Letter from Tacoma #9: December 28, 2015

 Hey, everyone!

I loved all the letters for home, and it sounded like you guys had an amazing Christmas! The gifts looked exciting, and I'm very thankful for all the gifts that were sent my way! In fact, this morning I was able to get and open up the Heuers' package, and I love it! I love the Legend of Zelda!

​Don't worry, it's blank, so it's appropriate for a mission

Also, I want to write and say thank you to my family for the big assortment of things they gave me, like a new journal, William Joseph CD's (Love that music!), candy, etc.

Thank you, Grandma and Papa Moe, for a new scarf! Wore it during the Christmas call home.

Thanks for the package of goodies and rice krispie treats, Aunt Donelle! They were yummy!

Everything I got from home just made Christmas away from everybody that much better. I loved spending the holiday with different members, and even Christmas Eve with an Investigator family! Yet, from what I've read in all of your emails from home, I really missed out on this Christmas back in Utah:

1) The house was packed with family!

2) The little kids look adorable, yet still growing up at the same time! Braxton barely looks like a toddler anymore!

3) I MISSED OUT ON SEEING A CHRISTMAS PROPOSAL TO MY SISTER? AH, COME ON!

.... Oh, and congratulations on that, by the way!

4) Again, Utah weather seems to be the most merciful during Christmas Day, because I don't remember a single Christmas back home that didn't have a decent layer of snow outside.

But yeah, I still had a great Christmas. Love you all and can't wait to hear more from home!

Anyways, besides the season of the holidays, yesterday was a very interesting Sunday. It was surprisingly eventful.

So when we went to the church, we walked into the chapel around 8:35, and barely anyone was there. But then on comes Bro. Johnson, 2nd in the bishopric, down from the stand and says, "Elders! Two of our speakers today called in sick, so could you give talks today?"

Talk about spur of the moment, so hesitantly (Hesitant on my part, mostly), we agreed. Though from what Bro. Johnson told us, it seemed like half of the ward was sick from church. So, we figured this would be a fairly small meeting.

But boy, were we wrong. It turned out that a family in our ward had a grandchild that was being blessed, and so by the time sacrament started, the chapel was packed with family, friends, and relatives of this family with child. It kind of astounded me how most of the chapel was filled by just visitors from other wards. There were more people there in this sacrament that there were usually, and that's after a lot of the ward stayed home sick.

And even better, an investigator family came to church that day for the first time ever, and their first experience there got to be witnessing a baby blessing, so how cool is that?

So, as you can guess, everything happening then kind of overshadowed my impromptu talk at the pulpit, so I wasn't that nervous when I got up there. Either way, I think I did a pretty good job without any preparation whatsoever.

I decided I had wanted to speak on Forgiveness, and it went better than expected. I talked about how at one point in time, I thought when you forgave somebody for something, you expected them to not do it again. However, I also explained that after a certain family home evening lesson, I learned that forgiveness has no pre-requisites, or terms for distribution. When you forgive someone, you don't do it with, "I think you've learned your lesson, so I'll forget about this." That's not really forgiveness; You must do it with unconditional love, and when you forgive, you assure them that you bear no ill or grudge against them. That is the way God forgives us, for while "Our sins are as scarlet, they will be made white as snow", and when our Heavenly Father forgives, he forgets it completely, as if it never happened at all.

While I was giving this small talk though, I felt prompted to add to the end of it, "Forgiveness towards others is great, and it's what we need to strive for when we repent. But that's only a part of it. While you may feel guilt, that is good, but repentance is not about carrying that guilt with you everywhere you go. It's about forgiving yourself, so you can drop that burden and forget it entirely."

Afterwards, in the halls between hours, an elderly sister from the ward came up to me and said, "Wonderful talk, Elder. I really liked how you said we need to be able to forgive ourselves.,. I just want to let you know it really helped me."

Just goes to show that God knows everyone's problems, and will use any possibility at His disposal to solve one, as well as dozens, or maybe even hundreds in the process of that very act. Now a simple little addition to a talk might not bring that big of an extreme, but here's to hoping!

Merry Christmas! And I wish everyone a happy new year! HAPPY 2016!!!!

First snowfall of the mission! Beautiful, even though it only lasted 1 night before it was all melted. My companion, who's been out 19 months, says that's the first snow he's seen out here in Washington.

Wa-Tac Mission Christmas Party! So many elders and sisters, and it was CRAZY!)

Thanks for reading!

Elder R. Austin Moe