Monday, November 29th 2010

Oí Família!

Well, like in the song... "It´s closing time..." I don´t know the rest of the words, but it is the end of the transfer once again and I am pretty darn sure that I will be leaving this area. We had a Stake Conference yesterday that was really really good! I will tell you guys a little part that I liked the most. So this guy was at a college of theology, explaining Gospel Doctrine to this group of theologists. He and this Institute teacher finished their presentation and they had some time left over, so they decided to introduce the first vision of Joseph Smith and Heavenly Father and Jesus Christ. Then the interrogating questions started flying in from this classroom filled with theoligists. "Where are the golden plates, now?" trying to catch these two guys in the middle of their words so that they contradict one another. The institute teacher wanted to answer the question... "I have them with me right now as a matter of fact." Everyone in the room gasped. Then the teacher placed a big box of copies of the Book of Mormon on the desk. "I have the translation of the plates right here and enough for everyone!" And then someone asked again, "but where are the actual plates?" So the teacher responded again, "Oh these ones are much better... they´re in Portuguese! You wouldn´t be able to understand the other ones anyways!" I was laughing really hard because so many people ask this question. It really doesn´t matter, because the plates where translated by the power of God and now we have means of understanding them in our own tongue. It´s a matter of faith for us to believe in the words that it contains. If we still had the plates, we wouldn´t need faith to believe in the truth of the Book of Mormon, thus, taking away our agency to make this decision, which is not the plan of God. He will not force ANYONE to believe that these things are true because He wants us to humble ourselves before Him and ask with sincerity if these things are true... or not. It´s simple, and it works.

I am sorry I didn´t have time to put anymore funny stories or interesting stories this week. I will tell you all about everything next week... or Christmas during the phone call... whichever comes first for me lol.

Love you all!
Elder Clark