Transfer

Hi Everyone

Elder Katzakian was tranferred a few weeks ago and is now in Austin.  If you would like his apartment address please leave a comment with your email address and I will send it to you, otherwise you can mail letters to the mission home.

Thanks!

Baptism

So Cheeto was baptized on Saturday.  He was so excited!  I'll have to send some pictures.  I confirmed him on Sunday, and that was pretty intense because there were a bunch of people there who needed translation for the meeting, so I did that too.  It was all a little nerve-racking, but turned out well.

 

I also saw a kinda funny bumber sticker yesterday... It said, "God's original plan was to hang out in a garden with some naked vegetarians."  First, it made me laugh, but then it made me reflect on the purpose of life, and the plan that God has for us.  It seems to me that the world's declining morals are due mainly to a deficiency in understanding of the purpose of life.  If I thought we were here with all these challenges just because my great great great great great great great great great great great great grandpearents ate some magic fruit, and now we just had to kinda be good and learn about/accept Jesus so we could go back to some garden or heaven or whatever and hang out forever with some naked winged children in the clouds, I'd probably do bad stuff too.  I love God with all my heart, but if the purpose was for us all to leave him so only the good ones would come back, and then just sit there and sing about him for the rest of unending eternity, I probably wouldn't care a whole lot...  What would compell us to be good besides the fear of punishment?  It makes a lot more sense to me for the fall to have been part of the plan, because what do we do all of our life? We learn.  We constantly, involuntarily, take in, analyze, and store information, then base our actions off of that information.  progression and growth cannot happen until there is some sort of damage or retrogression first.  The way that every living thing in nature works, is that it does not become any stronger or better until it faces opposition.  Your skin doesn't get thicker until it's torn.  Your muscles don't get bigger until you tear them with work. Etc.  There was none of that in the garden.  That would've been a boring plan.  We would've stayed the same forever.  Life is only fun when you are accomplishing things...  And our capacity to learn and grow makes it obvious that God want's us to be more than we are now. What more would we be if we did less?  We have our families to help us learn about our relationship with him and his with us.  We don't raise children just so they can come back to our home and tell us how great we are so we'll take care of them for the rest of their lives.  We raise them to be self sufficient.  To be able to go out on their own and accomplish things.  God is the same.  He will always be or father, we will always be under his rule, but he wants us to grow up and become more. 

 

Elder Katzakain

! Me Voy!

I'm getting transferred this week.  Somewhere in san antonio or austin (or somewhere in between) but I don't know where yet.   

 

So the conference with Elder Zivic was cool.  He's from Argentina, so he spoke some spanish and that was kind of cool.  Unfortunately, not every missionary in the mission is Spanish speaking, so he had to speak English for most of it.

 

Yesterday something pretty funny happened.  Well, I guess it was a little sad... but it was funny.  There were a couple people who randomly showed up in the foyer of the church way early because they took the bus, and apparently the friend who invited them told them it was at ten, but it really started at ten thirty. Upon further investigation we figured out that they had been invited to another nearby church that fit a similar description... that's why they couldn't find their friend.  Anyways, we invited them to come in and sit with us until their friend got there, so there they were in their first fast and testimony meeting ever.  They seemed a little nervous, until someone mentioned the Book of Mormon, then they looked scared.  They got up and left immediately after the service, declining the offer to learn more.  It was mildly humorous, but sad st the same time because of how they changed as soon as they found out it was "the mormons."  Even though everything was centered on christ and on gaining a closer relation with our father in heaven so we could be happy, and how the family can be eternal (which was interesting; a lot of people talked about that, and the gentleman there had been invited to church by his friend because his dad had died recently and he was having a hard time), they stopped listening at the mention of the word "mormon."  I'm coming to really dislike the nickname and how so many people seem to think so negatively of the church.  I suppose I can understand disagreeing, but I have done my best to see it from an outsider's perspective, and to think about all of the things that could go agaainst it, but with the knowledge I have of the church, it just makes sense to be true, or at least good.  Not something to run from.  If God is important to a person at all, it's worth learning about.  I just wish I'd been more willing to share it before being a missionary.  I'd be better off now, and so would others.

 

Anyways, I've gotta jet now so I can get ready to ship out.  Thanks for everything,

 

Love Elder Katzakian