Precious Resources

When a missionary receives his or her missionary call letter it says:  "You will also be expected to devote all your time and attention to serving the Lord, leaving behind all other personal affairs.."  Elder U. and Elder W. are perfect examples of this challenge.  They spend all their time dedicated to missionary work.  Everything they do has as its purpose to serve the Lord.  Last week the district had an exchange where Elder W. went to work with another elder in the district and a different elder came to work with Elder U.  Well, during this exchange, the phone ended up with the wrong elder and so Elder U. borrowed my phone to arrange to get their phone back.  What I found interesting was that Elder U. worked hard to waste as little time and car mileage as possible.  It seems he consider these as precious resources of the Lord.  They don't want to waste time that should be spent studying or preaching the gospel and they don't want to waste gas that has been purchased for the sacred work of preaching the gospel on something like this.  It is awesome to see how serious some of our missionaries are about the work of the Lord.

Okay, now for the funny part of this story.  I was working in the garage and Elder U. came in and asked if he could borrow my phone, I asked if he wanted to use the landline or just use my cell phone?  I warned him that my cell phone is kind of old (my nephews are always teasing me that I need to get a new phone -and Elder U. knows about the teasing), so I gave him my cell phone and he kind of laughed about the phone, but what really made him laugh was when I pulled out the antenna for him (yes, my phone is so old that it still has an extendable antenna).  So, he uses the phone and makes the proper arrangements, and when he hands me the phone back, he said "wait" and makes a point to show me that he has to push the antenna back down.  I accused him of mocking me.  But, it's all good, he meant it in a good way and I am glad that he feels comfortable enough to tease me.  He is only about three years older than one my nephews and so I am glad that for the teasing.

Pretty quiet week otherwise. 

The Gospel is true and what these missionaries are doing is important.  The Atonement of Christ is real.  If I could just understand how important the Atonement of Christ really is, I would probably be more motivated to do missionary work like Elder U. and Elder W.
Stay awesome this week.  Share your testimony with someone you love.  I am so very motivated to hear the words of our prophet next Saturday and Sunday.  Don't forget to listen to General Conference.  That recharges me like nothing else. 
May the Lord bless all of our missionaries.

Matthew, remember what I said about being nice to the Elders in your area.  They probably have a little brother at home they miss too.