4 Baptisms Last Week

Hey everyone.
Well we had 4 baptisms last week, so that was really great. My companion
baptized the four of them and I conducted and we had some pretty good
attendance! We hope to start a couple of them in preparing to serve a
mission in a couple years, so that will be pretty exciting too. We also saw
some less actives at church that haven't attended for a really long time.
So, to put it simply, everything is goin pretty well here in Libmanan. I
also found out that neither my companion or I will be transferred, which is
great because I feel like we've been working really well together.
We've also had some disappointments with Less Active members. We try again
and again with some of them, but they never seem to make real progress. I
guess I've learned a lot about agency in the past little bit. It's one of
the greatest gifts we've been given in this life, the ability to choose
what we want to make of it. We are all born with weaknesses, or challenges,
physical, mental, or emotional. But we also have a potential that no one
can take away except ourselves. That potential is always there, but can
only be unlocked through the Atonement of Christ, through following the
counsel of modern prophets. I like to think that our potential is exactly
what Jesus thought of as he suffered through the Atonement. On the other
hand, it can only be held from us by our own disobedience, not by the
dictations of anyone else. But no matter what path we may have taken in the
past, or what others around us may be doing, there is always healing
available for us and them. The world is dark. Life isn't easy. It was never
meant to be. That heaviness can be compounded by the decisions of others.
But in the end, we can *always* bear up that weight and carry on to a
better future and a brighter day. I may not be able to make someone come to
church. I know I can never force a man to pray or to believe in modern
revelation, or do any number of other things. But I can do that for myself.
I will close with a favorite poem of mine.

Invictus by William Ernest Henley



Out of the night that covers me,

Black as the Pit from pole to pole,

I thank whatever gods my be

For my unconquerable soul.

In the fell clutch of circumstance

I have not whined or cried aloud,

Under the bludgeonings of chance

My head is bloody, but unbowed.

Beyond this place of wrath and tears

Looms but the horror of the shade,

And yet the menace of the years

Finds, and shall find, me unafraid.

It matters not how straight the gate,

How charged with punishments the scroll,

I am the master of my fate:

I am the captain of my soul