1) Do the weeks fly passed you as fast as they seem to go here? Man. It is crazy how quickly time moves. Did you do anything different/fun for Valentine's weekend? Service opportunities?
2) Any chance you wrote to your brother this week?
3) What are your goals for the final 17 days in the mission?
4) Brother Walker gave me the topic he'd like you to speak on in Sacrament Meeting when you get home. You'll be speaking March 13th. Do you want that now? Or wait until you are home?
5) Also, the week after you speak will be the Provo City Center Temple dedication. Would you like a ticket for that?
- It's interesting. Because seriously, every day feels like a week--we'll get done with planning for the next day and then we report on what we did today and everything that happened that morning feels like a week ago. And yet the weeks fly by--like I'm pretty sure I wrote an email home yesterday....but no. Haha time is just so weird. As for Valentine's, we didn't really do anything. We had dinner with our Bishop and his wife, and that was fun. They are such good people.
- I wrote to him a week or two ago, actually yes I think it was last week.
- Funny you should ask that, because in zone training last Thursday, our zone leaders had us all write down goals for ourselves personally that we want to achieve by the end of our missions--kind of who we want to be. I found it somewhat ironic, but I did it anyway. It was kind of cool to look back and see how far I've come too. I'm certainly nowhere near perfect but I have changed immensely since the beginning of my service as a full-time missionary, a set apart representative of Christ. And it truly is amazing. As for the next couple weeks, I set the goal to pray daily for Christlike attributes and to account every single night for that day. Because I don't want to have a single regret. And I know that as I account for my labors, the Lord will help me feel that I am giving all that I am and all that I have.
- I don't want to know yet. I'll be speaking here in Sycamore on the 28th and I'd rather not be stressing about two talks at once. Plus, I just don't like thinking about anything at home for long periods of time. It's just kind of useless right now.
- Yes! Did you get tickets for the open house? (Por fis yes....)
Also,
before I forget, just so you know: I signed up for Institute (it was
part of My Plan) so I'll have that Thursday's from 7-8:30 at the high
school.
As
for this week, it was good. We're learning to work better together and I
think we'll continue to see even more miracles. We also got to go on
exchanges again so that was fun--went to Wheaton for the third time (it
was actually only the fourth time I've left my area). I kept forgetting
that I was in Wheaton and not in Sycamore and that it wasn't actually my
area. Met a member named Roberto who knows a family from Pleasant Grove
(Peterson, but I can't remember the first names...I think one was
actually Saturday. Maybe another was Jaden? Not sure. But I didn't
recognize the names when he told me. But it's possible I know them
because I have forgotten SO much...)
We had zone training this week as
well and it was great. I gave my departing testimony--I was the only
one--and it was just as terrifying as I thought it would be. At the same
time, I felt totally peaceful. It was cool too because a headache had
started to build on the left side of my head and I kept drinking water
and more water and it was only getting worse. Neither of us had any
drugs I could take so I just had to deal with it. And then I get up to
the pulpit to share my testimony and it was totally gone until I sat
back down in the pew. Phew, talk about a tender mercy. I don't know that
I said anything that anyone actually benefited from or needed to hear,
but at least it's over and I can focus again. Except for the fact that
it was announced in ward council yesterday that I'm leaving the
beginning of March to go home and that made it real hard to focus
because then all these members kept coming up to me and asking about
various things that aren't important right now. I mean, I love the
members, truly I do. But I just want to be focused on the work right
now. There's a line in the Missionary Handbook (we read from it daily)
that says "the time that you have to serve the Lord with all your heart
might mind and strength is extremely short" and it's like a stab in the
heart every time that we read it. It is SO TRUE people! And I don't want
to make it any shorter so I will be staying as focused as possible.
This work means so much to me--we are literally saving souls. Maybe
that's quite the claim to make but I know it's true. Because the thing
about our church is that we aren't just about making bad men good and
good men better. With any other church, a person can qualify for the
terrestrial kingdom instead of the telestial, but only through the
Church of Jesus Christ may a person qualify for the celestial
kingdom--which is the only place where a person can live for all
eternity with God the Father, His Son Jesus Christ, and with their
families. There's a saying that a missionary from the Church of Jesus
Christ of Latter-day Saints is someone to leaves their family for 18-24
months so that others can be with their families for eternity. And it is
so true. No one else has the capability to seal families for time and
all eternities. Sure, you can be together until death do you part, but
unless you are sealed by someone holding the priesthood power of God,
that marriage ends with death, just like they warn you in the ceremony. I
say this not to threaten or to scare anyone, but it is the truth. I've
felt the Spirit of God witness this truth to me time and time again. And
I want those around me to have their families forever, and not just for
this life.
I may not be able to control the circumstances that come
upon others, but I have the very thing that will bring them peace in
this life and eternal life in the world to come. And it my
responsibility and privilege to share it. I know that this is the Gospel
of Jesus Christ. It was lost after His death and the deaths of His
apostles, but He Himself has restored it to the earth through a living
prophet, even Joseph Smith. I testify that Christ lives and He directs
His Church today, just as He has throughout all of the earth's
history--through prophets. I am so grateful to Him and His Father for
all that They do for me, so that I may be happy and have joy. I know
that this Gospel that I share everyday is the one thing that will make a
person truly and enduringly happy. And I know that any person may come
to know and feel these truths by the power of the Holy Ghost, if they
will but desire to know and believe. Of these things I testify, in the
name of Jesus Christ, Amen.
Love, Hermana DeBuck
Little late, but better late than never.
Little late, but better late than never.
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| James, one of the McConkie Family children. He loves the limelight--this is a regular occurrence in family photos, we heard. |
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| The McConkie family plus us and the elders (Christian, Elizabeth, Sis M, Bro M, Rosemary, Emma, E. Hibbard, James, H. Albrechtsen, E. Jones, me) |
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| We had to do one more funny one with James. Too good. |
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