Robert vs. The Greenie

Robert with his new companion and President and Sister Batt

Maik!!!  

Wow, interesting week.  I haven't really decided how I like training...I would rather not train to be honest but it has its perks and fun times.  We get along pretty good and of course he copies like everything I do and asks me tons of questions which I am ok with.  He was in shock the first couple of days cause he thought that we would just be super busy all day every day teaching and just being busy little bees.  He is from Logan so he has had this "perfect mission super spiritual" mindset pounded into him since he was a kid.  He about fell over when we pulled into our parking lot with our HUUUGEEE 20ft. camper with a smashed up door and of course a MASSIVE Utah size chapel that can fit about 50 inside maybe.  Its pretty funny to see him so wide eyed and not haveing any idea what to do or say....I know we aren't supposed to call them greenies but...this boy is green as they can come.  Good kid though and I happy to be with him.  and yes mom, he likes monopoly and baseball...those were the first 2 questions I asked before he even knew my name.  Were good to go now. I am being nice to him and haven't done any pranks or anything...but I will give him a few more weeks of freedom before my fun begins.

   

We had a good fast Sunday and for the 2nd time in my life I voluntarily got up and bore my testimony.  We only have about 15-20 people coming to church right now but hopefully we can get that to change.  I am pretty dang sick right now as well with some major throat soreness it really hurts to talk.  Speaking of talking....last Saturday September 6th we had ELDER JEFFREY R. HOLLAND and Elder Lynn Robins and Elder something katcher come and speak to the mission.....no big deal.  Let me start by saying that Elder Holland is hilarious!  He just loves to mess with people and he is not afraid to embarrass you if you say or do something goofy in front of everyone.  They are going to need a new pulpit as well because I lost count of how many times he basically punched that thing and almost tipped it over once.  He likes to yell.  But its in a good way.  The last 20 mins or so  he came down off the stand and walked around answering questions.  I didn't really have a intelligent question to ask him and plus I already knew the answer but I just wanted to ask an apostle something and see what it was like to have Elder Holland stand 6 feet in front of you staring at you in the face.  Intense..thats all I'm gonna say.  He is not as tall as I thought he would be..he's about 5'8...but his voice definitely covers his size.  A couple things he talked about were how we aren't expected to be perfect people...but we are supposed to try.  That a mission isnt supposed to make you into a perfect person and the Christlike attributes that we try to develop on a mission might not even happen during those 2 years...in fact he said that some of them actually flipped upside down for him by the time he got home from his mission. He gave a couple of awesome insights on Christ....."we are led by a wounded captain."  isn't it interesting and frankly ironic that Jesus Christ does NOT have a perfect body....just think about that.  He is baring the 7 marks of his crucifixion until it is ALL over so that he can fulfill prophecy and show during the 2nd coming that He is Jesus Christ, "who came unto His own, and His own received Him not."  He is the only person that will ever be resurrected without a complete, perfect body.  Crazy stuff.  Then he gave my favorite line of the whole meeting...."God is very easy to please....but extremely difficult to satisfy."  Meaning that Heavenly Father and Jesus Christ are going to continue to push us til we may feel like we want to give up but as long as we are progressing towards them they are happy.  

He talked about the Book of Mormon and how about every single "missionary moment" in the Book of Mormon you will find that somewhere in the text the teaching or baptizing or sometimes condemning was done with "power and authority."  The biggest contribution to power and authority is worthiness.  Good stuff good stuff.  GO BRONCOS

Love Elder Christensen