Week 35- District Conference!!

Hello everyone!

Let's get to it because there has been a lot on  my mind this past week!  As some of you may or may not remember, as the Zimbabwe Harare Mission we are doing a united reading of the Book of Mormon.  This past week we were studying in the book of Alma, and it always shocks me that no matter how many times I read the Book of Mormon there is always something new to learn and to apply in 

life.

The most powerful thing that I read this week came from Alma 22.  In this chapter Aaron is teaching King Lamoni's father about the Plan of Salvation.  The king asks Aaron what he needes to do to gain the eternal life that he had spoken of, and Aaron tells him that he must repent of all of his sins in faith.  As the king is praying to God he says "I will give away all my sins to know thee."  King Lamoni's father was not righteous by any means but he became willing to give up everything to come to know God personally.  Are we willing to give up everything to serve God?  To give up all our sins no matter how small so we can know God personally?  I know I sat pondering this line for a long time.  To give up everything no matter how small or insignificant it may seem.  It's not easy, it may not make sense why we need to give up everything and not just most things.  That's where faith comes in.  As a missionary I try to be exactly obedient.  And it's hard.  But nothing was ever easy for Jesus Christ, so why would we expect it to be easy for us? In our mission orientation book my favourite line says "coming to know God is not a cheap experience, but worth every effort you will make." I testify that that is true.  As we strive to sanctify ourselves and our lives, that is how we will be able to come to know God.  Not just know of him, but become like him and have a personal relationship with him.  I invite you all to pick one thing this week that you can give up to come to know God more personally.  Maybe even your "favourite sin" as President Nelson put it:) I promise that as you do this you will be able to feel the Holy Ghost in greater abundance.  And that your trust and confidence in God's plan for you will increase. 

Fast forward to this past Saturday and Sunday.   We had District Conference and it was incredible!!  President and Sister Judd came and spoke and they brought with them one of our Area Seventies Elder Msane.  The focus of the conference was on covenants, missionary work, and tithing.  I'm not even kidding you, Elder Msane spoke for 2 straight hours on tithing.  But my testimony of this commandment definitely grew so much.  Its not about how much we pay, but it's about paying honestly and for the right reason!  President Judd is still probably the most powerful teacher I've ever met.  I'm literally just in shock each time I hear him teach.  He literally spent 20 minutes "yelling" at the members here to stop gossiping.  The best part was he started out his talk by saying "the first thing that I want to say is that I love you.  The second thing that I want to say is I pray that you will all accept what I'm about to say with humility and not get mad."  It was powerful though and I definitely felt the spirit.  His second talk was on living the Doctrine of Christ.  He talked about how it is the only way to live, and about the power that will come into our lives as we do so.  Sister Judd talked about the Book of Mormon and temples.  This is the second stake conference I've been to here in Zimbabwe and both times Sister Judd spoke on temples.  And both times I cried 

because I miss the temple so much haha.  

We were able to put one of our friends, Tsitsi Mandipaka on date to be baptised next week!!  Her and Claud will both be baptised and I am so excited.  They are both so powerful and have been consistently coming to church on their own for months.

Okay I promise I'm almost done haha.  Yesterday morning we had a prospective missionary meeting.  It was where all the youth and all the missionaries in this zone got together with President and Sister Judd and Elder Msane to talk about preparing for a mission and to answer any questions and concerns. President started the meeting off by having us missionaries stand up and recite our missionary purpose.  Then all the youth stood up and joined us as we sang Called to Serve as loudly as we could.  The spirit was so strong and testified to me about how important this work really is.

Random things that happened this week:

-the 4 of us somehow ate 1 litre of peanut butter

-Killed so many huge spiders in our house

-Had a Sisters devotional 

-finally tried freezits after 5+ months in this area

-accidentally bought bread spread instead of butter (because apparently they're different??) And made no bakes with it

Quotes:

-"go on a mission and baptise 70+ people-work-get married-have at least 5 kids"- pres mutema

-"Is killing someone considered a serious crime?"- claud

-"Was it like an actual fruit? Like a vegetable fruit?"- owen

-"keep doing God's work. Don't get pissed and don't get tired."- ronald

-"there's a baby crying. Iwe, I don't have a plan of salvation pamphlet."- mpofu

-"Why did Nicodimus go to Jesus in the night?"- Prince

-"So which one of you is the Book of Mormon and which one is the bible?"- president judd

-"if you wake up in the morning with a headache, know you have malaria. "- nobert

Anyways, I think that's it.  I love you all so much!!

Sister Baker

Sorry there are only two pics this week.  Have to wait for the rest to download!