We can truly command in the name Jesus

Dear Family,

Bluberry muffins!!!
(Elder McGuire FINALLY got his Christmas package last week)

What a week! The weather. An attempted shooting. Good gravy this was a crazy week. I think that sometimes it's easy to make excuses for our circumstances. We may say that really it's okay for me not to go to church because I read and pray everyday and God knows that I'm doing my best. There are no exceptions for the gospel. If you want to know how to receive answers to your questions you have to do four things: study your scriptures, pray with faith, voluntarily be obedient, and go to church. So often we sidestep these fundamental stepping stones to receiving revelation. We get offended about a doctrine in the church and resolve that we can't go to church because we don't understand the gospel. We get offended when someone asks us to repent. We can't resolve our own concerns if we aren't doing our part to receive revelation. You will be unable to understand why Joseph Smith was a prophet if you don't read the Book of Mormon. This is the Law of the Harvest. What you reap is what you sow.

In general the week was an excellent stepping stone in receiving revelation. I know that as we search the scriptures and diligently try and understand the words of the prophets that our hearts will be filled with understanding. I remember before my mission thinking there was no point in looking for answers in the scriptures because I wasn't going to like what it was going to say. Gospel understanding is not about finding some kind of missing piece or loophole to a commandment. It is understanding what we must do to align ourselves with the will of God. Sometimes we look at the answer and still don't understand-because we don't want to. We lack faith. If we lack faith there are three things that need to be happening to promote faith and then knowledge. Read the scriptures, pray, and be obedient. If you want faith do those three things. 

Found my new favorite scripture.

I was listening to President Monson's talk about a man having a purpose. After much prayer and contemplation-I devised my personal vision. This is pretty much what I worked on for most of my personal studies this week. I realized that really this mission is not about me. This time is the Lord's time. It is not my will by the Lord's. I have set some lofty goals, but I think I have a good idea of what it takes to turn my mission around. Not to say that my mission hasn't already been successful, but I know I am capable of more. I have revamped my planner to ensure that I am not stopped with obtaining my goals. I simply place a sticky note over the notes section for my initial plans and the on the actual notes section I write down my back-up plan. I used to hate back-up plans and planning in general but now I don't want to do anything without having a back-up plan. A back-up plan helps relieve a ton of stress. That way I don't have to put all I have into one plan and waste myself away. I think I'm going to have a planner for the rest of my life.

Also here's what one of my days looks like for those who were wondering

So many things in the gospel are meant to remind us. We are forgetful people. I don't know why we forget things, but I know the solution is writing things down. This is why we have the scriptures. Heavenly Father keeps a planner. The scriptures are His planner. He has prophets write His plan and then tell us all what Heavenly Father's plan is. This way we are all on the same page. I am a large fan of Preach My Gospel Ch. 8. It's going to be a great week.

The very trees obey us. Jacob 4:6

HURRAH FOR ISRAEL!

Elder McGuire

Elder Henderson and the mission cook book

Here's what you've all been waiting for I'm sure. This is my personal vision for 2015

Exchange in Halifax with Ryan Gao the super mormon

So thrilled about the weather!

Which Way Do You Face?

Dear Family,

Thank you all for your letters. Although many of you have unique situations, circumstances and problems, the gospel of Jesus Christ will help you. One thing that I think is funny in the church-one of those false social norms of this ugly thing called the mormon club that looks like the Church of Jesus Christ-is when a missionary or any other member bears testimony to another member or non-member outside of testimony meeting. Even in dinner appointments I'm surprised when I bear my testimony about missionary work that members get uncomfortable or when I declare that the Book of Mormon is the word of God. We don't bear our testimonies to eachother enough. When was the last time you looked yourself in the eye in a mirror and told yourself that Joseph Smith was a prophet? Not many of us do that because that would be out of the ordinary. I'm worried that many of us think we are okay, that we are content, that no one needs to tell us that we need to improve. I am no excuse. Plenty times growing up, Mom being the great missionary that she is told me to improve. Wake up and pee! Maybe not the most elegant invitation, but still the spirit of inviting blessed my life. The purpose of missionary work is to invite others to come unto Christ. We can invite ourselves, our friends, our bishop, our children, our neighbour, and strangers. Others is a blanket term.

When we aren't inviting we aren't accomplishing much. This idea that all is well in Zion is false. One thing that I am starting to do in my personal studies is to ask myself really hard questions to receive revelation. Often we think we know what the problem is. Our problems are like a tree. We are a lumberjack. We may identify one problem "I am not smart enough." But is this really our problem? Asking why over and over again will get to the root of the problem and when we can't go any further it is time to start asking 'how' to fix the problem. So here was my experience. I wrote down what I thought the problem was: I can't find anyone to teach. Why? I'm not bold enough. Why? I'm afraid. Why? I don't have faith. Why? Do I not read the scriptures? Do I not pray? Do I not go to church? What is the issue here? I don't apply revelation or the scriptures or PMG. Why? I don't seek the will of God. Why? I seek my own. Why? I am prideful. Why? I am not humble. Why? And this is about as far as I've gotten. Thus is the reason for the title of this letter. We cannot serve two masters. I will be applying PMG in more aspects of my life. To be humble means to seek the will of the Lord over one's own. It means to listen to the prophet and apply his counsel. Elder Ballard said to write down a date-a deadline. So this means that by February 28th-someone will enter into the waters of baptism.

I encourage you to write down where you think it hurts. What you think the problem is. I promise that as you do you will get to the root of the problem. Then start cutting at the root. The whole tree will come down as you solve the root of the problem. It won't if you start hacking at the branches. Your problem will still be there. Make sure what you think the problem is is actually the problem.

I am too much of the Relief Society President or Elders Quorum President. By this I mean that we shoveled out most of the ward this past week with the amount of snowfall we had. Shoveling for a whole day is not a good idea. We then also moved one family in the ward. It's important to serve the members but we shouldn't replace the efforts of other members and family. After being physically spent we ended up with no non-members talked to and none of the members we served had any referrals for us. I just need to stop saying yes to people and focus on the task at hand. Not that service isn't important. The most important duty is to preach the gospel. We aren't going to lift someone out of the slums. We are going to invite them to come unto Christ and by becoming more like Christ they will lift themselves out of the slums. I'm 18 and not the brightest bulb on the Christmas tree, but I am learning. We haven't found anyone to teach this week and this was my lowest week in terms of key indicators. We even dropped one less-active who wasn't progressing. Real growth. Real active members is what we are going for.

Not the most exciting week, but I learnt a lot!

HURRAH FOR ISRAEL!

Love,

Elder McGuire 

Yes I am very lame for the lack of pics. I made some shrimp pasta and was feeling very accomplished. This is a picture of my companion during companion study

And He Shall Come into the World to Redeem His People

Richard McGuire

Dear Family,

Thank you for all of your prayers. Prayer is such a crucial element to obtaining the Spirit and the Spirit is the most important element in the Work of Salvation. Serving in Cole Harbour has its blessings and its challenges. We were able to clean the temple this morning and I got to work in the Celestial room cleaning the mirrors and polishing the lamps. The temple is the House of the Lord. My new companion, Elder Henderson got to escort one of his converts, Xi Gao for his endowments and I did two family names. I want to get to that point to where I get to sit in the celestial room with one of my converts. Such a goal. It's interesting, in Cole Harbour with the temple being around you would think that there would be a ton of members and it would be like New Utah and everyone be eating carrots in jello or whatever. However, this is still Nova Scotia. Not everyone is a member and in fact a lot of the people we meet have read some anti-mormon information about the temple and they have a large Spirit of contention with them. These things are spiritual. They just are. I can't convince anyone that there is a God, that the church has been restored, and that families can be together forever. I can only share with them what I know because I have prayed and fasted.

Do you ever wonder why there is a lot of anti-mormon information? Whenever we sin we sin. What keeps us in sin? Pride. I invite you to look up Beware of Pride by President Benson. Say we make some mistakes at work, or with money, or with other people. The church tells us that we must repent, make retribution, and change to become more like our Saviour. How many people actually want to do that. When people are in sin they either do two things: repent or look for information that will disprove the church. Such searching for a way to get out of eating healthy, get out of going to the temple, get out of not looking at pornography, get out of paying tithing, being kind to their spouse, spending time with their children, or anything else, mocks the atonement. Whenever we even think about taking a different stance on anything that is not in harmony with the church we mock the atonement. Christ descended above everything so that we could live again. When we look for fault in the church it is because we do not want to repent of something.

This week was an excellent week. Our investigator Lana, loves the Book of Mormon. She is willing to be exactly obedient and follow Jesus Christ. She even messaged us over Facebook "Are we allowed to eat chocolate?" "Yes Lana we are allowed to eat chocolate." She was reading about Lehi's family going out into the wilderness and she thought that she needed to go out into the wilderness. Not the brightest idea when we are in the middle of a Canadian winter, but I just love her willingness to repent and be baptized. She is going through a very difficult situation with her boyfriend and three kids. This is somewhat sad news, but she actually lives just outside of Cole Harbour in Dartmouth so we passed her off to the Dartmouth missionaries. So now we are still in need of finding new investigators. Will you all continue to pray for her? She is very exited to get baptized. I think it is better this way because the Dartmouth sister missionaries have been really struggling with even being missionaries and this will increase their confidence because Lana is very prepared.

I am looking forward to this upcoming zone conference. It's great to be a zone leader and have a better idea of what you are doing. Last transfer I was all over the place being in contact with every zone member rather than just working on my relationship with the district leaders. I have resolved that if I get into the mindset that I am the district leader of the district leaders then things will flow more smoothly and I'll be less-stressed. Reporting numbers was a gong show last night. We have three new district leaders and they just didn't get the memo that they needed to collect key indicators and evaluate their districts. After several phone calls and being on the phone with President Leavitt until 1 in the morning we finally got all of the standards in. We have also created some Facebook groups to promote communication between the district leaders and us.

Communication and thought is what will assist Heavenly Father move the work forward. Had some great revelation concerning chapter 8 of Preach My Gospel. We have to seriously consider the spiritual progression of others. What will help them progress, make a plan and then do it. Too many missionaries knock doors for 9 hours a day. There is a higher law. After each visit we write in the area book or member book about the visit. We write down "What did we learn, how did we feel? What's the plan?" Then transferring this information to the planner and doing some meaningful work. We visited with some less-actives last night. I won't go in to too many details, but we resolved that they want to come back, but they don't have the Spirit and they have had some bad experiences with elders in the past. So what's the plan? The plan is to follow up with them over Facebook in one week regarding their family history work and to also write them a thank you card. Then we will write down what happens in the area book and continue to see what we can do to help them.

So many ward councils fail to solve problems. They just go around and ask eachother if they have anything. No no no no no no! Talk about less-actives and how to help them, talk about recent-converts and how to help them, talk about potential members of the church and how to invite them to learn more about the restored gospel. The last thing that needs to be happening in a ward council meeting is talking about activities. Plans need to be made to determine how to help people. People fall away because others fail to love them.

I love you all

HURRAH FOR ISRAEL!

Elder McGuire 

Elder Corbett packing up and leaving 

There is a Scottish/Irish store in Halifax which is pretty great

It's Elder Henderson from Idaho! He has 6 weeks left

Sorry for the lack of pictures. It's difficult to take pictures when I'll get frostbite if my hands are out of my gloves for too long

I got my Christmas package. Christmas in February! I've got a lot of oils. I've got deep blue and serenity so I think I'm good. The stocking was awesome!!!! Don't think many cats would be out and about in minus 30 weather. Unless they were bears or something. Thank you thank thank you for sending me a Christmas package. You are the best.

Love,

Elder McGuire 

Has the Day of Miracles Ceased?

Dear Family,

Thank you all for your letters, your prayers, and own missionary-work. I would like to share some interesting dreams with you that I had this past week to get my letter going. The first dream I had was I was back in St. Stephen with Elder Wolvers and we were tracting on the infamous Ross St. (it is pretty much the Ammonihah of St. Stephen) and we were passing the sacrament to all of our contacts. You know, why not? So that woke me up with a smile on my face. Another strange dream I had was I was at a zone conference and we were watching the clip from Thomas S. Monson with his famous quote "Now is the time for members and missionaries to come together..." and then I get up and start dancing in front of everyone to the tune of "We're all in this together!" from High School Musical. I think my conscience is fighting against my desire to be like Paul and put away childish things. Thought I might let you know about those funny dreams.

This was seriously the best week of my mission. I felt like I was serving in Brazil or something. We had an excellent mission leadership council talking about finding. We are always talking about finding. That's mostly what we do all day but there is a better way to do missionary work than just knocking or street contacting for nine hours a day. It was Elder L. Tom Perry who said "The way we do missionary work has to fundamentally change." I think members do more missionary work than they think. I know that you are working on someone. You have this delicate process and have thought out how you are going to bring up the gospel. What are you going to do when these people tell you 'no' after your hard work of being nice to them and talking about the gospel? On occasion we put the cart before the horse. We climb the wrong mountain. We start digging another hole for a fence post when we've already got one hole half dug. None of this makes any sense. Clearly we need some pleasantries and normalities before we invite someone to learn more, but if we are procrastinating invitation there is just no point in doing missionary work. It is so hard to invite someone to learn more. It just is. It will always be hard. This is Heavenly Father's work. Satan doesn't like that. He knows that if he can stop us from inviting then he can stop us. Heavenly Father's work will move forward. It just will. The question is "Are we going to be apart of it?"

We had a jam session with Brother Chatham, a less-active member who can really shred. And Elder Henderson, my new companion who I already live with stole my camera and was taking pictures of me during a leadership call we were doing.

I've been studying about real intent, agency, and accountability lately. Do we actually believe what we believe in? Do we seriously want answers to our questions? Or do we just sit on the sidelines doing Christlike things, but not actually being Christlike. Do you go to seminary or do you actually go to seminary? Do you read the scriptures or do you actually read them? Whole-heartedly not returning without the plates and getting an answer to your questions. Even in missionary work. Are we actually convinced that we can invite someone to learn more about the gospel? Or do we fall into this trap of 'I just have to be an example and then people will join the church.' If missionary work worked that way all I would do each day would be a fever-strut and not actually talking to anyone. Just sitting down, watching the world go by. Not even talking. Just be an example. That's so easy. Heavenly Father demands more. He knows we are capable of more. Wo unto him that say All is well in Zion! Invite and follow-up.

Another thing that we are afraid to do is account. Why are we afraid to be accountable? Because that is how most things get done in the church. Satan knows this. We are afraid when someone bears their testimony to us. Sometimes we feel like we don't need to be preached to or have someone bear their testimony to us. Reasoning out all of these excuses to get out of things besides the atonement. Sometimes we don't want to account to people that we have done nothing. That we haven't done our home teaching. That we don't hold family prayer or scripture study. That we just don't want to go to church. But accountability is how others will help us. There are three laws to accountability that I have observed. Observation-just looking at people or what they are saying, that is how we'll know how to judge them and then help them. Follow-up-this is where we proactively check up on people. Asking questions like "Have you done your home teaching this month?" "How is your family home evening going?" Then the highest law of accountability that we can live is returning and reporting. This is where we proactively report our labours to a church leader and to the Lord. This demonstrates our real intent. If we actually did something. I have more thoughts about this so I think I'll just write a talk about agency and accountability and send it to you all. Running low on time so I'll just paste a part of my letter to President Leavitt to you.

We were blessed with significant miracles this past week. We went through our potential investigator forms to see who was actually interested in learning more about the restored gospel. Out of the pages and pages of potentials written down, we only determined three people who actually showed genuine interest. We used the criteria from the training "Real Potentials, Real Investigators" from Back to Basics to weed out those who had real intent. We then applied this principle of judging who we think will progress to members (who will actually do missionary work), who will actually progress as part-member families, unbaptized children, less-actives, overdue priesthood ordinations (Brother Moses got us a great list from LCR-personally I wish we had access to LCR), and potential missionary couples. Then after we discussed most of the ward we attempted to set appointments with each of these identified people to teach them the missionary discussions. It relieves a lot of stress to see the next week fill up with appointments rather than just stopping by. Elder Corbett isn't a fan of the phone or setting appointments so he didn't enjoy our four hour weekly planning session, but we have member appointments and that is what matters. Actually discussing finding was great and judging who we think will progress brings forth miracles. We found one new investigator, Lana, the other week and invited her to learn more. She came for a church tour, Terry's baptism, church, and is committed to being baptized on the21st of February. She is going through a difficult spot with her family-single parent and living on her own while her kids are with her boyfriend. However, she has just begun to become more religious-reading the bible, praying, and now going to our church. To quote her during the church tour "I was actually looking for a church to baptize me." I feel very blessed and I feel like we are making progress. I still want to go through each former and discuss with Elder Corbett or now Elder Henderson if these formers were actually investigators. 

I love you all!

HURRAH FOR ISRAEL!

Elder McGuire

They had compassion on them (Mosiah 20:26)

Richard McGuire

Dear Family,

I want to make it absolutely clear that your prayers bring miracles. Whenever we experience success it is a miracle. It is a miracle when we get further into a conversation, it is a miracle when someone gives us their name or Facebook, it is a miracle when a member refers us to a friend who is ready to receive the restored gospel of Jesus Christ. I want to express my gratitude for your prayers in my behalf. They do not go unanswered. Thank you for being as Lehi who cried mightily to the Lord in behalf of the welfare of his people. Sidenote: I think I might be turning into a maritimer because I look back through previous letters and notice that I'll quote some scripture passage wrong or something, but hey it's the thought that counts. We had a very productive week from lots of viewpoints: key indicators, personal contacting, interacting with members. Still no one to teach, but I realized that my frustration could be resolved by two things: realizing there are four parts to the Work of Salvation and there is always something we can do to improve the circumstances we are in, always.

The Work of Salvation means four things all surrounded by ordinances. Baptizing, retention, activation, and temple work. I had lost sight of the ordinances the previous week and when we lose sight of the goal we don't know where we are going. Baptism is the ordinance a lot of missionaries flip out about. That's pretty much the goal. That's where we want every non-member to get to. However, when we are only working on 25% of the Work of Salvation we are not going to be as successful. Therefore, we work on helping members do missionary work, we do service, we reach out to less-active members, we do family history and go to the temple. These four parts keep us balanced and less stressed.

My second point. There is always something we can do to improve the situation we are in. We can always work harder, work smarter, do something different, tweak something, change something, or invent something. Nephi and his brothers tried several different ways to get the plates. However, the principle was to get the plates. Surely as the Lord live and as we live, we will not go back to the tent of our father without the plates. The principle is diligence. To never quit. Never give up or give less. Don't return without the plates in hand.

I realized that I am not working as hard or as smart as I could. I could be calling more people in the car. I could be calling people over lunch. I could be setting up more appointments with members and less-actives rather than just 'stopping-by.' There is always a way to do things better. The way to do things better is in the scriptures. We had some great experiences this week.

So we put together a transfer plan or a plan to accomplish for the whole transfer for finding new investigators. After much thought we came up with more than 15 points of finding and a SWOT analysis of where we are as missionaries in Cole Harbour. We have since enacted this plan and we have a very solid potential investigator whom we found through fulfilling the plan.

We found Lana at a gas station filling up on gas and making conversation with the cashier. Lana is a single mom in her 30s who has been through a ton. She really likes the idea of prophets and continuing revelation. There are prepared people everywhere when we have a plan. Lana friended us on Facebook and on her profile page she has been posting quotes from Elder Oaks without even knowing who Elder Oaks is! She even wants to come to a baptism for the sisters' investigator this Saturday. Sidenote: the sisters found Terry through a member referral and Terry has a job, isn't on welfare, has a family, and functioning mental capacities!. We are blessed. There is not doubt in my mind that faith precedes the miracle.

Our Heavenly Father presented a beautiful plan before this life. He had a large plan called the Plan of Happiness, but he also had to plan how bears worked or how a river is supposed to flow or how fire is supposed to burn. Heavenly Father has a plan and it is real. The gospel is so real and makes so much sense it just blows my mind when people reject it.

Another story that I thought I'd share with you is about Brother Chatham and Brother Frank. Brother Frank, our assistant ward mission leader passed away this past week. It's amazing how fragile life is and how fast it goes. We were just in coordination meeting with him last week and he was putting together the digital mission when the next day he has a heart-attack. That man was a character. He reminded me a lot of you Dad. Always making jokes, always serving others,  telling you you're really not that smart. We were talking about self-reliance just the other week and I made the comment 'Don't teach a man to fish, fishing is not that hard.' He straight up told me "Elder McGuire, that doesn't make any sense." What a funny man. More than 500 people attended his funeral. He touched so many lives and was in the high council for years. He made lunch for a lot of apostles that would come and visit over the years. Elder Perry even wanted his tomato soup recipe. Really going to miss that man.

He was a very faithful home teacher. He pretty much home taught the whole ward because no one else would. One man he home taught, Brother Chatham, wouldn't even let him in the door for 10 years. So Brother Frank would wait each time every month on the door step until he had to go pick his wife up from work. Then 5 years ago Brother Chatham finally let him in to talk. They talked about everything. He challenged Brother Chatham to take the missionary discussions and he declined every month for 5 years. Brother Frank told us his goal was to sit in the celestial room with Brother Chatham. Now this goal is my goal. Brother Chatham doesn't even believe in Jesus Christ but he came to church yesterday and said he is going to try and read the Book of Mormon. He's also reading a ton of intellectual history political stuff about mormons which doesn't have the best agenda. Nevertheless, we will keep trying. Brother Chatham and I will sit in the celestial room together or we will sit in the Spirit World together. I will not return without the plates.

I want you all to know how much I love reading your letters. 

HURRAH FOR ISRAEL!

Elder McGuire

...and then an ice storm knocked out the power.

The Beatings will continue until Morale Improves

Picture Timeline---Guess what happened?-----again!


Hey Hey!!! It's Juicing Day!!

We don't even feel the cold!  See how happy it makes us?

 I'm going to stay here and count my ties.

You just------

Delicious!

There are no vegetables here in the winter.  You guys are crazy!  I will have none of it!

 I'm going to stay here where it's warm!

I like to juice.  You're going where?  Should I?

 Did that just really happen?  The door handle froze and broke off?

 No worries, it's a balmy -9.  Stereo still works!  Woohoo!

Slight detour to admire some drums

KChaw!  Seriously?                      There isn't a living soul crazy enough to be out on a day like today.

You have no idea how cold -9 really is until you've been locked out of your car and you have to walk a mile to get help.

HELP!!!

Not to worry, Smoki's is within walking distance.

What did I tell you boys about going out to hunt for vegetables this time of year?

I knew we were going to be o.k. all along

Home and warm =)

Only three more months of winter!


 https://www.dropbox.com/s/axqd5yl98tx50cr/MVI_4125.MOV?dl=0