So holy cats.... my mind is still racing and I continue to find insight from the worldwide training last night. That was so symbolic.
Just a couple of symbolic things that I noticed that I can't wait to share:
A missionary gave the opening prayer, a member gave the closing prayer.....
We are pretty sure there was a missionary AND a member playing the organ.....
The choir was comprised of missionaries AND members, but not only that, the members they chose were WARD COUNSEL members and Bishops and Ward mission leaders.....
They showed an example of a ward counsel, stake counsel, mission leadership counsel, and the Quorum of the twelve, all in ONE meeting from video conference around the world....
The talks were about fusing members and missionaries, about the ONE-NESS of missionary work, member work, and temple and family history work.
My favorite part of the meeting last night was the talk of counselling with all of the general leaders in the church, men and women, member and missionary, to make the decision of changing the missionary age. UNITY comes in counsel. Proverbs 15:22 says "without counsel purposes are disappointed: but in the multitude of counsellors they are established" The twelve and the first presidency are giving us an example of meaningful counsel in the church. I am so excited to apply that in whatever way I can.
I had a couple of really cool second witnesses during that meeting. I'll tell you that the meeting last night is the talk of the town in missionary land. We are all so excited and ready to put our effort in to the councils of the church. We know that the blessings of unity are great.
Every time we are in a member's home in the Yorktown ward we share the ward mission plan (developed by the ward counsel in conjunction with the ward mission leaders and the missionaries) which is to "pray daily for missionary experiences and the courage to act on them". We strive to help the members catch the vision, and our vision is this; if every member of a family is praying for missionary opportunities daily, and praying for the courage to act on them, the Lord will bless that family with missionary opportunities. We also share this idea from the First Presidency and Quorum of the twelve that missionary work is not about the members giving us names to go see and we go see them, missionary work is about everyone sharing the gospel, and missionaries are here to help members in that field of work. We are striving for unity in that vision.
Well, our favorite scripture to share with the families of the ward is John 17:20-21. This is a record of Jesus Christ praying for his desciples and the people who would believe his desciples. He prayed this prayer; "that they all may be one; as thou father, art in me, and I in thee, that they also may be one in us: that the world may know that thou hast sent me" Our vision has been stated like this;
"imagine if your whole family was unified in praying every day for missionary work, do you think the Lord would bless you with missionary opportunities?"
the reply is always an enthusiastic "yes!"
We say, "what do you think the Lord would do if 3 or 4 families were all united in praying EVERY DAY for missionary opportunities, do you think he would give them to you?"
Again, always a "yes" as they start to feel the power and vision of what we are trying to do.
then we drop the ward mission plan again "and imagine if EVERY DAY, EVERY MEMBER and EVERY MISSIONARY in the WHOLE WARD was praying for missionary opportunities. Do you think the Lord would bless us with them?"
With big eyes it's always "yes, of course"
Our vision continues upward, and we say "read again John 17:21, imagine if 14.5 million members were united with 70,000 missionaries. Imagine if they were all 'one'. Do you think that the world would know that the Father hath sent his Son?"
There is no greater vision.
This is the purpose we share as members and missionaries. To bring all unto Christ. I am so inspired and uplifted by last night. I want everyone to realize that EVERY ward counsel and EVERY Missionary Counsel and EVERY Stake counsel of the church was watching last night as one woman gave the closing prayer, thanking God for the opportunity to do missionary work and the strength to do more. WE WERE ONE. I felt so unified with the church as a whole. We are becoming ONE. Read again John 17 "that all may be one, that the world may believe that the Father hast sent me"
I know that if the members of the church and the missionaries of the church are united, THE WORLD WILL KNOW THAT THE FATHER HATH SENT THE SON. I know it. I FEEL IT. This is one work, "the work of salvation".
This is nothing new haha. We've been doing all of this for a while now. Preach my Gospel is an attempt at this. Unity and Vision have always been in the church, but just as the apostles said last night, the Lord is calling for more. He is inviting us and exhorting us to do MORE. To become ONE in purpose and to do his work. I am so humbled to be able to work as an instrument for HIM. We will apply it here, but I can't wait to come home and apply this as well. I don't want to live it Utah, there are enough people to build the kingdom there. I want to go somewhere where there IS no temple and share the gospel with them all. I want to move back to VA and do my part to bring the gospel to every creature here. OR SOMETHING!!!!! Somewhere. "I'll go where you want me to go dear Lord" Notice that was one of the songs in the program yesterday.
Our investigators are doing well. This week Adam and Kelly took us out to dinner and we had a wonderful lesson about the restoration. They caught the vision and loved it. Kelly has been the one to stop and ask Adam to turn off the TV so they can read the book of mormon. We invited them to be baptized and they felt like that was a lot of pressure. We are a little nervous because we invited him to a dinner and he said he was feeling pressured so we might just take a step back and evaluate what they need. Maybe it's not boldness that they need.
John isn't progressing much because he is fearful of leaving his old church. NEWS FLASH though the Newport News sisters called and they started teaching his mom this week! Just found her randomly. Well, not at random, it was God's hand. If john and his mother can't make the change individually, surely they can make it in unity. We are going to try to meet with them together with the Newport News Sisters.
No one else we are teaching really, a lot of finding going on. Lots of tracting. The ward is about to explode though, bishop is totally on board with this push of missionary work and already has a plan to have someone out with us each sunday. This is an awesome ward.
Haven't met with Mary Lou yet she keeps pushing it off. :/
Love you all, BYE!!!!
Elder Andreasen
P.S. I CHOOSE CHRIST!!!