Good Week

We had a really good week this week.  We've started teaching some new people, and we now have several people with baptismal dates.

 

I told you last week about [sister investigator], who we set a baptismal date with on the first visit.  We havn't taught her since last tuesday, but we have an apt. with her tomorrow.

 

We've had an investigator/potential, named [Investigator], who we've taught a couple times these last few months, but we had lost contact with him for several weeks.  We finally passed by last sunday with a member that already knew him ( I think I already told you about this part last week).  But we had a really good lesson with him.  And on Thursday we visited with him again, and he accepted a baptismal date for the end of July!  (The other good thing about that was that my companion, to celebrate setting the date with him, cooked us T-bone steaks!)

 

We're still working on getting [Investigator] ready for baptism, however we didn't get to teach him this week, because he doesn't have a phone, so we were'nt able to get in contact with him until this last fri/sat.

 

There was another person that we taught this week named [another sister investigator], (I know the name doesn't look hispanic but she is, she's from honduras, and for some reason or another a lot of honduraneans have american names.  I'm not sure why.)  I may have told you about her before, but we talked to her one day.  And it was the day right before when there was a lot of stuff going out on the news about how the end of the world was supposed to end on some day in may.  I don't know if you heard a lot of that or not.  But she was reaally scared that day because she knew that she was sinning.  We talked to her about the doctrine of christ and how she could be forgiven,  and then on tuesday we taught her again.  She had a ton of questions about the Resurrection and judgment.  So we read in 2 Ne 9, we didn't really have to do any teaching during that lesson, we just read, and through the BOM she answered her own questions.  We had another lesson with her on Fri.  where we talked about the Restoration.  We didn't quite get all the way through the lesson, because she asks a ton of questions.  It might take a while to teach her, because she doesn't know hardly anything about Religion, so we just have to start at square one,  But it seems like she has some potential.

 

On Saturday night we had a pretty interesting lesson.  We talked to this guy that believed that the Atonement of Jesus Christ was just merely a torture.  He thought that since christ was the son of God that he should have been worshiped rather than tortured and then hung on the cross, and he thought it would have been better for ten other normal men to go stand in his place and suffer that for him.  So we talked to him about that and tried to help him understand the atonement of Jesus Christ a little better and why Christ was the only one that could do it.  (the more I've thought about it the more I've realized how illogical it would be for anyone other than christ to try and perform the atonement.)  At the lesson it was him and his daughter and his daughters friend (who are both only 13)  and towards the end of the lesson his daughter started to try to flirt with me.  I'm wondering if it was just a ploy to get us out of there and to keep us from coming back, but either way, it worked and we got out of there quick and I don't have any plans to go back.

"Pretty Good" Week!

We had a pretty good week last week, we were able to teach a lot of people last week, and our evenings are pretty much booked from now until the weekend.  We are still teaching [investigator] and he is still on track to get baptized next month.  We were able to get permission from his mom to baptize him.  She was a little reluctant, but nonetheless gave us permission.

This last week we got in touch with several of our old investigators that we hadn't had contact with for a while.  Several of them have different work schedules now, and we are going to be able to visit with many of them this week.  So we'll hope that the all work out.

We just got back from an awesome lesson (we taught it right before I came to email.)  She had been raised in a baptist church, but recently she had quit going to church, but she wanted to start going to church again, and we just happened to knock her door at the right time (about a week ago).  She was busy at the time, but she invited us to come back.  We taught her today.  We just taught her about the restoration, but the spirit was really strong and you could tell that she was interested.  at the end of the lesson we set a baptismal date for the end of July.  She agreed so promptly to a baptismal date, that it was almost as if I wasn't sure if she new what I had asked her at first, but at the end of the lesson when she said the prayer she expressed her gratitude for being able to be baptized!

Yesterday, our preparation day, was memorial day, as you know (which is why I couldn't email yesterday.)  but the Racquetball courts were closed,  so we tried to go play Frisbee/basketball outside, but with the heat/humidity we didn't last longer than about an hour.  So we went back to the apartment, and I decided to cook something for dinner with the time that we had.  One of the members told me how to make salsa Verde, so I tried making that.  it turned out decent, but it will need improvement, and then I made rice, beans, chicken (well...i warmed up the chicken that a member brought us in the microwave), and homemade tortillas.  It took about an hour and 20 min, but doing all of that wore me out more than the longest bike ride I've gone on during my mission.

Another Baptism

How are things with your new companion?

Elder Dixson has been a really good companion.  He's a good missionary and we get a long really well. 

 

How goes the piano playing

Good, I guess they didn't get the memo at the baptism, because I went to go up to play the piano and somebody already beat me to it and played the recording on the piano.  But either way, I've been playing the piano at the apt. quite a bit.

 This week we had the baptism of [investigator] (as I mentioned earlier).  Everything went really well.  I'm trying to download the pix to send to you, but the computer doesn't seem to recognize my camera, so we'll see if I can send it or not.

I'm trying to think of what happened this week, but I can't really think of anything, it always goes so fast that it seems like I just wrote you.  We had a lot of appointments set up this week, but it seemed like about 70% of those appointments fell through this week.  so we did a lot of contacting and we have tried to get up with some of our investigators.  Recently, as in the last couple of weeks, we found several new investigators, we're just trying to get back up with all of them and try to get them progressing.  One problem we seem to run into a lot is that a lot of our investigators don't have cell phones or any phone at all for that matter.  so it is difficult to get in contact with them because we're out in the country, and it's hard to get around to all of our investigators.  This was the same problem I ran into in Raeford when I first got there, but once I learned the area and got the hang of it I was able to keep things moving pretty good, so maybe it will be similar here.

We are teaching someone right now named [investigator].  I think I told you about him last week,  but we reset his baptismal date for the 25 of june, and I think its going to go through,  the grandma had a few conflicts with the previous date that we set.  But this week when we taught him we were at his dads house and we went there with bro. Brown (he served his mission in Chile).  The girlfriend of [investigator's] dad was there, and so she listened to the lesson while we were there.  Bro Brown did a really good job at friend shipping and helping out with the lesson, and she agreed to be there at the next apointment, which is today.  The other good thing was that she is from honduras, and so I asked her if she knew how to make Valeadas (Tacos made from flour tortillas usually with beans, some sort of meet, hondurenean cheese and crema...ask Cody I'm sure he could explain it.)  so, the next time we go over with bro. Brown, he's going to teach elder Dixson and I how to make Valeadas (or at least the tortillas).

Baptism!

How are you all doing.

This week was a fairly busy week, but at the same time I can't really remember what it was that we did.  We have been working on getting [investigator] ready for his baptism and getting the baptismal service all lined up.  He seems like he is excited and ready to go for his baptism.

So, there was something funny that I found out this week.  While we were getting ready for the baptismal service I asked [my companion] who it was that played the piano every week for church, because I always saw one member behind the piano.  But then he said that nobody plays the piano, it just plays itself.  Which surprised me, I couldn't believe that nobody played the piano for church.  I think I told you before that we have a piano at our apartment, so I have been practicing it in the morning, and I've gotten to where I have a list of about 8-10 hymns that I can play.  So I'm going to play for the baptism.  And we'll see how it goes for church, pres. Atkins knows that I play the piano, but I don't know if he wants me to play for sacrament meeting or not.

This last week we had a training, which was really good, and I learned a lot of things that I have been able to apply.

I think I told you last week that I was thinking of getting some raquetball raquets to play raquetball.  We found some raquets that didn't cost too much, and we played raquetball last week for preparation day.  It was a lot of fun, it is nice to be able to get out of the apartment on preparation day.

We began teaching a boy this week.  His grandma is a member, and he lives at his dads house most of the time, except every other weekend he stays at his grandma's house.  His grandma has always brought him to church.  however it might be difficult getting and keeping the support of the dad.  We talked to the dad yesterday, and he gave us permission to teach/baptize [his son].  But I don't think there was much support behind it.  The grandma however is there to support him as much as she can, but she can only have contact with him every other weekend.

This weekend is transfers, but [my companion] is staying and I am staying also.

Some New Pictures!

Translating for stake conference

Finally got that mouse!

Baptism

Temple

Empty mailbox???

Gift Card Found

Hmmm...I'm not exactly sure what to write, I just talked to you yesterday.

There was a new investigator that we found this week.  We found her out knocking doors, and she told us that her mom is mormon, but she never really went to church or got baptized.   However she went with one of her friends to mutual since she was 14-18.  She has investigated many different churches, but has found falts with most of them, so she has mostly just been interested in learning about religion and has done her best to try and peice it all together.  At the end of the contact she talked about how she was a little worried, because she realizes that the second coming is coming
quick.  when we taught her, we told her about the hope that can come through the gospel of Jesus Christ, and then taught her the restoration.  She said it all made sense.  We ended up setting a baptismal date for the 4th of june.

You know that gift card you sent me a while back for valentines day?  Well, it finally came.  I'm not sure what happened to it, but it got stuck in the mail.  I thought I had accidentally thrown it out, but it
just took forever to get here.

Elder Scott Visits

So will you have your baptism on Saturday?

• We moved the baptismal date for to the 21 of may.  I think it is still going to happen.  it had just been a while since had come to church, so we decided that it would be best to give him a little more time to prepare.  We also thought it would be best that he have a stronger testimony.

Have you seen any tornadoes?  The Southern United States is just being pounded with storms.  Keep safe.

• Nope, on thursday when there were a bunch of storms again, we were inside the whole day.  Not because of the storms specifically, but on thursday we always do weekly planning, which seemed to last for ever this week, but we were inside until about 6 in the evening, and by that time there were blue skies. 

 So, this last week, we had a conference with Elder Richard G. Scott.  It was amazing.  it started at 9 in the morning, and he allowed all of us to shake his hand.  Then the first part, for about an hour and a half was instruction from  a 70, and pres. cotterall.  It was pretty cool though, because both the area 70 and Richard G Scott speak spanish, so the area 70 gave us some insruction on language learning.  This was kind of nice, because serving in the united states, speaking spanish, I think it gets neglected in the mission that there are spanish missionaries, and that it is important that we can clearly speak spanish.  Even though it's not the most important thing to be able to speak spanish, it's hard to effectively communicate the restored gospel of jesus Christ if you cant speak spanish.  Then Richard G Scott spoke to us for a little bit, and then for about an 1 1/2 he opened it up for Q. & A. IT was awesome, there were a lot of things that I learned.  At the end he bore his testimony of Jesus Christ.  Hearing the testimony from an apostle like that is an unforgetable experience.  It makes the hair stand up un your back, The spirit came in so strong, and I can't serve it justice in just writing about how it felt.