November 10th, 2014

Hey Everyone!

It's been a pretty swell week out here in Edmond, Oklahoma, although there wasn't a whole ton of remarkable things there were a lot of cool little things that happened throughout the week. It's been super nice weather all this week, which was awesome for those days where we got to do a lot of tracting or biking, which is pretty much everyday. Since I'm currently not entirely sure what I want to put in this email today, I guess I'll just start with some of the thoughts that have recurred over the last week. Recently I read a book titled "Believing Christ" by Stephen Robinson which focused upon actually believing what Christ says and what he can do and not just believing in Him. There was also a large emphasis on the doctrines of Grace, Faith, and salvation, along with a pretty neat explanation of the atonement throughout the entire book. One cool quote that kind of emphasizes his point is: "We often think that having faith in Christ means believing in his identity as the Son of God and the Savior of the world. But believing in Jesus' identity as the Christ is only the first half of it. The other half is believing in his ability, in his power to cleanse and to save - to make unworthy sons and daughters worthy. Not only must we believe that he is who he says he is, we must also believe that he can do what he says he can do." It's been a pretty good book to read this last week, and I'd recommend it to anyone who wants to have a pretty plain talk about some oft times confusing topics.

In my studies this week I focused a lot on Preach my Gospel and studying from that, and so I wanted to share a few quotes that struck me in my studies:

• "Preach My Gospel‍ focuses on the fundamentals of missionary work.It does not answer every question or situation you will encounter. Youwill be most effective as you follow the Spirit, search the scriptures,keep the commandments, and apply what you learn" - Introduction
• "Frequent study of this manual will enable them to fulfill theirresponsibilities as member missionaries and will foster unity with thefull-time missionaries." - Introduction
• "President Ezra Taft Benson taught: “We are commanded by God totake this gospel to all the world. That is the cause that must unite ustoday. Only the gospel will save the world from the calamity of itsown self-destruction. Only the gospel will unite men of all races andnationalities in peace. Only the gospel will bring joy, happiness, andsalvation to the human family” - Chapter 1
•  “Preach the first principles of the Gospel—preach them over again:you will find that day after day new ideas and additional lightconcerning them will be revealed to you." - Hyrum Smith, Chapter 1
• "The purpose of the gospel is to cleanse people of their sins so theycan receive the Savior’s mercy at the day of judgment. Therefore, thefocus of this book and, more important, the work you do each day isto invite others to come unto Christ by helping them receive therestored gospel through faith in Jesus Christ and His Atonement,repentance, baptism, receiving the Holy Ghost, and enduring to theend." - Chapter 1
• "Repentance involves a change of heart and a desire to forsake sinand serve God. ... It requires that people increase their commitmentto live in agreement with God’s will. ... It is a positive experience thatbrings joy and peace." - Chapter 1

Anyway, this week we got to see a few people and with one family we got to watch a video the church recently put out about temple garments and such, and since I can't remember if I've given y'all a link to it before I'm going to put on here: LINK! Another topic we talked about a lot this week was daily scripture study and prayer and the importance that has in our lives. We watched the Daily Bread Mormon messages (Links: 1 2 3) and had some fantastic discussions about those topics. On Wednesday it seemed to be a family history kind of day as that was discussed, at least in some form, with most of the people we got to see that day. On Friday I got to go on exchanges up in Guthrie again, and it was a pretty swell day. We talked with a few people and got to have some good discussions about baptism and the Holy Ghost with a couple people where we got to emphasize the importance they have in our daily lives as we strive to come closer to Christ. The only really exciting thing that happened was on Saturday when I got a flat tire and some nice couple gave us a ride back to our apartment. Apparently the wife grew up with Sherri Dew, which was pretty neat especially since I found out today that she'll be doing some sort of lecture thing (check it out here) this week that I'll hopefully remember and get to listen to next week. That night we got to talk about obedience with Sandy - who got baptized a little while back and her daughter Michelle - who is getting baptized on the 21st of the month, and watched President Monson's talk "Obedience Brings Blessings", which is super awesome. Of note for Sunday was the awesome day at church, and then also a quote that I wrote down during dinner. It's a joke, so you have to read it aloud in a Jersey accent: "Why should you never play cards in the Jungle? Cause there might be a Cheetah!" Considering it was a little kid who told it to us, it was pretty funny.

Though there wasn't much that happened exciting wise this week, it was still an awesome week to be a missionary, since every week is an awesome week to be a missionary! We had some fun times, and some not so fun times (like the flat tire that I later found out was actually 2 flat tires... evil burrs), but the work moves forward. I hope y'all have a fantastic week! Love y'all!

'Til Next Time,

Elder Jordan Nielson