We had another baptism this Saturday! Junior, the son of a less active family we've been visiting, got baptized with his sister Perla, who's eight. It was great for their family. Elder Neves and I got to do the baptisms. I was pretty nervous when I got in there. I was worried I'd forget something or not do it right. Fortunately, though, I only had to do it once. I've decided that while baptisms are great, I normally feel the Spirit more in confirmations. Confirmations don't have the same amount of symbolism and aren't as active as a baptism, but it's really the most important part.
I've been studying a lot about the Holy Ghost this week. I've learned a lot of good things. There was a quote from President Hinckley in Preach My Gospel that I really liked. When he was asked how to recognize the Spirit, he read in Moroni 7 and then said that the real test is that if it uplifts and edifies you, it's from God. I liked that. Sometimes I worry about whether or not a thought comes from the Spirit as a missionary, but that quote taught me that as long as it's something good, it's something I should act on. One of the big things I learned from my study on the Holy Ghost is that before I thought of the Holy Ghost as something that makes you feel good. In a way, that's true, but the gift of the Holy Ghost is not the promise that you'll never be sad again. I learned that the gift of the Holy Ghost is more of a force that helps us to do good and change to follow Christ and that when we act on its promptings we'll find that happiness we're looking for. I learned that the Holy Ghost is less of a therapist and more of a personal trainer. It's not there to help us feel good about where we are, but rather where we're going. I think that help our journey to become more like our Heavenly Father is why the gift of the Holy Ghost is the most critical part of baptism.
We had the director of proselyting from the missionary department come and talk to us. That was pretty cool. He was on the committee that created Preach My Gospel. He was giving a training on a Church media campaign that they're starting here in Phoenix. It's centered around mormon.org. The Church is going to be running ads on local television and putting up billboards. It sounds pretty cool. So he trained us on the media campaign and also talked a lot about the true meaning of Preach My Gospel and how to be a good missionary. He told us that being a good missionary all starts with helping others to receive the blessings of the Atonement through faith, repentance, baptism, receiving the gift of the Holy Ghost, and enduring to the end. As it says in Preach My Gospel, those five steps become a pattern for our lives as we grow closer to Jesus Christ.
If you want to understand the Gospel better, study Preach My Gospel. It's a life-changer. Of course, it teaches the basic principles we all already know, so if you're looking for a lot of new doctrinal points or interesting facts it's probably not the study tool for you. What it really does though is that it teaches those basic priniciples and focuses on their real importance. Preach My Gospel hasn't so much taught me new things as much as organized the things I already knew into their true order of importance. That's not to say that there isn't a lot of new information in it to learn, but I think its true value is in how it helps us to look at the information we already have in a new way. I'd invite all of you back home that are old enough to study maybe just one section of Preach My Gospel every day. It's a great tool to use in daily scripture study. I promise that if you read it daily, you'll learn new things about subjects you have been learning about since primary.
The temperature has been going down here. It's been really nice. I feel a little more relaxed during the day.
Love,
Elder Grasley
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