Weekly Update - Dec 20, 2006

Here you go! Two weeks worth of updates and now I'm finally back on track!!!

Enjoy and Merry Christmas!!!

Dec. 20^th, 2006
Well, guess what!? This last week was awesome! Even though it was my companion's last week (he leaves me tomorrow), I still managed to keep him working a bit. And the Lord is truly blessing us for it! You may remember reading a few updates ago that we were teaching a one "Emily." She's the twelve year-old. Well, we challenged here for baptism and she accepted!!! It will be so special for her! She'll also be able to be sealed to her family for time and eternity. They will be able to be together forever! How special that is. And to think that God has made that blessing available to all of us is so neat. Just one example of God's love for us. Emily's baptism will be on December 28^th! I can't wait to be there for it!

This transfer, we didn't have interviews with the President. Instead, we had a little fireside-ish thing with him and his wife. We met at the Church building that I meet at on Sundays and started out with a breakfast that President and Sister Hacking (and a few volunteers) cooked for us. They cooked Waffles and German Pancakes (mmm… German Pancakes made me feel a little bit closer to home. My family had that after church almost every Sunday for a long while) and there were a few other things there too. It was tasty.

Then, we'd all been asked to bring a white elephant gift to exchange and we played that. It was a lot of fun. I had a deck of Phase 10 cards snatched from me and I never got it back. When I went to pick my next gift after getting mine stolen, I was absolutely surprised at what I got. It was a ream of Paper!!! That's right! 500 pages of printer paper! What am I gonna do with 500 pages of printer paper?! Nothing, that's what!!! So I traded it for the gift President Hacking got stuck with… I little pooping deer. Yup. You read right, a little, toy deer that poops out little jellybeans (President was trying super-hard to get rid of it!)… Who brought these gifts anyways?! *laughs* I mean, honestly, I brought snakes and ladders which Sister Hacking wound up with. But… a ream of paper and a pooping deer??? Oh well. I laughed the whole time and it'll be a good story to remember and tell later.

After the white elephant game, we all went into the chapel and watched a Christmas themed mission video that someone (probably the A.P.s) prepared for all the missionaries of the Missouri, Independence Mission. It was nice. So, watch for that at home in the coming weeks Mom, okay? Then President Hacking shared some Christmas memories with us and then asked us if we had any that we wanted to share. I shared a Christmas story that happened only a few years ago, while we lived in Arizona (2005?).

My Dad had always wanted a roller-top desk, but never got himself one. He always gave to the family and put us first. Looking back, I can see that sometimes putting us first, meant putting his desires to the side.

  My Mom loves my Dad with all her heart. And all of us (her children) too. Well, one year, my Mom found a magnificent roller-top desk and got it for my dad. But this would prove to be a little tricky surprising him with for a few reasons:

1)       It was big!

2)       She got the desk for him in August!!! So we were just a few months out 'til Christmas…

3)       We had nowhere to really hide this monster piece of furniture except in the garage. And that was a big mess!

4)       It was big!

5)       Our van was too small to fit this thing in to move from one place to another.

6)       And last but not least this thing was big!!!

But my mom (as clever as she is) figured all that stuff out. She managed to hide it at a friend's house and then move it to our garage where she had cleared a spot for it so it would look like it was just a stack of boxes. And then, the best part of all. The surprise.

  It was Christmas Eve. And my Mom stayed awake long enough to wait 'til Dad had finished putting out extra surprise gifts for the kids. And my brother and I stayed up too. Then, once Dad was fast asleep, we called some friends and we all moved the Giant roller-top desk into the front room where Dad had left his stocking. Then, we covered it with a big comforter and anxiously waited for the time that we'd all get up for Presents in the morning…

  My Mother, my brother and me all hurried downstairs and waited for Dad… And to see his face- his surprise as he came around the corner and saw that there was a huge SOMETHING where his stocking had been… You should have seen the look on his face when he pulled away the comforter and saw a roller-top desk sitting there. He looked like a school boy. He was so happy and excited!!!

  …I love that Christmas memory! As I shared it with all the other missionaries and as I'm sharing it now, I was (and am) brought to tears at the thought of making someone I love so much that happy. Making that Christmas a special one.
 
After sharing our Christmas stories, President Hacking encouraged us to make this Christmas a special one. And I plan to. We're going to do something special for families in need. I'm thinking of Cammie. Her heart is so big, but I know that she could use a little love and help this Christmas. So we're going to do something special for her and others on Christmas Day. I'm excited for that.
 
I would encourage each of you to make this Christmas a "roller-top Christmas." A Christmas that you MAKE special by doing something for someone else or giving of yourself. I promise you that if you do, you will have many cherished memories of Christmas that will last you a lifetime.

I love my family so much! And I am super-jazzed to be talking to them next Monday!!! I can hardly wait!!!

Take care, all of you! Have a very Merry Christmas! Make memories that will love and cherish throughout your lives. Give of yourself like Jesus did. Make Him the center of this Christmas by making others the focus of yours.
 
Merry Christmas!!!

Your Son, Brother and Friend;
   ~Elder Garn Mosiah Penrod

 
Dec. 13^th, 2006
  So yesterday was my 14 month mark! It really doesn't feel like all that long ago that I was at my year mark and look now. Good heavens! Time sure does fly when you're having fun.
 
Okay, so we're down to crunch time for my companion now. He goes home next week and I can see that keeping him going will be tricky. But he's got a good head on his shoulders (even if it is half way home already) and I don't think he'll be too opposed to anything I suggest, as long as I take the initiative to DO it.
 
I haven't written many of you for a while and I want you all to know that it's not that I don't care. I've just been juggling a lot lately. Too much in fact. So much, that I'd lost track of my priorities. It's amazing some of the tricks that Satan will use to keep us from our full potential. Little by little he'll get you to spend all your time on something worthwhile, to keep you from something better or more important. And then, before you know it, you're spending all this time and effort on these little and ultimately inconsequential things that you no longer "have the time" to do the really important things anymore. Until you finally get a slap in the face and you take a step back and realize what's happened. You've let your priorities get all out of whack. And that's what's happened to me. I have let my priorities get all messed up. I'd forgotten the following lesson. Let me use an example I've heard before to explain:
 
Imagine a large, clear pitcher. Now, you have a few large stones, a handful of little pebbles and a bag of sand that you want to fit in your pitcher. How would you get it all in there? If you started by emptying the sand and dumping the pebbles into your pitcher, then there wouldn't be enough room for the stones. But, if you placed the stones in the pitcher first, and then the put in the pebbles, and then poured in the sand, you'd have enough room for everything because everything is in its proper order and would just fall into place.
 
So it is with out lives. If the pitcher represented you and the space inside it represented the time that you have to spend, then how could you fit everything in? By putting the important things (represented by the large stones) first. That would be God, your Family, Work, and School. Then, the other things that are also important (but ultimately secondary) come next. These are your pebbles. Your friends, your playtime, etc. The sand is everything else. And like in this example, it will fill in the gaps and just fall into place… IF we've already placed those other things before it. Otherwise, the small things will take up all our time and we'll have pushed the Large Stones (the important things) out of our pitchers (our lives). This is what's happened to me. Over the last 4½ months. And I am changing that.
 
These last few weeks have been kind of a reset for me. A chance to step back and realize what I need to do and start doing it. And I have been. I am looking forward to being back in the right mindset of priorities. When that's all clear in your head, everything else just falls into place. And so this week, I invite all who are reading this, old or young, man or woman, missionary or not, to evaluate your lives and see if somewhere along the line you've displaced the stones from your pitchers. And make the effort to put everything in order if you have. And if you haven't displaced those stones, then stay true to your course. It is always far easier to adjust a plotted course then completely modify or change it.
 
I love you all. Know that I am praying for you and that I am thinking of you this holiday season.
 
Thank you for all your prayers and support. I know that I wouldn't be handling all of this nearly as well without them.
 
Your Son, Brother and Friend:
  ~Elder Garn Mosiah Penrod