Falling in Reverse - 04/15/13

Well, we are halfway through the transfer, and halfway through the month of April. We may not meet our zone goal of having every companionship baptize in the month of April. But I'm pretty sure we will baptize our petite Mexican friend before transfer calls! She wants to get baptized at 5pm on Cinco de Mayo. Transfers are the sixth. So I may not see the confirmation, but I'm pretty sure she's going to make her baptism date. She's made up her mind, and I don't think we could talk her out of it if we tried. But our last four baptismal dates didn't culminate in baptisms, so I can't make any promises.

Being a district leader is fun. It's also more work than I originally anticipated. But we had a district leader meeting that really helped a lot, I enjoyed the training a ton. I'm super motivated about this coming up district meeting! Being on top of things and planning effectively makes me happy.

Lots of things weren't as well-planned as I'd like them to be. We totally spaced on our correlation meeting, for one, and that made us seem super irresponsible to our Ward Mission Leader and the other ward missionaries. But we've been giving him daily text reports, now, which kind of stopped when Coleman left, and I'm happy to start it up again. We were rewarded for our diligence with cookies from Sister "C".  And I hope to not let them down again in the near future.

Well, other than the random baptism out of the blue, things were more or less business as usual. We felt like our week wasn't as productive as it could have been, in terms of investigator lessons, but we taught 18 lessons total, which is better than this area has done in a long time. We're shooting for 20 lessons this week, 7 of which will be to investigators with a member present. We haven't missed a single day of 20 contacts since "J" got here, which is also a large improvement. All in all, things are looking up. I wish I wasn't so hard on myself! One of our ward missionaries told me I was very considerate of other people, but I underestimate myself. Maybe that's a good thing that I'm so humble, but I really need to work on having faith in my calling as a chosen representative of Jesus Christ. I may be inadequate, but with the Spirit, I can do the job that I have been set apart to do.

I found a ton of really good talks and leadership material with the Los Alamos Elders at their apartment. My favorite talk so far was given by Jeffrey R Holland in January of 1988, just before I arrived on this earth. It's called "Of Souls, Symbols, and Sacraments." It's so beautiful. I'm not sure how effective I would be at trying to incorporate those concepts into my Law of Chastity lessons, but I can try.

I love you guys! Have a wonderful week.

You were only waiting for this moment to arrive - 04/08/13

I've lived through half of my mission! And enjoyed my second General Conference. Everything seems to be moving at light speed now.

 

I'm enjoying being with my district and helping them progress. We got to spend a lot of time together watching conference and between sessions. There was a really sweet couple that made lunch for us between sessions, and we got free acai berry yogurt at the Juice It Up down the street. We did a lot of tracting together between sessions, and talking with the few members and recent converts that showed up to the stake center to watch conference. It seems like nobody bothers to go to church for conference anymore because it's so easy and convenient to find a way to watch it at home. Everybody has access to the internet or cable or satellite or whatever. You could probably watch it on your phone, for most of the people in my wards.

 

I really enjoyed a lot of the talks. I was thinking about how I could improve my missionary experience all week long, and Conference confirmed what I was thinking. I need to be a little more obedient, I need to take the spirit with me everywhere, I need to be fearless, and I need to testify more often. I don't think I was doing a horrible job before. But there's always room for improvement.

 

Do you think the apostles are thinking about missionary work? I feel like a lot of the talks were addressed to the new wave of missionary work moving forward. I'm so glad that I get to be part of this upswell. 

Oh, and remember how the Cedar City temple got announced? Apparently my companion's grandfather sold the land to the church so they could build it there. That's pretty sweet.

 

I'm not sure whether to count my hump day as 1 year after I entered the field (April 11) or one year before I go home (April 8). Either way, it's this week. I don't know if we'll be doing anything special, really. I have a district leader meeting in Riverside to attend. And a couple lessons in the evening. Haven't found a dinner appointment yet. We haven't been able to pass the calendar around since before Easter. 

I'm really impressed with how God always places us in the right place at the right time. We were able to talk to somebody in a parking lot that agreed to have us teach her tonight. It's really cool to see stuff like that happen.
I'm also super glad that I've been able to meet and befriend so many people in my time so far here in Murrieta. It really is a wonderful feeling to know that I am doing God's work and changing the lives of his children.
Have a blessed day, guys.

All Your Life - 04/01/13

Well it's a wonderful week! Everything is bright and sunshiny here in Murrieta, California. Today we played soccer as a zone with my Ward Mission Leader for Cole Canyon and had a barbeque at his house. It was the most fun I've had in a long time! I actually played soccer and football and enjoyed myself quite a bit. Way better than sitting on a stage watching other people play basketball. Basketball every week gets kind of old. Which is why I typically take letters to write or find someone to play a board game with. Maybe I should invest in a copy of Settlers while I'm out.

 

We moved homeshares finally. It took most of our day Thursday. We didn't turn in that night until 10:25, and nothing was unpacked, so we slept in our white shirts and slacks. I didn't care, I was exhausted. Well, at 5:45 the next morning, the guy we live with was knocking on our door to make sure we wanted to go hiking with him. So we got dressed and went on an hour-long hike. I've been really, really tired this whole week. Our numbers were bad, but I feel like I was pretty much always on the go. 

Well, as a District Leader, I get to give my first baptismal interview tonight! That's exciting. I hope there are many more to come. The zone leaders are in our district, and I'm pretty sure that the new ZL (zone leader) will rev up the work and get a few more baptisms in the near future. The other companionship in my district is a little bit more relaxed and ... well, unmotivated. I hope I can get some good effort out of them, too. We've spent a lot of time with them this past week doing service and getting moved and everything, and I hope to do actual exchanges either this week or next. There's a ton of potential in them, maybe not so much in their area, but I think they can rejuvenate the area if they put some elbow grease in it. 

Our baptism for the golden 14-year-old girl didn't happen. The father of our girl apparently flipped out and thought she was rushing into things, so the baptism has been postponed until he can be a little more comfortable with things. We were pretty disappointed, since she told us he was okay, but I should have seen that one coming. And I'm sure she was super heartbroken about the whole thing. Luckily for us, her friends in the ward threw her a pool party that very night, and she and her mom were at church on Easter. The mom went to the post-trek testimony meeting, and she said it moved her so much that she wanted to get up and bear her testimony. So perhaps with the extra time to wait, we can get the Mom on board as well her daughter.  I'm pretty optimistic about things, despite how despondent I was when the baptism got cancelled 2 hours before it was supposed to happen.

 

That Saturday was just a bad day, because one of the Elders in my district got a really nasty letter from home - a chastisement letter from his girlfriend. She might be his ex-girlfriend pretty soon. I'm not sure. I'm just glad that I made the choice to come out on my mission single. So yeah, we were all pretty sad, but we did some service together and that kept us busy and helped us feel better. I love helping other people, even if it's as simple as digging holes to plant trees in. 

On a slightly more upbeat note, we also went on a tracting blitz with these elders and the Alta Murrieta elders, and it was one of the most uplifting and productive times I've had knocking doors in a while. Afterwards, we were all piled into the Corolla to go home, and I heard a big bump as we pulled up to the homeshare. I thought I had clipped the curb or something. But no, I had run over a can of blue spray paint and it exploded all over the street. The car had very minimal splatter on it, but the street was covered in blue. So now I'm Gargamel the Smurf-killer. I guess that means we should make sure everybody has a seat belt next time we do something like that.

 

My scripture for the week: Isaiah 25:8.

8)  He will swallow up death in victory; and the Lord God will wipe away tears from off all faces; and the rebuke of his people shall he take away from off all the earth: for the Lord hath spoken it.

 

Love you all, and happy Easter!