Words from Elder Garrett Hollembeak in West Virginia

Hello!

It was a great week here in Parkersburg. We got over a foot of snow on
Thursday this week so we had a lot of drives and sidewalks to shovel.
It was a great opportunity to serve our members and show them our love
for them. We had three of our less active members at church this week.
Two of them were the Brother and Sister Lyman. We were able to teach
them on Saturday and Brother Lyman asked for a blessing. You could
tell he felt the Spirit and has really sincere desires to be fully
active. Elder Higley and I are doing good together, he's on his last
month in the mission but he's still going strong. Our zone is doing
really well too, there was a flu bug going around Parkersburg and a
couple of our missionaries got sick, thankfully I'm doing good but
some of our investigators were also under the weather. We got the news
officially this week that Elder D. Todd Christofferson will be coming
to our mission on the 21st to speak to the missionaries. We're all
pretty excited. We also have a big leadership meeting on the twelfth
this week and a couple of people from the missionary department of the
church are coming. One of the highlights of this week happened
yesterday when we got to administer the sacrament to a member of the
ward who recently had heart surgery. It definitely makes you
appreciate the sacrament and what it does for us. I learned recently
the word "sacrament" is another word for ordinance and on Sunday we
take the sacrament of the Lord's Supper. I imagine that the meal the
apostles shared with the Savior prior to the crucifixion was one of
their most sacred experiences and it struck me this week that when we
go to church on Sunday we are afforded the opportunity to break bread
with the Savior by the means of his priesthood holders. Sacrament
meeting is an opportunity to commune with the Spirit and to receive
guidance and instruction for that week. It made me feel humbled that
the Lord allows me to take the sacrament and to be given the blessing
of the Holy Ghost. The more I learn about the gospel the more I
realize how little I understand the scope of God's plan for us but in
the same breath the more I am assured of the truthfulness of the
gospel and the reality of God's love for us and the Savior redeeming
atonement. I hope you guys have a wonderful week and are staying warm
and safe. I love you so much.