Missionary Work Really?

Hello friends and family!  You can wake up now, September is
over.  Haha, I'm funny.  Anyways... life is great as always.  Sorry if
I ever sound repetitious.  Missionary work is that way.  I think it's
funny when we try to have conversations with members, they always ask
us what's new, and we say, "Nothing much.  We're still missionaries,
and we still are spreading the gospel."  Although it's pretty routine,
the miracles I see every day are very unique and specific to the
challenges and trials that the people we meet with are going through.
So... not much is new this week.  Doug is a member now, so that is
great.  We can take him to go teach people with us now, which is
awesome.  We actually have an appointment tonight with a girl named
Ashley that we are teaching, so that will be great.  We actually
started teaching Ashely last week, she was a referral by the Spanish
Elders.  Let's just say she is your stereotypical cheerleader/blond
(no offense to smart cheerleaders and blondes).  :)  So that is fun.
We also are teaching a couple of people out in a small town called
Seward right now.  They don't have missionaries right now, and since
we cover the whole zone we go out and teach them.  One of them is
named Bryanna and she's pretty awesome.  She's actually the brother of
a less-active that I taught in Beatrice, and she's also the friend of
a recent convert here in the University ward named Josh, so we take
him out there with us to teach her.  It's been going really great, and
she should be getting baptized at the end of this month.  The work
continues to progress, and despite our inability to find investigators
through our own efforts, the Lord continues to provide people for us
to teach.  It's great!
        So, I've been thinking a lot about what I want to share this
week, and I thought I might share something about missionary work.  I
love being a missionary, and one of the saddest things for me is that,
one, I wasn't more of a missionary before my mission (I had plenty of
opportunities), and two, that the members of the Church aren't
catching the vision of missionary work as well.  I feel like we have
so many opportunities in our lives to share the Gospel, and the Church
would grow so much if we just opened our mouths and invited people to
learn.  I know it's awkward at first, and that we feel like we might
be pushing it on others, but that's not the case at all.  The Gospel
is the greatest blessing in this life and in eternity, and we cannot
be content with just keeping that for ourselves.  This applies to
everyone, even you people that live in Utah.  This is coming from
someone who lived in Utah most of his life, served part of his mission
there and saw much success, went to a high school that was 95% LDS and
still had a ton of friends who weren't members of the Church, had
three roommates in college who weren't members either, and also have
family members who are not active in the Gospel.  There are PLENTY of
chances, wherever we are, to share the gospel.  And Joseph Smith said,
"After all that is said and done, our most important duty is to share
the gospel."  So my challenge to you, every time I hear from you, I
would love to hear about a missionary experience that you have had.  I
promise as you search to share the Gospel, the Lord will put people in
your path who need to hear it.  You will feel the amazing joy that
comes from helping others find the truth, and you will be able to see
the vision that the prophets and apostles want us to have, and more
importantly that our Heavenly Father and Savior want us to have.  I
love you all so much, and hope you have a great experience this week
in sharing the Gospel with someone.

Godspeed,
Elder Chandler Kendall