One should not try to console either those who lost their eyes, or those who have suffered other losses--of money, health, or a loved one. It is necessary instead to show them what their loss brings them, to show them the gifts they receive in place of what they have losst. Because there are always gifts. God wills it so. Order is restored; nothing ever disappears completely.

We wish to force our own conditons on life; this is our real weakness. We forget that God never creates new conditons for us without giving us the strength to meet them... By all this, I learned at the same time that we shoule never give way to despair, no matter what brutal and negative events occur in our lives [because] just as quickly the same sum of life is given back to us.
--Jacques Lusseyran, Buchenwald prison camp survivor, blinded at age 7.

SAMBA PARTY BIO'S

advice from Church's leading scholar

Have faith that there is more than you know; repent of all your present shallowness and silliness; wash off everything of this world in the waters of baptism, and be reborn...to a course of action requiring perpetual, progressive repentance...until you are full of grace and truth...then "ye shall receive the gift of the Holy Ghost" and get the guidance you need.
--Hugh Nibley

lepote flom Taiwan missionaly namba wan

Yo 'sup y'all,

I've left my abode in XinDian AnKang (see pic), I love that place. It was a ghetto little piece of city nestled in steep-cliff mountains coverd with thick jungle. I saw MANY miracles there, to share a few:

Cui [my non-English speaking Korean companion] & I had an impression to go to a certain aera of the city & contact people/knock doors. When we got there we came to a place where the small street we walked divided into 4 small lanes, we both felt to walk down a certain one, and the first door we knocked a small Taiwanese came out, she listened intently as we briefly shared about Heavenly Father & His restored gospel. She didn't really understand what we said (many of them really have no idea who Jesus Christ is, so his 'restored' gospel has even smaller import) but she felt the spirit & wanted the blessing we promised her family - she is doing great & LOVES church, she's progressing so fast.

One day Cui I were contacting in a park, & I saw an apartment building across the river & thought to go there & knock a bit. When we got there, we had several doors to choose from (each door leads into a complex of probly 50+ appt.) We rang one of the 50 doorbells, and someone let us in without checking to see who we were- Cha Ching! We started knockin' the complex without much luck, when we only had 5 min. left, Cui said, "K, just knock the ones that feel good we only have a few minutes" "This door seems good" We knocked & met a college-aged girl, gave her a tract & welcomed her to church- expecting nothing of it... Next sunday she showed up!!! & started meeting with the sister missionaries, she will be baptized this month! It's a great feeling to be a sharp RAMBO knife in the hand of the Lord.

There were many more miracles, I will miss that place..
-Elder Pietr Mikkelsen