Off To Rushmore!!!

Hello awesome friends and family!!!!!  

Ughh it feels like forever since I have last emailed you all, but I am so excited that I get to talk to you all now! As always let's start this email off right with a quick spiritual thought. Since Valentine's day was yesterday I was thinking I could share a quick thought all about the power of love. Heavenly Father and Jesus Christ should be our templates as we learn to love and see the divine heritage of those all around us. We too often look past the individual's strengths and instead expose and exaggerate their faults and frailties. As emphasized by President Nelson, this is not true love, but rather belittling and putting down. True love "highlights unique qualities that are part of the divine heritage of every son and daughter of God, and beyond that, love flings open the gates of service, which lead to the sweet fields of fulfillment and understanding". My sweet Brothers and Sisters kindness will become service, service will become a relationship, and your relationships will become grounded in love. I know for a fact that we all have a Heavenly Father and Savior that love us exponentially and that as we try to love others as they love us we can feel and see even more miracles in our lives and have hearts full of charity. 

 

BIG NEWS!!! This week transfer calls came and...(drumroll please)... Elder McMullin is packing his bags and moving down to Rapid City, South Dakota! Not going to lie I am so excited to be leaving Bismarck and have the opportunity to serve and teach the amazing people of Rapid City South Dakota. In other news my assignment as mission lawyer and Facebook advertiser is finally coming to a close. It's astonishing to think that I have been running ads and taking care of social media lawsuits for over six months of my mission with the same companion all in the same area.  Needless to say, I am super excited for a change of scenery and a change of pace, but also a little nervous. However, a wise man once said "when you exit the comfort you enter the miracle zone"

 

Weather update: IT IS SO FLIPPIN COLD!!!! I never would have thought it would be possible for one's eyelashes to freeze together, or to have one's nostril hairs freeze and break off when you sneeze outside. It's kind of cool to say that you've experienced -42 degrees and were able to drop boiling water off the second floor balcony and have it all freeze/evaporate before it hit the ground, but only after you have had like half a gallon of Hot Chocolate. Kind of a funny story is our mission recently purchased brand new Chevy Equinoxes for most of the missionaries, but we found out three days ago that they are all being recalled because they have the tendency to freeze up spontaneously and turn off all power in the vehicle. Needless to say, this is a perfect vehicle for a mission whose average temperature is 7 degrees in the winter.

 

FRIEND UPDATE!!! Not going to lie this week hasn't been so great on those that we are teaching, especially since our most progressing person was sent to prison yesterday. However, we had the amazing opportunity to go over to the Sayler's today and celebrate Presidents day with car racing, darts, and dance dance revolution. I love the Sayler family so much and am so excited for them as they announced that Corey will be baptized in the upcoming month and that they are going to be working towards getting sealed together as a family and are inviting us all to the session whether will still on a mission or married and have families of our own. This was a huge testimony builder for me to see a family that has gone through so many trails be healed by the gospel and be sealed together for all the eternities and until the end of time. I am so deeply grateful to be a part of a Church that allows families to be together forever and am even more blessed to be a part of one. I am also so grateful for this opportunity to be a missionary and to testify that families really can be forever.

 

Well awesome friends and family, I don't know what else to say, except that I love and miss you all so much and that I am thinking and praying for you everyday! Look forward to writing to you all from Mount Rushmore next week!!!! Love you all so much!!!!

 

Sent with love from,

Elder McMullin :)

 

Photo Gallery!!!!!

1-3) The Saylers!

4-5) Elder McMullin got to sit in the driver's seat  (They told me they would sell it to me when I get off my mission)

6) Some of my favorite Elders trying to get to their original missions for the third time

7) Ballin' with the Elderz

8) Our car is literally frozen shut 

New Mission President Announced

This clipping is from the Church News.    It's the announcement of my new Mission President that is taking over in July.

Being A "Checklist Christian"

HALLAH FRIENDS AND FAMILY!!!  

This week has been so crazy, but at the same time, so crazy AWESOME! However, before we get into all of those juicy details let's start this email off right by putting Christ first! Yesterday, I had the wonderful opportunity to go to Sunday School where Bishop Thueson and his wife taught all about magnifying our callings every day and becoming true disciples of Christ. They opened the lesson with this idea of being a "Checklist Christian" where we wake up with a set "to-do" list of things that we need to do to please God and have everlasting joy and happiness. I loved this analogy and want to take it one step further by comparing a "Checklist Christian" to full time discipleship. Now, being a Checklist Christian isn't a bad thing, the problem is that over time we begin to see the Gospel as a chore and gradually lose sight that the Gospel is unique and individual with our Heavenly Father. Heavenly Father created us all with colorful custom personality traits and talents, and constantly encourages us to always be enriching these talents and sharing them with others (Matthew 25:14-30). As a Checklist Christian we put in the least effort possible and then proceed to move onto the next mundane task that is required for salvation. As colorful unique children of God we diligently seek out ways that we can magnify those "mundane tasks" and customize them into tools of invitation and conversion. Consistently trying to magnify our efforts and infuse them with our personality can sometimes be very difficult and sometimes even create tension between our fellow brothers and sisters. The remedy for this recurring struggle is to simply not judge others and their unique discipleship, but rather love them for the unique sibling of God that they are. Let us all start now in not trying to check off Gospel tasks and see them as burdens, but rather see each task as an opportunity to pair our testimony and our unique personality in glorifying, testifying, and inviting people to come unto Christ and be perfected in Him. I know that as we avoid being checklist Christians and diligently try to be unique disciples of Jesus Christ, we will not only see miracles, but find extreme and lasting joy in the Gospel. 

 

One of the things that has made this week so crazy was recently Facebook made a huge announcement that the option to "like" a Facebook page is going away and being replaced with only the option to follow the Facebook page. In a further announcement/clarification given by Facebook a couple of days later, everyone that likes your Facebook page, but does not follow it, will be permanently  deleted with the new "Facebook Experience" update. Needless to say, with this announcement panic arose all over the NDBM since these last couple of months have been really geared towards inviting people to "Like" the Facebook page making all of that hard work go to waste if we don't convert literally everyone to following the Facebook Page. Luckily we were able to find a solution, but now I am tasked to convert nearly 1,700 people who have liked, but not followed, the Facebook page individually all before the next batch of 27 new missionaries arrive on February 15th. So needless to say, it has been super stressful these last couple of days training Elder Rosas in advertising, trying to convert 1,700 people to follow the page, get a new collection of Facebook Valentines Ads ready by Wednesday, and helping establish Facebook Advertising in the Ghana, Accra mission but hey, it's nice to feel needed. With that being said if any of my missionary friends or cousins need help with social media work in your mission please be patient and give me six more days to respond to your emails, love you all so much though and will be more than happy to help.

 

BAPTISM!!! Before we get to ahead of ourselves, this is unfortunately not a person I was teaching getting baptized, but instead a sweet eight year old of a less active family making the big decision to follow the example of our Savior Jesus Christ and be baptized. However, this was the most stressful Baptism I have ever been too. For one Elder Rosas and I were tasked with the responsibility to fill up the font, and due to the wonderful North Dakota weather, you can't fill up the font too early before the baptism or else it cools off too fast and can even freeze at the bottom. Therefore, you need to turn the hot water dial a quarter of the way so it is a steady drizzle of steaming water not only to prevent the font from freezing but also so the 1970's water heater can keep up. It's also a really good safety measure to boil water and dump it into the font every thirty minutes to help maintain water temperature. Secondly, the sweet girl being baptized forgot her towel and the Sister missionaries that were teaching her didn't want to deal with the problem so Elder Rosas and I had to speed to the mission home, grab a spare towel, speed back and deliver the towel while also making sure that the font temperature was comfortable. I am proud to say the font was a lovely 75 degrees, and Kabriannae was wrapped in a large white poofy towel after the ordinance. Got to love the fun twists and turns of missionary work!

 

All in all, sweet family, life here in the NDBM is fantastic!!! I wish every single day that I could be with you, but my homesickness fades away everyday as I find people interested in learning more about God's plan and the restored Church of Jesus Christ. The Lord's work is sooooo good and I hope to always be a missionary both right now in the NDBM and as a college student back home in Utah. I love you all so much and want to thank you for all of your prayers and words of encouragement. You all are so amazing and a blessing to be able to call friends and family!!! LOVE YA!!!!!!!!!

 

Love your favorite McM in the NDBM!

Elder McMullin :)

 

Photo Gallery!!!

1-2) Literally the prettiest Ice Storm I have ever seen!!!

3) A gift from Elder Rosas: A Scorpion (yes it is real) in a sucker! Actually, quite delicious

4) A requested photo from a cousin who will not be named of my companion and I in our swanky new car (Love you Swag Sis)

5) Me as an armature dual photographer

6-8) The coolest graffiti murals in all of North Dakota