Change And Rejection Is Good

What is up everyone?! How are you all doing? This week was a week of rejection, growth, productivity, and change. I realized that I only got one year left out here in Brazil, so something is going to need to change. Let's get into it. 

Spiritual Thought (actually read it)

This week, I studied about the known and unknown costs of discipleship. In other words, the things that we knowingly and unknowling give up when we choose to follow Christ. It was in this study where I learned the great difference between sacrifice and consecration. 

Sacrifice is the lower law. It's when we sacrifice things that are known to us. For example, when I became a missionary, I knew that I would have to sacrifice time with my family and air conditioning. On the other hand, consecration is the higher law. It's sacrificing the things that are both known and unknown. When I started my mission, I didn't not know however that I would need to sacrifice my toe nails and my stomach health. If we are only willing to sacrifice the known things, we will never grow as a human, or as a disciple of Jesus Christ. 

The Lord doesn't want our time, talents, and possessions, but instead He wants our hearts, minds, and wills. These are the things that He will maximize. Instead of thinking, "this is not what I signed up for", we need to think, "this is exactly what I signed up for". As we do this, we will not only receive the anticipated blessings, but also the unaticipated. I am really trying to consecrate this last year of my mission!

Highlights

- On Wednesday, we had our multizone conference! Well, on Tuesday night at 8pm, we get a text saying that we need to prepare a 15 minute training for all of the missionaries on any topic that we want. We quickly brainstormed and put together a training as we were walking from lesson to lesson. It was the first ever training given without a powerpoint presentation, and I know that it could have definately been so much better, but according to Pres, "we hit the nail on the head". The rest of the conference went super well. That is until President got up and talked for over an hour about all of the rule changes in the mission. Everyone got depressed real quick. 

- I've been losing some weight recently! However, I don't know if it's a good thing, because I'm like so much weaker. But the other day, I weighed in at 180lbs after dinner. That's down 10lbs since the last time. 

- To make up for that lost weight, we found a bakery that sells really good pão de queijo (brazilian cheese bread). Let's just say that this has affected our happiness way too much. 

- This week we were rejected more that ever, but still managed to grow our teaching group more that ever. It's super cool how God puts some of these people in our path. It's also cool how He throws an occasional pastor in our path and let's us testify to the max about Christ, His church, and the Book of Mormon. 

- Our recent convert, Tatiana, has been teaching a bunch of lessons with us and has no introduced us to her mom and her sister! Tatiana told us that this gospel and this church is the best thing that ever happned to her! This makes me so happy that I could play a small part in this happiness. 

Okay so yeah, that's it for told. President got rid of messenger again lol so I'm back on email again if anyone wants to talk on here. But I love you all and hope that you guys have a fantastic week!

Elder Ware