Christmas is coming...
...and I have yet to mention something that took place a full transfer ago!But first I feel nessecary for all the nonmembers reading my Blog...
Church Organization 101
Okay, in the Bible (yes, we believe in the Bible) God called prophets. Always. Very important to God's Plan, the prophets.
Christ, kinda a prophet, but muuuuuuuuuch much more. Christ established his church by calling 12 apostles to lead it through his authority, which he gave him.
So, we can recognize Christ's church because it will be lead by prophets and apostles.
The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints (emaphsis added) presided over by a living prophet and 12 apostles. (I know! This is huge! And almost crazy! But it's true!) Thirteen million members worldwide, out of 6 billion people on the planet, right? Twelve out of thirteen million stand as apostles, special witnesses of Christ.
Okay, not trying to convert my friends, trying to make a point-point is-apostles. Not common.
Special Witness, Special Guest
At the end of October, Elder David A. Bednar of the Quorum of the Twelve Apostles visited Hungary. He held many meetings with many groups of people to give training and counsel. If Peter, James or John from the Bible told you something, you'd listen right?
So, Elder Bednar held our Zone Conference as missionaries last transfer. And what he did for 3 hours was open the field for questions. To an apostle. It is pretty huge to be in the same room as an apostle, let alone be able to ask a question.
So, in the process of three hours, I have been able to say quite a bit to an apostle. My companion and I sat in the second row, right in front of him and he called on me through out the confernce a couple of times to share things, etc, etc. Because of this, I hesitated to raise my hand to ask a question. I had already particpated pretty significantly in it. So I chose not to raise my hand most of the time to ask questions. As usual, I kept my hand down when he announced "Next Question" but when he followed it with "This will be the last one, too." I shrugged and thought, "Well, he probably won't call on me anyway, but what the heck-how many opportunities will I have in my life to even raise my hand to ask a question?" I was stunned when he actually called on me, because literally every missionary in the room had their hand up.
There is an Elder in my group who likes to point out how often I speak in meetings and such. He said when this happened he about died-a room of 100 missionaries and I get called on the most. All it really means is that in a room of 100 missionaries, I have the biggest mouth. I hope I'm using it well.
The big question...
...went something like this...
"Elder Bednar, there seem to be countless times we say something enormous such as 'There is a living prophet' or 'There is another volume of scripture about our Savior' and they just stare at us blankly which dumbfounds me. We study the doctrine and we strive to have the Spirit with us and be sensitive to what it might be telling us to say. What more can we do personally to prepare for those moments?"
An apostle, one out of 12 such men on the earth looks Sister Pollock in the eye and says one word.
"Relax."
Of course, he expounded a bit on his one word, but I about died too. I had to laugh though... I told my mother that Monday, "Well Mom, an Apostle of the Lord told your daughter to chill out-how do you feel about that?"
So, I've been trying to relax. Still working hard, but in that "I'm gonna do my best and that's all I can do." Or, as I was told by someone in the Book of Knowledge, "Ya gotta keep a'goin."
When an apostle says something in general, you listen. There is a general conference of the church twice a year so that the prophets and apostles can tell us stuff so we can listen. And you use what they say, it's just a given.
Now, when an apostle tells YOU something personally...well, then you REALLY listen.
I need to relax.
So let me know if I'm not doing what the apostle (who is of Hungarian ancestery, by the way) told me to do and if I sound too stressed around here, remind me to relax.
I thought it was funny-I thought y'all might think so too.
I'm loving you all!
posted by Ashley @ 3:57 AM
