Sips, no mas

Q tal family, 
 
Cool stuff happening back at home. 
 
Yesterday, I gave a talk in church, pretty much nailed it. It was 
funny because I always make the joke of saying ``hombre´´ instead of 
``hambre´´ just for kicks. Well, I was used to saying it so much that 
in my talk, I accidently said hombre when I meant to say hambre. But 
besides that it went well. Share the gospel, be united, be humble. And 
I recieved one of my first references from members right after church! 
 
                    What I learned this week 
I don´t have much to say this week so I´ll just get to the point. One 
thing that I have learned from my companion is being direct and to the 
point. Not beating around the bush. As missionaries, we sometimes have 
to be direct like ``Will you pray to know it´s true´´ or ``Did you 
read´´. Yes or no questions. And many times, we have to face 
confrontations front on. Before, I would try to avoid those 
confrontations, probably from being scared, timid, or didn´t want an 
arguement. But now I realized that it is necessary to be direct with 
people. But not all the time. My companion is just flat out blunt with 
people. You know, I don´t want to hurt people´s feelings either. It´s 
about having a happy medium. 
 
The other thing that I have learned and will expound more on is that 
``Perfect love casteth out fear´´ (1 john 4:18). With perfect love, 
there can be no fear. The same goes with other emotions too. Sometimes 
we feel like others need to change their attitudes and emotions. But 
if we want to change others, we ourselves have to be unchangeable. It 
reminds me of Avatar the Last Airbender. The whole point of the show 
and the objective of Aang, the avatar, is to defeat the fire nation. 
Everyone tells him that the only way is to kill the firelord. To get 
to the point, he ended up finded a huge lion turtle (random) and he 
told him ``The true mind can weather away all lies and illusions 
without being lost. The true heart can touch the poison of hatred 
without being harmed. Since beginningless time, darkness fills the 
voids; but always yeilds to everlasting light.´´ ``In the era before 
the Avatar, we bend not elements, but the energy within ourselves. To 
bend anothers´ energy, you yourself have to completely indestructible, 
or else you will be destroyed.´´ He ended up taking away the bending 
from the firelord and ended the war. The end. If you want to take the 
hatred out of people, you yourself must have perfect love. If you want 
people to stop shouting, you yourself have to talk with a soft, kind, 
and loving voice, etc. We experience this alot as missionaries. We met 
this racist guy against the U.S. that was yelling at me. If I had 
yelled back or argued with his flawed reasoning, we wouldn´t have 
gained anything, and I would´ve been flustered the rest of the day. We 
can´t teach things that we ourselves are not. This brings me to my 
next point. I have noticed that many missionaries in this mission are 
really great teachers; however, they don´t apply what they teach. They 
don´t have the attributes of Christ. They teach obedience, but 
themselves are disobedient to the rules. You can´t do that. It´s very 
hypocritical and I despise it. I´m sure God doesn´t appreciate it 
either. We can´t teach the word of wisdom and then go out and drink 
the next day. Sometimes the best teaching is being an example to the 
rest. They will end up following your example. 
 
Well, that´s about it (it´s cold in my picture). Que El Señor les bendiga. 
 
-Elder Walker