June 6th Email

Hey Everyone,

This past week I was only able to be in my area Monday, Tuesday, and Saturday evening. Before I left on exchanges we had another lesson with Sarah. It was such a spiritual lesson. I got off on a tangent and it was an experience that I had never had before on my mission. As I was teaching her my mind turned off but my mouth continued to teach. I have no idea what I said but I know that at that point I was truly an instrument in the Lord's hands. Since then I have felt that my teaching has grown tremendously, actually I can't really say MY teaching but I have become that instrument that the Lord wants me to be. Bill fell this past week and broke his hip. He had the ball at the top of his hip replaced and has been in a lot of pain. On the humorous side on Monday we were talking to him and he joked about how the only time he has quit smoking for a period of time is when he was in the hospital a fews years back and jokingly said that if he were to go back in it would help him overcome the addiction. So when we got to the hospital we joked about it and reminded him of the story, he laughed, and we said well Bill looks like the Lord gave you what you wanted :). Larry was baptized by our Bishop yesterday!! The ward is so excited and they are just craving for more! It was a great experience because before church our Ward Mission Leader came up to me because I was supposed to give the talk on Baptism and he asked that I got to the Lord and change the topic to something more personal to Larry. I did so and in Sacrament meeting I felt the need to open up the Ensign and I opened up to the talk given by Elder Maynes about Establishing a Christ-Centered Home. It was definately something that helped him realize his duties as he will in the future be the Priesthood holder in the family. Elder Allen who was recently called to the Quorum of the Seventy and was the head guy with the making of Preach My Gospel came to our leadership meeting and we got chastened quite a bit but it was to help us improve. I got a little aggrivated so the next morning I ended up reading Elder Christofferson's talk As Many as I Love, I Rebuke and Chasten. Talk about a humbling experience haha. In his talk he says "Divine chastening has at least three purposes: (1) to persuade us to repent, (2) to refine and sanctify us, and (3) at times to redirect our course in life to what God knows is a better path." Elder Allen did all three and I am truly grateful for the love and caring that he had for us to put us on the right path and I truly feel that the mission will take off as we do as we were directed.

I Love You All,

Elder Salmon