Yubelkis was
baptized this past weekend! It was a miracle! Oh my goodness, I love her so
much. I have been waiting for this moment for the past three months! What a
beautiful and special service. After she was actually baptized, we were waiting
for her at the bottom of the steps with her towel. She had the biggest smile on
her face. We asked her how she felt, and as she replied, tears filled my eyes.
She said, "I just feel so happy. Finally, I'm able to feel this … really
feel it. This is the best day of my life." I wouldn't trade anything for
that moment. The most rewarding, amazing way to bring these 18 months to a
close. The past year and a half has been the most satisfying and priceless
experience.
I was
reading in the New Testament where it says: "I
have fought a good a fight, I have finished my course, I have kept the
faith." (2 Timothy 4)
I can't
believe this is all ending next week, but I also know this is just the
beginning. This mission has been a training for me; a training that has
prepared me for whatever life will bring.
Yesterday we
had Concilio. I always love meeting with the leaders of the mission and
learning from them. They are all so incredible, but often good things must come
to an end. It was my last meeting, and I was the only one out of the whole meeting
what is going home this transfer. They asked me if I could go up, bear my
testimony and share what the Lord has taught me throughout this sacred 18
months. Here are some of the things I shared and would like to share with each
of you:
THE LORD HAS
TAUGHT ME …
Whether or
not they admit it, or no matter what people say … EVERYONE has the desire to
love and be loved. I have learned to see people as God sees them; to see their
worth and their potential. I have learned to love those that no one else loves
… notice those who go unnoticed, serve those with feeble knees and hands that
hang down … who have NEVER receive a helping hand in their life.
"There is no fear in love;
but perfect love casteth out fear: because fear hath torment. He that feareth
is not made perfect in love.
We love him, because he first
loved us.
If a man say, I love God, and
hateth his brother, he is a liar: for he that loveth not his brother whom he
hath seen, how can he love God whom he hath not seen?" (1 John 4:18-20)
Perfect love
casteth out all fear. Faith and fear cannot coexist. Love is the essence of
this gospel. Do we have faith? Do we have a perfect love for these people? Then
if so, we will not fear. We need to be courageous. We cannot be afraid as
missionaries. This work needs fearless and faithful messengers of Christ.
There are no
such thing as atheists. Everyone wants to believe in something. They know that
there has to be something more. For one reason or another they have just lost
all hope. We are all born with the Light of Christ and are able to feel His
blessings and love. We are the ones who push Him out of our lives. There are so
many prepared souls, waiting and longing to hear this great message.
"Yea, they were encircled
about with everlasting darkness and destruction; but behold, he has brought
them into his everlasting light, yea, into everlasting salvation; and they are
encircled about with the matchless bounty of his love; yea, and we have been
instruments in his hands of doing this great and marvelous work." (Alma 26:15)
"That which is of God is
light; and he that receiveth light, and continueth in God, receiveth more light;
and that light groweth brighter and brighter until the perfect day." (D&C 50:24)
He has taught me to recognize the
darkness; that there is a very real force out there. We have to recognize it.
No matter what, Christ's light can never be dimmed. If he is on our side,
neither will our light be dimmed. We all have this light and we can either
brighten it or diminish it. It is a light that swallows the darkness, heals our
wounds, and blazes even in the midst of the deepest sorrow and unfathomable
darkness. All good things come from God. We will be able to notice the
difference, but we have to be worthy of the Spirit to be able to detect it. He
has taught me that being worthy of the Spirit is one of our biggest blessings
and brings the greatest peace. "Let virtue
garnish thy thoughts unceasingly, then shall thy confidence wax strong in the
presence of God."
The gospel
changes people from the inside out, both sinners and saints. Even if I thought
I was doing good, there is so much more that is needed to improve and change.
It's that whole "good, better and best" thing. I feel like I finally
know what the “best” is for me, specifically. Now I just have to put it into
action. I don't even remember what I was like before my mission. I feel like I
didn't know anything back then … I didn't know what I was doing, where I was
going or even, at times, didn't truly know who I was. The mission didn't need
me … I needed the mission.
I have
learned that anything that isn't eternal or of eternal significance, isn't
worth my time. Things like the gospel, families, covenants, the Atonement, etc.
are everlasting, and are the things that really matter. If it's not eternal, I
don't want it in my life.
I am a
daughter of God. He has taught me that fact in a most real and intimate way, a
way that is much deeper than I have ever experienced before.
My mission
has become Holy Ground for me … a state of higher thinking, living life on a
holier plane. Both my mission and Spain are so sacred to me.
Miracles
exist! They exist! Each and every day! As missionaries, we have every right to
make daily miracles our reality. So much depends on our faith and diligence.
The Lord has
taught me to be humble.
There is
necessity in prayer. It has never been so real, so needed and so easy in my
life. It is that sacred opportunity to talk one-on-one with our Maker. He wants
to hear from us and He is always listening. He cares about you and knows the
silent, unspoken prayers of your heart.
I have
learned to be patient with others because I know how patient God is with me.
I am in
control of my own life. Happiness, true happiness, is a choice. We need to
choose it and live it every day. We can't control others or the majority of the
things that happen around us, but we are the architects of our lives. Create
that happiness within yourself.
This is a
work and a glory far beyond what we could ever possibly imagine. I have stood
all amazed, each and every day of my mission; in awe of the greatness of God.
His wounds
heal mine. I have come to understand the reality of my Savior and the power of
the Atonement. I have felt it in my life each and every day. He has purified
and molded me into the person I was born to be. We need Him. We represent Him.
We are his disciples to feed His sheep.
Progression
and Repentance are the same. Repentance simply means changing and trying to be
better and better every day. We don't have to be perfect, we just have to be
good at getting better. It's a daily process; we must endure to the end each
day. It doesn't mean we are going to be perfect, we all have our weaknesses,
but we just aren't going to fall as hard or sink as deep. We will pick
ourselves up, and go into the next trial stronger and stronger, until we
finally conquer those weaknesses. We will learn over time, so don't let it
immobilize you.
Obedience is
a blessing, and being obedient doesn’t hold us back, it frees us. Because of
Christ's obedience to the Father, we can receive eternal life. I am obedient
because I want to be, not because someone is just telling me what to do.
"If ye love me, keep my commandments”. Obedience shows our true love for
Him.
This gospel
is all about 2nd chances. It changes us from the inside out and
shines in our countenance. It can soften any heart, can change any life and
save any soul. It's that real.
No matter
how far we go, He is always RIGHT there.
If you are
reading and praying every day, you will never lose your testimony. It can't go
stale.
I have come
to understand God's plan, little by little, and accepted His will and been
willing to change. Isn't it wonderful to know that God knows and understands us
so perfectly? He grants the righteous desires of our hearts, in His perfect way
and timing, even if we don't understand why or have to be patient. It just
makes sense, and we need to trust him. Sometimes the path might seem a little
foggy, but if we just have faith and take one step at a time … everything will
be okay.
This race of
discipleship is not a sprint; it’s a marathon, and it makes little difference
how fast we go. In fact, the only way we can lose the race is by finally giving
in or giving up. To die for the gospel is easy, but that's not what God needs. He
needs people who will live for the gospel.
The Restoration
will continue to roll forth … this is just the beginning. I know this is the
greatest news that we could be declaring; at this time, in this place, with
these people. The Gospel of Jesus Christ has been restored and it will continue
to roll forth forever and ever. He has showed me the Love of God. Because God
loves us and we are His children, He has blessed us with all of these things!
There are
angels on BOTH sides of the veil helping in this great cause to lift us up.
"I firmly believe and will
go to my grave saying that missionaries never rise in their entire life above
the stature they carve out for themselves in the mission field."
God trusts
us. We are His children. We are the Lord's missionaries and His disciples. He
blessed me by having me born into the church, because He knew I would say this:
"Also I heard the voice of
the Lord, saying, Whom shall I send, and who will go for us? Then said I, Here
am I; send me." (Isaiah 6:8)
One of my
favorite talks ever was given by a modern day apostle of the Lord. Elder
Jeffery R. Holland spoke about what happened with the Apostles, right after the
death and resurrection of our Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ.
"Then, after such a short
time to learn and even less time to prepare, the unthinkable happened, the
unbelievable was true. Their Lord and Master, their Counselor and King, was
crucified. His mortal ministry was over, and the struggling little Church He
had established seemed doomed to scorn and destined for extinction. His
Apostles did witness Him in His resurrected state, but that only added to their
bewilderment. As they surely must have wondered, ‘What do we do now?’ they
turned for an answer to Peter, the senior Apostle.
Here I ask your indulgence as I
take some nonscriptural liberty in my portrayal of this exchange. In effect,
Peter said to his associates: ‘Brethren, it has been a glorious three years.
None of us could have imagined such a few short months ago the miracles we have
seen and the divinity we have enjoyed. We have talked with, prayed with, and
labored with the very Son of God Himself. We have walked with Him and wept with
Him, and on the night of that horrible ending, no one wept more bitterly than
I. But that is over. He has finished His work, and He has risen from the tomb.
He has worked out His salvation and ours. So you ask, ‘What do we do now?’ I
don’t know more to tell you than to return to your former life, rejoicing. I
intend to ‘go a fishing.’’ And at least six of the ten other remaining Apostles
said in agreement, ‘We also go with thee.’ John, who was one of them, writes, ‘They
went forth, and entered into a ship immediately.’
But, alas, the fishing wasn’t
very good. Their first night back on the lake, they caught nothing--not a
single fish. With the first rays of dawn, they disappointedly turned toward the
shore, where they saw in the distance a figure who called out to them, ‘Children,
have you caught anything?’ Glumly these Apostles-turned-again-fishermen gave
the answer no fisherman wants to give. ‘We have caught nothing,’ they muttered,
and to add insult to injury, they were being called ‘children.’
‘Cast the net on the right side of
the ship, and ye shall find,’ the stranger calls out--and with those simple
words, recognition begins to flood over them. Just three years earlier these
very men had been fishing on this very sea. On that occasion too they had ‘toiled
all the night, and [had] taken nothing,’ the scripture says. But a fellow
Galilean on the shore had called out to them to let down their nets, and they
drew ‘a great multitude of fishes,’ enough that their nets broke, the catch
filling two boats so heavily they had begun to sink.
Now it was happening again. These
‘children’, as they were rightly called, eagerly lowered their net, and ‘they
were not able to draw it for the multitude of fishes’. John said the obvious:
‘It is the Lord.’ And over the edge of the boat, the irrepressible Peter
leaped.
After a joyful reunion with the
resurrected Jesus, Peter had an exchange with the Savior that I consider the
crucial turning point of the apostolic ministry generally and certainly for
Peter personally, moving this great rock of a man to a majestic life of devoted
service and leadership. Looking at their battered little boats, their frayed
nets, and a stunning pile of 153 fish, Jesus said to His senior Apostle, ‘Peter,
do you love me more than you love all this?’ Peter said, ‘Yea, Lord; thou
knowest that I love thee.’
The Savior responds to that reply
but continues to look into the eyes of His disciple and says again, ‘Peter, do
you love me?’ Undoubtedly confused a bit by the repetition of the question, the
great fisherman answers a second time, ‘Yea, Lord; thou knowest that I love
thee.’
The Savior again gives a brief
response, but with relentless scrutiny He asks for the third time, ‘Peter, do
you love me?’ By now surely Peter is feeling truly uncomfortable. Perhaps there
is in his heart the memory of only a few days earlier when he had been asked
another question three times and he had answered equally emphatically--but in
the negative. Or perhaps he began to wonder if he misunderstood the Master
Teacher’s question. Or perhaps he was searching his heart, seeking honest
confirmation of the answer he had given so readily, almost automatically.
Whatever his feelings, Peter said for the third time, ‘Lord, … thou knowest
that I love thee.’
To which Jesus responded (and
here again I acknowledge my nonscriptural elaboration), perhaps saying
something like: ‘Then Peter, why are you here? Why are we back on this same
shore, by these same nets, having this same conversation? Wasn’t it obvious
then and isn’t it obvious now that if I want fish, I can get fish? What I need,
Peter, are disciples--and I need them forever. I need someone to feed my sheep
and save my lambs. I need someone to preach my gospel and defend my faith. I
need someone who loves me, truly, truly loves me, and loves what our Father in
Heaven has commissioned me to do. Ours is not a feeble message. It is not a
fleeting task. It is not hapless; it is not hopeless; it is not to be consigned
to the ash heap of history. It is the work of Almighty God, and it is to change
the world. So, Peter, for the second and presumably the last time, I am asking
you to leave all this and to go teach and testify, labor and serve loyally
until the day in which they will do to you exactly what they did to me.’
Then, turning to all the
Apostles, He might well have said something like: ‘Were you as foolhardy as the
scribes and Pharisees? As Herod and Pilate? Did you, like they, think that this
work could be killed simply by killing me? Did you, like they, think the cross
and the nails and the tomb were the end of it all and each could blissfully go
back to being whatever you were before? Children, did not my life and my love
touch your hearts more deeply than this?’
My beloved brothers and sisters,
I am not certain just what our experience will be on Judgment Day, but I will
be very surprised if at some point in that conversation, God does not ask us exactly
what Christ asked Peter: ‘Did you love me?’ I think He will want to know if in
our very mortal, very inadequate, and sometimes childish grasp of things, did
we at least understand one commandment, the first and greatest commandment of
them all—‘Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart, and with all thy
soul, and with all thy strength, and with all thy mind.” And if at such a
moment we can stammer out, ‘Yea, Lord, thou knowest that I love thee,’ then He
may remind us that the crowning characteristic of love is always loyalty.
‘If ye love me, keep my
commandments,’ Jesus said. So we have neighbors to bless, children to protect,
the poor to lift up, and the truth to defend. We have wrongs to make right,
truths to share, and good to do. In short, we have a life of devoted
discipleship to give in demonstrating our love of the Lord. We can’t quit and
we can’t go back. After an encounter with the living Son of the living God,
nothing is ever again to be as it was before. The Crucifixion, Atonement, and
Resurrection of Jesus Christ mark the beginning of a Christian life, not the
end of it. It was this truth, this reality, that allowed a handful of Galilean
fishermen-turned-again-Apostles without ‘a single synagogue or sword’ to leave
those nets a second time and go on to shape the history of the world in which
we now live.
I testify from the bottom of my
heart, with the intensity of my soul, to all who can hear my voice that those
apostolic keys have been restored to the earth, and they are found in The
Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. To those who have not yet joined
with us in this great final cause of Christ, we say, ‘Please come.’ To those
who were once with us but have retreated, preferring to pick and choose a few
cultural hors d’oeuvres from the smorgasbord of the Restoration and leave the
rest of the feast, I say that I fear you face a lot of long nights and empty
nets. The call is to come back, to stay true, to love God, and to lend a hand.
I include in that call to fixed faithfulness every returned missionary who ever
stood in a baptismal font and with arm to the square said, ‘Having been
commissioned of Jesus Christ.’ That commission was to have changed your convert
forever, but it was surely supposed to have changed you forever as well. To the
youth of the Church rising up to missions and temples and marriage, we say: ‘Love
God and remain clean from the blood and sins of this generation. You have a
monumental work to do, underscored by that marvelous announcement President
Thomas S. Monson made yesterday morning. Your Father in Heaven expects your
loyalty and your love at every stage of your life.’
To all within the sound of my
voice, the voice of Christ comes ringing down through the halls of time, asking
each one of us while there is time, ‘Do you love me?’ And for every one of us,
I answer with my honor and my soul, ‘Yea, Lord, we do love thee.’ And having
set our ‘hand to the plough,’ we will never look back until this work is
finished and love of God and neighbor rules the world. In the name of Jesus
Christ, amen." (Elder
Jeffery R. Holland. October 2012 "The
First and Great Commandment")
“Therefore, let us glory, yea, we
will glory in the Lord; yea, we will rejoice, for our joy is full; yea, we will
praise our God forever. Behold, who can glory too much in the Lord? Yea, who
can say too much of his great power, and of his mercy, and of his
long-suffering towards the children of men? Behold, I say unto you, I cannot
say the smallest part which I feel." (Alma 26:16)
Before my
mission, the gospel was a huge part of my life. Now, it has become who I am. It
is my identity. It means everything to me. I don't know who I was before, but
I'm never going back. The gospel is the solution to literally anything and
everything. Any or every question, doubt, fear, problem, trial or need … the
Gospel of Jesus Christ and His grace are sufficient to lead us on and bring us
home again. The Restoration is not completed; it is rolling forth. It will
penetrate every heart and sound in every ear. Anything and everything of worth
and value I have understood or learned about my life … has happened here on my
mission. I love the Lord and this great work! I've learned that DECISIONS
DETERMINE DESTINY. These past few months and these next few months are going to
set the tone for the rest of my life. I have made some very big choices and
changes in my life. I love the Lord with ALL my heart! I know I can return to
live with my Heavenly Father and Jesus Christ and my family through the eternities.
This plan is perfect.
I am excited
for the day when we will be able to all see each other again and be able to
look into each other's eyes and know that we have kept the faith … that we have
stayed true to our covenants and that we continue to be faithful disciples of
our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. I look forward to that day and also the day
when I can look into my Heavenly Father's eyes and know that I did all that I
could to live worthily in His presence. This mission means everything to me and
has completely changed my life forever. I love you all more than you could ever
know.
See you
soon!
Love forever
and always,
Hermana
Lydia Pamela Vance
