April 27, 2015

Hey Everyone!

This week was quite an adventure and extremely busy!
We had a Zone conference and housed some ASL Missionaries who trained
us on how to contact and help deaf people! They are just rolling out
an ASL Branch and beginning to meet people they can help who
beforehand couldn't meet with missionaries because of being deaf. It's
a pretty neat thing to see the fulfillment of the scripture in D&C 90:

For it shall come to pass in that day, that every man shall hear the
fulness of the gospel in his own tongue, and in his own language,
through those who are ordained unto this power, by the administration
of the Comforter, shed forth upon them for the revelation of Jesus
Christ" (D&C 90:11).

They may not "hear" the gospel, but they will learn the fullness of
the gospel in their language, and most importantly learn from the Holy
Ghost that it's true!

It's been interesting to see how the church has been focusing a lot
lately on keeping the Sabbath Day Holy and Fasting. It was a topic in
our zone conference as well as Stake Conference this weekend with
Elder Stoddard from the Seventy. It's definitely something I will be
studying and applying more completely.

Ashley got baptized this last week! We weren't actually able to go to
our own Investigator's baptism because she did it in her hometown
which is outside the mission. So we were bummed about that, but it
doesn't really matter because she got baptized all the same, and she
had so much support they had to move to the chapel! We are excited for
her.

We have been praying a lot lately for the Lord to lead us to a family
at we can teach and help be baptized. Last week we found our family,
the Montoyas! They are some of the most humble and prepared people we
have met in a while. It was exciting to feel the spirit teach and
testify of the Restoration to this family who has been searching for a
long time!

Well I feel like I talk about the same things every week, so if you
have anything you'd like to hear about so I don't bore you to death,
please email me and tell me what you'd like to hear more of!
I love you all and pray you will be safe and have a wonderful week!

Elder Collin Christensen

April 20, 2015

Buenas tardes!
This week was awesome. Saturday Jake and Ashley got hitched and later that day Jake was baptized! He is a trooper and has a solid testimony of the Gospel. The hilarious part was the Batman themed Wedding in the church building...don't worry, we felt uncomfortable too. Haha They were happy though! Just a few months ago Jake considered himself the last person to join the church, but after spending time around his close member friends and feeling the spirit he started to recognize the truth of the Gospel. My favorite part of being a missionary is definitely seeing the gospel click in someone's mind and heart, and then watching it bring light into their lives as they live it. I don't know how else to put it! 

I've been reading through the Book of Mormon again looking for how people demonstrate Attributes of Christ. It's been one of my favorite times reading through and I have noticed several things I have never noticed before. One of my favorites so far has been Nephi. If you know who Nephi is, you know he was courageous and stalwart, and extremely obedient. Well of course that's what we learn growing up, every kid wants to be "large in stature" and chosen to be a "ruler" over their siblings like Nephi was. But honestly, it's pretty true that most people admire Nephi and want to be like him. But how did he get the way he was? Was he just born that way? I always just assumed so.
"And it came to pass that I, Nephi, being exceedingly young, nevertheless being large in stature, and also having great desires to know of the mysteries of God, wherefore, I did cry unto the Lord; and behold he did visit me, and did soften my heart that I did believe all the words which had been spoken by my father; wherefore, I did not rebel against him like unto my brothers." (1 Nephi 2:16)

I love this. Even Nephi had to have his heart softened, but it all just began with a desire to know the truth of what his father had spoken. Nephi had to gain his own personal witness and testimony before he could courageously say "I will go and do the things which the Lord hath commanded" in chapter 3. Because of his desire and effort to know the truth, the Lord said:

"Blessed art thou, Nephi, because of thy faith, for thou hast sought me diligently, with lowliness of heart. And inasmuch as ye shall keep my commandments, ye shall prosper" (1 Nephi 19-20).

Personal application is that we can try our best to be as faithful as Nephi, but in end if we don't begin with a desire and effort to know the truth we can't do the right things for the right reasons. Sometimes coming to know something comes from living it. Whatever way we learn truth, I'm grateful for the Book of Mormon and how it can teach us truth according to our needs. I know it was written for our day.

Have an awesome week everyone!

Elder Collin Christensen

April 13, 2015

Family and Friends:

This week was awesome! Damien got baptized and he is pumped to go to
the temple with us soon! He bore his testimony of how his baptism for
him was the fresh start he had been looking for, and even invited some
non member friends to come! The Spirit in those baptismal services is
unique and it's no question to me that those who choose to be baptized
are following God's will for them. I'll attach some pictures!

This week we had a bunch of meetings, so it was the longest I've
stayed in Phoenix in a long time. After our MLC I exchanged with Elder
Taylor down there, who grew up in the Mexican Colonies in Chihuahua. I
learned a ton from him and we had a good time. It was crazy seeing so
many Spanish speakers again! During our exchange we had a Spanish
Specialized Training done by a professor from Spain! We had a family
from my first ward in Peoria bring their taco truck by and feed us all
lunch too, it was awesome. I miss that culture so much! The Spanish
speaking population and missionaries here makes me so happy. A lot of
them don't have much, and yet most of them are happier than any
English speaking person I've met. I think a lot of it has to do with
things like outlook, perspective and priorities. Most everything they
do is for their families, and not for themselves. It wouldn't be fair
to say they are all this way, and English speakers are all the
opposite, but it's always been something I've loved since I began my
mission.

This week we had a Zone meeting about online Proselyting. Since we
haven't had it for a while as missionaries, most people don't miss it.
It was viewed as just a distraction. Yet the prophets and apostles
have said missionaries will use Facebook to move the work forward. So
we took away everyone's phones and said we wouldn't have them for a
while. It was pretty hilarious to see because everyone was freaking
out. No one knew what they'd do without their phones because it's so
helpful in missionary work. Finally we told them we weren't really,
but that we have to change our mindset of how we use Facebook so that
its as resourceful to us as our phones are. It will be cool once we
get back on to see how things change and how the work picks up!

Funniest door we knocked this week was a less active members house. No
one answered so we knocked again, and within seconds a Great Dane
opens the door and walks out to greet us. No humans home, just the dog
welcoming visitors! Haha Animals must be getting smarter.

Well, today we played racquetball with our investigator Arnaud and his
friend Tyler, who's a member. It was super fun, was going well until
Elder Searle pegged him real hard right where it counts. Poor kid, we
will see if he wants to keep meeting with us when we see him tonight.
Haha
Love you all! Have an awesome day!

Elder Collin Christensen

April 6, 2015

Dear Family and Friends!

Well General Conference was fantastic, and it's kinda sad it was my
last one as a missionary! I spent a while before conference praying
about questions and concerns I had for some Investigators and for
myself. Almost every talk addressed one of my questions directly and
gave me a lot to think about! I've mostly been worried about people
who choose to doubt their faith and testimony, and I learned that for
one thing I need to be patient and have more faith that God is in
control, since it's HIS work. I learned we can help others latch onto
the truth they do know while helping them find answers to their honest
questions one at a time. I also learned that sometimes people just
aren't ready, and their testimonies will be rediscovered at the
perfect time in the future. Overall I felt like gained a brighter
understanding of what Jesus Christ did for each of us, how and why.
I've been asking myself lately why it's so easy for us to forget him,
besides two holidays a year when we celebrate his life and mission.
I'm learning that when we can successfully keep our promise to "always
remember him" each day, we feel the Holy Ghost in greater abundance
and enjoy our lives more completely. I'm setting a plan for myself so
that I can "seek the Lord" and remember him each and everyday, even
when I am not a missionary anymore. Anyways, I hope you all got the
chance to watch General Conference, and whether or not you did that
you go to LDS.org to watch and study these talks regularly. If you
watch or read 1-2 talks each week starting this week you will be able
to study all the talks again before General Conference in October!

We had a great week, with significantly less hiccups than the previous
three weeks. We saw an awesome example of member missionary work. A
member was praying for missionary opportunities and an ability to
invite several of his friends he was thinking about. Instead of those
friends, a random acquaintance from work approached him and asked to
"learn about Mormons" and so we taught his friend for the first time
last week! This was a prime example of how to exercise faith and
desire in the Lord's work, and how the Lord rewards us in ways we
wouldn't expect. We will be teaching him again tonight! Another tender
mercy this week was when we were out in the boonies of our ward making
visits, and as we were on our way back into town we got a call from a
family who had hit a bear on their drive to Missouri and the daughter
was in bad shape. They were right by the Flagstaff airport and they
just so happened to call us right before we passed the exit to the
airport. We got there within a minute of him calling us and were able
to give his daughter a Priesthood blessing. It was pretty amazing how
the timing worked out!
Well I love each of you and hope to hear what your favorite parts of
conference were! Have an awesome week!

Elder Collin Christensen

March 30, 2015

Buenas tardes!

I'm pretty wiped so I'm sorry this will be short. This week we had a
lot of success as far as finding and teaching this week! We are
finally starting to see some balance between our work in the family
Ward and the work in the YSA ward. We began teaching a guy named
Arnaud who is solid! He has been going to institute classes for the
last couple semester. He previously investigated but his parents made
him stop. Now he is at college and realizes this is something he wants
in his life. It's crazy yet so obvious that we are naturally drawn to
the gospel in our lives.  We also began teaching a Chinese Scholar
here at NAU. He has broken English but understands pretty good, and he
is super interested in Mormonism. He enrolled in every institute class
we offer and is now taking missionary lessons! A member is bringing
him and a group of 15+ other Chinese students to the Easter Pageant at
the Mesa Temple, and also to the Payson, Utah temple open house! They
are awesome and will be going back to China soon, but the amazing
thing is that the Church's representative in China has a son living in
our stake who is helping us! Since no one can be baptized yet in China
unless they are family, this is a super neat opportunity to help them
accept the gospel now that they are here so their families will have
it in the future. He told us that to him the family was the most
important social unit in his perspective. He pointed at the Family
Proclamation to the World on our wall and said "that is Chinese
Culture." Once again, it's evidence that the gospel just has a
familiar "ring" to it when you begin to discover it with an open
heart.
In addition to these awesome successes cam some pretty huge setbacks
and trials last week. We went from having 6 on date to be baptized to
3, and 2 of them completely stopped meeting with us due to anti Mormon
material and just pressure in general. It's been tough to live with an
understand why it's all happening at once. This is the most busy, fun,
fruitful, and rewarding area I've ever served in, and yet it's also
proven to have the most stress, frustration and disappointment. Mostly
because we've had to watch people we love gain testimonies from the
Holy Ghost and then not act upon it, and even completely ignore it.
That's been the hardest thing for me to deal with. When someone sees
the fruits of the gospel, lives it, loves it, knows it's true, commits
to follow the commandments, and then totally lets go. That kills me
more than anything. And yet I know God has a plan for me, and a
purpose for me at this time to experience these setbacks. It's good,
it's teaching me patience and humility that's for sure!
Well I love you all and hope you have a lovely Easter weekend watching
General Conference! Remember to share the new video on
helives.mormon.org, or watch it if you haven't yet!

Elder Collin Christensen