General -

Hey everyone!

Well, another week has gone by. It still seems like the weeks are going by ever so much faster. It has been said that the days go by slowly but the weeks fly by. This is sort of how I am feeling. Time is weird when serving a mission... Either way, here I am, again behind the keyboard of the computer which I have been behind a week ago, for the same purpose as before. I am sorry that a bit late for my weekly E-mail, by the way - my companion's family expects their E-mails at 2:00 P.M. I may change my schedule to accommodate. So, if you do not get my E-mail at the scheduled time, do not worry, there is usually a good reason for it.

Anyway, back to my week. I mentioned that I was going to eat pizza at President Fenn's house right after I had left for my E-mail. I had gotten to use my driving privileges to not only take people up there, but also to take a companionship back home when one of the Young Elders was suddenly not feeling well. As for the pizza itself, it was delicious - we were in charge of each making our own, from shaping the pre-made dough, to topping it up, to cooking it in the pizza oven. And it was delicious! Of course, pizza is always delicious, but when it is homemade like that, there is nothing quite like it! All in all, it was a nice little evening to go out, and enjoy some good food together!

Next Monday was, of course, another performance from the choir. However, this time was a bit different - it was the last performance our director, Elder Baer, would be working with us. He has done well, and he will be missed. However, we have a new director, Sister Watkins who also has quite a bit to offer. She has a notable music background, including having written some of the songs in our hymnbooks. We have had our first practice with her last Wednesday, and things have gone quite well. Of course, Elder Baer was there to see how things went. The practice has gone quite well that day, Sister Watkins truly knows her stuff. I think we all look forward to working with her.

We had our Young Elder mission conference last Wednesday as well. This took up the first part of the day. President Fenn actually shared the first message this time. He said a couple of things about obedience to mission rules, and  - there had been some talk about missionaries who had not been living quite up to missionary standards. As far as I know, most of this stuff wasn't sinful at all - it just wasn't proper missionary behavior. After his remarks, we had our message from the Young Elder assistants to the president, who spoke about apartment cleanliness. Of course, we have inspectors come by periodically to check our apartments, but Young Elders had been cleaning up just for the inspection, then reverting back to old habits once the inspections had passed. As a result, the inspections had been given less and less warning in advance. They had announced that now, there would be no advance warning about this. It is a bit of a shame that it had to come to this, but it is probably what the Young Elders in this mission need. 

After these remarks, we had our spiritual messages from Sister and President Hansen, the latter being the first counselor in the mission presidency (for those of you who do not remember back that far, which is completely understandable, he is one of the people I had given eclipse glasses to when the eclipse happened). Sister Hansen shared with us a message about having a positive outlook on life, and dealing with mission stress. After this, President Hansen spoke to us. He said that he had a talk he had been preparing for months beforehand which he wanted to share with us, but he was then prompted to start from scratch with another message. This message was about consecrating ourselves, which went pretty well with what President Fenn had shared with us. I will share more about this message in my weekly challenge.

I also had a chance to meet some family last Wednesday (as you can probably tell by now, Wednesday was a very interesting day for me). My great aunt Jodee was visiting the Family History Library, and I was able to meet them there. We had taken a couple of pictures there, one of which I will attach to this E-mail. Every now and again, it is nice to run into a familiar face, though I think if it happened more often, it would make me a bit homesick! I am doing alright at the moment though, one surprise visit isn't enough to do that for me. Either way, such is what happens when you serve so close to home - you run into occasional familiar faces!

There has also been talk about moving the contact center into the Family History Library. I personally don't quite see why this would happen, aside from the fact that there are some staff members who will be moving there. I guess this is a mission of constant change. Such is the following paradox: the only reliably constant thing in life is change. We will also be getting a new paid supervisor soon, so that will be another major change to the zone. I do look forward to all this, it is nice to have a change in pace every once in a while!

Finally, me and my companion had our interviews with the president yesterday. They were originally going to be Tuesday, but President Fenn was quite busy that day, and so had to reschedule them. The interviews did take longer than they generally should, but that was alright. I was happy to find that I am doing a lot better now than I was doing a month ago. There is still definitely room for improvement, but I have improved a lot since last time. I was happy to be able to tell President Fenn this, and he was quite happy as well. I had asked him what I could do to improve my service as a missionary, and he told me that I could work to be a better example to everyone around me, and to practice exact obedience to the rules (I do believe this could apply to everyone, by the way). So, I feel like I am on the right path, and I plan on staying there.

Well, that's my week for you. This week has definitely been more eventful than the previous, and the next will probably be just as exciting. We will get new Young Elders next Monday, meaning yet another transfer conference is coming up. So, next Friday is the last week I can guarantee that my next E-mail will come on a Friday. But, we don't have to worry about that just yet. For now, just look forward to Fridayat 2:00, as my companion would rather be sending E-mails out then. So, I will see you all next week. Have a good one!

From,

Elder Bryce Petersen

Challenge: President Hansen had given the spiritual message at mission conference last Wednesday, and he talked about consecrating ourselves to the Lord. He started off with the New Testament story of Ananias and Sapphira, which goes as follows: After Christ's crucifixion, his apostles had been continuing to build up his church. All the members of this church were required to live the law of consecration by selling all they owned and giving the money to the apostles, who would then redistribute it according to the needs of the members. Now, Ananias and Sapphira had sold something, but withheld some of the money they had gotten when giving the money to the apostles, and tried to tell them it was the full price of the possession. Peter had declared that, by holding back a part of what they had and lying about it, they had lied before God, and they were then struck dead. Peter also noted that before they had made the commitment to follow the gospel, they were free to do what they wanted with what they had. 

What can we learn from this? When we commit to do something, we are expected to put our all into it. Of course, this applies to everything in life, but it especially applies to following Jesus Christ. In these days, we do not have to do things the same way they were done back in the day - we are not asked to part with our possessions. However, we are still expected to give our all to this Gospel. This means that we live the gospel 24 hours a day, 7 days a week, without an exception. This is done by coming unto Christ with a broken heart and a contrite spirit. This essentially means that we are willing to submit ourselves to the will of God. If we can do this, then consecrating ourselves to the Gospel will be that much easier, and we will find our lives will be more fully blessed from it.