Put to rest what you thought of me - 09/24/13

It's official, guys. I feel like an old missionary. Little things keep jumping out at me as the perfect thing to say to a certain investigator. The spirit pushes me hard to testify to certain people, especially the cases that seem hopeless. Sometimes I can't sleep at night because I'm thinking about my investigators. I even think about them in the shower. There's a sense of urgency that hasn't been present in my work in a long time. I wouldn't have put two and two together if it wasn't for our dinner appointment last night who pointed that out when I was telling her about my inexplicable drive to testify to a certain member of our ward. But yep, I have all the symptoms. Luckily there's still lots of time. 

This email is a day late because yesterday was our meeting with Kent Richards of the 70. He said lots of really cool things during his 4-hour lecture. It really built my faith. But honestly, the quality of instruction and the spirit that I felt was pretty darn similar to what I feel when President Smart trains us. It's nice to hear it from someone new, but I think I would have been just as happy with good old President Smart training us. Don't tell Elder Richards that... I'm very grateful that he came to visit us. It was fun. 

Last Monday we had fun with our laundry. I think I've told you about the woes of spending $4 a week on the laundromat tax. Well, another fun side effect is that my white load of clothes came out of the wash smelling like marijuana last Monday. I'm guessing that somebody forgot about some bud in their pocket when they used the washer or dryer right before me. Elder "H" and I had a good laugh about it and rewashed my whites the next day at a member's house. 

Oh, and when I was pulling them out of the member's dryer, she asked "Do they still smell like reefer?" and I held up what was in my hands and said "I dunno, Elder "H", do they?" I didn't realize that what I was offering him to sniff was my underwear bottoms. He didn't want to sniff those very much.

Tuesday marked the fulfillment of prophecy. Everybody has been telling me and my companion that our hard work is bound to pay off eventually in this ward. Well, on Tuesday night, we went on splits with the ward, and right as we were meeting up at the church before splitting off I got a phone call from a member in the ward asking if we could teach their friend on Wednesday night. Of course I agreed. After we got back to the church, we saw a YSA friend in the parking lot who told us that one of her friends was asking to take the missionary discussions. I was so excited I almost hugged her on the spot. Elder "H" got tackle-hugged instead. She got us an appointment with that friend the very next day. So on Wednesday we taught both referrals. Both lessons went fantastically well and both of them committed to baptism. I don't think I would have been more excited if I won a million dollars. 

Seriously though, this ward has been really slow lately, and both of these two fine young ladies asked *us* about baptism before we had a chance to ask them about it. Wednesday was one big giant miracle. Getting them to church is going to be hard, because one of them plays softball and the other one goes to work from 7am to 12:30 pm every Sunday. But we will figure out a way to make it work. They both are pretty dedicated already from the get-go.

The rest of our investigators evaded us or disappointed me in one way or another this week. I lost sleep over one of them. I prayed at night to know what to teach her. That night, I dreamed that I was teaching out of a certain chapter and I knew it was important. When I woke up, all I could think of was "Read Alma 20." So I did, and it was perfect for this girl's situation. She canceled on us that day and refused to give us a return appointment, which was especially disappointing because I had baked her some chocolate chip cookies. I kept thinking about it all that night. 

I remember thinking in my bed "Why do I care so much? Why can't I just not care?" And I received a very clear answer to that question. "That is your GIFT. That is your gift and there are those that wish they had it. It is your job to figure out how to use your gift to help others." I am quite confident that was the Lord speaking to me. 

So yes, I have had a very spiritual week. My prayers have been answered in extraordinary ways. I have been instructed and fed spiritually by special servants of Christ. I have been blessed with two miraculous investigators to work with. And I've come to appreciate my special spiritual gifts and talents even more. I hope to hone them and bridle them so that I can use them to further the Lord's work in this part of his vineyard.

In other news, there will be an epic Nerf battle next week at the stake center. My companion just bought a beastly Nerf gun - the "Rampage". We also discovered in our chats with returned missionaries that a short length of 1/2" pvc pipe makes an excellent blowgun for blowing Nerf darts at people with all the speed and accuracy of the guns. We have tried it out with a foot of that pvc and it's actually pretty good. So that may be an option for the sister missionaries that don't want to buy a gun.

What am I talking about? Most of the sister missionaries here are super competitive and will be blasting us all away anyways. :P

Love you tons. Have an awesome week.  

A seven nation army couldn't hold me back - 09/16/13

Elder "H" and I are going to do some great things together. I'm still super excited about the next five weeks. Our teaching pool is pretty small, and our area is still the richest and snobbiest part of Moreno Valley, but I have faith that things will pick up as we continue to put in a solid effort.

Elder "H" likes to sing and play his guitar. He used to play soccer, and I'm thinking that his legs are still in pretty good shape because by the end of this week, he was biking faster than me all over our crazy hilly area. That's actually an awesome thing. I don't have to worry about leaving him behind. We can plan however we want without having to worry about whether my companion will get worn out and worn down while I'm still chomping at the bit. 

I had a bit of an accident on Friday. I was biking entirely too fast down a hill when I caught the edge of the sidewalk and lost control. The bike went into a big bush and stopped. I flew into the bush and rolled onto the sidewalk. I must have done a full turn in there somewhere because my companion was behind me and he says he saw my face. He said it was surprising how I didn't look at all shocked or scared, but very highly annoyed. In any case, I ate it. But the bush absorbed most of the fall and I hopped right back on my feet. I only have a scratched-up arm to show for my stupidity. I think that's decent. It gave my companion something to laugh at all day, anyways.
 This Sunday was the Primary Program in sacrament meeting. So, naturally, we spent all day Saturday visiting everyone we could think of and inviting them to church. Who doesn't like the Primary Program? Either you're sappy and you're touched by the pure innocent testimony of children, or you're a normal person who laughs at the hilarity of children making mistakes and hamming it up on stage. Total win-win situation. Well, we tried to invite everybody. Only a couple people gave a solid commitment to come. We spent a lot of time biking to and from places and actually ran out of places to go by the end of the night. It felt like everybody had been taken up in the Rapture and only my companion and I had been left behind. The fall-back less actives were gone. The active members were gone. The ancient widows and widowers were gone. We were striking out everywhere we went. 

But there is a silver lining: everybody that we did talk to fed us. We got free donuts at the stake center from the Primary, even though we were there to help the high priests set up for a dinner. We met up with our Ward Mission Leader there, and he took us out to lunch. We managed to catch an Ecuadorian part-member family at home, and they insisted we stay and eat their delicious hornado even though we'd already eaten lunch. We biked over to the church to meet our teamup, who drove us to an appointment that stood us up, and then went driving all over our area trying to find work to do. We ended up going to Baskin Robbins. Then we had dinner with a lawyer and his family who allowed us to have a family home evening with their five beautiful kids all under age 12 and then took us out for frozen yogurt. So 2 breakfasts, 2 lunches, ice cream, dinner, more ice cream. We didn't get much done, but we were being fed all day long. 

Well, I didn't enjoy the Primary Program very much. I was saddened to the edge of tears by the fact that none of our investigators were present to take the sacrament. We had two ladies that had promised us they would be there, and they both failed me. I was so sad for them. Neither one of these families has been to church in a long time, and I don't know if they realize what a blessing it is that they are missing out on. 

I spent a lot of time reading a hand-out Book of Mormon. I was led to Alma 14, where Alma and Amulek are forced to witness tons of horrible things and go through lots of hardship before being finally delivered from their captivity. I can't quite put it into words, but I found comfort in their story. Perhaps because they never gave up hope that everything would be all right in the end. I feel very strongly that Elder "H" and I will reap bountifully in this area before I leave, and we are putting in an awful lot of effort, but we haven't seen a lot of payoff yet. These things just take time.

The rest of the day Sunday was superb. I was led to a home where the missionaries' spirit was sorely needed, and we ended up giving a blessing to somebody who really wanted one. And I think we may have motivated her to start coming back to church. 

At the end of the day, I was a bit saddened by what I'd seen. I couldn't stop thinking about a YSA in the ward who is making choices similar to mine, the families who had forsaken the sacrament, and a former investigator that just popped into my head for no apparent reason (somebody please baptize "BC" so I can stop thinking about her everywhere I go).  I was talking about these things with Elder "H". He told me I am too emotionally involved. It isn't healthy for me to care this much about other people.

Well, perhaps there's some truth to that. But while I'm a missionary, I feel it is my duty to invite people to come unto Christ the best way I possibly can. And sometimes that takes some work and some personal investment. I'd like to think that I'm fulfilling the call to mourn with those that mourn and comfort those that stand in need of comfort. (Mosiah 18:9) And that in the end, I will receive mercy because I was merciful to others, as per the beatitude stated by our Savior (3 Nephi 12:7, Matthew 5:7). I'm going to love others the best I can and help them along their way.

Have a wonderful week, guys. Remember to smile. 

I just met you and this is crazy - 09/09/11

I finally get a new full-time companion!  I don't know a ton about him yet, because he hasn't gotten here yet. But I know he served in the Menifee singles branch with a friend of mine last transfer, he's been in the field for 8 months or something like that, and he hails from West Virginia. So, this should be a lot of fun, from what it sounds like. I was super paranoid that they would kick me out and put sisters in my ward. That seems to be par for the course in this mission. 

In fact, starting today, there will be more sisters than elders in this zone: four sets of elders and five sets of sisters. They added a second set of missionaries to two of the wards. One of the sets of sisters will be a second set of Sister Training Leaders, which basically translates to "Sister AP". So we have more female APs in our mission than male APs. I'm fully expecting them to give the women the priesthood next general conference.... just kidding. Kind of. 

We were talking about the huge numbers of sister missionaries with the high councilor over missionary work.  He is so excited about the next generation of youth that will be born into households where both parents served missions. It's going to be pretty amazing when most of the Moms can tell mission stories as well as the Dads. That little thought just blew my mind. I can't wait.

So yeah. I'm excited. Only one missionary is being sent away from this zone, and five are coming in. Three are new recruits. In fact, one of the districts is led by a 3-month-old elder who is training, and his district has two 3-month-old sisters who are training. At the end of this month, if you add up all of their mission ages together, I'm still older than that entire district. 

Gosh I'm old. 

I gave a really awesome object lesson this week.  Elder "S" and I cut out a bunch of paper swords and spears and axes. Then we went and taught a lesson about the Anti-Nephi-Lehis throwing all their weapons of war into the ground so they wouldn't be tempted to use them to kill people, as described in Alma 24. Then we read Alma 23:7, which reads: "For they became a righteous people; they did lay down the weapons of their rebellion, that they did not fight against God any more, neither against any of their brethren." We talked about how all of us have weapons of rebellion against God, and how we allow sin and temptation to separate us from God's love. So we wrote down our temptations and pet sins on our paper swords, and then tore them up and threw them away as a sign of our commitment to avoid those temptations that so easily beset us. I thought it was pretty effective. 

All in all we had an awesome week. I'm really happy to know that Jesus died so that all of us could be happy, and that we get to go to church and take the sacrament every week to be cleansed from our sin and reminded of our eternal worth. God is awesome.

Love you guys.

#2 mini-missionary comp - 09/02/13

Transfers happen a week from today. Can't wait to see what happens! 

My current companion is another mini-missionary.  He's part Chinese, part Hawaiian. He likes to play his ukulele and generally keeps to himself. Pretty chill. I like him. I only have to deal with him for a week, so no worries. 
I got sick this week, which somehow allowed me to sleep from about 8:30 a.m. until 1:30 p.m.  I feel bad for my past mini. He listened to my music and played with the Nerf guns while I slept. He also put a pretty impressive drawing up on the whiteboard, which I will include as an attachment. :D 

The miraculous thing is that I got a priesthood blessing from my buddies the Zone Leaders and felt good enough to go out almost instantly. But then we discovered that my mini had a flat tire, and that we couldn't go anywhere. Then we got somebody to take us to Wal-Mart and buy a new inner tube after dinner, and it was the wrong size tube. So we had to go back to Wal-Mart the next morning and return that tube and get the right tube. All in all, a lot of time at Wal-Mart. But it's okay. Stuff happens.  

The Lasselle ward elders had a double header baptism on Saturday! I was so thrilled for them. And the Lasselle ward came out in force to support them. I was kind of worried that no one would show up but it was a packed house. I'm so proud of those elders and of the two young ladies they baptized. I got to give the baptismal interviews on Thursday and I really enjoyed it. There is something special about those interviews. I just felt the spirit so strongly. 

And I can kind of appreciate how much change the two ladies went through to join the church. I hadn't met the first one, but she had a learning disability of sorts and still managed to learn a lot about the gospel in a short amount of time. I could tell she had been prepared by the spirit. And the latter one, I had only met once, in a less-than-righteous environment. But she is committed to living the standards of the gospel, and I could see her determination. They have both been converted to the gospel of Jesus Christ, and it was so cool to be able to see it firsthand. 

The sad news about all this is that they broke up the dream team. The trainer in the Lasselle ward got emergency reassigned Saturday morning and was not allowed to go to the baptism. So the other Lasselle Elder had to hang out with me all day while we prepped for the baptism. It was a very sad thing that he couldn't be there. And even odder that they couldn't wait another week for regular transfers, and for the 12-week training program to be finished. 
I have been surrounded by the best and worst of missionary life in MoVal. And nothing has stayed stable for me for very long. I guess the Lord wants me to learn to be flexible. And I think I'm learning.

We had very spiritual visits with a less-active guy with one leg, with our country gal eternagator in the canyon, the Suicide Silence family, and my favorite CA public defendant lawyer guy. Hopefully there will be more of those this week that really touch my heart! I'm about to finish out a transfer here, and I feel like I'm overwhelmingly getting attached to the people that I have the opportunity to teach. But I kind of doubt I'm leaving right now. We'll see what happens. 

I love you all! Keep the faith and don't give up. 1 Corinthians 3:16

"As eternal beings, we each have in us a spark of divinity. And, as one who has traveled over much of this world, on both sides of the iron curtain, I am convinced that our Father’s children are essentially good. They want to live in peace, they want to be good neighbors,  they love their homes and their families, they want to improve their standards of living,  they want to do what is right, they are essentially good. And I know that God loves them"

- Spencer W. Kimball