No comfort in the Growth zone

Hello hello!! 

Hope everyone had a great week!  For me, this week was slower moving, for sure, but we still had a lot of great things happen! Our friends Modesta, Juan, and Trinidad (a family we’ve been teaching) have been progressing.  They have been coming to understand why we want them to read the Book of Mormon so much and the power it can have in their lives! Juan even bore his testimony about the power of prayer during our Zoom church meeting on Sunday!  We also had fun walking around outside in our actual area more this week and meeting a few new faces of both members and friends as we walked! We have to wear masks, of course, but it's nice to be out! 

BEAUTIFUL SUNSET

This week my mind has been focused a lot on something shared with us during a devotional: "A testimony is less something you feel and more something that makes you want to change and become better." Wow, i love that every time I read it. As missionaries, we are constantly inviting people to make changes in their lives. This allows us to use the gift Jesus Christ gave us through his Atonement to become better people than we were the day before. The hard part is, a lot of us don't like change (myself included—haha). We don't want to change a certain habit, a certain tradition we grew up with, or a way of living that we're comfortable with. We don't want to try something new because we might not like it, we don't want to do something other than what the crowd does because we might seem weird...and the list goes on. The thing is... maybe if we decided to try change a little more often, we might discover how much better our lives could be and we might like the better people we could become, as well.

With all this in mind, I have thought a lot about the topic of daily repentance and what that means for me. I love this quote that makes it very simple—daily repentance is when "we stop doing things that are wrong and continue doing things that are right."  We see the fruits of daily repentance when we see our lives improve, feel our heart and our behavior become more like Christ's, and we feel joy when we discover something else we can improve. I love that last one... actually feeling joy when we discover some new way we can improve, something new we can change. For me, the gospel of Jesus Christ helps me see new things I can do to be better every day; whether it's having more patience with people, thinking more about others and less about myself, or having more love for the people we are teaching... the gospel shows me ways I can be more like my savior Jesus Christ and thus come to know Him better.

The best part about all of this is, as one of our modern day apostles recently said, that "The Lord loves effort." Sometimes I get caught up in how many things I should be changing at once and then living the gospel becomes a chore. But something I've learned on my mission, is that the Lord really does recognize and appreciate our diligence in trying to improve the little things.  Being diligent means to have "consistent, valiant effort" and I know that as long as I'm truly trying to change, and putting forth even a little effort, then the Lord will magnify all I do.

I hope each one of you can feel just how much the Lord loves you and recognizes the efforts you make to draw closer to Him. The principles of the gospel of Jesus Christ may make us a little uncomfortable at times because of the way they stretch us, but they also shape us into better and happier people... people who know the purpose of life and why we’re here.  I know God lives and loves us.

I hope you all have an amazing week! Next week is transfers here, so we'll see if I continue on here in San Clemente or if I’m off to another place here in SoCal! 

Hermana Leonard

DISTRICT SERVICE DAY

CALLIGRAPHY INSPIRATION