another great week has passed by in this wonderful journey! time flies its weird to think that on the 5th of july ill be on my 5 month mark. but all presses forward in the lords vineyard!
i want to wish all those fathers out there a HAPPY FATHERS DAY! hopefully my card made it to my dad! but this week i took time to write everyone a letter and gave them a picture along with it hopefully those make it out soon. but the letters are short but decided to do something to make up for not getting an email out last week. last week i got to busy to write the email cauz i had to prep my apartment for treatment which i might have to do again but im not sure anyway, you know how your parents always said "goodnight, dont let the bed bugs bite" thinking that was a joke. thats how i thought it was till i was getting eatten alive by them which now i believe in bed bugs. right now i have all my stuff washed and bagged in garbage bags till it gets resolved.
so this week has been cool since we have been able to finally get a hold of allot of our investigators and hopefully the Jamaican family makes it this sunday! we have had great progress with the investigators mike and pedro which have a baptismal date for july 6th so as well as its going i hope they get baptized. hopefully i get to stay another transfer to see it happen but we will see because this transfer ends on the 25th of this month. my prediction is that i may get transferred and get sent to dc biking or something but we will see where The Lord sends me. so also we went to go see a less active that hasn't been to church for a while neither has his family and we went over there to visit with hi one day and we got talking and something came up that was something that The Lord would like him to do and he was telling us how his oldest son that lives with his mom is preparing for a mission and would like his dad to be there but he cant because of a situation i cant mention anyway but he now that his son has brought this up and another thing that is helped him was doing family history but he has this desire to come back to church and he has this feeling that there is temple work he needs to do for family that he has said that he feels he needs to do for some of his family. so he asked us for the phone number to call to set up an appointment with the bishop when he feels he's comfortable to do it. so there was that great miracle and hopefully we can get them re-activated but it will be sweet when they get to that point.
"conversion or re-activation always starts with how they feel, not what they know"
- Elder M. Russell Ballard
(mission conference)
i hope that next week will be a great week full of work to do!
so last week i gave a workshop on 4 christlike attributes and im going to share it with all of you!
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June 11 2014 District Workshop
5 And faith, hope, charity and love, with an eye single to the glory of God, qualify him for the work.
D&C 4
When I think about this scripture I think of as we do theses Christlike attributes we do it through god.
Remember when elder Ballard came and he was telling us when he got called in to get asked to be an apostle and how I think it was president hunter who asked him but said "with all the love I possess" and not "with the authority that I have."
Definition of the Christlike attributes. Scriptures to share.
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Faith
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Faith is to hope for things which are not seen, but which are true (Heb. 11:1; Alma 32:21), and must be centered in Jesus Christ in order to produce salvation. To have faith is to have confidence in something or someone. The Lord has revealed Himself and His perfect character, possessing in their fulness all the attributes of love, knowledge, justice, mercy, unchangeableness, power, and every other needful thing, so as to enable the mind of man to place confidence in Him without reservation. Faith is kindled by hearing the testimony of those who have faith (Rom. 10:14–17). Miracles do not produce faith, but strong faith is developed by obedience to the gospel of Jesus Christ; in other words, faith comes by righteousness, although miracles often confirm one’s faith.
21 And now as I said concerning faith--faith is not to have a perfect knowledge of things; therefore if ye have faith ye hope for things which are not seen, which are true.
Alma 32
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Hope
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to desire something with confidence of fulfillment
a desire supported by confidence of its fulfillment
that which is desired
expectation, confidences
Do we have hope in our day?
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Charity
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The highest, noblest, strongest kind of love, not merely affection; the pure love of Christ. It is never used to denote alms or deeds of benevolence, although it may be a prompting motive (1 Cor. 8:1; 13:1–4, 8; 13; 14:1; Moro. 7:47).
Charity
Do we always look or take those opportunity to help those we see that may need help?
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Love
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April 1995 by president Monson called "that they may hear"
Third, labor with love. There is no substitute for love. Often this love is kindled in youth by a mother, expanded by a father, and kept vibrant through service to God. Remember the Lord’s counsel: “And faith, hope, charity and love, with an eye single to the glory of God, qualify him for the work.”11 Well might each of us ask himself: Today, have I increased in faith, in hope, in charity, in love? When our lives comply with God’s standard and we labor with love to bring souls unto Him, those within our sphere of influence will never speak the lament, “The harvest is past, the summer is ended, and we are not saved.”12
Questions/ discussions
How can these Christ like attributes can help us In our life's.
What does it mean to you to have faith, hope, charity and love towards others?
These where things we talked about to improve our missionary work and just Christlike attributes we can use in our everyday life with those we care about or help out in times of need.
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the thing i like about this workshop is the greatness of the christlike attributes we can use to help others or just those we see that need help. in conference one of the general authorities stated that in the dictionary "selfie" was the word of the year but if we show these christ like attributes to others we can turn the "selfie" word into "selfless acts" and i know we will have happiness and joy as we show this to others. I'm grateful for the gospel we have and the atonement that Jesus Christ has given us and that i can be out here in D.C/Maryland teaching those in the lords vineyard! I'm grateful i can show others the joy and happiness in this gospel. and i say these things in the name of Jesus Christ, amen
I hope everyone's having a great week and a blessed day! Hope everyone gets the letters I sent out! So how has everyone's summer been? How has everyone's week been? I always look forward to others letters or questions for me!
Let me know if you don't get my letter by Wednesday July 18th 2014 so I can try to send it again and so you can have it!
I sent this a day before so that anyone wants me to respond to anything tomorrow so I have the time!
DC NORTH MISSIONARY ELDER SIMONS
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