"Can't you see that everyone..." (12/3/2018)

Happy 11-month mark to me!

Hey everybody, this week was pretty great. Before I get into that though, I have an absolutely brilliant idea. I call it: Missionary Quartering. With this enormous area to cover and us pinned down with limited mileage and an apartment to return home to every night, I think our outreach would be much better if we could instead quarter ourselves without warning in any members' homes for a night! Think of it, we show up on your doorstep, announce our need for a good night's rest, and you have to provide it! It'd be amazing! We could go anywhere!!

Heheh...Yeah, that was a joke, in case you were wondering. That'd be a sure way to get everybody's names removed from Church records!

So as for people we're teaching, first there's Juanita. Things are moving a bit slowly with her but we are having a lesson tomorrow morning. She intends to know for herself if the Book of Mormon is true but she's taking it really slow. There were several weeks where we had very limited contact with her. But we had an opening and went over with a member and had a pretty good discussion with her to help her see that the Book of Mormon complements the Bible. We taught part of the Plan of Salvation in a lesson the next day and after answering her questions, it seems that she understands it and accepts it. She even figured out without any prompts from us whatsoever that there is a Heavenly Mother. She basically reasoned that from how we described God, He must have a wife, and I was like "...Yeah. There is a Heavenly Mother." Pretty cool. Of course talking about Her almost always quickly devolves into speculation which I don't like so I tried to steer us back on track. She cannot come to church yet because she works at another church and I guess she's gonna have to be pretty sure that this is the truth before she quits her job for it, haha. Pray that the lesson goes well tomorrow.

Then there's JB. It's been a while since I mentioned him but we've been meeting with him consistently again for the past few weeks. He's been as stubborn and bitter and difficult to teach as ever. Bad news is his health is declining and he's been hospitalized. He's quite old so we don't know what will happen next. We told the Bishop and he said he'd like to visit him, which JB agreed to. So pray for his health, physical as well as spiritual.

Then there's Jon Figley, who as of Saturday night is on date to be baptized on the 29th. He's doing well so far but we'll need to keep lessons into high gear if we're gonna teach him everything before his baptismal interview. We invited him to watch the Christmas Devotional with us and some members last night and he really enjoyed it. I thought it was a pretty great devotional too. Tomorrow we are having a big lesson so pray that we will be able to teach it effectively and he'll be able to continue progressing.

Lastly, I just want to let you all know that you can feel charity. It may not be super consistent but you can feel it. That's one thing I learned this past week. You can feel it, though it never stays easily. One thing I know is we need to continually strive to replace our natural man with God's truth. We need to work hard if we want to experience a change of heart. And that's the problem, I guess--most of us don't want to change our hearts. But we have to. Why? Because of who we are.

Who are we? I present an answer from "Taking upon Ourselves the Name of Jesus Christ" by Elder Robert C. Gay from this past conference, which I now consider my absolute favorite from the conference:

"Joseph Smith said, 'While one portion of the human race is judging and condemning the other without mercy, the Great Parent of the universe looks upon the whole of the human family with a fatherly care and paternal regard,' for '''His love [is] unfathomable.'''

"A few years ago my older sister passed away. She had a challenging life. She struggled with the gospel and was never really active. Her husband abandoned their marriage and left her with four young children to raise. On the evening of her passing, in a room with her children present, I gave her a blessing to peacefully return home. At that moment I realized I had too often defined my sister’s life in terms of her trials and inactivity. As I placed my hands on her head that evening, I received a severe rebuke from the Spirit. I was made acutely aware of her goodness and allowed to see her as God saw her—not as someone who struggled with the gospel and life but as someone who had to deal with difficult issues I did not have. I saw her as a magnificent mother who, despite great obstacles, had raised four beautiful, amazing children. I saw her as the friend to our mother who took time to watch over and be a companion to her after our father passed away.

"During that final evening with my sister, I believe God was asking me, 'Can’t you see that everyone around you is a sacred being?'"

(Man, that hit me hard when I read it Saturday morning.)

That's what God sees. That's what Jesus Christ saw so perfectly, and it's why He did what He did. He understood our worth. What's the worth of a soul? -- What you'd pay for it. God paid for our souls with the blood and infinite suffering of His perfect, Firstborn Son. Jesus Christ was willing to submit to His Father's will in this because He also knew that we are sacred beings. He was willing to endure the worst pain imaginable because He understood that it was the only way to save and exalt all of us.

Satan, on the other hand, wanted to usurp God's power (Moses 4:3) so bad that he was willing to con us all with a plan that would certainly have damned every single one of us. Satan views everyone as a worthless being to be hated and exploited; God views everyone as an infinitely valuable, sacred being to be loved and guided. So, choose you this day whom you will serve.

Choose to view yourself as a sacred being worthy of all the blessings God wants you to enjoy. And choose to view others the way the God of Truth views them: as sacred beings.

"Can't you see that?"

Love,

Elder Gallagher