Elder Evan Baer: Canada Calgary Mission: Jesus is my Anti-depressant

(Subject line brought to you by my favorite district member)

August 28, 2023

你好吗！What's Good! How we doin'? How are the August "Dog Days" treating you? I hear everyone's gettin' back into school these days. . .

. . . my condolences.

Y'all. This week kinda just . . . happened. There's still noteworthy stuff to tell, but at the same time some of the days just seemed like copy and paste.

A General Authority, Elder Peter M. Johnson, came for a Devo this Tuesday! Unlike a lot of other lecture style devotionals, Elder Johnson was very interactive. He had a couple people on stage who he just asked a bunch of questions about overcoming the world and what that looks like. He talked about faith and confidence - and then the spirit gave me a cool lil' nudge so WARNING: brief sermon incoming! *inhales deeply*

So to have faith is like having confidence in God and in yourself, but what does confidence mean? See the word "confide" in confidence? To have confidence might mean to confide in something, or confide your trust in something, right? To confide in something might mean to "be one" with something, as we do during the sacrament when we take His name on us. So when we "Let God Prevail" we align our view with His, our views are one, we confide in the Lord, we place our confidence in the Lord, and in essence we have faith in the Lord.

. . . Kind of a circular thought in retrospect, but I thought it was cool in the moment.

Our district helped welcome the new guys to the MTC on Wednesday. Kinda fun, kind of really weird to be on the other side of the situation just waiting for someone to wipe away some tears before they start the journey of meetings and more meetings. I carried luggage for a guy who said he had a call to Spain, and then had to recover from cancer real quick before he got re-assigned to Arkansas. BRUV!! The man's dedication is insane.

Language immersion started on Thursday, and that's when all the days really started to be the same. We got two awesome teachers: Sister Spangler who is a fantastic pantomime and has a slight speech impediment, and Sister Hutchinson who is really funny and uses a bunch of trendy words and gestures even though she allegedly dislikes Gen-Z and the slang. . . .

We taught our same "investigator" friend from two weeks ago. My companion Facebook-stalked her and found out she is a church member. Makes sense now considering lesson #2 seemed like it was set to easy mode.

Y'all. Chinese Family is wildly complicated. Imagine not having the simple terms like brother & sister, aunt & uncle, grandma & grandpa; but imagine that each of your aunts and uncles has a specific different title depending on whether they're older or younger than your parents, or whether they're on your mom or your dad's side, or whether they married into your family, etc, etc. It'll really make your ancestors dizzy.

SUNDAYS BRO! They're so rad!! Everyone here complains about Sunday being the busiest day of the week, but I haven't seen that yet. We have sacrament meeting and an evening devotional, and then a big study session in between. It seems a lot more chill than showing up to early morning Stake meetings and then church and then mission prep and then a different mission prep and then a fireside. (Loved the grind this last January. #blessed) As it turns out I can listen to music during our "Go and Do" 2 hour study time. New favorite part of the week for sure. Passio Secundum Johannem by Arvo Pärt was an absolute study banger! A bit on the repetitive side, but the intro though. Heck*n' good stuff. But even more rad was the stuff I was studying. Get buckled everyone, brief sermon #2 incoming. *big inhale*

Okay, so the Sacrament, right? We partake of the Sacrament before we "Feast on the words of Christ" with some prepared or sometimes impromptu messages from the pulpit. The sacrament itself goes back to the Last Supper, Christ's Passover meal with the Apostles. Ever thought about the symbolic significance of a meal? I had a huge lightbulb moment realizing that meals are a universal symbol of unity. Families gather almost every night for dinner, and we invite friends to join us on holidays and celebrations as well. As we sit at the table we sit in unity, often all eating the same dish as well. Before we eat we often say a blessing, showing unity to God. We hold feasts at weddings when two families become united as a man and woman make vows to each other and to God to unite with God's power in one family. We hold a banquet at funerals when all attending unite to commemorate and celebrate the life of one who has passed on, or one who now unites with the heavenly hosts. Even the very act of eating unites the power of nutrients in food with the organs and cells in the body. Christ shared several examples about the significance of meals: the parable of the Wedding of the King's Son, all of the parables involving vineyards, the feeding of the five thousand, the meal with men on the road to Emmaus, and of course, the Last Supper. It is only fitting that when we take the Lord's name upon us we gather as neighbors and friends in unity for a [sacramental] "meal" so to speak.

The point is, It's no wonder that we unify ourselves with God, Jesus Christ, and the Holy Ghost by partaking of bread and water placed on a table. It's no wonder other faiths refer to this sacrament as "communion." Just a little something for you to chew on this week ;)

Best of luck to y'all this week. Let me know how things are going! Love y'all

--Elder Baer

(Photos include district elders in good study, A temple trip from last week with our good Cantonese district, and a sub-par performance instrument from the hands of the Lord)

Morning ~~nap~~ study

Elders Hart & Groscost