Week 29 - A trip to the temple

March 1, 2016 - I don't think I'm going to have time to email an update this week.  This p-day has been crazy! We were on the phone with an investigator for like half an hour today and that took up a huge chunk of p-day, along with going to the temple. Sister Wall took this. She's one of the office workers in the mission.

Week 28
Hey family how is it going? Not a whole ton has happened this week but we finally got my bike back so we are biking a ton now! There is this HUGE hill in the middle of our area and I feel like I am going to die each time we go through it. But somehow I always make it over the top and then we just keep on biking. It reminds me a lot of spiritual and mental trials. There are times when we think that we just can't make it, that we are completely incapable of going on another second. But if we continue doing what's right we have the Lord's promise that he will help us and that with His help we will always make it through,very much like the Jaredites crossing the great deep, in Ether 6 verses 5-12. Though they were battered by "mountainous waves" and "fierce winds" and sometimes they were even "buried in the deep" they always continued to "cry unto the Lord" and they were always brought forth again on the "top of the waters". And those fierce winds that caused terrible tempests and seemed so frightening actually carried them closer to the promised land. Just like all of the things that seem hard or scary in our lives can seem insurmountable but in reality they lead us closer to what the Lord has planned for us. I know that God does have a plan and that He is always looking out for us. Sometimes we are tempted to think that Lord has forgotten us but I know that He is always looking out for us. I love these verses in first nephi 21.

14 But, behold, Zion hath said: The Lord hath forsaken me, and my Lord hath forgotten me—but he will show that he hath not.

15 For can a woman forget her sucking child, that she should not have compassion on the son of her womb? Yea,they may forget, yet will I not forget thee, O house of Israel.

16 Behold, I have graven thee upon the palms of my hands; thy walls are continually before me.

Jesus has engraven us his palms and He will never forget or forsake us. That's kind of what I have been studying this week and it's a very comforting scripture I think. It helps to substitute your own name in place of Zion in verse 14 and placing it h    (not sure what else he was going to say here but I'm sure it was profound *:-? thinking !)

I'll keep trying to work hard and stay positive. Being out here really does teach you to rely on the Lord and to value the scriptures. It teaches you a lot of stuff. Love you a lot,

SLY
Elder Stoddard