¡Hola desde Idaho! (Hello from Idaho!)
Yay! I (LeAnn) had a “real” missionary moment this week. A
little background: As part of our weekly assignments, Lane and I attend (via
Zoom) an Area social media meeting. Our Area consists of Venezuela, Colombia,
Ecuador, Peru, and Bolivia, and it’s always amazing to me to see the many
missionaries from these different countries each week. The meeting focuses on
how we can all learn from each other and use social media – mainly Facebook –
more effectively as missionaries. In addition to the weekly meeting, we also
joined the group’s WhatsApp message stream. The downside to this is that it is
a very active stream at times; i.e., we get inundated with messages, most of
which do not impact us at all.
Anyway, on Wednesday, I noticed that Maggie – one of the
Area social media specialists – had sent a new message which contained a bunch
of self-referrals from social media that didn’t have addresses connected with them.
Apparently, these referrals had come in response to a Facebook general conference
post made by the Area. The referrals contained names, phone numbers, and
country of residence. As I scrolled through the message, I saw that most of the
referrals were for Venezuela; however, there was one listed for Lima, Peru.
When we met with one of our office elders later in the
afternoon, I asked him about this referral. He said, “Well, let’s call him and
see where he lives so we can figure out which missionaries are covering his
neighborhood.” There are 4 or 5 missions in Lima, Peru; if he doesn’t live in
our mission, we can forward his referral to the proper mission and
missionaries. So, Elder C. made the phone call while we watched him via Zoom.
And guess what…….this man lives in our mission! He said that he had watched our
general conference and had appreciated the messages and wanted to learn more.
We were excited that we were able to put him in touch with those who can teach
him more about Jesus Christ and our purpose on earth.
Thought: As I was reviewing some of my favorite scriptures
this week, I came across 2 Nephi 9:39. The last phrase of this scripture says,
“…Remember, to be carnally-minded is death, and to be spiritually-minded is life eternal."
The
last five words of this scripture remind me to SMILE: Spiritually-Minded
Is Life Eternal
I wondered what these words (“spiritually-minded is life eternal”) translated to in Spanish (using Google Translate): “…Mentalidad Espiritual Es La Vida Eterna.”
These letters can be broken into the following words: ME EL VE.
This phrase translates back into English as: He sees me.
So, when we’re spiritually-focused, we feel happy and smile and God sees us!
¡Que tengan una semana
fabulosa! (Have a fabulous week!)
Love,
Lane & LeAnn
of "over-hugging" the concrete!
