Another Week in the Mission

Dear Family and Friends,

Well uh, Gary wasn't baptized this past weekend.  Elder Rich texted me and told me that some things happened and it didn't work out. That's the way it goes as a missionary though...

Foiled again.

I was on exchange the only time that we had a lesson with those awesome investigators this week.  Elder LeSueur says it was a fantastic lesson!  I didn't see them at church though.

So this last week, one of the priests in the ward told us about the latest craze known as "gallon smashing."  It's INCREDIBLE!!!  I love it.  So hilarious...

Also, there's a member over here who allegedly beat "Snoop Lion" (the artist formerly known as "Snoop Dog") in a rap battle in his youth.  Oh Knoxville Tennessee...

I'm super excited about the 2013 edition of the LDS scriptures being released.  It's going to be INCREDIBLE!!!  I hope they have a midnight release party like they used to do for Harry Potter and stuff like that.  If you haven't heard the news, check it out on lds.org!

We went to a couple of baptismal services this past Saturday.  It was pretty difficult to keep a straight face at some of them because it was just really wild.  Things are just different here in the south.  There was applause after one of the ordinances and a lot of things were said that just shouldn't have been said.  One of them was the most casual baptismal services I had ever seen.  I couldn't stop laughing in the car.

I'm a terrible person.  I know.  Sorry.

So I've kind of been thinking a lot about faith recently and more focusing on the belief aspect of faith.  In the church, we really emphasize works when we talk about faith and I've been guilty of discrediting the importance of belief along with that.  In the scriptures, we learn "Faith without works is dead" and I'd go so far as to say the converse that "Works without faith (or 'belief') are dead" is true as well.  I've been trying not to write off the importance of belief lately.  You might be living the gospel standards, but if you don't believe in the blessings that come by faith in Jesus Christ, you aren't going to feel the Spirit as much as you ought; you may wonder why you don't have success in your trials when you live the principles without belief.

I probably did a really bad job at communicating what I wanted to with that thought, so do what you will with that.

Okay time to go, love you b'bye.

Love
Elder Grabinger

P.S.  Dang, the only thing I could think of that would be worse than a mac would be some computer brand whose product starts acting silly so you can't back it up and reboot it so you have to order a new one.  Oh wait...

P.P.S.  Haha, jk.  You know I just love to fuel the 'windows v mac' fire.