Are you Drifting?

What a week let me tell ya! This week was awesome!!! It was transfer week, so it usually tends to be the slowest week.  Most missionaries don't perform to the level that they could.  It's interesting how (I've found myself falling into this trap) even though we have our purpose in doing "work" we look for opportunities to lay back.

This week I made it a point to work and boy did we ever work! Guess what? Low and behold we saw lots of success! Crazy huh?!;) 

I would also like to draw a parallel with this to a talk I read from October 2014 General Conference called "Stay in the Boat and Hold On!" In this talk Elder M. Russell Ballard (Of the Quorum of the Twelve Apostles) related the church to the ol' ship Zion. We as members of the church are on this great indestructible ship and despite the storms we find our selves in, if we stay on the ship, we are promised we will BE SAFE! 

Now back to missionary work... We are promised if we do X Y Z and work hard we will see success. Now who in this world doesn't want to see success? NOBODY! So why is it that we find ourselves wavering, being laxed, and wondering why we aren't seeing success? Why do we jump ship when we know and are promised that we will be safe if we stay on the ship. There is no silver bullet answers for this one, but I can share what I know to be true for me. For me it is because I haven't truly identified or become committed to a "destination". When I don't have a destination, so to speak, I become what we can call a DRIFTER, going through the motions and simply drifting like a piece of drift wood with no set direction, or in some cases I have a destination that I would like, but I'm not committed to the point that I'm willing to work towards it. 

I have found that I must take a self examination often. In this I mean continually identifying what I would like my destination to be (also when it's the Lords destination for you, things tend to work out better;).  So lets recap... First, Be COMMITTED to it. Next, take constant self evaluation and weigh the choices you make to the destination you would like to arrive at.

This week I wanted to hit what we call "gold standard" in the mission, mind you I've wanted this for the last 6 months. I had a destination in mind, but I wasn't truly committed to it. This week I changed that and I got committed and created results (now there is not question that the Lords hand was involved). When we keep Gods commandments and show Him we are committed then we become blessed opportunities to serve! I am loving life! 

This week we got a ton of snow! Elder Thompson and I shoveled a lot of it! We are actually  working with this lady who hasn't been to church in a l-o-n-g time and we committed her to come to church Sunday. Well, Saturday we were talking to her on the phone and she was like "yeah my sons out of town and my drive way (which her son uses a tractor to clear it, it's kind of a big driveway) is full of snow. I can't get out, so I won't be able to come to church."  We dropped what we were doing and darted over to her house and had a blast... Guess what?! She came to church. ;)

ps... Scott (Dallin's friend), thanks for the email. I'm glad you got  to spend time in Arizona. I look forward to meeting  you some day!

Lots of Love,
Elder Craig

Weather forecast for the day.