Missionary life doesn't get much better than when we have General Conference. So amazing how we get to hear so much from a living prophet and the Lord's apostles. I heard a joke this week that went like, "Catholicism promotes papal infallibility (or that when the Pope speaks about faith, he is perfect and cannot be wrong), but no Catholic believes it. The Church of Jesus Christ proclaims prophetic fallibility (or that prophets are normal people with errors too), but no member of the Church believes it." We certainly are blessed with amazing leaders.
We introduced ourselves to someone the other day (Elder Harris and Elder Stewart) and they said, "Harris and Stewart! Sounds like a couple of detectives!"
The Church has something called IMOS (Internet Mission Office System) that we have access to in order to do things like adjust area boundaries and things, and when using it, I noticed it has a tab that defines commonly used terms on the page. Most are technical and computer terms or terms about missionary organization. One that I found very interesting, though, was the definition (according to IMOS) of 'missionary.' It said, "An elder or sister called by the President of the Church to teach the gospel." Isn't it amazing to think of the weight of our charge? Being commissioned by a prophet of God to go and labor. Anyone within the geographical area you cover that wants to come unto Christ by baptism into His Church must do so through you. There is nobody else that has that authority. That is a pretty awesome responsibility.
We are getting better at finding people to teach on Facebook! We found three people to teach in the last five days. It has been interesting to see it evolve from "who on earth would ever try and do that" to an actual common finding method. Definitely did not see it coming in El Salvador. Anyway, we met this really cool guy and had a videocall with him on Wednesday. Then we had another one with him and the missionaries in his area (which is just a little north in our mission) on Thursday. And a third call on Friday! It is really odd to teach him because he is just so normal. He is like the most normal person I have ever taught. Seems like he is already a member. In one of my first interactions with him he talked about how he feels like God is our loving Heavenly Father and just wants what is best for us. He just sounds like he is already a member! In our most recent videocall he thanked us for reaching out with a random Facebook message. Such a strange way to make such an awesome friendship.
Another person that is pretty amazing is a guy that was taught here a long time ago. He called some other missionaries whose number he had and asked what time church was. They let us know that he had called, and we reached out but couldn't really get in touch. Then one day out of the blue, he texted, "Can you text about God please." We were of course more than happy to and sent him a scripture about Christ's Atonement. He asked what the atoning blood of Christ meant, and we told him it talks about how Christ suffered and bled for us so we can be clean of our sins and live again. He said, "Do you really think we can live again?" We assured him we can and asked if we could send another scripture, to which he said, "Sure please. I would like 2 know more." We sent him one more scripture about Christ and life after death. His next message was, "Can you please send me the Book of Mormon in the mail." Anyway, long story short, we dropped him off the Book of Mormon and he watched General Conference (Afterwards asking, "What is the prophet's name again?" When he got the answer back, he responded with a simple, "Yes, Russell." Already on a first name basis with the prophet.). If we just try to be available and keep our heads up, God really blesses us to find those who need the gospel.
I went on exchanges with a missionary who is about to return home who is actually from El Salvador and is a convert to the church. We had a lot of fun speaking entirely in Spanish (although for poor Elder Stewart it wasn't as fun because every time I saw him I would get mixed up and speak to him in Spanish too) and talking about El Salvador. But anyway, as I spent the day with this humble missionary, I just had a strong impression that "THIS is a missionary." Some missionaries joke around a lot. This one spoke about our Savior a lot, and the spiritual power showed. We had three lessons together (and one was just a phone call) and in all three, the people we taught cried. He goes home in a week, but I thought to myself that there goes a missionary who understood his purpose. He had a powerful example. I hope to one day do the same.
We talked to an old man who was a tattoo artist and car detailer. He wasn't too interested, but thanked us for our work and told us to keep going, saying, "Even an old biker like me knows when I see you on the side of the road that those are God's boys."
So, off we go. God's boys.
'Til we meet,
Elder Harris
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