Querida Familia,
On the blue box you may discover how to spell "Milk" in Spanish! Yes, that does say "combined with vegetable oil", too.
On the blue box you may discover how to spell "Milk" in Spanish! Yes, that does say "combined with vegetable oil", too.
That was a super-potente package, guys, thank you. I am using everything in it. My favorite things in the world to get are letters and granola bars. (If you are going to send something to a missionary and don’t know what to send, send letters and granola bars.) And THANK YOU, Bup, for sending the music and player. I feel very spoiled. :)
I was walking down the street the other day and realized, “Wait
a second. My mission is NOT ending soon. I have 6 more months.” I had a like a
week of feeling a little trunqui (trunky =
ready to pack your bags to go home!) but I realized I need to snap out of
it.
I love Hermana Carr. She is a beautiful person. Nos
desahogamos muy bien juntas (we are able
to unburden/ de-stress well together), usually during breakfast or while we’re
sitting in our hamacas. We think a lot about the same things, so we can just
talk and talk and talk. We’re also
really good at pointing out our problems and being feedback-givers. I’m going
to miss her a lot. Transfers are this
Sunday. :-(
Heavenly Father really does answer specific questions. But
he also does it according to the “intentness” of our desire. I think that’s why
he usually does it line upon line, precept upon precept. Hermana Carr and I had
a lot of problems knowing what we are supposed to teach in the first lesson
because we received a lot of confusing instruction from our leaders. And the
first lesson is the most important, so it made us feel like really bad
missionaries because, even though we have been giving first lessons our whole
mission, we suddenly felt like we had no idea what to do.
But for about two weeks we prayed (frequently and out loud)
about it and poco a poco (little by
little) we studied it and practiced it and we’ve gotten to a point where we
now feel decently comfortable about it. And people are accepting mas fechas en
la primera lección (setting dates in the
first lesson).
In case you want to know what we do, our first lesson is:
[How to Begin Teaching]
1. The first paragraph of How to Begin Teaching (Preach My Gospel, Teaching Skills) plus
a few other personal questions (i.e. why they want to listen to us, or what is
hard in their life that they wish was better--the point is to find what the
gospel can help them with.)
2. Based on what we learned from step one, we use a few of
the 10 Points of How to Begin Teaching
3. Sing Hymn (usually I am a Child of God)
4. Teach how and why we pray, and invite them to give the
prayer at the end. One of us prays.
[God is Our Loving Heavenly Father]
5. Teach the newly-added principle of the Godhead (God and
Christ both have bodies and are two different people, and they are also
different from the Spirit.)
We then explain what the GOAL of those three beings (bring to pass eternal life of man), and then describe the functions of the three
using the principles: God is Our Loving Heavenly Father. That was the
hardest part for us because at the beginning we really didn’t understand that
principle. (Go study this section for two weeks!) At some point, explain the purpose of the
Spirit (help us recognize truth) and
explain how to know when you are feeling the Spirit.
[Baptismal Invitation]
6. Sometimes the next part is going out on a wing with the
Spirit to tie their need into baptism, but usually it involves something like:
“God has provided us a (singular, definitive) way to have success
in this life and return with Him in the next” which then leads us to the
Restoration-- that if they aren’t LIVING the RESTORED gospel, they can’t have
eternal life. Tah-dah! baptism with proper authority.
OR, another option, when mentioning “The Atonement is a central
part of God's plan,” we explain how in order to FULLY make use of the Atonement
(be comforted, be enabled, be forgiven) we have to make authorized covenants
with God. Tah-dah! baptism with proper authority to receive the gift of the
Holy Ghost.
Invite to be baptized.
7. We then explain the Restoration briefly to explain
restored authority to baptize/restored doctrine.
8. Briefly explain how the Book of Mormon teaches that
doctrine and give them a copy.
9. Commit them to READ the Book of Mormon and the
Restoration pamphlet, PRAY if it is true, and GO to church that Sunday.
10. Make the next appointment and ask who they can invite to
be here the next time.
11. They pray. We congratulate them.
12. Next appointment!
Of course, all very subject to changes according to the
Spirit.
Love you all a lot. I imagine you’ll probably hear about a
new companion next week...
Love,
Hermana Ludlam
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