June 9, 2014

Elder Low's report:

This week I've been reading a lot in 3rd Nephi particularly in chapter 21 which talks about the gathering of Israel as the Book of Mormon comes forth. I was particularly struck by verses 2 and 28, which say: 

 "2 ...for verily I say unto you that when these things which I declare unto you, and which I shall declare unto you hereafter of myself, and by the power of the Holy Ghost which shall be given unto you of the Father [the book of mormon], shall be made known unto the Gentiles that they may know concerning this people who are a remnant of the house of Jacob, and concerning this my people who shall be scattered by them; 

28 Yea, ... then shall the work commence, with the Father among all nations in preparing the way whereby his people may be gathered home to the land of their inheritance."

I love that scripture because it talks about how 'his' people shall be gathered in that day. 'His' people are those who hearken unto his voice. If there is one thing that I have learned on my mission, it is that the Lord has prepared his people to accept his message already. Our role is to follow his spirit to them, and to demonstrate by the spirit that is conducted through our faith and obedience to the principles of the restored gospel that we are his servants.

This week we had a lot of investigators who had accumulated from past weeks through our finding methods. We were working tons with them and all was going super great. Each one of them seemed so prepared and ready to come to church. Nevertheless one day we felt particularly inspired that needed to harvest to find new investigators who would still yet come to church. Elder S. while we were looking at the map pointed to a place he felt good about and we went out and harvested, knowing there was someone there who was ready for the gospel. The last door we knocked was a 40 year old Cuban man. As we introduced ourselves as representatives of Jesus Christ and began to talk to him he opened up and told us how he had recently had a heart attack and how he was sure that God had saved his life. We prayed with him and testified that truly God had saved his life so that he could be born again, follow him and with his new more grateful outlook on life became happy forever. We stated this came through baptism. He accepted the invitation as well as an invitation to church. It made us super happy, but we didn't think of how great a miracle it was just at that moment. As the week progressed many of the investigators we had began to fall off and as we came to church we weren't sure who we'd find there. As we came into the chapel, there next to our ward mission leader was this man. He knew almost nothing about the gospel, but had felt the spirit and knew he had to come. 

I know that as we live as representatives of Jesus Christ and follow his spirit we shall be led to those who are ready for this message and they shall know the voice of their Shepard.

Elder Low.