Bueno!
Well, this week we had cambios, and unfortunately, my biffles Elder Evans is going to finish his mission training a greeny in Puerto Penasco, so he will be leaving me tonight :( Its ok, Im trying to keep myself together. dont cry cause its over, smile because it happened right? thank you instagram quotes. Good news is that I am now reunited with ELDER ALVARENGA FROM PARAGUAY!!!!! WHAT A COINKIDINK! We are gonna be compas otra vez for this cambio and it is going to be awesome. Finally a latino companero!!
So I had a really awesome experience this week, and learned a lot of things that I hope are going to stick with me. The biggest one that I want to share with you guys is about prayer. When we pray to God, it seems that we often would like to think that God will just miraculously "give" us what we want, without requiring very much on our part, and that all we need to do is have faith, and it will be given to us. For example, if we are out of work and looking for a job, it is easy to say "God, please give me a job, so I can start to work and provide for myself. Please do something, so that I can start work." But I have come to realize that this is often not how God goes about answering our prayers. God answers prayers when we really desire to receive an answer, and this means that we must be willing to do what it takes and show that desire in our actions, not just sit around and wait hoping that it will arrive. Instead of asking God to just simply give us our wish, we should ask him what we can do to achieve it, and help us align our efforts with what he knows is best for us.
This Sunday, we had Stake Conference, and we had brought a family with us to church. The chapel was absolutely packed, and sitting all the way in the back, we couldn't hear hardly anything. We decided to move to one of the other rooms where they were airing the conference on televisions, but once we moved, we realized there was only the visual, and no sound. After losing our seats, and a large amount of time, I was feeling pretty bummed that this family was just sitting bored in the church after making the effort to come. As the other members struggled to fix the audio problem, I started to pray and ask God to just "fix this problem, and just miraculously make the sound come on, in 3, 2, 1 ..... " and that's when it came to me. Although yes, God is omnipotent and absolutely performs miracles in miraculous ways, of which I can also bear witness, I think we see his hand manifested more powerfully in our lives when it performs through our own. In that moment, I changed what I was praying for, I asked God to bless me with the knowledge of what I should do, so that this family could listen to conference and feel His spirit, and His will could be fulfilled. The subtle thought came to me to ask them if they would prefer to stand on the side where we would at least be able to hear, but not see, an idea that given the circumstances, wasn't very ideal. They agreed. As I opened the door to the conference room, one of the sisters of our ward, recognized our situation, immediately stood up, and offered her seats to our investigators. It all happened so fast and so perfectly, as if it were "coincidence." They now had great seats, and could perfectly see and her the conference. My prayer had been answered because I had acted. God was not going to force me to get and up try something on my own, but he did provide me with the perfect idea in the exact moment to answer my own prayer, I just had to be willing to do it.
God answers prayers. I know it, I´ve seen it happen, and I know its true. But we must realize that in order to grow the most, we must be willing to offer ourselves up as a means for our prayer to be answered. When we ask God to bless the poor and feed the hungry and to help the sick, then may WE be willing to help the poor and give the hungry a meal or do whatever we can for the sick. When we do this, the Lord will have more power in our lives, and in turn, we will become more powerful.
Love you all. Pray boldy, and then be bold!
Elder Bernal
No comments:
Post a Comment