Elder Phillips 🥰😘

 

Oiii

I can't believe I only have 4 of these emails left  Only 4 more weeks of being a full-time representative of Jesus Christ. Only 4 more Sundays of greeting all the cute members and friends coming to church every week in Vila Nova de Gaia Portugal. Only 4 more weeks of annoying the elders quorum president to give our recent converts ministerers. 

This week, Elder Alan T. Phillips came and did a mission tour!! He just gave a talk at conference this past month that was soooo good. On Wednesday we had MLC with him down in Lisbon, and then on Thursday we had zone conference with him in Porto!! Lots of long train rides!! But it was sooo worth it. 

A couple of weeks ago on an exchange we talked to a lady on the bus and our convo has had me thinking the past couple of weeks!! Everyone here (almost) is catholic and so it's pretty rare to find someone who doesn't believe in God or Jesus Christ. We started talking to Cristina on the bus and when we asked her "Tudo bem?" She said "mais ou menos." She was sad about the wars that are happening around the world. We asked her if she believed in Jesus Christ and if she had faith in Him. She said she couldn't possibly believe in God or Jesus Christ because she can't see them, but that she has lots of faith in herself. I was actually genuinely taken back by her answer!! It is so sad to me to imagine living life without faith in something beyond myself and my own efforts. I understand her sadness, because from that point of view, the world would seem like such a dark, hopeless, and helpless place. Obviously she didn't understand what faith really means, and I definitely pulled out Alma 32:21 and we read together about faith: "And now as I said concerning faith—faith is not to have a perfect knowledge of things; therefore if ye have faith ye hope for things which are not seen, which are true." The world needs a Savior!  (https://www.churchofjesuschrist.org/study/video/christmas-messages/2015-12-1000-why-we-need-a-savior--a-christmas-message-about-our-savior-jesus-christ-asaviorisborn?lang=engWe) We need to not only have faith, but faith in ou Savior, Jesus Christ. I was reading Elder Phillips talk in preparation for his tour and what he said reminded me of this bus contact. 

"To my dear friends of the rising generation, Gen Z and Gen Alpha: Please know faith requires work. We live in a time when, for many, only “seeing is believing.” Faith can be challenging and requires choices. But prayers are answered. And answers can be felt. Some of the most real things in life are not seen; they are felt, known, and experienced. They too are real."

"You are His child. If you are feeling lost, if you have questions or lack wisdom, if you are struggling with your circumstances or wrestling with spiritual dissonance, turn to Him. Pray to Him for comfort, love, answers, and direction. Whatever the need and wherever you are, pour out your heart to your Heavenly Father. For some, you may want to follow President Nelson’s invitation and ask “if He is really there—if He knows you. Ask Him how He feels about you. And then listen.”

One things Elder Phillips talked about at our mission conference that touched me, was what he said about our testimonies. First he compared our testimonies to a wall, or I imagined those cinder blocks walls they use all over AZ. When we have a gap in our testimony or a doubt or a question, our wall is missing a cinder block. He said that the adversary loooves this representation of our testimony, because if we don't have everything figured out, and if we don't have a perfect testimony, then we seem imperfect and incomplete. He talked about how often people leave the church over 1 or 2 or 3 cinder blocks when they fail to recognize the rest of our constructed wall. He then drew a big block on the board next to really small jenga size blocks. In the middle of the big block he wrote Helaman 5:12:

"And now, my sons, remember, remember that it is upon the rock of our Redeemer, who is Christ, the Son of God, that ye must build your foundation; that when the devil shall send forth his mighty winds, yea, his shafts in the whirlwind, yea, when all his hail and his mighty storm shall beat upon you, it shall have no power over you to drag you down to the gulf of misery and endless wo, because of the rock upon which ye are built, which is a sure foundation, a foundation whereon if men build they cannot fall."

If we build our foundation, our testimony, on the Savior Jesus Christ, our doubts and questions, our small jenga blocks, will not be the reason we fall. Being a disciple of Jesus Christ does not mean that we won't have a few jenga blocks. But it does mean that our jenga blocks will not be a reason to panic.

Work now to build your foundation upon the rock of our Redeemer 

 Sister Menden

Pics!!

- pday last week!

- Big zone conference!! Sister Cordner was there!! We sang together  That was the last time that I'll see her before our bye bye dinner 

- The elevator wouldn't work because both of us were over 700 lbs

- Guilherme and Josué are gonna get baptized next week!!!  this is me and Josué he is so precious. He has a little autism and is the most precious soul. He kept pulling me down to sit with him 

- Sister Jones cutting her nails on public transportation HAHAH

- Messages that Carlos, our recent convert of one week, sent to mom