September 22nd, 2014 - Zone Conference!

Hey Everyone!

This week was pretty great! We got to have a zone conference on Wednesday, which was super awesome. In addition to that, we had some good visits and had a pretty great time throughout the week. A couple noteworthy events happened throughout the week, that I'll talk about in a bit. After I share this quote from Elder Holland that I found was pretty neat:

"A memorable account of the power of such teaching comes from the life of the prophet Jeremiah. This great man felt the way most teachers orspeakers or Church officers feel when called—inexperienced, inadequate,frightened. “Ah, Lord,” he cried, “behold, I cannot speak: for I am [but] a child.”
But the Lord reassured him: “Be not afraid of their faces: for I am with thee. … Therefore gird up thy loins, and arise, and speak unto them.”
So speak unto them he did, but initially not with much success. Things went from bad to worse until finally he was imprisoned and made a laughingstock among the people. Angry that he had been so mistreated and maligned, Jeremiah vowed, in effect, never to teach another lesson,whether that be to an investigator, Primary child, new convert, or—heaven forbid—the 15-year-olds. “I will not make mention of [the Lord], nor speak any more in his name,” the discouraged prophet said. But then came the turning point of Jeremiah’s life. Something had been happening with every testimony he had borne, every scripture he had read, every truth he had taught. Something had been happening that he hadn’t counted on. Even as he vowed to close his mouth and walk away from the Lord’s work, he found that he could not. Why? Because “his word was in mine heart as a burning fire shut up in my bones, and I was weary with forbearing, and I could not stay.”
That is what happens in the gospel to both the teacher and the taught."

It's from the talk "A Teacher Come from God" and I thought it was pretty neat as I was listening to it this morning. Anyway, the first highlight I wanted to share this week was on Tuesday when a family invited all of us over for a Chicken Nugget Eating Contest, where I learned that after about 20 nuggets they just don't taste very good. The results of the contest were:

• Sister Ellis - 20
• Elder Neves - 30
• Aj McKendrick - 30
• Elder Hansen - 40
• Elder Hoopes - 50
• Sister Heaton - 53
• Elder Nielson - 65

Anyway, it was a pretty great time as we all struggled to eat as many nuggets as we could. In total we ate about 288 nuggets - just with those involved in the contest. Good thing they got them at Aldi instead of like McDonalds or something expensive like that. Then on Wednesday the highlight was that we got to go to zone conference! So, some quick thoughts/notes from that which I wanted to share!

• President Walkenhorst Shared some quotes from Elder Cook at the latest Mission President's seminar he went to:
• "If we have more faith we will have more success"
• "There is a large gap between the two" (D&C 10:53 and 29:7)
• "What is a mighty change of heart? A Hard heart to a broken heart to a healed heart to a turned heart (desire to share with others, especially your own family)."
• D&C Section 112:
• 10 - Be humble. God will lead you
• 14 - Feed my sheep
• 19-21 - An Effectual door to be opened. You have power to open the door
• 22 - Hearken to the voice of the spirit
• 28 - Purify your hearts before me, preach my gospel to every creature
• 30 - Power is given for the last time
• 33 - How great is your calling!
• President Satterthwaite shared some thoughts related to stakes that were pretty neat
• "What is a Stake?"
• Isaiah 52:2
• D&C 82:14
• D&C 109:39
• D&C 115:6
•  Lastly, at one point President Walkenhorst was talking about the church we are apart of and related it to a law firm - The people in the name are the key partners in a firm, and just like that the people included in the name of the Church are those who are important to it - D&c 115:4 says: "For thus shall my church be called in the last days, even TheChurch of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints." It's not just the Church of Jesus Christ, it's the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints - it's there for us and we have a key part to play in it. We're literally partners in his work.

The highlight/miracle from Thursday was that we got to see the Crofts! Brother Croft had been in the hospital the last couple weeks when he found out that he's got liver cancer, so we were able to chat with him a bit and hopefully next time we'll get to watch this cool mormon message that y'all should check out here!

For Friday the highlight was definitely our meeting with Bishop Newell, which was fantastic. We talked about the principle of visions that Elder Foster had taught us during the mission tour that I don't remember how well I talked about it last week... but basically he gave us 6 steps that are key to distinguishing between a vision and a goal. 

Hopefully that picture thing worked... Anyway, he talked a lot more about the vision side, since he said in general the church does pretty well with the Goals side. So, we shared that with Bishop, and then talked about it again in ward council yesterday, as we strive to share the vision with the ward that the Lord is Hastening his work to bring souls to Christ, and that he needs us all to be involved in it. But, the reason that was the highlight for Friday is just that it's always fantastic to work with people who have the same vision as you, and it seemed pretty clear that Bishop was on the same page. On Saturday we met a couple new people that will probably end up being highlights that you'll hear about in later emails, Joseph and then Brittany, but we'll see what happens.
​

Lastly, this week in Preach my Gospel I focused a lot on Chapter 10, as that's also what zone conference was focused on. It's all about teaching skills and a part from there I wanted to share with y'all along with a couple thoughts I had. It says: "The First Presidency and Quorum of the Twelve Apostles have stated: “Our purpose is to teach the message of the restored gospel in such a way as to allow the Spirit to direct both the missionaries and those being taught.It is essential to learn the [missionary lessons] but these should not be taught by rote presentation. The missionary should feel free to use his own words as prompted by the Spirit. He should not give a memorized recitation, butspeak from the heart in his own terms. He may depart from the order of the lessons, giving that which he is inspired to do, according to the interest and needs of the investigator. Speaking out of his own conviction and in his own words he should bear testimony of the truth of his teachings.” As I was ponder this paragraph this week I noticed a couple distinct things that I've put in bold here. The first one, really struck me because of that last part - the spirit has to direct those being taught just as much as us. If we push too hard, or they choose not to follow it then it will be almost impossible for any conversion to take place. It then gives us the way that we can allow the spirit to truly direct both us and them - speaking from the heart. It reminds me of this quote from President Hinckley:

“We must strengthen ourselves and our people to get our teachers to speak out of their hearts rather than out of their books, to communicate their love for the Lord and this precious work, and somehow it will catch fire in the hearts of those they teach” (Teachings of Gordon B. Hinckley[1997], 619–20).

As we strive to teach from the heart that doesn't mean we shouldn't prepare - in fact I've learned that in order to do that you have got to be more prepared then you would if you were just using a memorized thing for in order to truly speak from the heart it has to be something that's in your heart and not just your mind - you truly have to know and feel the truthfulness of everything you teach and not just accept that it's what the prophets and apostles have asked us to teach. Another quote from that same talk by Elder Holland real quick:

"In this Church it is virtually impossible to find anyone who is not a guide of one kind or another to his or her fellow members of the flock... For each of us to “come unto Christ,” to keep His commandments and follow His example back to the Father is surely the highest and holiest purpose of human existence. To help others do that as well—to teach, persuade, and prayerfully lead them to walk that path of redemption also—surely that must be the second most significant task in our lives."

I know that the Lord places us where we are for a reason. Missions are tough, but they're also fantastic! It's not always easy for us... but then again it wasn't easy for our master and leader either, so why should it be for us? (See this talk for more on that). Anyway... I didn't really want to share this story since it's kind of embarrassing, but since I still have some time today I think I will. For those of you who suffered through the rest of this, perhaps this is a nice reward. On Saturday morning we were going through our phone contacts calling people we didn't know and deleting numbers that either we didn't need anymore - like people who have moved out, or that were disconnected. So, while doing that there were two noteworthy calls. The first was to a Brother Peterson... We had a less active brother Peterson on our roster, so that's who I figured it was... so we called the number to see if it still worked. After ringing for a little while someone answered, and I asked if it was Brother Peterson. It was, and then he asked who I was, so I told him. He asked what he could do for us, and so I asked if he was still living in Ardmore, he said that he hadn't lived here since 2006... so I asked if he was the Brother Peterson on our roster who was less active... and it turned out to instead be the President for the Lawton stake, President Peterson whom I had met a couple times while I was in Lawton... silly me calling him thinking he was less active, right?

The other probably not that funny story was a conversation with someone in our contacts named "City" It went something like this:

"Hello, City of.... (I couldn't tell what she said)"

"What?"

"City of Ardmore Answering Service, what can I do for you?"

"What is this for?"

"It's the Answering Service for the City of Ardmore...?"

"Oh... Thanks for answering!" - Call Ends.

Elder Hansen thought it was pretty funny... but I just had no idea what to even ask the answering service... and I would have felt rude just hanging up... so that's all I got. I dunno... it made sense to me at the moment?

Anyway, I've gotta get going now! I hope y'all have a fantastic week! Love y'all!

'Til Next Time,

Elder Jordan Nielson

P.S. Sorry it's long today... Or I guess not sorry if you wanted a long email today... but I didn't have many other emails to respond to, and I didn't have anything else to do on the computer... so this is what happens I guess.