May the 4th be With You

Good morning everyone!! Well can I just say that this week has been absolutely crazy. One of the busiest my whole mission! which makes the week fly by. Which is also good because if we didn't stay busy throughout the week, it would be a rough quarantine. But rather than telling you how crazy it was, I'll catch you up. 

Tuesday: We had MLC! Eight hour meetings can just take it out of you believe it or not;) A lot of the meeting was just training us for a new Facebook initiative! It is so cool. So the run down.... within each zone/stake, there is a new Facebook page. This is how we will do all of our finding and stuff like that. Basically it's a place for the missionaries and members to work together. We will invite all of our friends on Facebook, then the members invite all of theirs. So really if the members don't help, it's going to be harder. But we have been getting the members all pumped up about it. Members and missionaries can post, do live videos, post events, market place, and so much more! We had training's on what to put on and what will attract the most people. Sneaky ways to find new people to teach through comments, likes, and people messaging us. this upcoming Tuesday, May 5th, if you get an invite from me, give the page a like! No need to follow it but the more likes we get, the more Facebook sees our page and gives us free advertisements and stuff like that. So just give it a like! It is for a good cause. Anyway so a long meeting learning a lot about Facebook. Then that night we coordinated with the Sister Training Leaders and made a calendar for when missionaries should post certain posts. A lot is going into this. Tuesday night we had a family home evening with Damaris and  her little sister. It was like the best thing ever. We weren't able to plan it the best we wanted but it ended up being the best thing ever! We read over the story when Nephi and his brothers go back to get the plates in the children's Book of Mormon. Then we acted it out. We went first then they did. Theirs was by far better. Made our whole night! 

Wednesday: Us and the Sister Training Leaders decided that we wanted to get in contact with all the parents of the missionaries in our zone (with permission from President) and get little encouraging videos for them. We wanted them all by Thursday night so that we could get the video made in time for zone council Friday. Super short notice for the parents but we followed the spirit and it turned out awesome! Wednesday is when we reached out to them all. It was difficult and we were on the phone a lot but it was all worth it. My favorite was meatballs video. He says, "Elder Jackson......" Then you hear my mom say, "continue please." Oh man I got a kick out of that one! 

Thursday: Some of the sisters in our zone moved to a new apartment. Their old one was nasty and gross. So we helped them move! We got everything out of the apartment, then cleaned it good. Like way good. Then took everything to their new apartment. It is on the third floor and so we had to take beds, couches, dressers, bookshelf, boxes, and luggage up three flights of stairs. And because no big groups, we were the only elders. Good thing we have been working out pretty hard, or else we probably would've been more tired then we were. But it was so fun to get out in the sun, do some good hard work, talk to other people, and laugh! (Don't worry, me and Elder Esplin have our fair share of GOOD laughs). But the rest of Thursday was all leadership reports and stuff that had to be done by Saturday night. Which we barely made.

 

Friday: Today was the day. We had zone council in the morning. We had to relay everything from MLC to the missionaries in our zone. It was hard to take a really long meeting and cram it into a two hour meeting. But we did the best we could! At the end of the meeting, we ended with the video of everyone's parents and it was so good! It was so fun to watch the missionaries reactions! Some families sang to "Go the Distance" from Hercules. One family did a rap for their elder. Some held up big posters. And others kept it simple and just told them they love them and knew they were where they needed to be.  It brought the spirit super strong and ended the meeting super good. Friday night we called a family and had a super good discussion on Ether 12 with them. I learned a lot! 

Saturday: So for the Facebook pages, we needed to put together a video introducing the pages. So we planned out a video we could make to introduce the pages. And then of course we had to run through it just us to see if everything ran smoothly and sounded good. Other than that we just prepared for the Facebook page. 

Sunday: Oh boy it was a crazy one. We started the day off nice and early with a meeting with the stake at 8 to introduce the Facebook page to all the leaders in the stake. We also had other meetings like ward council, Sunday school, stuff like that. At 3, we went around to all the different companionship's and recorded their parts for the video. It was hot, but all went good. Then a friend at home is helping put the video all together:) We also needed to take pictures of the companionship's for the page. So that people can see the missionaries. We went to a place called Elephant Butte here in El Paso. It's a big rock shaped like an elephant and it is so cool. We also got to see the sunset up there. So pretty! It took a lot of planning because we needed the companionship's show up at certain times and others leave so that there wasn't a big group. It turned out awesome! 

This week was full of miracles and went by so quick! So I mentioned how on Friday night, we had a discussion with a family about Ether 12. It is so amazing. So many good lessons about faith and being anchored in our faith. It was through faith of us and the people before Christ that he did everything. But Moroni talks about his weaknesses. Specifically his weakness in writing and his worries about that. In verse 27 the Lord answers him saying, "And if men come unto me I will show unto them their weakness. I give unto men weakness that they may be humble; and my grace is sufficient for all men that humble themselves before me; for if they humble themselves before me, and have faith in me, then will I make weak things become strong unto them." What God told Moroni is something we need to apply to our lifes. It is okay to have weaknesses! Everyone has weaknesses. But what we do to make them strengths is important. God tells us to humble ourselves because His grace is sufficient. Turn to Him. Go read Ether 12 and give our page a like on Tuesday!