"Go ye therefore and teach all nations . . ." Matthew 28:19

"Go ye therefore and teach all nations . . ." Matthew 28:19

Monday, October 12, 2015

Week 8 - Poutine, President Worner, and Perseverance - October 12

I had my first poutine this week. It was interesting. Basically it's french fries covered in a gravy sauce of some sort with cheese curds and mine had chicken on it. It was really good! However, I could feel my arteries clogging up slightly ;)






I love our branch president and his family so much!!! He has helped me out so much it's incredible!! He has us over in the mornings 2-3 times a week for language study and he helps us on pronunciation, intonation, grammar and basically anything we need help with or anything he thinks will help us. He is so amazing!! Our lessons are continuously getting better. We had a few lessons with Philippe, a less-active, and we shared a scripture in Alma where Alma is talking and promising blessings to his son Helaman before he dies. Alma 36:3 "And now, O my son Helaman, behold, thou art in thy youth, and therefore, I beseech of thee that thou wilt hear my words and learn of me; for I do know that whosoever shall put their trust in God shall be supported in their trials, and their troubles, and their afflictions, and shall be lifted up at the last day." I then asked him if he had seen this promise in his life and he talked for a good 20 minutes on blessings from the Lord in his life and he talked about his family, it was incredible. Such a testimony builder on the power of inspired questions.


Lessons were hard to come by during the bulk of the week. People "smurfed" us several times which was rough ("smurf" apparently is a term used for stood up).


What has helped me a lot is taking a bit of study time or time after all our lessons to stop by the church and re-listen to conference talks. So powerful each time you listen to them. I absolutely love the talks by Elder Holland and Elder Uchtdorf from the General Young Women's Meeting. (no we didn't watch or listen to all of the women's session we were just advised to listen to those talks in particular) Anyways they are such testimony builders and fill you with the Spirit so strongly! We had a lesson with the former investigator on Friday. Well it was more or less a lesson. It was a conversation mainly about her story and where she came from and about her culture. (she's from Mali and Pres. Worner was with us) At the end of our meeting, she told us that she wasn't going to change religions so we simply shared Alma 36:3 with her and left. She was super nice and has such strong faith as a Muslim!


We had 3 good lessons about the Sabbath with 3 different less-active members and they all said they would come to church.  Unfortunately, none of them came...Understanding that this is the Lord's work and it's done in His time and in His way, it's still sad to see them feel the Spirit but never act upon it or progress.


Church this week was still pretty good. President Worner asked me to conduct sacrament meeting which included 15 people made up, in part, of the two of us missionaries and 5 infants. That was an interesting experience. I'm understanding and I am able to communicate better in French!! The gift of tongues is real, but only after we've been working as hard as we can.



Our little Rimouski Branch Chapel


Last thing, during personal study, I was reading the first few pages of Preach My Gospel (the introductory pages are so power packed!) and I read about charity.  Moroni 7:47 says "But charity is the pure love of Christ, and it endureth forever; and whoso is found possessed of it at the last day, it shall be well with him." Did you catch it? Every time I've read it I've read it as "...he who is found possessing it..." what does it say though? "He who is found possessed of it". What I learned is that charity isn't something we can obtain or have possession of, it's a gift from God that if we ask for it and are worthy of it, it will consume us and become us. It will be who we are. I pray that we all can be worthy of such a gift, for it is the "pure love of Christ" and it comes from, as Elder Bednar explained, turning outward towards others when the natural man would turn inwards. I pray that we all become more Christ-like and try to focus on others, for as we do this, we become like Christ and will be given the gift of charity. Love you all! Stay safe, stay faithful!! Read and pray daily!!



Love you all,
Elder DiReda