Woah what a week! Time seems to fly by, but I also feel like I've been here
for two months!
Well, the highlight of the week was a devotional we had last night. After a
horrible lesson with our "investigator", really our teacher, who apparently
graduated from Julliard for acting, I was feeling a bit overwhelmed. Okay
our teacher didn't go to Julliard, he was just really good at acting like
an uninterested Asian man. How was I going to ever understand mumbled
Cantonese? How could I get my testimony across and teach with my tiny
vocabulary? How would I ever feel confident and prepared?
But I had to take a step back and remind myself A) I have been here for not
even TWO weeks. It's okay. B) Heavenly Father is going to make up the
difference C) I still have seven weeks to progress, and D) Charity never
faileth.
**Okay side note. Another companionship from my distrcit taught "Chris"
right before us. He asked what they did today and all Gu Ji Muih could
remember how to say was "we learned and ate." And we starting laughing so
hard because I said "That is literally what we do!" Maybe you had to be
there. But it was funny. Yep we basically learn, study, and eat. And it's
awesome.**
Even after all of those comforting thoughts, I still felt a little
overwhelmed. Then we had the most amazing devotional I have ever attended.
Try to find it, if they publish it online...it was given by Bruce C. Hafen
and was exactly what I needed. Exactly.
He shared a quote from a survivor of the Martin Willy Handcart
Company..."We came to know Him in our extremities, and the price we paid to
know him was a privilege to pay." Elder Hafen spoke of extremities;
experiences that challenge us and almost break us. But they also bring us
closest to Christ. Not only in a literal sense; we come to experience a
tiny piece of what he did in his mortal life, we are obliged to turn to him
and use and rely on the Atonement. It is a privilege to pay. We were
reading the Book of Mormon as a district, and I think it was in Alma 32,
but I am not sure, we were reading about Christ and faith and the
Atonement. I realized that Christ and Heavenly Father ask us to sacrifice.
(Really the only thing that is really ours to sacrifice is our agency, so
obedience is the biggest sacrifice we can offer Them) But Heavenly Father
and Jesus Christ never ask us to do something They haven't or would not do.
And They only ask us to sacrifice so that in turn, we can receive *something
greater*. Christ sacrificed everything. He was a god, and the only thing he
could sacrifice to be of worth to us and mortals, was pure understanding
and love. His *something greater*, was the ability to succor us, his
brothers and sisters. He created the earth and the heavens, yet he
sacrificed and felt all our ALL experiences, so that we could experience
what he had-eternal life and charity.
In Ether 12, two verses have the phrase "prepared a more excellent way."
Heavenly Father has prepared a more excellent way for us to come unto Him
and progress. Sometimes, often times, that means trials. Bruce C. Hafen
said, in response to Joseph Smith's experience in Liberty Jail as well as
the trials of the Handcart Company, that "Castles arose from weeds." Better
things come out of hardships.
I am sure I am not explaining this as well as I would like, but I cannot
put into words exactly how I feel. I know that I am slowly coming to
understand how necessary trials are, and how Heavenly Father blesses His
children. I still have much to work on, and these personal revelations
about the gospel were mostly from the amazing missionaries I am surrounded
by, but I am just thankful for the truth of the gospel and that I get to
share it!
Sacrificing 18 months of my life and learning Cantonese are a privilege to
pay to get to know my Savior.
--
*Sister Dopp
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