Another Kobe
There's a good thing about being a missionary in Utah, you get fed. The bad thing is, you can't escape politics at dinner and I've had enough already. It even happened in sacrament meeting this Sunday. It was a great talk and then he was like "just wanted to finish off with this... I love the red white and blue" he got really choked up when he said that, "now I'm a big Dallas cowboys fan but I'll never kneel for my flag" and went on about all that. He got back on track by closing with his testimony which was good. I think it was kinda odd to talk about that in sacrament meeting and the spirit wasn't as strong when he said that, but it's good that he loved our country. Anyways it's worse when the members talk about it at dinner and all their opinions. It reminds me of when I was in the MTC and all the riots were going on and all this hatred on social media. I was glad to be off of it and be focused on Christ. It's important to have Christ in our life and remember the joy and happiness His gospel brings.
Spend some time each day thinking about the Savior and all He's done for your life. If you're not sure how the Savior has impacted your life, send me a quick email and I'll be glad to talk with you about Him and what He's done for you.
I like the quote attached to this email because even though many people hated the Savior, he still loved them and prayed for them. We can do the same and follow the Savior's example especially now with all the hatred that's been going on these past few months. I'll also include this link to a talk by Elder Carlos H Amado of the seventy called "Christ the Redeemer" from April 2014. I love it, it talks about the Savior's life on earth and the miracles he performed and other great things. It's a good tall to remember Jesus Christ throughout your day.
https://www.churchofjesuschrist.org/study/general-conference/2014/04/christ-the-redeemer?lang=eng
Anyways this week has gone by a lot faster than last week. We've been having lessons with 2 kids this week. One of them, his name is Ryler, is 8 almost 9 I think, and we're teaching him things that he should be learning in primary. Because of all the covid crap I think he wasn't on track to get baptized, there might be some issues in the family idk, but anyways we're teaching him to be prepared. He doesn't pay attention a lot but when we talked about Jesus Christ his face lit up. He had so many questions about the Savior! It was such a cool experience to see someone learn about Jesus for basically the first time and see their honest, joyful reaction. We had a lesson with the other kid, Kairi (Idk if I talked about her before). I asked her if she wanted to be baptized and she said yes but she wants to be baptized with her mom and she's sick all the time so we don't have a date for Kairi yet. Could have 3 more potential baptisms this month including Ryler. We were invited to a baptism for an 8 year old kid named Carlitos this past Saturday. His mom is a member and his dad is not. His dad speaks Spanish and although we didn't get too talk to him, my companions told me to write a note in Spanish in the baptism book that was getting passed around. I wrote, "nosotros somos muy felices por tu decisión ser bautizado. siempre recuerda esta día." I think that's right. Anyways it was cool to be a witness and be part of the confirmation.
Because of the virus we can't go knock doors but we can if we have another person or a "fellowshipper" with us, which to me sounds weird because that's adding more people. We're not really doing it right because the fellowshipper is supposed to knock on the door and were supposed to stand behind him with masks on but no one cares in this small town. So we're gonna try to invite recently returned missionaries to be our fellowshipper and I looked at the list and there's another Kobe. Kinda funny because I've never met a Kobe that spells it the correct way. Anyways we met this one family while knocking doors that has been avoiding our calls for a while. Their kids want to be baptized by their dad but he's not progressing. I noticed one of their sons plays basketball with some other members on this local team. I talked to this one member that I knew knows about how basketball works around here and I told him about my idea to run a free training camp thing and he said its possible so my companions and I are gonna talk to the zone leaders and see if we're allowed to do that for a service project. We'll probably do it in 2 weeks if we get it approved.
I had been thinking for a while, why did I wait to serve a mission instead of going after high school? I had always felt that I should do school before I went out but I didn't know why until now. I've always loved service and I think that's why I was called by the Lord now because most of what we can do during covid is service. Another thing I've noticed about my reassignment to provo is that there are so many kids to teach here. I've been working with kids ever since I started training them in basketball. Oh another thing, during the week I've been having many ideas for object lessons to use with kids when teaching the gospel, too. If anyone has any good object lessons or comparisons or whatever send them to me. If you're a missionary and want some I have a lot.
I reread Bednar's talk "Called To the Work" and I remember when he gave it, that talk stuck out to me the most. I've always understood that we're called to the work not to a place ever since that talk. Now, I'm in that exact position of not going to where I was called originally but I was called to the work.
I know lots of my friends are starting/finishing mission papers, starting the MTC or going into the field soon or within the next few months. I'm excited for you and I know you'll all do great. I know you all well enough to know that you're prepared. It's a sacrifice especially during all this Corona stuff to go out and serve a mission and Heavenly Father knows that and He is watching over us. President Nelson has said that we are the best team and the Lord is putting us in in the last inning, last quarter, last half whatever you wanna call it, but the Lord's work is still being done. In a training this week, we found out that "prayer" is the most searched word on google for the last 6 months. People are looking for answers that we have. We may not know everything there is to know about all that's been happening but we know that this is part of Heavenly Father's plan and that He loves His children.
Read D&C 4 and 80 (both are super short)
One last scripture for ya
D&C 3: 2
"For God doth not walk in crooked paths, neither doth he turn to the right hand nor to the left, neither doth he vary from that which he hath said, therefore his paths are straight..."
Con amor,
Élder Garrick
🏀 Someone keep me updated on the Lakers por favor, I know they'll win just let me know when that happens.
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