Conference with Elder Christensen

Hola a todos!

So, we had a conference with Elder Christensen from the Presidency of the Seventy this week. That was super awesome and I didn´t know he was in the presidency until after the conference.

It was really cool this week.

So yeah, details as they tell me I should include...

Monday, normal. We had a pancake party with the Johnsons as you should know.

Tuesday, Office meeting, went to migrations and did more tramites so that people can get their foreign residency cards other office stuff.

Wednesday, We set up everything for the conference with Elder Christensen. All the other Elders painted the front gate walls on the Church. I would have, but I went with Elder Diaz so that he could have a companion while he was stuck in a tube for an hour getting some kind of treatment to help his healing process from a small surgery a while back. I also did cartas de poder which means I can do legal stuff for other people legally.

Thursday, The conference! We had told everyone to be there by 9 or else. That so that everyone would be there early when it started at 10. Then around 8-8:30 President got a call asking if it could be earlier at 9. And it could because they´d planned ahead.

The big things I took out of the conference are some of these: ¨The Spirit talks to us all at first in yes and no, then phrases. And as an Apostle put it, ¨pages and books¨¨ That´s the best as I remember it and translated, (Elder Christensen speaks very good Spanish. And I thought about that after the conference one night and the Book of Mormon came to mind. Mormon wrote a book by the power of the Holy Ghost. Pretty cool stuff!

He talked a lot about the Spirit. God cannot and will not take away our agency. But within that, spiritual promptings from the Holy Ghost give us an inspired option for us to choose between. We can act or not. He guides us to others to respond to prayers, but not without us acting, he doesn´t move us, He inspires and guides us if we let Him. We always have the choice, but God wants and does help us when we let Him.

His wife talked about the need we all have to wash, wash, wash, wash, wash and wash again our garments in the blood of Christ. Just like she would wash the clothes of her sports inclined children. They would get very dirty and she would get them white again. We do that spiritually each week when we partake of the Sacrament. I finally figured out the answer to a question I´ve had for a while. Repentance prepares us for and removes sinful habits from our lives. But it´s baptism and the subsequent renewal of those covenants through he sacrament that gives us the remission of our sins. Or, that actually cleans us after we´ve climbed out of the mud of sin.

Elder Godoy (who also came with his wife) talked about how we´re pretty much living in Book of Mormon areas and that as we are missionaries, we´re adding chapters to the Book of Mormon. Not to the standard work, but to the story. The continuing story that keeps going and going. Adding new chapters to this part of the history of the world.

That´s the highlights from the conference.

Friday, We ended up finally able to make copies of the carnés (foreign residency cards) so that we can keep the originals and everyone can prove they´re legal.

I had the best day Saturday, it was supposed to be P-day, right? And I had scheduled to go do some power of attorney letters, so I missed going to the place everyone else went to and another Elder that was here for something went around with me. We had to wait a while in the plaza de armas for the missionaries involved to meet up with us, but 4 BYU students passed by and said hi to us since we´re Elders and easy to recognize. Did the letters, then went shopping a little bit, (bought myself some forks!) then picked up the letters. Then lunch, then I said hi to some members from Sicuani that I recognized as we were heading back to the office. Then went to a cita that fell through, then picked up Elder Barry from the bus terminal, then came back and got ready for the baptism the Hermanas had at 5 and then went there. Then the family of the person baptized invited us to eat at their house with everyone that was at the baptism, then we ate dinner in our pension. It was quite amazing! It was super busy, but super awesome. Because I got so much done and was able to do it all, there was at least one tender mercy involving timing. And there were two tender mercies with people that said hi to me.

And Sunday was good too. I don´t remember much actually, which surprises me, but I remember that it was good. I prepped some stuff for the people who are ending.

I hope you all have a great week!

--

Hurrah for Israel!

~Elder Fincher