This has been a wet week.
It has rained, and rained, and rained!
That has been fun for Elder Gray and I, as we both love the combination
of small lakes in the road and our pickup.
There was mild flooding in town.
The rain is a blessing for all the parched farmland.
The best part of the wet week was the baptisms! Saint and Stephen were baptized Friday night,
and Saturday afternoon I went down to Fresno for John, Mai, and Harry's
baptism. They are a family I started
teaching a year ago when I was still with Elder Knapton in Fresno. They asked if I would baptize them. It was an honor. They said I was "their missionary,"
the one who really got their conversion going.
This is the first time that I have had a full family that I taught
progress to baptism, complete with a father, mother, and children. It was wonderful. The gospel blesses families! Mai is due to have a baby in two weeks. That child has to be excited! He is coming into a family that has now fully
embraced the same gospel that we all embraced pre-mortally! Who wouldn't be excited??
I have spent some time this week thinking about the covenant
of baptism, specifically the importance of always remembering Christ. Saint, Stephen, John, Mai, and Harry have now
made a promise to do exactly that.
As part of this pondering, I came across D&C
45:3-5. In these verses read like this:
Listen to him who is the advocate with the Father, who is
pleading your cause before him—
Saying: Father, behold the sufferings and death of him who
did no sin, in whom thou wast well pleased; behold the blood of thy Son which
was shed, the blood of him whom thou gavest that thyself might be glorified;
Wherefore, Father,
spare these my brethren that believe on my name, that they may come unto me and
have everlasting life.
There is a pattern here.
Christ pleads with our Heavenly Father that he will keep in mind both
the sufferings and death of our Savior (the body, or the bread as represented
in the sacrament) and the blood of our Savior that was shed (or the water, as
represented in the sacrament). It is
after Christ's plea with God the Father to always remember the Atonement that
Christ pleads that we, the sinners, can be granted everlasting life. Our Heavenly Father can permit us, unclean as
we are when left to our own merits, because he remembers and honors the
Atonement. In His perspective all of our
negative attributes are swallowed up in Christ's perfection because of the
covenants we have made at baptism---the witness that we are willing to take
Christ's name upon us.
We all make mistakes.
We all have weaknesses and imperfections. There are also many things that we do
well. In spite of even our best
attributes, it is only through the "through the merits, and mercy, and
grace of the Holy Messiah" that any of us can return to the presence of
God ((2 Nephi 2:8). When we always
remember Christ we remember who He is too.
We don't just remember what He did.
Because of our covenants, who He is individually is also who We are, Him
and us, together.
We in mortality tend to identify ourselves based on what we
have done. We are athletic because we
were on the cross country team when we were younger. We are musical because we have spent hours at
the piano. We are consider ourselves
intelligent because of the books we have read or the schools we have attended. We view ourselves as skilled or unskilled, as
winners or losers, as righteous or wicked because of our past life
experiences. When we always remember
Christ we are begin to identify ourselves with His past experiences. We no longer are weak as we once were because
who He is gives us strength and ultimately changes our character. In our covenant relationship we are perfect
in Christ. Because of that covenant
relationship we can live with God, our Father, again and live with our families
in eternal joy and glory.
That is exciting.
That is what I want for everyone.
Remember Him this week!
Love,
Elder Cummings
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