testify of that. I love our Heavenly Father and this is absolutely his truth! Anyone, absolutely anyone, can find more peace in and threw the Book of Mormon than anything else in this life! Thank y'all for all your support! We finna go home to catch some fish and hopefully eat them as well! Letters are much appreciated!!!
With Love,
Elder Pond
