"Power Week" 8-8-2011

Hola! everybody!

I seriously cannot believe that another month has gone by, i have officially
started the down hilldrive. I hit my 13 month mark yesterday, I try not to
think to much about the time I have left on the mission but sometimes its
hard not to. This week was pretty good. I call this week my power week.
Lately I have been really thinking about the power and authority that I have
as a missionary and representative of Jesus Christ. For along time in my
mission I have been somewhat of a pushover as far as correcting peoples
beliefs in false doctrine. I have learned that there really is a difference
between contention and correcting on doctrinal points. For example,
yesterday, this guy were were teaching started making fun of baptisms for
the dead and trying to convince our recent convert that she made the wrong
decision in choosing this church. I felt like the Profet Jacob in the book
of mormon when Sherem (a very crafty and eloquent man who fought against the
prophesies of the mesiah). During the lesson he turned to me and said
baptisms for the dead is really really really bad, what do you think? I
honestly could have shown him exactly where in the bible it talks about it
and i could have proved him wrong right then and there. But in preach my
gospel it doesnt tell us to answer objections like that. As a representative
of Jesus Christ I had to tell him that it was true doctrine. Preach my
gospel teaches us to teach to the real source of the problem, understanding
exactly why they think that way and then applying it to their needs. Ammon
is also the perfect example of this as well when he was talking with king
lamoni. In order to understand the work for the dead people need to first
understand that that God has called living prophets in our days. We cant put
the icing on the cake without first baking the cake. ME and my companion
felt the spririt strongly and we really tought with authority. It was good.
This is what I learned this week, My mission will be different from now on.
The world is jsut so full of ignorance and false teachings, it is really
sad, but thats were my job comes in as a misisonary.

Well I gotta go, I ran out of time really really fast.


Love,

Elder West