June 30, 2014

I just flew back to Mindoro from Quezon City where we had Mission Leadership Council and it's been a blast. This past week was a week of miracles here in Mindoro. Elder Robison and I have been having so much fun and the Lord has been blessing us with success. I really enjoy going out and doing the Lord's work and the greatest evidence is the Holy Ghost in my life:) 

Just a cool experience, we were teaching a family about the Plan of Salvation and the wife and husband just decided to talk about how they have been fighting and arguing when we aren't there.  So, we just taught about how the gospel blesses families and at the end we knelt down and prayed together and re-committed them to do this every morning and night. When the prayer was over they were both crying and filled with love:) The spirit was so strong and I got to be a part of their learning that the gospel really does bless families. 

Also we were teaching the same lesson to another family and then the father asked what Heavenly Father's name is, I told him Elohim.  Then Elder Robison my companion explained that God doesn't want to be called that; He wants to be called Father. Then he referred to the life of the father we were teaching, and asked "when your kids talk to you, would you want them to call you Von, or Daddy?" It would be so obviously weird to call them by their first name, it would be kind of disrespectful. I realized too or the spirit was teaching me that it is so important to call Him Father because it means that we have a relationship with Him. If we just called him by His first name it would not mean we are tied to Him through and unbreakable bond of love.  Not calling him Father instead actually separate us from Him. It was just a cool ah ha  moment for me as we were teaching where the spirit taught me more deeply the truthfulness of the way we pray:) 

In personal study I have been having such wonderful experiences about the Restoration of the Gospel. I have been thirsting for a greater testimony of the restoration and as I have been studying it things have been becoming so clear to me through the Holy Ghost that this is the only true church with all the truth and necessary ordinances for salvation. Reading from the Bible strengthens my testimony of the Book of Mormon so much and also just running into so many different religions, none of them have proof that its true, they all have their own version of the Bible and argue. But for us it's very simple, there is only one Book of Mormon and one version only that states the truth found also in the Bible but without the Book of Mormon you still don't know.  It's still almost guessing. I know that the restoration is true and that Joseph Smith is a true prophet and that Thomas S. Monson is his true successor and holds the Keys and authority necessary for prophets. I am so grateful for what I have. Nothing is more precious than testimony and that's what I am realizing too. 

Love, Elder Blackham