(Anziano Wilkinson)
We had a pretty eventful week this week! We had a
mission-wide conference up in Milan on Sunday and had the chance there to hear
from an member of the Quorum of the Twelve Apostles, Elder Jeffery R. Holland!
The Quorum of the Twelve Apostles is a group of twelve men who have been chosen
by revelation through a living prophet, just like the original twelve apostles
in the Bible. We believe they are called of God and that they hold the
priesthood authority to administer to the church on a global scale. They travel
the world addressing members of the church and any number of other groups in
order to carry forth Christ's message of faith and repentance. And seeing as
there are only twelve of them and they can't be everywhere all at once, it is a
really special opportunity to have one visit and to be taught by one in person!
The conference was held on Sunday, but our trip up to Milan
started on Saturday morning and was made in two parts since Ancona is the
farthest city from Milan in our entire mission and the conference was to be
held in the morning. So the first part of our trip was up to Bologna, which is
roughly halfway, where stayed the night with the Anziani there. The same day
they just happened to be holding a meeting in the Bologna chapel for church
leaders in the region, so I got the chance to see many of the friends I had
made in Pisa and Livorno almost a year ago! It was really a special experience
for me. Those people are truly great people.
The next morning we traveled the last leg of our trip to
arrive in Milan and for the next hour or so I had the amazing opportunity to
see all of the missionaries I had served with and had become so close to. It
was wonderful to be able to catch up with my old companions and friends again.
The group of us that came in to Italy on the same day all got together and took
a picture; some of them I hadn't seen practically since we got off the plane
together! I was really glad to have the chance to see them and everyone else
who I'd gotten so close to over the past 14 months.
The conference itself was really amazing as well. Our mission
president and his wife both addressed us with powerful, brief, and caring
messages that only helped set the stage for Elder Holland's talk. Elder Holland
decided not to use a microphone or the pulpit, but rather opted to walk down
the aisles and talk to us face to face, which was really neat and gave the
meeting a lighter mood than it would have had if we had just watched him at the
pulpit. He talked about many things, and he even let us ask him a few
questions. One of the questions asked was, in effect, "how can we learn to
care about other people more deeply?". His answer was simple but powerful:
we are naturally filled with more love for other people when we learn to love
our Father in Heaven more deeply. He taught us that if we focus our efforts on
loving God and doing the things that make Him happy, we will naturally learn to
do the same for our fellow brothers and sisters.
His answer reminded me of two very powerful scriptures, the
first one being Mosiah 2:17 in the Book of Mormon, which reads, "And
behold, I tell you these things that ye may learn wisdom; that ye may learn
that when ye are in the service of your fellow beings ye are only in the
service of your God." And the second being Matthew 25:34-40 in the New
Testament, which says, "Then shall the King say unto them on his right
hand, Come, ye blessed of my Father, inherit the kingdom prepared for you from
the foundation of the world: For I was an hungred, and ye gave me meat: I was
thirsty, and ye gave me drink: I was a stranger, and ye took me in: Naked, and
ye clothed me: I was sick, and ye visited me: I was in prison, and ye came unto
me. Then shall the righteous answer him, saying, Lord, when saw we thee an
hungred, and fed thee? or thirsty, and gave thee drink? When saw we thee a
stranger, and took thee in? or naked, and clothed thee? Or when saw we thee
sick, or in prison, and came unto thee? And the King shall answer and say unto
them, Verily I say unto you, Inasmuch as ye have done it unto one of the least
of these my brethren, ye have done it unto me."
I love these two scriptures because they contain such
powerful truths, one being the God loves His children and that he doesn't
desire our suffering and another being that when we serve others, we are in
turn serving God. The Gospel of Jesus Christ was never intended to secure only
the happiness and salvation of single individuals, exactly the opposite, in
fact. In order to live the teachings of Christ, we must necessarily love and
serve others! There is no other way. We simply cannot be selfish and righteous
at the same time; those words are practically antonyms in God's vocabulary!
Everything He has ever taught us since the very beginning has been based around
His desires for us to 1) love Him and 2) love each other (Matthew 22:37-40). He
wants us to love Him because He so deeply and infinitely loves us, even to the
point of giving His only perfect Son to pay the price of all of our sins,
pains, and imperfections. And because He loves ALL of us, it hurts Him to see
us treat each other with apathy, hatred, violence, or in any negative way at
all.
Our Father in Heaven desires our happiness and He knows that
true happiness is found only in loving selflessly. By learning to love others,
we learn to love God and by learning to love God, we learn to love others.
Elder Holland's explanation of this truth was very simple yet very powerful.
The simple act of loving our Father in Heaven helps us to love others, which,
as we know, will in turn make us happier.
Have a great week and look for the chance to love others
this week! Open a door for someone, wash someone else's dishes for them, offer
to help under any circumstance that presents itself! Doing so will only make
you happier!
-Anziano Jake Wilkinson
