This week was great. Jean Yves and Christian were able to get baptized and the service went very well. The spirit was great and their testimonies afterwards were awesome. We are now looking forward to Clovis and Jaqueline's marriage this week and hopefully at least 5 more baptisms next week.
I would say that the highlight of this week was definitely the baptisms. The service went great and pretty much without any problems. One of the speakers didn't show up so Elder Koncurat got to improvise a talk about Baptism, but he did a great job. Then, after church on Sunday we went over to Jean Yves' house to teach him and his brothers. He was really, really excited. We asked how he felt when he received the Holy Ghost and he gave an awesome answer. It doesn't really translate into English so I'm not going to tell you exactly what he said, but just trust me that it was good. Anyways, his younger brother and also his cousin have been coming to church with him for a couple of weeks, and we commited them to be baptized on
April 15, just under a month away. They both accepted and Orellien, the younger brother, even said that he wants Jean Yves to perform the baptism! He will have received the Aaronic priesthood at that point, and we are way excited for that service to come! In other news, we are now only missing 1 paper for Clovis and Jaqueline's marriage, which means that they should be able to catch their goal for being baptized on
April 1st!! In other news, I had a big first this week! For the first time in my mission, we were able to clearly teach all of the first three missionary lessons at in one lesson. That's the restoration, the plan of salvation, and the gospel of Jesus Christ all at once. We had a lesson with Allen, the son of Modeste and Soazara, who are recent converts. Allen is 18 years old and learned from the missionaries with his parents last year, but due to some questions he had that were left unanswered he still hasn't been baptized. We had a great first meeting with him and are excited to see him start to progress well soon. We are way excited for the things to come and the direction that the work is headed in here in Andranomadio.
So this week in studies I read and looked more in to repentance, and more specifically a deeper understanding of why we need to repent. I studied a lot in to the fall of adam and also some in the encounter that Moses had with our Heavenly Father in Moses 1. I actually did learn some great things. With the fall of Adam, man became estranged from Him. We ended up in a fallen, carnal state (see 2 Nephi 9). Then we go to Moses 1, where moses is taken up and sees the whole world, and he then speaks with Heavenly Father. When it was over, it took Moses several hours to recover at which point he said
"Now, for this cause I know that man is nothing, which thing I never had supposed." He has come to understand the insignificance of man when compared to all that God is and has. Then Satan shows up to tempt Moses.
12 And it came to pass that when Moses had said these words, behold, Satan came tempting him, saying: Moses, son of man, worship me.
13 And it came to pass that Moses looked upon Satan and said: Who art thou? For behold, I am a son of God, in the similitude of his Only Begotten; and where is thy glory, that I should worship thee?
14 For behold, I could not look upon God, except his glory should come upon me, and I were transfigured before him. But I can look upon thee in the natural man. Is it not so, surely?
At this point we see the diference between God and Satan. Satan has no glory. Heavenly Father's glory is so great that if we look with our natural eyes, in this carnal state in which we now live, we really can't look at all. For this cause must we repent. We have to overcome temptation and sin and become saints as it says in mosiah 3:19. This is the only way that we can return to him. His whole work and his glory is to bring us back, but that is a path we have to choose for ourselves, and the only way we can do that is through repentance. This is why repentance should be a happy thing. We should want to change so that we can return to him. Love you all so much, hope that makes sense because it makes sense in my head,
Elder Jensen
Scripture of the Week: Mosiah 3:19
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