Monday, April 28, 2014

Photo Update

I promised last week that I would try to send a photo today, so here it is.  That's my companion, Elder Pappenfuss on the left, our newest member and her husband (who is already a Church member), and me.


Our mission scripture is 3 Nephi 5:13.  I have it memorized in Mongolian, Russian, and English.

"Behold, I am a disciple of Jesus Christ, the son of God.  I have been called of him to declare his word among his people, that they might have everlasting life."

The Mongolian people are God's people, just like any other people on the earth, and it's a privilege to be here to help them find everlasting life.

Monday, April 21, 2014

Bacon

My companion and I found a person in the local market that had imported a bunch of bacon from Hungary.  I told her that it was Americans' favorite meat!  I hope that didn't make her raise the price on it before we bought it, but I cooked up the bacon along with some eggs and toast one morning.  We had a real breakfast!  It was great.

We had a baptism this week, the wife of a returned missionary.  They asked me to perform the baptism, which was very nice. Our weather is nice and warm, despite some snow over the weekend.

Easter isn't really celebrated in Mongolia, but we did enjoy a nice meal at a member's home.  The celebrations don't matter as much as the reason for the day.  I am grateful for the Savior's Atonement and love to see people in Mongolia accept it.

Monday, April 14, 2014

General Conference

We have to wait a week to see General Conference until it can be translated from English into Mongolian, but we watched it this weekend.  I look forward to studying it out more, but I liked it.

I remember one talk about educating our desires.  I once saw a photo of some graffiti that declared "Never regret anything because at one time it was exactly what you wanted."  But this assumes that wanting something somehow makes it okay or better than something else.  Yet as rational beings and as children of God, we have the ability to stop and think when we want something and, to the best of our ability, consider whether it will lead us ultimately to good or to bad.  And if we realize a desire or pattern of desires that does not agree with God's commandments or we can otherwise see it might bring us down a bad path, we can over time change and remove that desire.

It's a simple reminder to use the example of a donut.  If we see one and want to eat it, we can also take a moment to consider that tomorrow the "joy" of eating that donut will have gone away, but the poor nutrition of that donut will remain with us in negative ways.  Realizing that, we can also realize we don't really want it, and we can avoid eating it.  It's a good skill to develop.

I really liked President Eyring's talk about being a priesthood hero and Elder Oaks talk about the priesthood.  There were other talks I liked, of course, but I need to study them more.