Another Great Week - 1 Month

I just have to say as Mom and the moderator of this blog that I think Elder Josh is glowing!  He has true joy in his service and it warms my heart to see his growth in just a month!  He says it's exactly a month but he forgot already that he left us early on a Tuesday and his pdays are Thursdays in the CCM.  Love this boy!

District 11C before transfers 

New haircut

Hello everybody, 

Hope you are all safe and enjoying life.

It's been another great week here at the CCM. Lots of studying and learning still. We have to write a 5 minute talk each week for sacrament and then on Sunday they randomly choose 4 people. It's been awesome to write these and I feel like  even though they are in a different language they are still some of the best talks I've ever written as I have been guided by the Spirit in what thoughts I should share.

We had an awesome devotional this week from Elder Bednar! He talked on basically how to make the most of general conference talks now that we  have heard them. Basically we have 3 sections for each talk: The doctrine, the invitation, and the blessings promised. If we find these things for each talk  then we will be able to make the most use of it in our lives.  It reminds of of the scripture in D and C somewhere about how when we do what the Lord has commanded, he is bound to do what he said he would. Essentially if we do our part then he has to bless us for it or he would cease to be God. Pretty cool to think about and ponder on if I am doing all that is asked of me to receive those blessings.

I guess it's been officially a month today I've been gone! It almost feels like a dream and it has passed very fast. It's hard to believe that I'm actually here sometimes. As my brother Dallin told me, we have 2 years to serve and a lifetime to think about it. This will help me sometimes when I get distracted that I need to  do all I can while I have the chance.

I know I haven't had the chance to really teach any real investigators yet but this gospel is so amazing and I can't wait to share it with others. I've been studying a lot the life of Jesus Christ in the book Jesus the Christ by James Talmage. Its is amazing and reading that has probably been the highlight of my CCM experience so far. I can't really express how I feel about Jesus and all he has done for me, all I can do is try to help others find this for themselves.

Have a great week!

Avanza Su Verdad!

Love,

Elder Gardner

These pictures are me and my new haircut, and then everyone in our house. The Latino guys finished up their CCM training and left already. We have 12 new Latino guys in our house now, hopefully they are as cool as the last group.

To Mom and Dad in answer to questions this week:
hola! yeah we had a great devotional on specific prayer!  Basically we tell the Lord a specific blessing we need, why we need it, then like give a specific time period for something to happen and have faith it will work out. Kinda hard to explain real quick but like one missionary left his bag in a taxi, and it had everything from his whole mission in it- pictures, journals, todas cosas. He prayed that he would stand on the corner of the 7 11 for an hour holding a sign. Then after 58 minutes of standing there, the taxi driver handed his bag out the window of the taxi and said don't worry I'm christian, I didn't take anything!

tons of other examples too that I don't have time to tell! but specific prayers work!

So the letter I sent wont show up for a few weeks, but the letter you sent should probably get here my last week. It takes about a month for stuff to arrive here.

Language is going good and I've been busy learning  tons of different things. Ill try to send them an email since the letters won't arrive for a while. Love you!