I`ll let you figure it out, but please promise to read the whole title.
So this week I learned some things, I forgot some things, I remembered some things, and now its time for me to write a letter.
Fun.
Do people even read these letters? I mean, shout out to Addie Rutter, Kallee Pierce , and Cardon Merrill for acknowledging that they do, and I know my family reads them, but... Im just curious who else, so send me a like a ten word email this week telling me if you read this and how you are doing... deal?
I`m in a really good mood this week, so if my letter is a bit confused just know that a veces mi mente es completemente frito y las idiomas no importa por nada.
But... I actually wasn`t in a really good mood the second half of this week. Let me explain, no wait, there is too much, let me sum up!
One of the things I learned this week is that God loves me and that I am important to him. This has always been one of the strongest parts of my testimony, but this week I felt it profoundly. I could feel him just out of reach. Encouraging me and maybe even righteously chuckling at me trying to esforzarme the best i could but struggling a little bit.
Also I learned that my Heavenly Mother loves me. Its a very sacred topic, a very sacred love. Go read Our Search for Happiness if you want to learn more. I just think about how much my mom here on earth worries for me and loves me while I am away from home, and waits anxiously for the day that I come back home, and I begin to see how much she must miss us all here and how much she worries for our eternal welfare.
Something I forgot this week? to be happy. Wednesday we had a multi zone conference and I saw my CCM companion Elder Maxwell and I remembered how much i love him. Then I sinned a bit by starting to compare him with my current companion. Ccomparisons suck. They make you feel nasty and down on yourself. The only thing you should compare is who you were yesterday with who you are today. I repented and now I'm feelling a lot better about myself and about life. Promise me you won`t compare things that it isn`t really fair to compare.
Saturday morning I fell and scraped up my leg and arm pretty good. I think my cocinera`s son put up a video of me laughing and screaming while we were cleaning it on Facebook. i dunno though. I felt a little discouraged, but...Pause for dramatic effect... you wanna know what happened?
I remembered something.
Well, I fasted from Saturday afternoon until Sunday afternoon for a number of investigators (pray for Juana, Diego, Nataly, the Moreno family, Kevin Flores, Ricardo, Obidio, and the Las Delicias Ward please) but I also fasted for myself. What followed was the hardest evening of the month.
I wondered, why? I was praying so hard to be able to have success, I had fasted so hard to be able to be happy, but I was feeling like crap. Why when I was trying so hard was I struggling so hard? My leg hurt, my arm was infected, I felt negative toward my companion, and I didn`t know how to get out of it.
Well, I pressed forward with steadfastness in Christ. and you know what? at every lesson I had the ability to testify powerfully. The portion of the spirit I had fasted so hard for came! I remembered, I had ASKED for hard times. Well, not actually, but the hard times are what made me stronger!
I love a talk by Elder Holland about this.
How dare we expect it to be easy, when it was never easy for them of old. It wasnt easy for Abinidi, for Alma, for Moses, for David, for Noah, for Nephi, for Ether, for Ester, nor for ANYONE that has been called to this work. This is not an easy work, this life is not a walk in the park. If we want to be great, we have to struggle, we have to stretch, we have to grow. When we work out a muscle it gets sore, when we push ourselves to the limits, the limits are broken.
And just remember the greatest Man who ever walked on this Earth. Was it ever easy for Him? was it easy when He was rejected by those who should have worshipped Him? was it easy when He took upon Him the sins of the very people who had rejected Him, and sweated great drops of blood for them, crying out in pain to the Father? Was it easy when He was beaten? Was it easy when he was slain?
No,
But Jesus the Christ did all of these things for us, for ME. So that when I come upon hard times in my life, he understands how to make me happy. He knows what I need to be able to vencer, overcome, the trials that I face on a day to day basis. He suffered for my sins, He suffered for yours, and He died so that we may smile in the face of
struggles, knowing that all these things will be for our good. And now, He lives.
I testify of Him as one called to represent Him here in El Salvador.
He loves you.
He is waiting for us to return, with our whole family.
Just be patient, and trust Him.
Today, I feel happy. My arm hurts, my leg hurts, but only a little bit. My heart doesn`t hurt though. He helps me be whole.
Please, turn to Him, strenghting your faith.
I love you all,
Elder David McFarland
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