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