This is the Lord's work

Hello dear friends and family, 

I am so grateful to be a missionary! I love my life and my Savior. I'm learning so much and am so grateful for the chance I have to constantly change as a person and help others to come unto Christ. I know that this work is His. He directs it. 

One little miracle! I message-contacted someone on Facebook (who turned out to be a member), and it wound up being the exact moment that she needed help. She was very happy about the prospect of an uplifting spiritual message from the missionaries in her hard time. I asked her what was making things so hard, and it turned out (on top of a lot of other things), her son was about to fail math! So, that turned into an on-the-spot tutoring session. The Lord works in mysterious ways, and He will use our unique gifts and talents to do so, even when it's something like enjoying math.

Another pair of miracles. This isn't all new, but I haven't put it in my weekly. Turns out when I got transferred here, my comp had just barely gotten symptomatic with covid. Then within the next week and a half, the other two elders we live with got sick. I had gotten the first vaccine just three days before transfers. We looked into it, and it turns out that the antibodies often take only a couple days to develop! (those with medical knowledge correct me if further explanation is needed). I never got sick even a little bit, even though I spent most of three weeks with three contagious, symptomatic, sick elders, a miracle we put down to my having gotten vaccinated just in time. Then, we had an answer to prayer with them approving my waiver to get the second dose a few days early so as to be able to get it and recover before leaving the country! Prayers are answered and we're being looked out for. 

Next week I'll be writing from Peru! This week's going to be a little crazy what with transit, prep, and accommodations, but it'll be okay. This last week was a little crazy with quarantine, but that's okay too. I'm learning more and more every day how to be a better missionary and give more to the Lord.

Thanks for your thoughts, emails, and prayers! Sorry I haven't gotten to answering all of them. 

Happy, grateful, lucky and blessed, 

Elder Child

Re: A Quick Klein Stopby

Ahhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh!!!!! Peru!!! Yay!

On Mon, Apr 19, 2021 at 4:58 PM Elijah Child <elijah.child@missionary.org> wrote:

Well, this will be pretty quick. First and foremost, I love being a missionary! This life is one of constant growth, becoming more like my Savior, serving people, loving as completely as I can, and working to help others to come unto Christ. I absolutely love it, and it's the same work wherever we go. 

Second of all, I'm going back to Peru! I'll be back April 30. I'm super excited :) 

I'm not sure if I mentioned in my last weekly, but I did also just get transferred. So I'll only be in the Klein Oak ward for a total of three weeks and three days, but I'm super grateful for the time I have here and am doing my best to give my everything to invite others to come unto Christ. It's fascinating being in an English ward and seeing it from the missionary side. I've grown up in English wards, but it's quite different being the missionaries here. 

My new comp is Elder Salgado, from California, who grew up speaking both English and Spanish, which is super fun to be around.

One cool quick spiritual thought for this week, a math-related one. The nature of infinity teaches us that if we had an infinite sequence of random letters, it is 100% probable that that sequence, at some point, contains the complete works of Shakespeare, as well as Websters dictionary and any other finite sequence of letters. In Alma 34:9-10, Amulek very clearly teaches that any finite sacrifice could not have done what the Atonement of Jesus Christ did. What Christ did was infinite. To me, it makes sense that the same principle would apply. Christ's Atonement is so deep and infinite that it not only includes the pain and price of everything that humanity has done but the pain and probability of everything that we could ever possibly do, every possible lifetime combination of pain, sin, injury, and suffering. To me this makes sense, but I don't necessarily have doctrine to back it up. I'd love to hear your thoughts on this! (inspiration credit for this week's insight goes to Sister Lucy Ward and Elder Wilkins). 

We're seeing miracles. This work is the Lord's. 

Happy, grateful, lucky, and blessed, 

Elder Child

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A Quick Klein Stopby

Well, this will be pretty quick. First and foremost, I love being a missionary! This life is one of constant growth, becoming more like my Savior, serving people, loving as completely as I can, and working to help others to come unto Christ. I absolutely love it, and it's the same work wherever we go. 

Second of all, I'm going back to Peru! I'll be back April 30. I'm super excited :) 

I'm not sure if I mentioned in my last weekly, but I did also just get transferred. So I'll only be in the Klein Oak ward for a total of three weeks and three days, but I'm super grateful for the time I have here and am doing my best to give my everything to invite others to come unto Christ. It's fascinating being in an English ward and seeing it from the missionary side. I've grown up in English wards, but it's quite different being the missionaries here. 

My new comp is Elder Salgado, from California, who grew up speaking both English and Spanish, which is super fun to be around.

One cool quick spiritual thought for this week, a math-related one. The nature of infinity teaches us that if we had an infinite sequence of random letters, it is 100% probable that that sequence, at some point, contains the complete works of Shakespeare, as well as Websters dictionary and any other finite sequence of letters. In Alma 34:9-10, Amulek very clearly teaches that any finite sacrifice could not have done what the Atonement of Jesus Christ did. What Christ did was infinite. To me, it makes sense that the same principle would apply. Christ's Atonement is so deep and infinite that it not only includes the pain and price of everything that humanity has done but the pain and probability of everything that we could ever possibly do, every possible lifetime combination of pain, sin, injury, and suffering. To me this makes sense, but I don't necessarily have doctrine to back it up. I'd love to hear your thoughts on this! (inspiration credit for this week's insight goes to Sister Lucy Ward and Elder Wilkins). 

We're seeing miracles. This work is the Lord's. 

Happy, grateful, lucky, and blessed, 

Elder Child

Deep thoughts and transfers

Greetings from down South! 

I love my life :) I was thinking this week a lot about just how much of a blessing it is to be a full-time missionary. I love just serving, loving, and teaching people with all my time and effort. It's wonderful to be in the Lord's service.

Updates on my life: I got transferred and live in Spring now. Life is pretty fantastic here, and it's really interesting to be in an English ward for the first time as a missionary. My new comp is Elder Salgado, and we've been having a great time together. 

One deep thought and one deep question:

We talk a lot about our body's five senses. Then there's the kinematic sense for #6. I think that knowing the plan of salvation, we can actually add a couple more, spiritual senses. This list is far from comprehensive, I'd love your thoughts.

     The first we add is the truth sense. We as spirits and intelligences can sense truth, especially divine, religious truth, when we are presented with it. This is otherwise described as the light of Christ.

     Next is the revelation sense. There's something that feels different when the Spirit is speaking to us, something different from anything we can experience with the first seven.

Both senses have to be learned and are imperfect and develop as we learn to use them and gain experience about what it is that we learn through them, just as sight or hearing or smell. So the list of "senses of the soul" is sitting at eight so far, but I'm sure there are more you could add to the list. I'd love your thoughts! 

Interesting question. I've been and will be studying this as well. How did Christ's Resurrection make our own possible? Again, I'd love your thoughts. 

Thanks for the emails, the prayers, and doing the things you're doing to gather Israel! This is the work of God.

Happy, grateful, lucky and blessed, 

Elder Child

Wonderful Westgreen

Hello all! 

My life is wonderful. I'm so happy to be a missionary and feel enriched every day by feeling of the Lord's love for those around me. 

I am so grateful for living prophets! This past weekend, we got the chance to listen to the Lord's prophet, and for me it was a powerful testimiony-bulilder. I know that this Church is led by Jesus Christ through men called of Him to receive revelation for the whole world. We are so blessed to live in this the last dispensation!

One interesting thought I wanted to share. For context, during my time in Peru, President Nelson invited us in the NASW area to share, as the first part of the Book of Mormon that our friends are invited to read, 3 Nephi 11. From that point on, every time we taught someone about the Book of Mormon, we would invite them to read 3 Nephi 11 and pray to know of the truth of the book. I was recently reflecting on why it was that that of all chapters might be the first we are to invite people to read. It could be explained in many ways, but here's an explanation that just occurred to me. 3 Nephi 11 is really the keystone of the Book of Mormon. The book's writers spent 600 years prophesying of Christ and then 400 years testifying of Him. If He hadn't come down after His Resurrection, the entire book would be rather erroneous. Thus, the truth of the entire book rises and falls with the fact that Jesus Christ fulfills His promises, including visiting the ancient Americas as the prophets testified He would. 

I'm getting transferred! Westgreen has been a miraculous place to work, learn, and share the light of the gospel of Christ for two transfers. I've really loved my time here and am excited to find out where I'm heading tomorrow. 

I got vaccinated and don't think I ever got Covid, so that's a little miracle. 

Happy Easter :) I know that Jesus Christ lives. Easter is such an incredible holiday. Texas is very Christian, and it's been inspiring to see so many people trying to bring Him into their lives in so many ways. Everyone deserves the truth, too, and we're doing our very best to share it with them. Among those truths, I know that because He lives, we will all live again, and because He chose to suffer for our sins, we can be cleansed and come to live as perfected beings forever with our families. I am so grateful to know these eternal truths. In the name of Jesus Christ, Amen. 

Love you all! Happy, grateful, lucky, and blessed, 

Elder Child