April 16, 2012

Salutations,
It was a week of finding! All of our progressing amis are out of town or just got baptized, so we did lots of finding this week. It was really fun! It's been a long time, since we've been really busy preparing baptisms. Unfortunately, T wasn't baptized this week. He will be soon, he just needs some more time. He's definitely the most prepared and sincere person Elder Gubbay and I have ever met on our missions. Wen Xue and Arnaud are doing fantastic. One of the greatest parts of the mission is to see the blessings that people receive as they accept and live the Gospel. This week after their baptisms they both have been greatly blessed in so many aspects of their lives. It's incredible to see how quickly the Lord rewards His children for their obedience. W X is doing some missionary work as well! She has a chinese friend named Shi (pronounced "sure"). Basically, she talked to him about her baptism, he saw what it did for her and he wanted it as well, so he came to church with her and he told us he wants to be baptized. He has a date for the 5th of May as well as G and D. It should be a good day that day! Other than the people I've mentioned, we don't really have any other investigators that progress.
We're really focusing on finding the elect right now and inviting every single person to be baptized. We did a lot of finding this week via our mormon board. That bad boy works miracles still. We've also been doing this thing called "pillars of light" that the assistants showed us during zone council in Lyon a couple weeks ago. It's just a basic contact method, but it works really well. It's based off of Joseph Smith's experience prior to and during the first vision. Just like Joseph Smith had a question, we start the contact by an inspired question like, what have you done to build a happy family? Or what is the purpose of life? They start thinking about the question and start talking, then we teach a simple truth (like when Joseph Smith was taught by James from the Bible) and testify of it and allow the Spirit to confirm that truth and tie it to the restoration. There's more that is linked with Joseph Smith's experience, but I just had a blank and can't think haah sorry. But the idea is really cool. God can't speak to men until they ask questions. President shared soemthing really cool during zone council. He said one time when he was a 70 they were in a meeting with presidetn Packer. President Packer was addressing some issue about people thinking we're not Christians and he took some time to take questions. President Murdock asked him, "president Packer, why do they think we're not Christians?" Pres. Packer, "it's called the apostasy - next question." In that moment, it hit president that the apostasy continues today and the restoration didn't happen in 1830, but it happens every time someone is converted to the Gospel. We're not here to contact, teach lessons, etc; We're here to restore the Gospel into the lives of these people who are still living in the apostasy! I love having this vision of things. We need to bring people to the sacred grove by everything we do and we need to allow them to have the Gospel restored in their lives and end the apostasy. I know the church is true! We've gotta go to a lesson, so I had to cut my thought short. Sorry! Have a great week! Love you.
Love,
Elder Tudor