Zone Training, President Williams

Good Morning America...and other places in the world. :)

Hope you're all getting the most out of your summer, because it's almost gone!! Time is moving so incredibly fast and I don't know whether or not to see that as a blessing. I wouldn't mind being able to walk around in a comfortable temperature though. Bring on the Pukavick (jacket) weather!

Well here in Omsk, my district has a focused goal for this transfer to increase attendance at Sacrament Meeting. That goal allows us to focus on less-active members while still paying attention to investigators and the usual proselyting. So this week we've been doing a lot of kick start work for the goal trying to get everything rolling for our area. We've only got six weeks to do it. We've now got a plan that we're carrying out to drop by all the less actives and leave invitations and commitments. We've been running all over the city doing kinda the same thing we did back in March, but this time we have a good list to work with that has more accurate information. So that's about all we've been up to this week. Keeps us pretty busy. 

Wednesday the Sister training leaders came in from Novosibirsk to do Zone training which happens once a month. Being the first zone training coming from President Williams, we were pretty anxious to catch a bit of the vision he sees for the mission. His training was great, and came at a perfect time. It was all about Consecration, and following Christ. This has been on my mind and in my prayers a lot these last few weeks, so it brought answers and confirmations of questions I had. 

The central message of zone training was summed up by taking apart Mark 10:21.

21 Then Jesus beholding him loved him, and said unto him, One thing thou lackest: go thy way, sell whatsoever thou hast, and give to the poor, and thou shalt have treasure in heaven: and come, take up the cross, and follow me.

This scripture is talking about two different laws. The first being the law of sacrifice, and the second being the law of consecration. Here, Christ is asking a faithful man who has observed the commandments since his youth to go the next step into sacrifice and give up what he has. To leave it all behind, live a higher law, and to COME unto him. Coming unto Christ is sacrificing. Once you have COME, you take up the cross, symbolizing his sacrifice for all, the Atonement. You take up the cross accepting what he has done for you, and you FOLLOW him. Following Christ is living the law of consecration. Coming unto Christ though maybe difficult is an action, you do it, you get over it and you're there. You've come unto him. Following Christ is a process. With coming, there is an end point in view, you know where you are going. Following is more unknown, requiring more faith. You don't know where Christ will take you, but you have the faith to follow in his footsteps because you already know he will not lead you astray. 

The training went into discussion and didn't go as deep as I would have liked, but it was a good warm up for when President Williams came to Omsk on Sunday. They came in the morning, attended both branches, and afterwards had a meeting with the missionaries at the Walker's place. It was nice to finally get to meet with them. We had a testimony meeting with them, interviews with President, and got to visit with Sister Williams for a bit as well. President Williams used to be a Stake President in Colorado, and before anyone here knew who he was going to be, Aunt Shirley sent me an email telling me she knew my mission president! So When I was visiting with Sister Williams I asked her if she knew Shirley Scoville. Sure enough she did. Uncle Dave was President's executive secretary when he was their stake president in Colorado. She said she was going to write you, Shirley. 

That about sums up the week. I only took one picture this week. We were in the branch for lunch one day, had picked up some food from the store. We ate chocolate kontik with chocolate pillow cereal and bananas. 

Congrats to Christy for being a Rebound exchange student! Crazy how fast that year went eh? Just enjoy the summer, your senior year, and being in America. :) 

Have a fantastic week!

Love, 

Elder Benjamin Moore

"Time Flies on Wings of Lightning; We Cannot Call it Back"

                                                     ~Hymn 226 Improve the Shining Moments