Dear all,
I have heard too many missionaries say something like: "I do not want to change. I like who I am. Why should I be different?" I cannot imagine serving a mission and not changing. I cannot imagine watching conversion happen daily and not allowing my own heart to be converted. I cannot imagine being immersed in the gospel and not feeling to sing the song of redeeming love!
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| Mission Leadership Conference |
Elder Marvin J. Ashton once said:
"It is not so important whether a young man has been through the experience of a mission as it is whether the mission experience has been through him.”
One of my favorite Book of Mormon passages says:
"For how knoweth a man the master whom he has not served, and who is a stranger unto him, and is far from the thoughts and intents of his heart?" (Mosiah 5:13)
President Eyring has taught:
"In the Master’s service, you will come to know and love Him... If you think back on that time, you will remember that there were changes in you. The temptation to do evil seemed to lessen. The desire to do good increased. Those who knew you best and loved you may have said, “You have become more kind, more patient. You don’t seem to be the same person.”
You weren’t the same person because the Atonement of Jesus Christ is real. And the promise is real that we can become new, changed, and better. And we can become stronger for the tests of life. We then go in the strength of the Lord, a strength developed in His service. He goes with us. And in time we become His tested and strengthened disciples."
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| San Antonio North Zone |
The biggest goal that I have had on my mission has been to use the Atonement to become a true and steadfast disciple of Jesus Christ.
Christ said to His Nephite disciples: "What manner of men ought ye to be? Verily I say unto you, even as I am" (3 Nephi 27:27).
As I have worked at developing Christlike qualities and become as He is, I have felt myself grow and stretch beyond anything I had ever thought possible.
Elder Rafael E. Pino declared:
"The Lord knows what He wants to accomplish with each one of us. He knows the kind of reform He wants to achieve in our lives."
Everything that happens in life is for one purpose: to become. The Lord knows who we are, and He sees who we are to become.
The sweetest moments of my life have been those when I have been able to humbly say to my loving Father, "Not my will, but Thine, be done." Sometimes it's really hard to see how anything but what we want most in the moment could possibly be good for us, but as we step back and remember that God sees the entire picture, it becomes a blessing to accept His will.
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| Someone gave us pie!! |
I had a thought the other day as I pondered the parable of the lost sheep. Christ speaks of a shepherd who has 100 sheep, but notices that one has wandered. He leaves the 99 to rescue the one. We traditionally think of this parable as an invitation to rescue those who may be wandering and lost.
Speaking of this parable, President Dieter F. Uchtdorf said:
"Is it possible that Jesus’s purpose, first and foremost, was to teach about the work of the Good Shepherd? ... Is it possible that the Savior’s message was that God is fully aware of those who are lost--and that He will find them, that He will reach out to them, and that He will rescue them?"
When you study the parable, you come to realize that we are ALL the one lost sheep. None of us are the "ninety and nine who need no repentance." Still, I am convinced that many of us do not wander on purpose; we do not think to ourselves that we will leave the fold and leave our Savior.
The Good Shepherd has promised that He will bring us back into the fold. He will rescue us from paths that we thought were desirable and right, and lead us down the straight and narrow.
It is in this context that I ask: how many of us kick and scream at being brought back? How many of us insist that we know what is best; that the other pasture looks greener so that is where we must be? How many of us do not allow ourselves to be rescued?
The Lord knows all. He knows what we must do in order to become the disciple He sees us as.
"There’s surely somewhere a lowly place
In earth’s harvest fields so wide
Where I may labor through life’s short day
For Jesus, the Crucified.
So trusting my all to thy tender care,
And knowing thou lovest me,
I’ll do thy will with a heart sincere:
I’ll be what you want me to be"
(Hymns, 270).
May we all see our lives through our Father's eyes. May we allow our Shepherd to lead us back to the fold, no matter how good we think the alternative is.
Love,
Sister Waite
