Mga Minamahal kong kapatid,
Unang una, pasensya na kayo na maiksi talaga ang email ko noong nakaraang linggo. Sabi ng mga magulang ko na di na sila magtatanong para mas exciting ang mga emails ko.. Nakakalungkot naman yan.. kasi ewan ko kung saan ko dapat magsimula.. So seguro isasalin nila ito mamaya para sa next time, magtatanong sila at di na kayo malilito sa Tagalog kong letter.
Google translate doesn't do a very good job with that but maybe you guys can figure it out.. =)
((( Google Translate said: First and foremost, that patience really short you email me on last week. My parents said that they could not ask more exciting for the emails I have .. Sadly turn yan .. because I ewan where should I start .. So they translated this insurance later for the next time, and they ask you not ashamed to I Tagalog letter.)))
But yeah.. My parents didn't ask anything at all this week so we'll see how this letter goes.. haha But lots of exciting stuff happened this week I was already planning on talking a lot about it so yeah.. This week was Thanksgiving! And we actually celebrated it! We celebrated it in style. Cuz this week was actually also our mission's mission tour. Which means we have a general authority come and tour our mission. We had Elder Neilson of the Seventy come. He's also in the Area Presidency here in the Philippines. It went superrr good. At the end I felt like we just got done with General Conference. We, as Zone Leaders, got a lot of time with him so it was really cool. Before the "Province" meeting of the mission tour on Wednesday. All the Province Zone Leaders had a meeting
with him. It was really cool because he treated us "as future bishops and stake presidents and leaders of the church." He talked a lot about observing and then acting. He reminded us that there were created two things, things to act and things to be acted upon. We as people are things to act, but too often we give up our agency and become objects by doing nothing, by just going with the flow.
One thing he said that I really liked is that he explained that by not acting we're giving up our agency, the very thing we fought for in the pre-mortal life. Satan sought and seeks to control and eventually take our agency away, and many people don't do anything and voluntarily give up that God given gift. He then invited us to sit on the stand with them and "observe our missionaries." It was really cool because he taught me a lot. I realized that as a Zone Leader, I'm not just another missionary. Like I am, but I'm not at the same time. I have a responsibility to address the needs of the missionaries in my zone as well.
After that meeting we had our Zone Conference/Mission Tour and it was really cool. He essentially started by thanking us all for our service and saying that he knows how hard it is but he said thats just how it is, "in the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints, we do hard things. Salvation is not easy; it requires our very best" For me,being a missionary isn't that hard, but being a great missionary or being the best missionary you can be... now thats difficult. Its hard cuz sometimes its real easy to reach a point in your progress where you can coast or say I got this now. But thats what you gotta avoid when you're trying to be the best missionary, the best disciple you can be. You can't coast. You can't be overly content. You gotta be grateful for the Lord's help, and then ask yourself what do I need to still improve on? And then go back to work. haha Yeah its hard sometimes but you just kinda gotta do it.
Elder Neilson told us the following story at our Special ZLC that we had with him Thursday night, after we we ate a Thanksgiving feast! #Boom! #MashedTaters&Turkey #NoGravyPlease#OhAndDontForgetTheChocolatePie #ThankYou =D hahaha But he related to us what happened when he first got called to be a general authority. He said that he got to church headquarters and got to his office and waited. He was supposed to have some sort of training or something daw. So he had the secretary call down and ask for information. They said that they'd let him know when they need him. So he waited in his office all day. You know just read some scriptures, get yourself settled and all that jazz then he went home. No word about what he's supposed to do. Then the second day same thing happened. Called down a couple times and they said they'd let him know when they needed him. So then I believe it was towards the end of the second day, that he was called into the office of one of the senior apostles. The apostle sat him down and welcomed him. He then said, "Elder Neilson, I understand that much of your life you've been a lawyer. Is that correct?" "Yes." "So that means you've always been scheduled every minute of your day." "Yeah, pretty much." "Well you're not a lawyer anymore. You're a called and set apart servant of the Lord, and it's not like that anymore. So I want you to go back to your office and become." And the interview was over. That was a challenge that he left with all of us at the end of ZLC. He challenged all of us to "go and become." So thats what I'm really striving to do, so I'm excited! At ZLC he also asked us to share one thing that the Spirit taught each of us during the zone conference we had.
It was really cool because every single thing that the other ZLs shared was something that I made special note of during the conference as well. The thing that I shared about was something that we talked about for a little bit during the conference. I felt that as missionaries we really need to do a better job of finishing the job. Our job is not done after baptism or after reactivation. Our job isn't done until both of those kinds of people make it to the temple to receive the saving ordinances there. It's true that members can help ALOT with that part of the journey, but missionaries can help a lot as well, especially here in the Philippines where leadership and fellowship isn't always there. So its up to us sometimes. I thought to myself.. well I wouldn't play a soccer game only to let someone else finish it... The ends the most important part! So yeah thats my spiel on our Mission Tour..
. . . And now I'm out of time.. hahaha Sorry you guys just got a long email about what I learned and nothin too much about experiences or our investigators or what not. Maybe next week.. haha Hope you guys keep being awesome!
Love you!
Elder Michael Gadberry
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