Merry Christmas, Universe! This is the ever-impressive Elder Z.S.Weber, reporting in to y'all live from the streets of Loveland, Colorado. We have only four more days before the epicness of stocking-unstuffing and present-unwrapping begins! Are y'all ready for it to go down? This last Friday, I finally got around to mailing out all of my presents for my family, and over the course of the week I got wrapped packages and sealed envelopes from family and friends near and dear to my heart. And speaking of this past week, what a week it has been! From the Christmas Zone Conference Devotional to the Ward Christmas Program, this week has just been one big warm-up to the Christmas chaos to come! So, with that being said—let's go!
The week started off on a fairly slow note, as on Tuesday and Wednesday, Elder NeVille and I went out and attempted to get some new investigators. I say attempted because the entire effort was rather unfruitful. It's odd, because according to President Brown, our mission president, Christmas is the best time of the year to talk to people about Christ. The Spirit of Christ is in the air, everyone is so cheerful and joyful, they're feeling genuine love for their fellowmen. Now that's usually true—but it's only any good to us if people are home. It seems as though every house we've knocked, they're either out of town, or in a very anti-Christmas mood. Which is just wonderful to experience first-hand via knocking on someone's front door.
Luckily, the Lord has this funny way of blessing us with Spiritual highs after we hit rather rough lows. And our Spiritual high came from our Christmas Zone Conference Devotional on Thursday.
Now, there are several reasons why I love the Christmas Devotional so much. Like all other Zone Conferences, we get a chance to gain some spiritual knowledge from the Zone Leaders, Assistants to the President, and President Brown. This conference, however, we were blessed to be able to watch a discussion some of the church leaders had for their training before the General Conference back in October. The message being presented was the importance if keeping the Sabbath Day holy, and what advice the leaders could give from their experiences growing up.
Along with the Spiritual nourishment, we also get time to enjoy a nice lunch with all of the other missionaries attending. It's a great moment to reconnect with old friends in the mission—though it's also quite terrifying, as it's a constant reminder of how long out you've been out. I swear, more than half of the missionaries I was trained around are back home enjoying life. The half that aren't home are going home at the end of this Transfer! Realizing something like that can be quite sobering—especially when you see them standing at the podium at the end of the Conference, bearing their testimonies to the Zones in attendance. Some of those Elders were only out about six months when I came out, and they're already saying goodbye! Heck, the sisters that came out with me are saying their farewells!
Ahem...anyways...
The rest of the week went by rather quick, after we got our Spiritual strength rekindled by the Zone Conference. However, though the week was over, we were still able to leave it on a high note. This past Sunday—so, yesterday—was our Ward's Christmas Program. Now, all Sacrament meetings are great in my opinion. I mean, we get a chance to renew the covenants we made at baptism and we get spiritual nourishment! However, the Christmas Program has always been wonderful, because of the wonderful Christmas talks given and beautiful Christmas music that's played. And in a Ward that has a fairly skilled oboist in their ranks (not me...can't play for another seven months), it was certain to be a beautiful program!
And, so that's my week in review. Which means that it's time for the Spiritual Thought. Now, last week, I mentioned something in my letter that bothered me, and others, in how it was presented. I said that those who seek to do good in this world are few. Now, that was an exaggeration—I obviously don't truly believe that Gods children are that outnumbered. If anything, I believe that all people are born being innately drawn to good. It's only after they've experienced the world, and are raised to believe the ways of the world, that they start to seek to do that which they believe is good for themselves, which isn't always in line with the gospel. Still, I believe that most of the world still has a desire to do that which is good.
However, this has got me thinking seriously over the week about views, and points of view, and interests. And with Star Wars: The Force Awakenscoming out this past week, something that's come to my mind is spoiler alerts (bear with me here, I'll explain it as I go). I mean, everyone loves reading epic stories and watching awesome movies—Harry Potter, Lord of the Rings, Star Wars. However, whenever a new book in a series comes out, you always have those few people that finish the book faster than others and spoil the ending. To be fair, a lot of the endings were pretty much known from the beginning—Harry kills Voldemort, Frodo and Sam destroy the One Ring, Luke blows up the Death Star. Really, what people are getting upset about is the fact that they can no longer wonder about how the story ends. When they read it, they'll start to see how everything lines up for the ending.
Now, here's the spiritual side of the message. God is a spoiler when it comes to endings. In the Book of Mormon, He told Nephi that his people would dwindle in unbelief and be destroyed 1,000 years before it happened! He revealed through Isaiah that his Son, Jesus Christ, would sacrifice himself for all of humanity 800 years before it happened! He told Joseph of Egypt that the gospel would be restored through Joseph Smith approximately 4,000 years before it happened! So, what is the greatest 'spoiler' God has ever given us? Regarding the war waged between Satan and his followers, and Christ and his followers, this is the ending God has revealed to us since the beginning of time?
Good will conquer all.
That's it. That's the summary of the entire war being waged. It doesn't matter what happens in these last days—it doesn't even matter how corrupted Satan will shape the world, because we already know it's going to be worse than it is even now! No matter how bad it gets, God will always win. So here's what I want to get across. If you knew how all of your favorite books and movies ended, would it change the way you approached reading or watching the story? If you knew who would win the Super Bowl, would it change who you root for? We know the ending for our story—so the question remains; whose side are you fighting for? The victorious, godly side, the one that never loses, or the side the rest of the world is following, the side of the devil, the side that never wins?
I leave this simple message with you all, in the name of Jesus Christ, Amen.
—Elder Z.S.Weber
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