Kamusta, tanan!
Another transfer in
Naga, and yet another English speaking companion who was a district leader!
We'll see if the same thing happens as my other companions who have stepped up
to leadership positions in the mission. In the zone, right now I'm called the
"refiner's fire" because of all my companions who are now leaders. My
first companion is now district leader, my second went home because of medical
issues, my third and fourth became zone leaders right after being my companion.
- I was talking to Elder Woods the other day (he was the one who came up with 'refiner's
fire') and he was talking about how I prepare leaders and so he said that I'm
"like the smith or armour-er or whatever and take the materials and just
bam bam bam then they're like 'this is a good shiny piece of leader' " I
couldn't help but laugh, hearing shiny and leader together. But if that's what
the Lord needs, that's what I want to be, making shiny refined leaders :) The
other missionaries say that if a missionary can survive as my companion,
they'll step up to a leadership position. But either way, I'm just going to
continue to try improving and become the best missionary I can be.
The last couple of days,
we've been teaching a lot of investigators about baptismal covenant and how
important it is. The reason for that is because of the new rule in the mission
that if they're 15-17 and no adult member (family support) in the residence
there's two options for them to be baptized: 6 months of pagsimba (going to
church) or permission from president. It's also really easy to show how
important it is with how many examples of people who were baptized and went
inactive. For example, one investigator is staying at a member's house for
school - we were going to baptize her but I'm glad we didn't because awhile
back there were two others who were from the same house and they were baptized
and later finished up their work and went back to their families who weren't
members and the nearest church is a long way away from Tuburan where she lives
- nearest is Balamban. She happens to be from the same place; we'll see what
happens in March when she graduates. Then we have others who are going less
active who already live close to the church! The main problem with that
particular group is we made the mistake of telling them the specific reason for
them not being baptized yet (4 Sundays in a row) so they made the extra effort
to do what they needed to be baptized; that made it much more difficult to see
their conversion and so we thought they were doing good and so they were
baptized. now, about a month and a half later one or two out of the five of
them didn't come over the holidays. They haven't been attending lessons either
so we haven't been able to discuss the exceeding need to be baptized. Anyways,
with our other investigators right now, I'm really glad we get the chance to
see their conversion if it's true or not. Even though I want to see them
baptized, first I want to make sure that they're converted. Baptizing someone
without converting them is like having something that's broken, but trying to
use it before you fix it; it may work for awhile or longer if you're lucky, but
most all of the time, it's going to break down.
So what needs to be done
is to make sure their fixing (repentance) is done to the point where they're
converted through faith.
So until next time, hope
everything's going well with you and yours!
Og misyonaryo sa Ginoo,
si Elder Dallin Carlson
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