Changing Perspectives

I don´t know if you saw the world wide special broadcast.  It was so awesome!  My comp and I have been having a lot of thoughts about our purpose and what we do.  We have felt like we just work our butts off and nothing happens because the members don´t care at all.  In the end, we made a sick ward mission plan and got the members more involved, and it´s just starting to role.  

Then we saw this broadcast, and the general authorities basically confirmed everything that we had done.  So cool!!!  They were even using a ton of scriptures that we had used for our ward vision like Alma 31:34-35, and my mission scripture in Jacob 5:70-72.  That last one still gives me chills everytime that I read it.  It´s the best.  I´m really pumped.  I feel like I just got here from the mtc and I´m an excited young missionary.  It´s pretty awesome.

I really do feel totally different.  I feel great.

This is the last week for President Veirs.  I´m really going to miss him, but I´m sure that the next one will be great.  The good thing to remember is that in the end, it´s the same Master.  Jesus Christ is at the head of this mission, and of every mission.  Catch the wave!

 

So what have you done this week to share the Gospel?

So this week has been a week of changing perspectives.  I´m learning a lot, and seeing some incredible changes in the work.

For those of you who haven´t seen the special world wide broadcast of the quorum of the 12 and first pres, you all need to watch it now.  here´s a link.

http://www.lds.org/training/wwlt/2013/hastening/special-broadcast?lang=eng

I love this work.  There is something that everyone needs to understand.  

THIS IS THE MOST IMPORTANT CAUSE IN THE WORLD.  

It doesn´t matter what you´re doing, how busy you are, or how important the thing is that you´re doing.  It´s not more important than sharing the Gospel of Jesus Christ with others.

"Never let a problem to be solved become more important than a person to be loved."  Thomas S. Monson

Being a missionary is the best thing that has ever happened in my life.  I honestly have never been happier.  Never more motivated to do something in my life.  

Even more than athletics, more than making movies, more than anything.  

This is the work of saving souls.  There is no greater cause.

This week we put all of our efforts into helping the members join us in this work.  They seem to be responding with enthusiasm, but this week is when the plan goes into full swing.  We already see results, but this is going to test everyone of us.  I Can´t Wait!  I think that we´re going to see a lot of miracles here in La Miramar.

I lovey you all, and hope that everyone this week can Catch the Wave!!!

Creativity

 

This week we had a leadership meeting and we learned a whole bunch about how we need to help the members and missionaries think outside the box.  A lot of times, you just spend two years doing the same old thing over and over.... you get bored.  And it really can be boring.  I don´t know why none of us enjoy it more, when all you have to do is be creative.  

The Watermelon.  So one thing we did (that wasn´t totally my idea) was use food.  We visited a member and shared a quick scripture; Alma 18:10.  You know, the one about how the worth of souls is great.  Then you just talk for about thirty seconds about how everyone is important.  "you´re important right.  And I´m important too!  And your neighbors... God loves them and values them too. Do you like pineapple?"

"Huh?"  The member wakes up a little bit...

"Yeah, ya know, those little cakes with pineapple in them?"

A little more interested in what we´re saying now... "yeah!  those are delicious.  Who doesn´t?"

"Yeah, well we have some that we´d like to share with you."

Very happy to receive them, and a little less confused, he enjoys his pineapple cake.  We also ate one each.  Then we ask, "Who doesn´t like pineapple cakes?  I bet that everyone on this street where you live likes pineapple cakes!"

"Yeah I bet your right," he responds.

At this point, I hope you know how close I was to just laughing.  This was just so funny to see this guy get so excited about those pineapple cakes.  It just makes me smile.

"Let´s go and give the rest of these to your neighbors!"

So we excitedly went and shared a pineapple flavored Gospel message with his neighbors, and found an innactive family out of it.  It was pretty hilariously effective, and we will be doing it again for sure.  But the great thing was just how stinkin´ fun it was.  I think that me and my companion were laughing about it for the whole day.  Sometimes Honduranians are just a hoot.

We also sharred an awesome new ward mission plan with the members.  We are going to have each of the six organizations of the ward visit investigators that pertain to them daily.  (relief society, elders, youth, etc...).  And we´re going to make a tree, and each branch represents an organization.  So let´s say that there´s a branch that is elders quorum.  And let´s say they have ten investigators.  That branch will have ten leaves.  Now if four of those go to church, those leaves become flowers, because going to church means they´re progressing towards baptism.  And when they get baptized, the flour becomes a fruit!  Awesome!  And the goal is to have at least one fruit for every organization every month.  And that means the ward (with help from the missionaries) will baptize six people minimum every month.  Best idea ever!

Missionary work is the bomb!!!!  And it should be fun.  It´s is easy!  I love it so much, and I especially love helping others do it.  I love this county, and I love these people.  The mission is the best thing that´s every ocurred in my life.

Love,

Elder Kent Thalman

A Storm is Coming...

So, this week honestly was mostly a learning week.  I feel like we haven´t made any huge progress, but the work goes on.  What I did really feel this week was that I am now learning what needs to happen so that things really do change.  And what changes need to occur in our work so that it really does happen.  For that reason, I´m excited to write you all next week to see what really occurs here in la Zona Miramar in the next few days.  I have a lot of faith that if we all put these things in practice, things are going to explode.

In the multi zone conference Elder Moreno (AP) explained how we can improve our relationships with the members.  There are three types of confidence that we can have with them.  We can have the gossipy latina confidence, the Friendship confidence, and the worker confidence.  The first is destructive.  All you accomplish is that they tell you all the bad things everyone in the ward has ever done.  The second is good, but not sufficient.  It just accomplishes a good relationship, but doesn´t really get anything done.  Then he explained that respect is most important in the end, and that´s what comes from having worker confidence in the mission with the members.  They know that you´re there to share the Gospel, to baptize, and to get work done.

Elder Buffat explained how to work with each organization to baptize more people and increase activity in the church, which in the end was an excellent capitation.  I think I´ll spare the details, but it was awesome.  We´re going to put that one enthusiastically into practice this month, and hopefully in the whole zone.

President Veirs talked about something called the four missionaries, that blew me away.  I had to reevaluate my whole mission.  It was great.  I think that it was based off of a longer talk from somewhere that I had seen.  If I find it, I´ll send it.  Really great stuff.

America is progressing, and she made a cool comment last night.  She went to church on her own yesterday, and really loved the stake conference (which was awesome).  Then in the lesson we talked about the Sabbath Day observance and how you don´t shop on Sunday.  There were here grand kids making a ruckus there (really funny kids) and she was trying to help them understand.  She said that George (her son who is a member) had explained to her that stuff about Sundays and that she wasn´t going to shop anymore on Sundays after she is baptized.  Those are little things that are cool to hear out of the mouths of your investigators.  I think that she´s for sure going to get baptized.

Oscar and Jessica did a small sale making hamburgers to pay for their wedding, which went really well.  Now they have all the money that they need to get married, and they are a "for sure family this month of June!"  We´re both pumped for them, because they´re not just a good receptive family, but they have all their sights set on making it to the temple and being sealed in exactly one year!  Way awesome.

I love this mission. Things will move forward!  The gospel with move forward independently!  It really doesn´t matter what we do.  It honestly is more about how much do we want to participate.  God lets us participate and He shares in His divine power to save.  Nothing that I´ve done in the mission is on behalf of myself or my worthiness.  In other words, I don´t deserve anything from God.  He has given it to me.  And if we thrust our plow in and reap with all our might, we reap salvation.

I love this work.  I love these people.

Elder Thalman

The Best Days of My Life

So, I wouldn´t say that this was the best week ever, but I´m really just reflecting on how much I love being a missionary and being on the mission.  I´ve had some really tough spots and all, but the mission itself is just way awesome.  I´m really happy, and I especially love making other people happy.  I love serving them and even other missionaries.  I´m learning a lot about what hope really is.  I never got it, no matter how many darn times I read chapter six of Preach My Gospel.  

But now I´m getting it.  You can tell if someone has hope depending on their attitude.  If they are really committed to working, and they do it happily, they have hope.  Some of the best missionaries I´ve ever met are just superstars because they´re so darn happy!  Really positive all the time, and it´s something that I´ve always aspired to do...  to be.  

This week, we´re progressing with three part member families.  All three are going to get baptized in June, which is super exciting.  The area is really moving forward, as well as the zone.  In April the zone baptized only four.  In may, five.  This month, we want to baptize (as a goal) about thirty.  Honestly, the minimum will be twenty in my opinion.  But we could get the goal of thirty honestly.  I love this zone.  It´s so cool.

Today, we went and played football (500) on the beach, and got ... wet.  Didn´t break any rules... we can´t control the rain.  haha.  It was way fun.  I´ll send pics.

We did an activity call 4Pasteles, which we had done before, but never in this ward.  We basically used extortionism (which really isn't a word) to get references from the members... or in other words, cake.  Whomever gave us the most refs. won the cake.  haha.  And there were four of them, so we got about 50 references.  most of those, for competitive reasons will be garbage, so probably more like 20, but that´s not bad!  haha.

This mission is the best!

Love you all!

Elder Kent Thalman