New Opportunities to Serve

Last week we met with the Ward Correlation Committee in Plano 4th Ward, and they gave us a "starter" list of people to call on.  The bishop said we'll be needed here for a long time as they have  people who need extra love and support.  We've visited three at home in the past two days.  It will be hard to catch people as there are, at least, 22 large apartment communities in the ward.  People move in and out sometimes before they're even aware of them. 


Our baby Savannah will be eight months old before she goes home from the hospital.  Her parents have now agreed to do a tracheotomy on her and put in a g-tube.  She will have the surgery on the 24th of this month.  It's amazing to look at how chubby she is now, 15 pounds, when she was only one pound four ounces at birth.  She's always happy and bubbly when we come.  I caught her mother with her a few days ago and she was putting braids in her hair!  So cute...I just had to take a couple of pictures!  Look at those cute smiles!

When we were at the cemetery we noticed some beautiful buildings up on a hill.  We drove up to them and it was a Baptist University.  I'm added these few pictures.  The Baptist's here are very strong, and don't like us Mormons!  We're lucky we didn't get kicked out while taking these pictures.              

  

  

Last Monday evening we went to a concert in the park with Laneeda.  She has been gone for a few weeks visiting her daughter in England and her family in Utah.  We were so sad to see the change in her Alzheimer's in such a short time.  My heart aches for her family.  We are happy she is back as we enjoy our outings with her.  Bro. Lucero seems to have confidence in us as he calls us when he travels on business so we can check in on her.

The miracles and blessings of our mission are many.  In the past few weeks we've had several people tell us that we are here on our mission because it's an answer to their prayers.  I can't begin to tell you how those words touch my spirit!  I've heard, over the years from missionaries, that their missions were exactly where Heavenly Father needed them to be.  I can attest to that now.  He really does provide a way for us to love and touch those who need us in their lives.

Jeffrey R. Holland   "All Things are Possible to Him That Believeth" 

"Returning from the magnificent spiritual experience high on the Mount of Transfiguration where He was shrouded in glory and heard the voice of His Father say, “This is my beloved son: hear him” (Mark 9:7), Jesus was understandably dismayed when He came upon a group of His disciples and local scribes arguing and striving with one another in a hostile way.

Responding to the Savior's inquiry as to the cause of this contention, a man stepped forward, the father of an afflicted child who said that the self-­destructive spirit afflicting his son, an infirmity the boy had since childhood, was getting increasingly more dangerous. Initially the father had approached Jesus' disciples for a blessing, a cure of some kind, but they could not provide it—apparently prompting the shouting match now in full force. With the boy gnashing his teeth and foaming from the mouth as he wallowed on the ground before them, the father said to Jesus in something of a weary, last-resort tone of voice:

“If thou canst do any thing, have compassion on us, and help us.  Jesus said unto him, "If thou canst believe, all things are possible to him that believeth.  And straightway the father of the child cried out, and said with tears, Lord, I believe; help thou mine unbelief” (Mark 9:14–24).

Christ, ever the teacher, seizes on the man's very language and limited faith and turns it back on him and states  "If thou canst believe, all things are possible to him that believeth.”  In that very instant, in the length of time it took  to hear His voice, or the majesty of His bearing, or simply the words He spoke....something touches this man spiritually and an inexorable change begins. Up to that moment he had thought that everything depended on others—doctors, soothsayers, priests, the disciples, or, here at the very last, Jesus. Only now, in this exchange, does he grasp that a great deal of the answer to his quest rests upon his own shoulders, or, more accurately, in his own ­soul.

This is one of the greatest New Testament accounts we have probing the complexity of faith and the degrees one experiences in its development. The man's initial faith, by his own admission, is limited. But he has some faith. He did, after all, approach the disciples but, of course, met disappointment there. With whatever remaining faith he has, he turns to Jesus and says, “If thou canst do any thing,” please help us, hoping perhaps Jesus might be able to succeed where all others have failed.

So here, almost before our very eyes, we see a man address the issue of faith and we see the seed of faith begin to grow. “Straightaway” the scripture says, not slowly or skeptically or cynically but “straightaway” the father of the child cries out and sheds parental tears. After all, this is bone of his bone and flesh of his flesh. This is as close to home as it can get. This is a father pleading for his son. This is new faith versus old fear in a fistfight, a fear perhaps only parents of struggling children can ever know. He cries, literally, “Lord, I believe; help thou mine unbelief.” And of course we know the miraculous blessing that then comes as a result of such an honest, earnest ­assertion.  

So often we think we need great faith in order to accomplish His will, but if we turn to Him, he gives us the strength to overcome our weakness.  Once again, it is the atonement making it possible for us to become as He is.  We are incapable of doing that on our own, so our faith, though small, bridges the gap."   (end quote)