{Letter #31} This is God's Work!

This week has been amazing! We've had lots of miracles, and signs over and over that confirm to me that this is God's work! He is with us every step of the way. A quick summary of what happened this week: interviews, exchanges, Jimmy, Laura, and Raven!

Those series of events happened in no particular order^^^

First off were exchanges last week! Those were a lot of fun! I got to stay in my area with Elder Stallard biking around with me!

 It was a pretty uneventful exchange for the most part, we did talk a little bit about following the promptings of the Spirit though. What we talked about made me think of the prophet King Benjamin (from The Book of Mormon-Another Testament of Jesus Christ) said. He taught:

"For the natural man is an enemy to God, and has been from the fall of Adam, and will be, forever and ever, unless he yields to the enticings of the Holy Spirit, and putteth off the natural man and becometh a saint through the atonement of Christ the Lord"(Mosiah 3:19)

I love what this teaches us! The natural state of all people is to not follow the promptings of the Spirit. It is something that takes deliberate effort, in the form of diligence and faith, to follow the Spirit. But, despite this challenge of our natural state being to not follow the Spirit, we can overcome this! If we rely on the atonement of Jesus Christ for strength we can be more receptive to the promptings of the Spirit and increase our capacity to follow them.

I had never thought about that verse in that way, and thought it was kinda cool.

The next few things that happened were amazing lessons that we were able to have with some of our friends. First off, Jimmy. He has been taught by missionaries for a long time, and is facing a smoking habit that is difficult for him to break. In our lesson this Friday he expressed to us that he felt the need to be baptized so he can receive forgiveness. He also expressed that he just doesn't feel worthy though. We testified to Him of Christ's love and the redeeming power that comes through Christ's atonement. The Spirit was unbelievably strong. He is praying this week to know if it is the right thing for him to be baptized. We will be following up with him tonight.

The next cool lesson we had was with our friend Laura! We just met her a couple weeks ago, but she is awesome! She has some doubts about organized religion, but is still willing to meet with us and has been reading The Book of Mormon. We were teaching the restoration to her this most recent lesson, and we asked her what she would do if she knew that God had restored His church to the earth today. She said that she would undoubtedly follow it. She then said that despite her bad experiences with religion in the past, it feels right every time we come over. She is now praying to know for herself if the church and the Book of Mormon are true. We will be following up with her tonight.

Lastly our friend Raven. We just met her this week knocking on a random door. At first she seemed really uninterested, ubt as we asked a couple more questions she opened up to us about the things that she's been going through. The Spirit was very present as we testified of the strength that can come through Christ. She invited us back and we will see her again this Friday!

All of these things, and more, were just confirmations to me that this is God's work! The Gathering of Israel is truly the most important thing that anyone can be involved in on the earth!

The last thing that happened this week were interviews with President Haymond! These are honestly always a highlight. One thing that he encouraged me to do was to study and memorize the words of the living prophets! That is something that I will be working on for the next while!

Also, we went to the temple this week.

 If you haven't gone or haven't been recently, you should go! It is a place of learning and growth!

My spiritual thought this week is going to be from the living prophet's, President Russell M. Nelson's, most recent address to all God's children in General Conference. In this address he teaches how we can overcome the challenges, opposition, an failures that we all face in this world. President Nelson taught:

"Overcoming the world is not an event that happens in a day or two. It happens over a lifetime as we repeatedly embrace the doctrine of Christ. We cultivate faith in Jesus Christ by repenting daily and keeping covenants that endow us with power. We stay on the covenant path and are blessed with spiritual strength, personal revelation, increasing faith, and the ministering of angels...

"...I plead with you now—to take charge of your own testimony of Jesus Christ and His gospel. Work for it. Nurture it so that it will grow. Feed it truth. As you make the continual strengthening of your testimony of Jesus Christ your highest priority, watch for miracles to happen in your life."

I know that this is true. As you live the doctrine of Christ every day in our lives-- being: faith in Jesus Christ and His atonement, repentance, baptism, receiving the gift of the Holy Ghost, and enduring to the end-- You will be able to find strength in Christ. As you do these things and seek to increase your testimony and conversion to Jesus Christ, you can expect miracles to occur in your life. I know that.

I know this gospel is true, I know that we have a living prophet on the earth today, and I know that Jesus Christ is at the head of the church leading and guiding us and its leaders every day!

I love you all! Jesus Christ loves all of you! I hope all of you are doing well! If there's anything I can help anyone with, please let me know!

Love,
Elder Goold

We were introduced to the very Portlandian sport of roofball this week... 

It was actually discovered by someone in Beaverton and the world's headquarters are still here.  We were invited to watch when we rode our bike by and were quite entertained for the few minutes we watched. 

We got some B-Dubs for our lunch today....

A glimpse at our family phone call this week....