Sacrifice brings forth the blessings of Heaven‏

ON WEDNESDAYS WE WEAR PINK

Haha that is a movie quote, but our district decided to wear pink to our district meeting this week... Per my request.

I taught our district about

"Living up to our Godly Potential"
and how we get lost and confused and distracted sometimes and forget that we are CHILDREN OF GOD.

I also talked about Lehi's dream in the Book of Mormon and how the mists of darkness confuse us if we are not holding on tight enough to the Iron Rod.

Sister Nielson drew a really good picture of it.

Everybody knows that missionaries get one day a week to get done all the things that they need to.

Elder Zwick of the 70 came to visit our mission a couple weeks ago and he promised us that if we taught at least 2 lessons on monday nights.... we could double the baptisms in our mission because so many missionaries just check out for the day!

So Sister Nielson and I decided to go the extra mile. We teach 3 lessons on mondays. I am learning and living the law of sacrifice. I may not get as much time to email/shop/other things but I know that because I am making a sacrifice, the Lord has been blessing me so much!

We have 9 people right now that are preparing to be baptized that we are teaching! The Lord is blessing us so much with so many people to teach!

We got to play at the beach last p-day and got some pizza and played some card games with the other missionaries.

We decided to bury Elder Tonge haha and it was pretty funny. I also found a couple jelly fish on the beach so I got a little scared of walking barefooted...

Some of my favorite investigators we are teaching right now are some kids of a family that has been astray for a while.

Tommy is 13, Mariana is 12, Michael is 11 and Christian is 11.

THEY ARE THE SWEETEST SPIRITS.

THEY LOVE THE BOOK OF MORMON.

And ask some of the best questions and say the cutest things

Like we were explaining what the holy ghost is, how he is like our conscious and that he delivers messages to us from Heavenly Father.

Mariana says "So the Holy Ghost is like a Mailman?"

There was an 8 year old girl named McKenzie that got baptized this Saturday. We were able to teach her the missionary discussions before she got baptized! She is so precious!

We got some of our investigators to come to her baptism!

We biked to their trailer an hour before it was supposed to start and got them a ride and it all worked out!

They loved watching her get baptized and were asking questions and talking on and on about how excited they are to get baptized on November 29th.

We had a Relief Society super saturday this week....

Relief Society is the Women's organization in the church and a lot of time when we do activities it's awesome because we actually

APPLY AND UTILIZE the skills we learn on pinterest.

So we brought Celeste with us, she got baptized back in August and I really love her. She understands and reads her scriptures everyday and we are so happy that she joined the church!

Funny story - as we are walking into the church she sees the Young Women tending the kids and she made a comment about how she wishes that she had a calling in the church and how much she loves little kids!

That night- I prayed that we could help get Celeste a calling because I know that she needs it and it would really help her with her life right now, and I made a mental note to talk to the Bishop at church about it the next day.

WELL WHAT DO YOU KNOW

The Lord is much smarter than I am

And Bishop felt inspired THAT VERY DAY to give Celeste a calling to teach the 5 year olds with another girl that is her age named Teagan.

Teagan is going to be such a good friend for Celeste and maybe they can start going to institute classes together as well as enjoy teaching the little kids.

SO, my testimony that prayers are answered was strengthened, as well as my testimony that callings from the Bishop are INSPIRED was strengthened.

It was just amazing. Simply Brilliant. THE LORD KNOWS WHAT WE NEED.

I know that the callings we get wether they be as a missionary, a nursery worker, a bishop, or even the prophet are not any better than another and that we are each special for our certain calling, because we are children of a HEAVENLY FATHER.

God wants us to sacrifice the things that are hard to give up so that we can be closer to him. HE wants us to be free. and happy.

In the Old Testament times..... many people were required to sacrifice their animals.... or in the case of Abraham their SON!

THE LAW OF MOSES WAS FULFILLED WHEN CHRIST DIED FOR US.

So we don't have to offer sacrifices like that anymore.

But the Lord still expects something of us....

What he requires now of us to sacrifice is

A BROKEN HEART AND A CONTRITE SPIRIT.

2 Nephi 4:32
"May the gates of hell be shut continually before me, because that my heart is broken and my spirit is contrite! O Lord, wilt thou not shut the gates of thy righteousness before me, that I may walk in the path of the low valley, that I may be strict in the plain road!"

And I know that the further away we are from Satan
The closer we are to Jesus Christ.

To close, I will share one of my favorite quotes by C.S. Lewis

“Give me all of you!!! I don’t want so much of your time, so much of your talents and money, and so much of your work. I want YOU!!! ALL OF YOU!! I have not come to torment or frustrate the natural man or woman, but to KILL IT! No half measures will do. I don’t want to only prune a branch here and a branch there; rather I want the whole tree out! Hand it over to me, the whole outfit, all of your desires, all of your wants and wishes and dreams. Turn them ALL over to me, give yourself to me and I will make of you a new self---in my image. Give me yourself and in exchange I will give you Myself. My will, shall become your will. My heart, shall become your heart.”

Love you all!

Sister Brown