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| Taranto Zone |
At the Taranto Zone Conference, President talked about Learning From and Teaching From the Scriptures. The Assistants followed up by teaching from Preach My Gospel about how Christ used the scriptures and then did a role play with the missionaries. They gave them a hypothetical question an investigator might ask and then asked them to find an answer from the scriptures.
During the breakout session where the elders and sisters met separately, the Sister Training Leaders talked about things they wish they had known early in their missions and things it is important for younger missionaries to learn in order to be future leaders. They concentrated their remarks on being obedient and the knowledge that you don't have to be perfect, because none of us are, but that you need to constantly try to be better. It fit right in with our mission theme which is "Bee the best you can bee." It is important to be as good as we can be, but we should never compare ourselves with others because we are all different and we all have different talents. Young missionaries should never compare themselves with missionaries who are experienced and nearly ready to return home. We should rejoice in our differences because when we compare ourselves, it breeds contention.
Occasionally we get missionaries who struggle because they can't accept the fact that they aren't totally perfect. I gave each of the sisters the following talk hoping it will help them.
Get on the Path: The Way to Perfection
(From an address by Bruce R.
McConkie, “the Probationary Test of Mortality”
delivered at the University of
Utah – January 10, 1982)
We don’t
need to get a complex or get a feeling that you have to be perfect to be
saved. You don’t. There’s only been
one perfect person, and that’s the Lord Jesus, but in order to be saved in the
Kingdom of God and in order to pass the test of mortality, what you have to do is get on the straight and narrow path—thus
charting a course leading to eternal
life—and then, being on that path, pass out of the life in full fellowship. I’m not saying that you don’t have to
keep the commandments. I’m saying you don’t have to be perfect to
be saved. If you did, no one would
be saved. The way it operates is
this: You get on the path that’s named
the “straight and narrow.” You do it by
entering the gate of repentance and baptism.
The straight and narrow path leads from the gate of repentance and
baptism, a very great distance, to a reward that’s called eternal life. If you’re on that path and pressing forward,
and you die, you’ll never get off the path.
There is no such thing as falling off the straight and narrow path in
the life to come, and the reason is that this life is the time that is given to
men to prepare for eternity. Now is the
time and the day of your salvation, so if you’re working zealously in this life
– though you haven’t fully overcome the world and you haven’t done all you
hoped you might do –you’re still going to be saved. You don’t have to do what Jacob said, “Go
beyond the mark.” You don’t have to live
a life that’s truer than true. You don’t
have to have an excessive zeal that becomes fanatical and becomes
unbalancing What you have to do is stay in the mainstream of the Church and
live as upright and decent people live in the Church – keeping the
commandments, paying your tithing, serving in the organizations of the Church,
loving the Lord, staying on the straight and narrow path. If you’re on that path when death comes –
because this is the time and the day appointed, this is the probationary estate
– you’ll never fall off from it, and, for all practical purposes, your calling and election is made sure.
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