Ephesians 4:11-14

On Christmas Day 2011, Elder Bednar spoke in the MTC about the character of Christ. I'm pretty sure that his talk has been shown to every single set of missionaries who has entered the MTC since then. It's the one where he compares the "natural man" to Cookie Monster ("I want cookie now! I want baptism now! I want marriage now!")

One of the things he shared in this talk is a technique he uses for studying the Book of Mormon and getting answers to his questions of the soul. He gets a paperback copy of the Book of Mormon and writes his question on the front or the sides of the book. And then he reads the Book of Mormon from cover to cover, looking for answers to his question. When he is finished, he writes a one-page summary of what he has learned. During the mission, our mission president challenged us to read the Book of Mormon from cover to cover, looking for every single example of the Atonement (i.e. a time when the Atonement of Jesus Christ enabled a person to do or become something that he or she could not have done or become on their own). As Elder Bednar promised, it changed my life.

The day that I flew home to New Mexico, I started a new copy with a second question: how to prepare for eternal family relationships. While reading about the Plan of Salvation in 2 Nephi, I was given guidance regarding how to work through challenges in courtship. Six months into the challenge, Bryan proposed to me and I joyfully said yes. As Elder Bednar promised, studying the Book of Mormon for an answer to a specific question of the soul changed my life.

On June 21, I started a new copy with my third question: how to spend time wisely. I have received little packets of inspiration that have guided me in deciding how to spend my time. Some of these packets of inspiration have been surprising: one morning, I was shown that I needed to pause my scripture study and go spend time with my husband.

Yesterday I was reading 2 Nephi 25:1, which says that a lot of people find it hard to understand the writings of Isaiah because they "know not concerning the manner of prophesying among the Jews." At first, I wanted to be very smug and think things like, "Oh, well, I'm squared away, since I know about God's pattern of working and teaching through prophets." And then I remembered that complacency equals pride and so I decided to refresh my testimony and understanding of prophets by going to Chapter 3, Lesson 1 of Preach My Gospel.

One of the scripture references took me to Ephesians 4:11-14. I like this verse because it explains the WHY of calling apostles, prophets, evangelists, pastors, and teachers. I also like it because it declares how long God will use this pattern. Here is what Paul said:

And he gave some, apostles; and some, prophets; and some, evangelists; and some, pastors and teachers;

For the perfecting of the saints, for the work of the ministry, for the edifying of the body of Christ:

Till we all come in the unity of the faith, and of the knowledge of the Son of God, unto a perfect man, unto the measure of the stature of the fulness of Christ:

That we henceforth be no more children, tossed to and fro, and carried about with every windo of doctrine, by the sleight of men, and cunning craftiness, whereby they lie in wait to deceive

Why do we need apostles, prophets, and all the other offices of the priesthood? The answer, for me, likes in verses 12 and 14: for the perfecting of the saints, for the work of the ministry, for the building up and strengthening of the whole church, so that we know the pure doctrine of Christ.

When will God stop calling apostles and prophets? The missionaries who taught me pointed out that verse 13 suggests that God will only stop giving us apostles and prophets when we have a unity of the  faith and knowledge of the Son of God and when we have realized perfection. That hasn't happened yet!

I know that these verses don't "prove" anything, but it was a very tender mercy for God to lead me to them and allow me to remember my own spiritual journey.

 

 

 

 

Romans 1: Apostles, grace, saints, faith, and apostasy

The Presbyterian pastor who spoke at my grandfather's funeral said that it was through reading Paul's epistle to the Romans that my grandfather gained a testimony of Jesus Christ as his Savior and Redeemer. In memory of my grandfather, I have decided to re-read this same epistle, and imagine that I am leading my grandfather through a bible study. Or imagine that he is leading some of his friends through a study and that he is helping them come to the same knowledge that he has.

I'm not a trained minister, so this is super informal. It's pretty much a verse-by-verse study of each chapter. I imagine Grampy reading one verse at a time, and at appropriate moments, asking the following questions:

Romans Chapter 1
As you read this chapter, pay attention to the attributes of Jesus Christ that Paul writes about. How can you develop these attributes in your own life?
(v. 1) How is being an apostle different from being a disciple?
(v. 1) It says in this verse that Paul is "called" to be an apostle. What does that mean? What is God's way of "calling" someone to be an apostle?
(v. 5) What does grace mean to you? Who is the source of grace?
(v. 5) Who is the source of apostleship?
(v. 7) Paul says that he is writing this apostle to "all that be in Rome" who are "called to be saints." What does that mean? And how do we become saints?

• Okay, I'm actually cheating with this question. One of my favorite verses in the Book of Mormon explains what it means to be a "saint." It doesn't mean just being naturally perfect! Instead, Mosiah 3:19 says that a saint is someone who has put off the "natural man" by yielding to "the enticings of the Holy Spirit." A person can become "a saint [ONLY] through the atonement of  Christ." A saint has become "as a child, submissive, meek, humble, patient, full of love, willing to submit to all things which The Lord seeth fit to inflict upon him, even as a child doth submit to his father." 
• Isn't it cool how the Book of Mormon and the Bible support each other? Okay, end digression...back to Romans.

(v. 8) What is faith?
(v. 17) What does it mean to live by faith?
(v. 21-31) How does God feel about people who change His truths?
(v. 29-31) What happens to people who reject God's truth?

A wedding and a funeral

Two weeks ago, I was sealed for time and all eternity to a man who is perfect for me. A whole bunch of little things "went wrong" on the day of our wedding, but a whole bunch of BIG things went right. It was a really special day, and we both felt extremely loved by our family, friends, and Heavenly Father. My grampy was not able to attend due to his rapidly declining health, but I heard from my uncle Glenn that he wore a white shirt and the red "wedding party" tie that we sent up to him. My granny and grampy watched most of the day's celebrations via skype.

We are still waiting on the professional photographs, but here is one that Bryan's step-mom took of us as we joyfully exited the temple on Saturday afternoon!

Bryan and I spent five glorious days on a cruise-ship in the Caribbean. The day after we returned, my grampy passed away. 

This photo is from May 2009, when I graduated from college. Granny and Grampy drove all the way from Parker, Colorado to Tucson, Arizona so that they could attend my College of Science ceremony. My parents were attending my brothers' high school graduation, so it meant a lot that Granny and Grampy were willing to endure the 100-degree heat just to show their love and support to a granddaughter.

Yesterday, Bryan and I flew up to Denver to attend Grampy's service. It was great to see [nearly] the whole family rally around each other to provide support and remember what a patient and loving father, grandfather, and great-grandfather Lewis Burrit Palmer was.

The pastor of Grampy's church mentioned that Grampy and Granny had both participated in a small Bible-study group that focused on the book of Romans, from the New Testament. Grampy really enjoyed it, and even led the discussion one week when the normal leader could not make it. The pastor said that reading Romans really helped Grampy come to know and understand that Jesus Christ is our Savior. I have decided to re-read that little book in the coming days. 

Back to the real world

Well, I'm back from the mission.  It's weird. I'm trying to acclimate to civilian life as best as I can, but it's still weird.

I'm dating the young man who wrote letters to me for eighteen months while I was living in Louisiana.

I have a job that pays the bills and keeps me moderately busy.  I teach with the sister missionaries in our YSA branch at least weekly.  I renewed my temple recommend.

I have a calling. I have a gym membership. I share a one bedroom, one bath apartment with a couple of periplanetae. I am taking a graduate course at UNM to see if I want to go to grad school one day.

I have to admit, that every aspect of my life is NOT focused on serving God. I try to involve Him in it, of course, but my main reason for dating my boyfriend is NOT to invite him to come unto Christ by helping him receive the restored gospel through faith in Jesus Christ, repentance, baptism, receiving the Holy Ghost, and enduring to the end.  Of course, I know that families are essential to God's plan for His children.

The Palmer clan! A few years ago...

But if God didn't want to choose someone who would make us (as individuals) happy to be our spouse, he wouldn't have let us do our own courting. Anyways, I digress....

I'd like to just keep writing on this blog, but my posts are gonna have to be a bit more secular than they were while I was a full-time missionary. Is that okay with y'all?

Picture of Sister Palmer and her companion, Sister Chausow

Nine Miracles

To start off, I just want to brag about the training that the assistants gave at transfer meeting.

First of all, instead of excluding the missionaries who are merely companions of "the leaders," the assistants invited every missionary who was not training to attend the "Mission Leadership" meeting. After all, every single one of us is in a position to influence others for good, so we are all leaders.

The assistants passed out pieces of paper so that everyone could take notes, even if we forgot to bring a study notebook with us to the meeting. We then watched President Monson's conference talk on obedience. The Spirit taught me that daily obedience requires discipline. The discipline I learn here will help me be obedient when I get home from my mission. The Spirit also taught me that I was being really negative at the time. I decided that I wanted and needed to change that (i.e. I needed to repent). I learned that it is only possible to be exactly obedient if we are doing it out of love. One of the missionaries in the room quoted the Doctrine and Covenants, which teaches that "no [missionary] receiveth the fulness unless [s]he keepeth His commandments" (Kirtland, Ohio, May 1833). The guide to a successful transfer is obedience to the commandments of God.

I came out of the meeting with a renewed commitment to obey every commandment with exactness, every time. Sister Chausow and I talked today about our zone's culture. She said that she feels our zone is at an 8 out of 10 on the "obedience" scale. That's good. But it's not exact obedience. We have been striving, every day, for exact obedience. We get up at 6:20 so that we can have a full 30 minutes of exercise time every morning. Before her mission, Sister Chausow printed out some "pinterest" workouts, which she keeps in a ziploc bag. Every other day, we draw out a workout from her bag. On the other three days, we walk and jog. Getting 30 minutes of good exercise is something that we can control. When 7 o'clock rolls around, we can feel confident in knowing that so far, we have been exactly obedient. We are starting our day guilt-free.

I have also committed myself to writing a little something in my journal every single night. I am trying to focus on "how I saw God's hand in my life" and "how I got to be God's hands in somebody else's life." It's a good way for me to reflect on the day. And these are the things that I really desire to remember.

Sister Chausow and I have committed to each other that we are going to be exactly obedient. Sometimes we have to problem-solve together to figure out how we are going to be exactly obedient. Like I learned at the transfer meeting, obedience requires discipline. I strongly believe that it is because of our increased obedience (and repentance) that we have seen some little miracles every single day this transfer.

On Wednesday, Sister LeBlanc (active, unendowed convert, needs strenghtening) took us out to dinner. Sister Chausow warned me beforehand that she probably was taking us to dinner because she figured we wouldn't be able to talk about spiritual things at a restaurant. Serendipitously, the hostess seated us in the back in a quiet little booth. We talked with her about temples and found out her real concern. It did not "count" as a lesson, but Sister Chausow said that she had never opened up that much before. (First miracle.)

Then we had a lesson with the Eades (active, need strengthening). We met Sister Eades' teenage son and her son's teammate. We taught a lesson about the little things and the sacrament with a non-member present. (Second miracle.) We need to follow up with Sister Eades to see what Tori thought about the lesson.

During weekly planning, I learned about how Sister Jones and Sister Chausow were using their own version of 5-5-5 to strive for balance in their lessons. Right now, we want to teach five lessons to investigators, five lessons to returning members, and five lessons to active members every week. Once we hit 5-5-5, we will switch our goal to 6-6-6. Once we hit 6-6-6, we weill switch to 7-7-7. Or at least that's the plan at this point.

We took our lunch break on Thursday to take a returning member named Karen out to frozen yogurt for her birthday. She was turning 22, so we taught her a lesson about where and WHO she was 25 years ago. She shared with us that she wants the Book of Mormon and the Church to be true, but she doesn't know if they are yet. Sister Chausow did a great job introducing and using Alma 32:27 to answer Karen's question of the soul. She, too, opened up to us in a way that she never had before. (Third miracle.)

On Saturday a less-active sister named Jennifer called us and asked for help. Right before transfers, this very same sister told Sister Jones and Sister Chausow that she didn't want to meet up with the missionaries any more. We got to deliver her food order to her and share a brief spiritual thought on grace. We also gave her adorable daughter two coloring pages with gospel themes. (Fourth miracle.)

Ever since I have been in the area, we have tried contacting a referral named Lily. We have been calling her every day at a different time. On Thursday and Friday when we called her, we did not leave a message (which is a tip that I learned from Sister Megan Spencer). On Saturday, we left a message. An hour later, she called us back and set up a return appointment for Tuesday. (Fifth miracle.)

Saturday evening, we stopped by the Risutto family. Sister Risutto is a family member and Brother Risutto is a non-member who used to be hostile to the missionaries but who now tolerates us. When we got to their house, we knocked on their door and waited. They didn't answer. We knocked again. Still no answer. Sister Chausow suggested that we call them, so we did. Brother Risutto answered the phone and I spoke to him. When he realized that we were missionaries, he passed the phone to his wife and we set up an appointment for later on in the week. We ended the call in a warm manner and Sister Chausow started writing a note to put in their door. As she was putting the note in the door, the Risuttos pulled up. Now, this encounter could have been really awkward. We were basically "caught" calling them right at their doorstep. But my impetuousness in this case may have helped us as I found myself speaking to the Risuttos: "Oh no! You caught us!" They laughed. I continued: "My dad - he's not Mormon - get's SOOO annoyed whenever the missionaries just 'drop by' to see him! And now we're doing the same thing!" Again, they laughed. And then Brother Risutto asked us if we had to leave, or if we could come in for a bit. (Sixth miracle.) We said we would love to stay, and then we helped them carry in their groceries.

In the past, Brother Risutto has stayed in the living room while the sisters talk to and teach his wife in the kitchen. This time, he came into the kitchen and made small talk. He asked where we were from. It was very hopeful. (Seventh miracle.)

After we read 2 Nephi 8 with Sister Risutto, we went back out to our car. As we were getting in, Sister Chausow got the impression to go talk to the Risutto's neighbors. It looked like they were drinking in their car port, and I really don't like arguing with drunk people, so I didn't really want to go talk to them. I warned her that they were probably drunk, but I said that I didn't really mind getting insulted, since that was the worst we could do (which was a fitting and inspired resonse, given what we read in 2 Nephi 8). Turns out they were just frying fish, and one of the people invited us to pray with her and come back another day. So now we have a PI named Anita. (Eighth miracle).

Yesterday we found out from Sister Tchoukalov that Sister Scott's husband is willing to meet with us missionaries. Here's why this is so cool: Sister Jones and Sister Chausow had identified a "trifecta" of non-member husbands. Brother Scott is one of them. Sister Jones and Sister Chausow had been practicing their teaching skills with Sister Scott by teaching her the first three lessons, and they were starting on teaching her all of the commandments. Sister Chausow thought that Sister Scott was annoyed at them. So the fact that she not only wants to continue meeting with us sister missionaries, but that she also wants us to teach her non-member husband, in another miracle. The ninth miracle, I think. And just to top it all off, Sister Tchoukalov is one of the assigned visiting teachers for Sister Scott. So we are getting this "tip" in the Lord's appointed way. The members of the Church are doing the finding, and then we missionaries will get to do the teaching. That is how we align the keys.

I know I've written a ton, but it's been a really good week. I am thrilled to be here, serving with Sister Chausow. She has opened up to me and helped me *understand* that she needs me to give her words of affirmation so that she can feel loved. I can do that. I like words.

Developing the faith to find those who are ready

At call-ins, Elder Riendeau asked us what was the biggest thing that we learned at Zone Training on Saturday.  Ironically, what I thought of was not actually taught by any of the speakers, but it came from a side-conversation that Sister Spencer and I had with Elder Burch during a break.  

Elder Burch was talking about how it had been challenging for him to be Sister Crookston's leader in Baton Rouge because they had different definitions of success.  What I learned from the conversation is just how important it is to have balance in your key indicators.

When our mission adopted the goal to teach 20 lessons per week per companionship, I showed initial resistance (for about five minutes), and then I embraced it as a way for us to become the best teaching mission in the world.  In my mind, the primary purpose for us to teach more lessons was so that we would become better teachers.

But we teach people, not lessons!  And even though I obviously wanted all of the people here in Natchitoches to progress, I was more committed to teaching 20 lessons per week than to teaching people that were ready to receive the restored gospel.  I was great at loving people who had no one else to love them.  But I think I was giving these wonderful people too much priority.  I think that I was thinking, "a bird in the hand is better than two in the bush."

Sister Spencer has helped me realize that part of being a great missionary is having the faith that there are people in our area who are ready to progress toward Jesus Christ TODAY.  Our job as missionaries is to teach true doctrine, with love and the Holy Ghost, present people with a clear choice, and then respect their agency.  

For so long, I've hated the idea of "dropping" someone.  What I understand now, is that you never really "drop" anyone, but sometimes, it is a good thing to put someone on the back burner and allow the Holy Ghost to work on their heart while we serve those who are thirsty for our message TODAY.  Great missionaries have faith that somehow, God will make sure that these precious souls of Natchitoches are not forgotten.

At the same time, it has been really really cool to see a ten year-old girl named Angel progress.  She lives in Carter trailer park, where the trailers lack carpet and there are holes in the plywood flooring.  She and her family have a very limited understanding of who God is and who Jesus Christ is.  Sister Hartshorn and I met them before Christmas and shared a Christmas message with them.  We got a return appointment and shared "Joy to the World" with them.  We tried really hard to just jump into the message of the Restoration, but we figured out that they needed a lot of time spend on basic gospel beliefs.  When we later watched "Finding Faith in Christ" with them, they were asking us questions like, "Is that Jesus' son?" and "Is that the devil?"  (It was like watching a movie with six year-old Karen Marie.)  We have been working with some of the daughters in the family to help them improve in their reading ability.  We have sung primary songs (i.e. the catchy songs that kids in the Church sing on Sundays).  Whenever we go to Carter trailer park to visit someone else, we check up on them.  They need a lot of love.  

This last week, Sister Spencer and I got to teach Angel the full Restoration.  At the beginning, when we were talking about who God is, the importance of families, prophets, and the life of Jesus Christ, Angel was able to teach the lesson to us, using the pictures in the pamphlet as a guide.  (That's another one of the great things about pamphlets...people can teach themselves!)  The experience made me think of the first time I met with missionaries; Elder Baker and Elder Moss told me afterward that *I* pretty much taught the Restoration to *them.*  

I guess my point is that sometimes it seems like all we're doing is loving people and hoeing the ground for future missionaries, but sometimes, unexpectedly, we get to see the early summer fruit beginning to bud.  

In my last two transfers, I am going to try really hard to apply everything that I have learned from Sister Spencer.