15 Years

I appreciate all of the letters of support from family this week due to this week being the 15th anniversary of "The Accident" I don't know the full effect that that event had on my life personally as well as on my family. I often experience things that I figure are probably tied back to it. I'm sure I will continue to find more as I grow up. But I do know that this is true: John 16:33 

"These things I have spoken unto you, that in me ye might have peace. In the world ye shall have tribulation: but be of good cheer; I have overcome the world." 

Crazy things happen in this imperfect fallen state that we are in. But Christ has overcome all the Pain, sorrow, and confusion that we carry. I also find comfort in 2 Ne 2 which explains why we have opposition and the eternal role it plays in our lives. With knowledge of both of these things it helps me to develop an attitude described in Mos 3:19

"...submissive, meek, humble, patient, full of love, willing to submit to all things which the Lord seeth fit to inflict upon him, even as a child doth submit to his father."

I don't know all the reasons why this event happened. But I do know that it happened for a reason. There are a lot of different emotions tied to this experience. Deep grief, sorrow, and despair. Anger, fear. But also Happiness and love in my new family as well as deep exquisite joy and empathy from moments of healing from deep wounds. But ultimately I think my greatest peace and excitement comes from my faith that there is a reason for every experience I go through in life. Good and bad. They all have a purpose for helping me to be what god wants me to be. 

This week has been pretty awesome! A few of our lessons this week were focused on recognizing the Spirit. I learned a ton about how simple it really is to feel the Spirit. Moroni 7:16 says it pretty clear. If it invites and entices you to do good and believe in God than it is the Spirit of Christ. That can be as simple as helping someone, then feeling good about it after. Or it can be the simple feeling of peace and excitement I felt yesterday as I sang a Christmas song for ward choir. It was really cool to see some of the people we are teaching as they realized that they were feeling the Spirit. And that that was God communicating with them.

Some may feel as I have before that yes this is a small way of feeling the Spirit, but I want to feel it stronger. I want it to be a powerful part of my life! How to get to that point is simple. 2 Ne 28:30 

"I will give unto men line upon line... For unto them that receiveth I will give more, and from them that shall say I have enough, from them shall be taken away even that which they have."

If you want to have a powerful experience with the Spirit start by recognizing the small simple workings of the Spirit within you and it will grow. Usually surprisingly quickly. In my experience its immediate. You don't have to wait a day, or an hour, or a minute. But the moment you recognize that you are feeling the Spirit your awareness and sensitivity to the Spirit dramatically increases.  Yesterday as we taught Tom, when he recognized that he had felt the Spirit he got super excited. You could see it all over his face. It does something to us when we realize that the God of the universe is communicating with us.

Sorry for all the preaching, but I'm a Missionary, its kinda just a habit. And its exciting to me because I just learned this.

We found another prepared person the other day. Recently as a new finding tool we have been boony tracting. It just means tracting all the houses in our area that are out of town in the boons. There was a certain house that we had driven by many many times in our adventures in the boons but never tried. So this last week we went out and knocked on the door. There was a super awesome lady there who just recently converted to Christianity like 2 years ago. She was really excited to share all of her experiences about how she came to know that God was there and that Jesus Christ was her Savior. We will start teaching her after Thanksgiving!

We've got two 10 year old twins getting baptized in our ward this Sunday! We're pretty excited for it!

Love Ya!

-Elder (Andre) Johnson