A Book From God

Email 24/4/17

Hello everybody,

Another week in Motril has come and gone. President Andersen stopped by on Thursday to do our interviews for the transfer, and he told me that, not surprisingly, I’m going to be transferred out of Motril when the transfer ends next week. I still have no idea to where I’ll be headed, so stay tuned.

It was a pretty “normal” week here in terms of the work and everything. On Wednesday, we went out to Sid’s house (the member from England) to help him finish putting up a fence. That involved digging holes, cementing poles into the ground, and then hanging up the fencing wire to the poles. It was pretty nice to be able to get out of the city and spend some time in the campo.

We were able to get in contact with Miguel during the week because luckily he was home one of the times that we passed by his house. We were basically like, “hey, how’s it going, it’s been a while since we’ve seen you guys, everything ok?” And he was like, “yeah, everything’s fine, don’t worry, everything’s fine,” and then we asked if they’d have any time to have a cita with us, and he was like, “I’m still not sure when we’ll have time again but don’t worry. No os preocupéis.” So we’ll see.

One night, as we were contacting people, we met this 76 year old lady from Mar del Plata, Argentina, which is the town where Presidente Izquierdo is from. We invited her to come to church, and she actually came and stayed for all three hours and really liked it. Only problem is that she believes in some pretty weird spiritually stuff, but it’s still super cool that a person who we talked to for only 10 minutes on the street actually came to church because that basically never happens.

We also got a reference during the week from some missionaries in Málaga that contacted a person on the street there who lives in Motril and was interested in meeting with the missionaries. The talked to this guy about four months ago and then never sent the reference to us until a few days ago, so better late than never! We showed up to the guy’s house, and he was still interested, so we taught him a lesson and should be heading back today to teach him some more.

We went back to that Luz del Mundo church again to teach those guys that I mentioned in my email last week. It was really nice because they’re super respectful and we were both able to share what our beliefs were without resorting to bible bashing or anything negative like that. Talking with them had actually helped me increase my appreciation for the Book of Mormon a lot. You see, they believe in a lot of the same doctrines that we do, but obviously there are still a lot of differences between us mostly because of doctrine that we’ve received through latter-day revelations. Because I know that the Book of Mormon is true, I know that Joseph Smith restored the original church of Jesus Christ and the original priesthood authority to the earth again, and that he and each of his successors up to President Monson today are prophets of God. It’s that simple.

Here’s a story I found this week from a talk called “The Book of Mormon — a Book from God” by Elder Tad R. Callister. I’d highly recommend this talk. https://www.lds.org/general-conference/2011/10/the-book-of-mormon-a-book-from-god?lang=eng

“Some years ago I attended one of our worship services in Toronto, Canada. A 14-year-old girl was the speaker. She said that she had been discussing religion with one of her friends at school. Her friend said to her, ‘What religion do you belong to?’

“She replied, ‘The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, or Mormons.’

“Her friend replied, ‘I know that church, and I know it’s not true.’

“’How do you know?’ came the reply.

“’Because,’ said her friend, ‘I have researched it.’

“’Have you read the Book of Mormon?’

“’No,’ came the answer. ‘I haven’t.’

“Then this sweet young girl responded, ‘Then you haven’t researched my church, because I have read every page of the Book of Mormon and I know it’s true.’”

I also have read every page of the Book of Mormon, multiple times, and know that it is true. I invite all of you to follow the prophetic council of President Monson and read the Book of Mormon everyday. As you do so with a prayerful attitude, the Holy Ghost will manifest the truth of the book to you as it has to me on multiple occasions.

Love,

Élder Stark ??

Photos

1: We were doing risky things on p-day