May 19, 2014
This is the portion of my letter I wrote to Jordan that he responded to:
I have a neat experience to tell you about that I had today.
You are being very blessed for serving your Heavenly Father and doing
his work selflessly. Well since Grandpa can't contribute to your mission
fund any more, I decided to ask at church today
to see how your account was looking. They did a print up and then came
and sat by me before church started to go over it with me. Every thing
looks regular with all the funds sent in each month, but you actually
have $540.00 dollars extra in your account. I didn't think anything
about it until I was telling Dad and then is hit me. You have 5 months
left and Grandpa can't help and there is $500.00 dollars extra in your
account! I think the Lord is really taking care of you because you are
such a faithful servant. I really had a special feeling about this today
as I put it all together. Thanks for being such a great person and
letting me share in your spiritual experiences. You make us proud.
That's
really cool about my account, I’m glad everything is going to work out. I truly
do feel blessed every day. I am glad that I decided to serve a mission at the
time that I did. It has really shaped me into who I need to be and I know if I
didn't come out when I did that my life would be completely different.
I
don't know if I’ve ever really told yall about how I decided to serve a
mission. My senior year in high school I had pretty much decided I wasn't going
to serve a mission, and the only reason I kept going to mission prep and church
was because I didn't want to listen to you tell me I needed to. The reason I
was going to do a semester of school first was so I would have an excuse not to
go on a mission. towards the end of my senior year, probably like January-ish I
was sitting in a lecture thing at school about college and a weird thought came
to me, "did you pray about it?" and I thought to myself, "that's
a dumb idea." (I know now that it was the spirit). Then over the next week
or two that same thought kept popping up, so I decided to pray about it,
and absolutely nothing happened, not even a hint of answer.
This
really upset me, and shook what little of a testimony I had. (I knew a lot
about the gospel, but I’ve learned now that there is a difference between
knowledge in your mind and knowledge in your heart).I kept praying and asking
what I should do and about a month later I was sitting at work and I got my
answer. I was in the Liquid filling room by myself and I had taken my
headphones out and was just thinking about things, and then the most clear and
powerful voice I have ever heard said, "You need to go on a mission as
soon as you can." the scriptures talk about the spirit being a voice of
perfect mildness that cuts to the heart, and that's exactly what this was. And
from that moment I knew what I needed to do, so I started taking mission prep
and church seriously and started to nourish my testimony again.
It
was hard, there were many days leading up to me leaving on my mission where I had
serious doubts that it was worth it and that I wasn't going to be a good
missionary and all other kinds of weird thoughts. I know now why I had those
thoughts, Satan knew the good that was going to happen from me going on a
mission, not just in my life, but in the lives of those I have served and those
I have served with. I would not be anywhere close to who I am today if I had
not served a mission. There is a reason that I went to the Raleigh mission and
then came up here, there have been events and people who have changed my life
and helped me to make changes in my life and prepare me to make important
decisions in the future. The extra money in my account is just another way that
the lord has had his hand in my life. I have truly been blessed.
This
week went well, we go to meet with one of our investigators. He is a 17 yr old
kid named Chris. The elders have been meeting with him for a month or two. He
is a solid kid, goes to seminary, and mutual. It was a good lesson, we talked
about getting answers to prayers and trying to help him figure out how the
spirit works in his life.
We
have been doing a lot of tracting, which has been hard because this area is a
little more ritzy, so we have been forced to think outside the box and try
new things. We are doing a church tour/open house on Saturday. Members seem
excited about it and it sounds like they will be bringing some friends so it
should be good.
This
ward has a lot of cool families and a lot of them are trying to do missionary
work, so that has been good. I think that's about it for this week.
Love
ya
Jordan
