Southport North Carolina

Southport North Carolina
Patrick in Southport

Tuesday, April 9, 2013

Week 42


Mon, Apr 8, 2013 at 11:32 AM

Hello dear family and friends,

So, family, how-de-do?  I am doing well.  Conference was absolutely fantastic!!!  Seriously, it was better than Christmas.  Listening to the last session is like opening the last present on Christmas morning, knowing it will be the last for a while.  So, I forgot my camera today, so you'll just have to deal with no pictures again ;)  But I did get letter 41 from mom and lots of gorgeous pictures.  Not kidding.  It looks absolutely fantastic.  I love it.  Makes the house look 55 years younger, and it just looks great overall.  So good.  Those before and after pictures...you should sell those to the flooring company you used, so they can use it on their commercials to get the ohs and ahs from the crowd. ;)

I also got a letter from Grandma, and Last week, I forgot to say I got 40 from mom as well.  Good stuff.  To answer a few questions...we watched conference at a member’s home. Since they don't broadcast it at our building, it wasn't even an option.  But the members we were with are great.  We love them :)  We didn't have any investigators at church per se, but a few did watch conference and absolutely loved it.  Good stuff. :)  Transfers is the week of April 22ish, and I hope that I get to stay another transfer with Elder Mickelsen.  One we get along ridiculously well still and we should be having a couple baptisms that transfer, but I'll go wherever the Lord needs me to go.  It's a possibility that I go either direction.   Also, it's crazy that Michael comes home in less than a month.  That's intense is all I have to say :)

Anyways, this past week has been pretty good.  Time continues to fly by.  We've definitely seen some miracles.  We have this one investigator who is a miracle.  So long story short, she is an Abish of the now.  She had a death, resurrection experience, where she basically died, but was allowed to come back.  And she had this amazing experience "dead" where she basically saw Lehi's dream.  She was telling us about this experience and all, and Elder Mickelsen felt inspired to leave her with 1 Nephi 8.  She didn't read it before we came back, but as were reading it with her a little bit, she was like "I know that field.  It's real, and it's huge" and she had seen a river and a tree.  It was amazing to witness.  Her desire is huge and angels definitely preceded our arrival and prepared her mind for the message.  She said that we had got her.  In a sense, since she was way intrigued with the Book of Mormon now.  The other crazy part to this story is that she was a referral from a lady that we just knocked on her door after we prayed about which couple of doors to knock on.  So when we told this investigator of ours who sent us, she didn't really know who we were talking about, and when we went back and talked to the lady whose door we knocked on, she really didn't even remember sending us.  Crazy, right?!?!  This is truly the Lord's work, and we'd better do it His way or absolutely NOTHING will ever get done.  

So, about conference.  2 HUGE themes/topics I noticed were member missionary work and exact obedience.  So powerful and true.  Elder Holland's talk was beautiful as usual.  Elder Bednar (my favorite apostle if we can have favorites ;) ) had a really good one as well.  Elder Mickelsen and I really enjoyed Elder Cook's talk about personal peace versus world peace.  So powerful.   I love it. :)   Two of my favorite quotes are not stuffing a bird through the beak and President Clayton's about how the commandments are not a buffet from which we can choose only the most appetizing and appealing.  So good.  President Uchtdorf's talk about light and darkness was metaphorically powerful.  I'm pretty sure we could find like a thousand levels to that talk...all with different meanings and implications.  Here's something I noticed...President Monson ended 2 of his addresses with quoting the Savior's invitation to "Follow thou Me"...hmmmm...must be important.  Elder Hales’ talk was also great.  It highlighted another theme of the conference, that even though the world's standards and morals are shifting and sliding, the doctrine and standards of God and the church do not and will not ever move or change.  

Overall, great weekend.  It's starting to warm up again, which is nice, but that means that gross humid heat is right around the corner.  ah yeah :)  Thanks for being the best family in the whole universe.  I love you all so much.  Stay safe and happy.  Know that I know my Redeemer lives.  I love Him and my Father so much, but They love us even more than we can understand.  His plan for our salvation is the best plan ever.  Love the Gospel of Christ...but more importantly...live it.

Love,

Elder Patty




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