April 15, 2013

Hey there everyone!!

I have officially left Carissa and now I am in a new area! Let me just give a little background of the area. It is called Aborlan, on the beautiful island of Palawan. If you don't know what Palawan is, google it and explore the glorious land that we missionaries like to call, paradise. I am so excited to serve here in Aborlan. I have already spent a few days here so I have already met a ton of our investigators as well as a ton of members that we will be working with. I also have a new companion, named Elder Wardle. he is awesome and really obedient which is always a good thing. I am excited to serve here with him and I know the work will really go forth. Right off the bat we were able to have a lot of awesome lessons and the Spirit was so strong in all of our lessons. I can't wait to continue to work. So enough about that, let's talk about General Conference! It was a wonderful Conference of course. I love hearing all of the leaders of the church and I can't wait to hear them again. I'm just bummed it has to be 6 months away! Anyways, I loved a ton of the talks given of course. A lot of them we actually weren't able to watch because the copies we were watching them on were a little corrupted or something. However we will get a Liahona in the next few months so I will be able to really study them so it is all good. So one of the talks that I really enjoyed was the one by Elder Richard G Scott. He just talked about having a Christ like centered home and it was just a wonderful message. Especially because we focus on teaching families out here on the mission as well as helping families to stay active. I know that when a home is centered on Christ and His teachings, they can be so much more happy, the Spirit will be in their home, and problems will be solved. Elder Scott said, "The prophetic counsel to have daily personal and family prayer, daily personal and family scripture study, and weekly family home evening are the essential, weight-bearing beams in the construction of a Christ-centered home. Without these regular practices it will be difficult to find the desired and much-needed peace and refuge from the world." It is just so true. When we do these things, we will find peace in our home. Another talk I loved was President Thomas S. Monson's wonderful talk on obedience to the commandments. When we are obedient, we are blessed. President Monson stated, "A loving Heavenly Father has plotted our course and provided an unfailing guide given obedience. A knowledge of truth and the answers to our greatest questions come to us as we are obedient to the commandments of God." All Heaving Father asks of us is to be obedient to the commandments. I know that President Monson is a prophet of God.j I know that God loves us and has given us prophets so we can come to know His gospel. It is up to us to follow Jesus Christ. I know this church is true, and we can all come to know of the truth for ourselves through diligent study and prayer. See you next week!

Elder Stephens