July 19, 2010

Dear Mom,

 

I'm an uncle again!!! =D I am SO glad the delivery went well and that both Ruth and Naomi are here and doing fine. ^^ Oh, I love it when children are born. It's one of those rare, breif moments when anyone can feel close to God. It's so wonderful to know that our loving Father in Heaven is always watching over us, His children. Being entrusted with the care of His precious loved ones is a heavy responsibility for parents to face, but one with infinite and eternal rewards. God is so good to us. =)

 

And they've managed to plug the oil spill, for now at least. That's a relief. I'm wondering though, since so much damage has already been done, what is it going to take to get eveything cleaned up? Will the wildlife ever be able to go back to normal, or will the whole earth burn up before then? I know I'm not the only one worrying about what's going to happen next or wether things are going to get better sooner or later, but I know that there's at least one person who has the answers, and He has a master plan that we can't mess up, no matter what dumb mistakes we make. That's comforting, especially for someone who makes a lot of dumb mistakes! =S

 

You got followed by a coyote?! O_O Where were you walking?? I hope he didn't get to close! I'm glad he didn't try to attack you! Thank goodness he wasn't /too/ hungry!

 

Wow, I feel sorry for you Sacramentans, having to deal with that kind of heat. The weather has been relatively pleasant here. It's never too warm. In fact, we've been getting some rainshowers, which are doubtlessly annoying (especially to those who carry paper planners and pass along cards), but not insufferable, like triple-digit heat is. I wonder how the missionaries serving in my hometown are doing. =/ They could probably use an ice-cold drink every now and again.

 

As for me, I've been doing great. ^^ The missionary work has been a little slow here lately. A lot of tracting. A lot of people not being home. And even a few people who tell me I'm a liar when I tell them that I believe in Christ. The hardest part about being a missionary isn't the hundreds of people who say they're not interested in what you have to say. I've gotten used to that by now. The hardest part is small handful of people who verbally and spiritually attack you for doing what you believe to be right and trying to help them.

 

But Elder Sheffield has been helping me a lot. He is MUCH better at handling those types of situations than I am, and he's been giving me some great tips. He has been teaching me that I don't need to answer every question that people ask me. I don't need to resolve all of the concerns that they have with our church. That's not my job. My job, our my purpose if you will, is to share the things that I've learned are true and good, and invite people to pray about those things so that they can learn from God (not from me) that those things ARE good and true. For example, I know that Jesus Christ in my Saviour. Others might disagree with me. I can't really prove that Jesus Christ died for me. All I can do is ask people to study the scriptures for themselves and pray for God to help them know whether it's true or not. The only way anyone can really know anything is by asking the one person who knows absolutely everything.

 

Elder Sheffield and I are becoming great friends. =) We share a lot of interests, and we spend much of our free time bouncing ideas off each other's heads. Elder Sheffield has LOTS of great ideas, and he's even writing a book! I wish I had the motivation to do that. I have plenty of ideas that I could use. The hard part for me would be to pick an idea to focus on and get started with it. Like me, Elder Sheffield wants to be a writer, but what impresses me about Elder Sheffield is that he has a lot of back-up plans as well. For example, if writing doesn't end up working out for him, he could end up in computer programming or the culinary arts. I wish I had plans like that. I don't have those kinds of skills, though. My greatest strength is my creativity, but I could never be a master pianist (I practice, but only for fun), I'm not the best at drawing things (I'm pretty good, I guess, but my brother is way better), and the trouble with writing books is that it seems that you either make it big, or you don't make it at all, and I don't think I've got the best odds of succeeding at that, either. =/

 

But that's not really my number one concern right now. Or, at least, it shouldn't be. My purpose right now is to invite others to come unto Christ, so that's what I'm going to do. What I do after this, I'll figure out once I get there. Maybe God'll have some pity on me and spell out what I should do in small, easy words, so I can hopefully understand Him, but that's only if I serve Him with all the heart, might and strength that I can muster. I can hardly expect Him to help me if I'm not willing to serve Him. All I know is that God must have some kind of plan for me, and if I follow the directions that He gives me, I'll end up in a good place.

 

Here's hoping we can all follow God's directions and end up in a good place!

 

Love, your God-fearing missionary, Elder Andrew Robarts