January 10, 2022

 From Ben - What's in its Pocketses?

Timmins, the land of the North, the land of the cold.

Where the snow never stops, and the Gospel is told.

With air crisp and clean to breathe 

After three and a half months, it's my time to leave. 

(Thank you, thank you. I'm here all night)

After a good run, the transfer news is in. I will be bidding my sweet French Memére a side hug goodbye, a couple of tears, and maybe a final game of sequence. 

God's called me to Weston, a neighborhood area in Toronto, and He's called me to be a District Leader!

I'll probably let it go to my head for a little bit, let others stand in awe of my new DL powers, embrace all the social clout and privileges that come from being in missionary leadership and hop on my Rameumptum.

Totally kidding of course. 

(Backflips off the Rameumptum) 

Despite knowing that God ultimately makes the difference, and that any effort I put forward He will consecrate, I'm still a bit nervous. 

District Leadership honestly isn't a very challenging calling. 

I have to conduct/organize a weekly meeting, and follow up weekly with the missionaries in the district with their Key Indicator goals. 

Beyond the uncertainty about the unknown and taking a couple shuffling steps further out of my comfort zone, I'm honestly scared that I'll just be average. 

If done with an incorrect attitude, it's possible to make District Council just 'another' meeting, or make follow up calls just another outside pressure to let God's missionaries know that they sure aren't measuring up. Both of which will numb the missionary experience.

I can't MAKE other missionaries have greater faith or greater joy for the work, I can't solve any mental health or personal challenges for them, and I can't even force the district to be unified. 

However, by mature humility, using God given gifts, relying on the Spirit, and using my agency righteously, I don't see how I couldn't afford every member in my district the chance to see their own genius, worth, ability and power.

I don't see how I couldn't offer them every possible chance to recieve the revelation they need in helping others come closer to Christ.

I don't see how I couldn't bring the opportunity for sincere friendship, support and love for one another.

I don't want to be an average District Leader. 

It's completely possible, that's just the nature of agency. 

I just hope that I'll break free from the iron chain of mediocrity, which only has binding power if I forget to use the key of the Spirit, which I have received as a gift, and which lies ready for use in my pocket. 

It'll be an adventure. Future Elder Smith will tell you all about his gripes, complaints and heroic (but hopefully humble) successes. 

On Friday we went to Kirkland lake! 

It's about a 2 hour drive and delivered a Book of Mormon to this super wonderful atheist.

He taught us a bit about Mui Tai, talked about DragonBall Z, and showed us a couple of arguments against the credibility of the Bible and the person of Christ.

It was actually a really cool visit. 

We gave him a Book of Mormon and he said he'd give it a go. 

On that same trip we... 

Through a Facebook call, put our friend Gabe on date for Baptism on the 5th.

Found a cool dude named Brent at Canadian Tire and are gonna give him a call on Tuesday.

Visited a wonderful less-active family and found another person to teach through them. 

That same family promised to bring two friends over the next time we came over as well. 

It was a miracle day. We were were all surprised at how it went honestly. 

Turns out this really is God's work 

We just get to be instruments in His hands, grateful for the chance to see His children learn to love and join in in His amazing music.

The question of 'Why Suffering' has made its appearance again a couple times this week. 

One member who struggles with intense bi-polar depression, another with Schizophrenia, and another with skin cancer, an aging body, and loneliness brought it to mind.

Why do children die seemingly unnecessarily and sometimes even painfully? What about random freak accidents of nature that wipe out entire cities? Do humans actually torture other humans? 

Why suffering? 

It's a really sad question to ask. Not because it's not a good one, but because it cuts to our core. 

There is a risk, as a missionary, when answering questions of this depth and character, to answer them with simple Christian platitudes, not matter how correct a particular platitude may be.

There's so much to this question. 

There's so much to be learned as we answer it.

And there are doctrinal, theological and even philosophical answers to this question. 

The problem is the character of the question necessarily changes the character of the answer.

And, in my mind, the character of the answer has to be answered almost individually, as we do go through suffering ourselves... I think. 

It reminds me of Mel's revelation about shouting for joy before we came to earth. 

I almost always imagine ourselves talking to God about the plan to come to earth when I think of this question. 

I imagine it's something like this

"Hey, God. Are we really going to have to go through what we have to go through? I'm looking at what we've got to experience, and gosh, it kinda looks really painful. 

Billy over there? He's getting born into a war zone! Both his parents aren't going to be around very long to help him, and the chances of him living with all his limbs are remarkably slim.

My friend Jim, over there, he was telling me he's got an auto-immune disorder for the entirety of his life. 

Jenna? She's going to lose 5 of her 6 children in childbirth.

Phil? Severe depression and anxiety. I'm not sure he's going to feel very loved throughout his life"

That's a bit scary to me, Father" 

I can see the tears in our Heavenly Parent's eyes and hear Him say something like.

"I know. I know.

I won't force you to go down there. 

But please, consider it. 

There will be suffering, I know. 

But I really want you to know what I do. 

I want you to know joy, and peace, and real love, 

I want you to learn how to choose these things. 

There will be times and moments where it seems impossible, overwhelming, and you won't understand. 

But do you remember what your Older Brother said He'd do? 

He's there with you. You know that.

It doesn't matter the pain, the suffering, the sadness. 

He said He'd take it on Himself, He'd feel it too. 

He promised to cry with you.

Remember?" 

And we did. And we accepted the reality of suffering by coming to earth. 

And knowing of the promises of our Elder Brother, we were able to shout for joy.

One possible angle or insight to understand when considering this question of 'Why Suffering'

Is that the degree of suffering is not important. Not in the way that we CAN suffer unbelievably, but that HE already suffered infinitely, beyond any measuring stick know to man. 

Our degree of suffering is redeemed, consecrated, and taken care of in the infinity of Christ's own suffering.

There's a lot of light and hope to be pulled from the answer of Why Suffering.  

I don't know it all, but maybe there's some insights in the quick thought shared 

Life is exciting, nerve-wracking, frustrating, and joyful. 

My mission is almost over, my gosh. It's disappearing. 

I only have 17 months left. 68 weeks. Oh golly. 

Love you all! 

Have a stellar week! 

-Elder Smith

1) Nerd Elder Hartman, after borrowing my glasses

2) Memére after her eye surgery. She has to wear this cool pirate eye patch thing

3) Just a quick shot as we left our apartment. Me, flexing my turtle head toque 

4) Elder Hartman got a shot of me randomly giving up the ghost or something. This in trying to get a good shot for the 'Gram

5) "Eating them by the Rafters!"

From Mom - Enjoy the Journey

Dear Elder Smith,

I found myself driving Amelia to her dentist appointment while simultaneously attending my University class via Zoom. At first I was annoyed (always my initial reaction) until I considered that we’re actually living in the future! Me, driving at 120 kms/hour with heated seats to an appointment 50 kms away from my house while listening to a live instructive session?  Granted, I couldn’t fully participate … but STILL! Annoyance banished. Life is seriously amazing. 

We’re learning about Susanna Moodie, a British immigrant to Canada in 1830. She was 29, a mother of one, comfortably middle-classed aristocrat whose family had fallen on hard-times. The FIRST author considered a Canadian author. She was torn between longing for her mother country and the miracle that Canada was becoming. She both hated (hard work, lonely) and loved (bountiful, beautiful, new, no class-distinction) Canada and wrote prolifically about the contrast; generally considered mentally unstable by today’s standards. The thing is … I wonder … how would her life/writing changed if she tuned her heart and mind to the amazingness of it all? What if her focus was on the miraculous without being blind to the hard? I really think she did see it but then was compromised by the remembrance of the ease and luxury of her European past. 

Proving contraries is kind of what we do in life, isn’t it? There is life and death, justice and mercy, ignorance and enlightenment, work and rest, etc (the list is long) … and we need one as well as the other … it’s just figuring out how to balance them. I feel that looking for the miraculous, the positive, the magic, the wonder, the hope … is just a better way to live. Maybe tempers the mental instability in each of us. 

For example:

Right? 

Anyway, we had a great week. Despite the fact that Mia and I are hacking out our lungs, we do not have Covid. And Abby is particularly empathetic because she went through the exact thing last summer. The weather has taken a lovely turn to warm (+2°C) so I get to put away my fleece base layers for a little while. 

The miraculous this week included an amazing meal by Dad. It was the busiest day of the week (Wednesday; school, Dentist appointment, choir, Youth … You know how it is). I drove a total of FOUR HOURS!! And somehow we were scheduled to feed the missionaries. Now, I love our missionaries, especially Elder Ponce, who is only a 2 hour drive from his family, waiting for his Visa to Chile and I like having good meals for them … but a remarkable lack of time. So I got pork chops crock-potting in the morning, and in a 15 minute window in the afternoon I started peeling potatoes before I had to leave again. I left detailed instructions for Dad and it was a long list. When we arrived home later on with a 45-minute window to eat and have a message before we had to leave again, the table was set and everything was ready. Mashed potatoes, cooked carrots, porkshops, garlic baguette, lemonade. Mmmmm! It was so amazing to come home and sit down and eat and laugh with the missionaries. Such a life-giving wonder. Good food and company. 

Another miracle … we sold our last kitten! She was starting to get out of the cute phase and it was looking like we weren’t going to find her a good homes. After NINETEEN interested people, Mia reframed the advertisement and lowered the price and found a perfect owner. We were so relieved because we were at the point where we would have had to give her to an animal shelter. Now we need to get Prim fixed so we don’t ever have to deal with kittens again, which is both sad and happy. Haha. Another contrary. At least Bowie got to play with this set.

One benefit of all my driving is listening to podcasts. I recently listened to an evangelical preacher talk about Stages of Faith and the faith crisis of his community. It’s interesting because I was only seeing faith transitions happen in my own religion, but apparently it’s happening to every religious denomination all over the world. It’s fascinating. 

He says faith is simply a human condition; that we have faith whether or not we believe we do. Even atheists build their belief system compared to God … or lack thereof. So considering we all have faith, he says there are three stages.

1) Simplicity. 

Ie. The church is true. (Think about children bearing their simple testimonies.) … or

Parents know everything, or

Doctors can heal you.

Then we get more information, grow older, have more life experience and our simple faith gets tested and tried and we realize it doesn’t fill in all the confusion and hard stuff, so we doubt it. It’s when our thoughts turn to cognitive dissonance, complexity, confused and sometimes bitter and cynical. It’s hard to question our belief system!

2) Complexity

 Ie. The church isn’t true, or

Parents are idiots, or 

Doctors cause more harm than good. 

It’s when people lose their testimonies, divorce their spouses, go vegan and give up their foundation. But then … we live some more, get additional information and life experiences. We realize our lack of faith is insufficient to live life and we start searching again. We enter …

3) Simplicity on the Other Side of Complexity

Ie. The church has many transcendent, life changing truths AND a complicated past/present.

Parents aren’t always right but sometimes they are AND they have much more life experience than us to share with those they love.

Doctors are well trained and can give us many options to help with health problems AND their options don’t always solve the issue.

Or, as Jared Halverson says, “Our faith journeys echo the Creation, the Fall and the Atonement.”

This is getting long, but it does give me hope for myself and my loved ones that we are just journeying, our mistakes are for learning, that God has a plan for us. It makes me want to live in wonder and hope and love and bask in the miraculous. It’s just a better way to live. 

And how are your first few days in Toronto proper? Eddie says there are a lot of drug deals in that part of town. Good thing you are in bed at 10:30 and can avoid most of that. Btw, Eddie and Renata moved to Niagara Falls. Haha. Always moving. So I hope you get to go there. Jared Townsend’s parents also live in Niagara Falls. 

You have time. 

Love you lots! And sorry for this late email. 

Mom