Tearing It Up!

Area- Vosloorus, South Africa
Companion- Elder Kelebogile
Letter #78

Hey wena's! Unjani?

Eler Kelebogile and I are tearing it up in Vosloorus! We are meeting more of them members, exploring more parts of our area and still teaching tons! My district is leading the zone! Don't even feel like we are working hard cause of how fun and awesome it is but we are doin tons!


I'll talk to ya more on sunday but here is something that i wanted to share quick:

One thing that I have been doing personally is trying to make Jesus Christ a bigger part of my teaching. Naturally we talk about him during our lessons but I have been trying to emphasize His role in every thing more than I have been in the past. I used to think it was difficult to make peoples problems and concerns relate to Him but as I have been thinking about it more often and applying it in our lessons I have found that it is really quite easy. I have strengthened my testimony of Him and I have been able to feel the spirit more powerfully during our lessons. I used to think that teaching the lessons would help me fulfill my purpose pretty well of inviting others to come unto Christ but I have realized that we have to do more than teach them the principles. I have found myself teaching more simply but powerfully what Jesus Christ has done for us and in turn it has helped them to understand the lessons that we are teaching them better. It was an interesting thing to learn seeing that I thought I was already doing a pretty good job at helping people feel the spirit and become converted to Christ. I am definitely going to continue the practice of seeing how He can play a bigger role in the things that I am doing every day and especially in my interactions with others for the rest of my life!

In my district we have been working on one Christlike attribute per week to improve on and learn more about. We have been doing for 8 weeks now so we have almost finished all the attributes in PMG chapter 6 but then we are gonna start over! It's so cool how much you can learn about something that you thought you already knew so much about and even when you are doing it together with other people to be able to hear what they have learned and be able to add to your knowledge.

the best part is that we learn all these new things we get to go out and Immediately apply them with the people that we are teaching! Even though we had less church attendance than usual this week it was just Satan's way of trying to make me think that those changes that i made were for nothing when I know that the changes we make to come closer to Jesus Christ don't always receive their blessings immediately. Example: We were at the temple recently and the Joburg and Sunnyside wards were both there so I got to see tons of people that I used to serve around. They were telling me about all the changes and improvements and even the people who were getting baptized. About 10 people they said got baptized or were going to in the next week were people that I had taught while I was there!

Love you family!
Thanks for all your support!
Have a super week!
-Elder Bobby Dirkmaat

ps I got your package from Bob! Thank you! Please dont tell me that I'm coming home to a vegetarian diet though.... I need time to get used to it and I don't think that time will be spent on mission!