I have thought a lot about the last two weeks. We have been incredibly busy, or at least I am appropriately tired for being busy. I have thought about the mission conference we had with Elder Christofferson. I am still so amazed at his talk. Actually, He got up to the pulpit and asked for questions. He answered about five questions. It was amazing that with each question asked, he would turn directly to read the answer from the scriptures. I mean he would flip right to the page and start reading either from the Book of Mormon, D&C, or Bible. And then he would flip again to another scripture, and another. That man knew his scriptures. I don't think I would ever be in command of scripture knowledge as he was. When they say the scriptures have all the answers in them for our time, Elder Christofferson was asked a question and he read the answer from the scriptures. Absolutely incredible.
As a side note, President Olson was so worried that cell phones would be turned off, that missionaries would be reverent, respectful, and, well, perfect. That desire, and instruction, was passed to Elder Lund and I, and quite frankly, I found I too had become stressed out that something would go wrong and I wouldn't have handled it. Pres. Olson said he was sitting on the stand and couldn't come down to handle anything and so I was at the front and he wanted Elder Lund at the back just in case something, or better yet, someone, would need to be handled. I was greatly relieved when every thing and every one went perfectly. Well,......
Yesterday Pres. Olson called me and the APs into his office to announce that on Aug 20th, the entire mission will be a part of a multi-stake weekend meeting. Elder Bednar, Elder David H. Burton, Elder Yashahita, Elder Callister, and Elder Cherrington will be speaking to only the mission from 9am-12:00noon. YIKES!!!! That is 5, count them, 5 GA's speaking to us. And as Pres. Olson put it, Elder Christofferson's speaking to us was just a warmup for this meeting as "Elder Bednar does not put up with anything!". I am super excited for this meeting. It will be held in Millville, outside of Providence, so we will go to Logan the night before, so we can be there extra early to "keep the Peace". I am, however absolutely terrified that a few of our "jeweled" Elders will not be on their best behavior. Many missionaries want to shake their hands, and get "up close and personal" and that just doesn't happen with a GA. To say that I am stressed is an understatement. I want this meeting to be another "perfect" meeting so it will reflect well on Pres. Olson. Well, we shall see.
On another note, the mission is just like life, I have decided. The phrase-ology for the mission is that when you "train" someone, they become your "son" or in the case of sisters, a "daughter". In the conference room, on the board, when a missionary is getting ready to come home, they denote that by turning the missionary's board card on their side. They lovingly say that the person is "dying", meaning that the person will soon be going home, and a few days before the missionary leaves the mission, people refer to them as "dead". Elder and Sister Christensen "died" today. I have reflected on how people come and go into the mission and home from the mission. People aren't particularly sad that missionaries have died. I wonder what the moral is for me about life. We come and live our life, and then die and go home. The mission, or Life, still continues on. Hmmm, I will need to think more on this. I guess I am writing about this as I am just amazed at how the office missionaries, and others as well, leave the mission without any whoop-dee-do or anything. They just go back home. I guess that is what will happen when we die. We will just go back home. Or wait, I remember Chris said that they will have a celebration when we die. Hmmmmm.
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