Soon: Living in a tent?

Good day, chaps!

Well, I must first start this letter by saying that fall is finally starting to come! (I know, all you people in Utah are probably still complaining about the snow...) But this past week was cool and rainy, and the leaves are finally starting to change! It's kind of weird to have fall come, I think mainly because the holiday season is right around the corner and it's just all going so fast.

The highlight of this week was definitely exchanges. And guess who I went with? Sister Meeks! (For those of you who haven't tuned in for a while, Sister Meeks was my trainer/first companion.) It was so good to just be back serving with her again. It's been like seven months since I served with her. I miss her so much, so it was a treat to be able to go on exchanges with her! Oh my goodness, what a flash back to old times. Needless to say, we had a lot of fun.

The rest of the week pretty much consisted of looking for apartments and trying to figure out our living situation. There's been a lot going on with the apartment debacle, so Sister McNeil and I have been tempted to just ask the Church to buy a plot of land that we can pitch a tent on. Either that or just buy a permanent house that the missionaries can live in. Or an RV. The options are endless.

We also spent a lot of time this week trying to work on the finder binder, and since I've been staring at maps for so long, I'm pretty sure when I talk to people I just see roads and coordinates on their faces...

I'm going to switch back to General Conference now:

Elder Quentin L. Cook's talk was one of my favorites because we are all in danger of being in bondage at one point or another. The Gospel is designed to help us be free. 

"Bondage, subjugation, addictions, and servitude come in many forms. They can be literal physical enslavement but can also be loss or impairment of moral agency that can impede our progress. ... Other kinds of bondage are equally destructive of the human spirit. Moral agency can be abused in many ways.

"First, addictions that impair agency, contradict moral beliefs, and destroy good health cause bondage. The impact of drugs and alcohol, immorality, pornography, gambling, financial subjugation, and other afflictions imposes on those in bondage and on society a burden of such magnitude that it is almost impossible to quantify.

"Second, some addictions or predilections, while not inherently evil, can use up our precious allotment of time which could otherwise be used to accomplish virtuous objectives. These can include excessive use of social media, video and digital games, sports, recreation, and many others.

"Third, the most universal subjugation in our day, as it has been throughout history, is ideology or political beliefs that are inconsistent with the gospel of Jesus Christ. Substituting the philosophies of men for gospel truth can lead us away from the simplicity of the Savior’s message. ... This is emblematic of our own day, where gospel truths are often rejected or distorted to make them intellectually more appealing or compatible with current cultural trends and intellectual philosophies. If we are not careful, we can be captured by these trends and place ourselves in intellectual bondage.

"Fourth, forces that violate sincerely held religious principles can result in bondage. One of the most invidious forms is when righteous people who feel accountable to God for their conduct are forced into activities that violate their conscience—for example, health providers forced to choose between assisting with abortions against their consciences or losing their jobs.

"Our primary emphasis, however, should always be to make any necessary sacrifices to protect our own family and the rising generation^. The vast majority of them are not yet in bondage to serious addictions or false ideologies. We must help inoculate them from a world that sounds a lot like the Jerusalem that Lehi and Jeremiah experienced."

He concluded with this: 

"Our challenge is to avoid bondage of any kind, help the Lord gather His elect, and sacrifice for the rising generation. We must always remember that we do not save ourselves. We are liberated by the love, grace, and atoning sacrifice of the Savior. ... If we are true to His light, follow His commandments, and rely on His merits, we will avoid spiritual, physical, and intellectual bondage as well as the lamentation of wandering in our own wilderness, for He is mighty to save."

'Til next time,
Sister Sarah Singleton