Merry Christmas from Kenora! Good to be here, but tomorrow I will be
heading down to I-Falls to do District Meeting and for an exchange. Then next week on Tuesday I will be in Dryden
doing the same thing and another baptismal interview! Then another possible baptismal interview in
I-Falls the following week, and hopefully I will be staying in Kenora, but
after 5 months, I never know, but I will know in 2 weeks what is happening.
Anyway, Merry Christmas! It is snowing up here and definitely looks the
part. There is a huge 50-foot Christmas
tree on Main St. in Kenora in the middle of the road. I love it. We have Christmas lights on the house and the
tree looks great, thanks to Elder Perkins' parents sending him tons of stuff to
load up the tree--I need to get a picture, I know, I know...
Speaking of Christmas, the
Kenora branch had a Christmas party last Saturday and it was great. We brought our 2 new baptismal dates, Jim and
Veronica. Ha, yup, we set baptismal
dates with them an hour before the party and they wanted to come and so they
did and they had an absolute blast! (BDs
are for Feb. 4th--we're talking 2012 here) Elder Perkins and I tried
to balance time between them and all the visitors we did not recognize,
and the Less-Actives that came and members and other investigators. Phew...what a job! But I shouldn't be complaining, Elder Perkins
was voluntold to be the merry, jolly, Santa Claus. Ha, he did fantastic and just took a few
pictures with people and got out of there. He plays the part: a big red jolly guy. During the Christmas party we were shown a
quick movie from lds.org that is part of a brand-new
series of videos of the life of Christ filmed in the new Jerusalem set in Utah
that they built. Wow, a wonderful,
spirit-filled movie. Compelling for
sure. I desperately wanted to watch all
of the videos because they were so good.
Our other baptismal date Alex
went to Winnipeg for the weekend and missed his bus coming back home to Kenora.
He couldn't come to church, and
Derold...well, let's just say I am learning patience. We woke him up and helped him get going off to
church (he won't accept rides, but insists to walk the 4 or so km's to church)
but he never showed. He ended up going
to this other church and he gave us a lame excuse. But, enough of that. I wrote plenty in my journal, so those are the
kind of stories you get to hear more about later. We have been teaching a lot of people and we
feel that a lot of these people are taking baby steps, but, are still coming
along. If they were stagnant, we would
drop them. We were privileged to find
more good people to teach this week, which is always exciting thinking of all their
potential. It’s always a game in my mind
to stay positive. For myself, it is easy
to assume things if an appointment does not work out, when there are other
possibilities. I am trying to always be
optomistic. I am learning lots of life
lessons out on my mission--more than I thought I would. I know that I would not have been able to
learn many things without my missionary service.
Some things I have learned on
my mission are these:
More gratitude for SO many
things: the love and effort my parents and family have for me. Not many so-called families are based around
love and wholesome things. Many are not
even families, more of "fend for yourself". I have especially learned gratitude for the
strength of the gospel where I grew up. It's
been very different on my mission. In
Winnipeg the ward had like 130 active members, in Saskatoon there were about
300, in IF (International Falls) about
40, in FF (Fort Frances) about 8 and in Kenora about 50 or 60. Wow. So, so very different. Each area a unique situation. Now, numbers do not reflect the strength of
the members there, either. Sheesh. I am grateful for the spiritual and physical
upbringing I had. Thank you, Mom and
Dad. I am grateful to have had a temple
so close to my house too. I never really
went all that often, which I plan to change, but that temple was a beacon of
light and a source of spiritual strength to the members. I have not even SEEN a temple for over 16
months. People here sacrifice a lot to
attend a temple that is about 9 hours away. And I have learned gratitude for testimonies. I have been thinking about this for a long
time and this morning I was reviewing a random talk that happened to mention
that. I was reading Sis. Barbara
Thompson's talk from the last Gen. Conf. (thanks Mom and Dad for the Ensign)
and she said it clearly, something like this: "it does not matter how
strong your testimony used to be, but how strong it is now". That was the gist of if and I have seen how
true that is my life and especially in people in these small branches. Wow. Testimonies
need to be constantly nourished. Constantly.
No wonder we are counseled to study the
scriptures every day. Hmm. No wonder. The Lord needs members with strong testimonies
to magnify their callings and to bring other people to the gospel and to
strengthen them.
Something I learned yesterday
from the discussion in Gospel Doctrine about agency (abilitiy to choose) and
compulsion: Forcing someone to do right is just as wrong as doing bad. That was Lucifer's plan in the first place and
we would have done nothing in life to learn and grow. Did you know that the most successful people
are those that fall the most? They fall
and keep getting up again.
Something elder Perkins and I
were discussing was the value of prayer rather than testimony. Which would we rather hear? A powerful prayer or a compelling testimony? Think about it. All too often I hear and feel powerful
testimonies, but sometimes it is talking the talk without walking the walk, the
DO without BE. There really is not
anything better than hearing an absolutely sincere prayer from someone seeking
truth. In that prayer you can FEEL the
sincerity, and can listen to their concerns, their core beliefs, their
testimony shines through, all of this through what is called the gift of
prayer, which is communication between us and God. What do you think, which would you rather
hear? A powerful, sincere prayer, or a
compelling testimony?
That's all folks. I look forward to being able to talk to you
Christmas morning. Talk to you soon!
Love you,
Elder Galbraith
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