Tuesday, January 21, 2014

how many are being prepared like him

Ok so for the weekly update. Man, this week has been really crazy. So I guess I gave y'all an update on wednesday when we went to the temple. I'll just kind of update what's happened since then.
Thursday was crazy! we had a lot of appointments lined up and didn't have time to breath hardly, we loved it. Time flies by when your busy. We've been working with some people I may not have mentioned before and some I've already talked about. On Friday I was on an exchange with Elder Johnson. We had this awesome member from their ward come out with us. His name is Steven. He's a convert and he's the most happy person I've ever met! He's preparing for a mission. So, to tell a little bit about him, he grew up going to disney sponsored schools and even college and then worked at disneyland so he's obsessed with it. He was telling us about how when he worked there for one of the jobs it was really important for them to smile. They had to just smile all of the time. It sounds kind of weird but he was telling me about how if you just always are smiling, even if you aren't happy, something will happen or someone will say something that will change your mood so that you are happy. I thought it was really good thinking but I haven't tried it out yet haha. Anyway, we also ate at this place called freebirds. It's a burrito place and it's pretty good. Elder Johnson got the biggest burrito that I've ever seen in my life. They said it weighed as much as a new born baby. He won the man of the day award. 
So, in the past few days things have been pretty interesting. A lot of our plans have fallen through and I've been a bit sick and tired and our car has been getting nails in the tires so we've had to switch in and out the spare and get that fixed and a few people have been a little bit more rude than usual to us but I've had a hard time remembering all of the bad because God just blesses us so much. The other night it was a rough night and our plans weren't working out and we met this lady walking by as we were walking to where we thought our car was in the parking lot and she told us about how her husband just had finished reading the bible. She told us he's probably be home and led us to the apartment. He wasn't home so we set an appointment to come back. Later as we found out that our car was actually in a different place we walked to where it actually was and saw a guy a little ways off and walked over and started talking to him and found out that it was that lady's husband. This guy started telling us all of these things that he had learned as he read through the bible. (we found out he did a very thorough study of it when he read through). He told us--among a few other things--that "You see, man has taken the important things that are taught in the bible and put his own twist on it. All of the different churches are only partially true with man's own twist on them. People don't understand the importance of Priestly authority. It's like it says in the Bible, there will be a restoring of all truth and all things." Me and Elder Baird just sat and listened to him and we just got more and more excited to teach him. It's amazing how God prepares the people who are put into our path. It makes me wonder how many are being prepared like him all around us.  I just finished doing a really detailed read of the story of the sons of Mosiah going to the land of Nephi to teach the Lamanites. I just love that story. They are the best examples. They had so much faith. That story is so amazing. If a people who were "a wild and a hardened and a ferocious people; a people who delighted in murdering the Nephites, and robbing and plundering them" (Alma 17:14-15), could change into a people who were righteous and so converted that they "never did fall away"(Alma 23:6), then think of the changes that can happen with the people around us, or even us ourselves. 
Well, anyway, I gotta get going. I love the Book of Mormon! It is the word of God. 
Love y'all! 
Elder Russell
Yes, this is Elder Johnson- They grew up as friends! 



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