This week was great!!!!
This past Monday we
taught Savannah the first lesson. It went really well. We had to try to
make it very interesting for her because her previous experience with
missionaries was very boring. So Elder Campbell drew some funny pictures
to help reinforce all of the points of the first lesson. So after we
taught with the pamphlets we showed her the pictures that Elder Campbell
drew and then we asked her if she would be baptized when she knows its
true. Her response was "yes... yes sir" haha it was great! She also came
to youth conference this week and she had a really good time! Today we
are going to be teaching her the Book of Mormon.
Tuesday we taught Armour. The last time we met with
him we committed him to read the first chapter of the Book of Mormon and
when we followed up on Tuesday he had read through chapter 9. We
answered some questions he had and then we brought up baptism. He said
he would need to get more familiar with it and that he has already been
baptized before, but he still seems very open to it. When we asked him
if he has thought/prayed if the Book of Mormon is true and he said, "Oh I
guess I never thought of that. I just took it for granted that it was
scripture and already true."
We met with a less-active family in the ward,
Prestons, and in our previous spiritual thoughts they just kinda think
its good but never really feel anything. However this time we shared a
Mormon message on the atonement and then I shared a quote from Elder
Maxwell, "Do not let yesterday take tomorrow hostage". Then we told them
that they can always get better. She teared up a bit and really
appreciated our message. They came to church this week and we hope that
this is the start of something good.
We had a recent convert move in to the ward a few
weeks ago and he was been in a car accident a few months ago. He is very
clingy and we just happen to live a few streets away from him... so we
tried to keep it a secret... but an awesome member took him to a dr
appointment and then they came to our place to talk to us, while we were
at lunch. Cliff said 'Oh I didn't know you lived so close'. Our cover
was blown! But I think it will be ok :)
So it was very sad... Tuesday night we stopped by
Konrad's and they were packing up to move to Sacramento the next day!
They have had some financial trouble and they are going to live with
some friends and family. They said we can send missionaries in a few
weeks. We hope that Konrad can have a good experience and meet some
great people!
We had Leadership Training this past Friday and
Interviews this past Thursday. Leadership Training was awesome! We
received some great training and I'm looking forward to using some of
the new things I've learned to help other missionaries and our
investigators.
One of the highlights of this week happened on
Saturday night during dinner. We went over to this family's house for
dinner and they had a friend there. Her name is Ali. So we ate dinner
and everything and I was thinking, "We need to teach her the
Restoration. but I don't want it to be awkward." So I thought that we
would just say, to everyone, that we have a new teaching style when we
teach people. Then we would just show them by teaching The Restoration.
So we did. During the lesson we asked her if she had a belief in Christ
and she said yes. Her member friend that was sitting next to her said,
"You do? I didn't know that" Then Ali said, "ya my family doesn't but I
do". So we finished the lesson and I asked her if she knew how to pray.
She said she didn't. We went over the basic steps and then I asked her
if she would pray about the message we've shared. (I intended for her to
just pray on her own later, since there was 8 people at the table) but
she said, "Ya I've never prayed before but I'll give it a shot". So she
did! It was awesome! She came to church the next day and stayed for all
three hours. She lives in another ward in the Stake and we will pass her
off to those missionaries soon.
So after dinner Elder Campbell said that he had the same impression
to teach the restoration but he didn't know how we could do it. It was
awesome that we both had the same impression.
Then!
Later that day we went to see a former investigator and Elder Campbell
asked if he would like to meet with us. He said that he was born a Roman
Catholic and he will die one. While he was talking I was thinking,
'That isn't the smartest thing, you need to at least pray about this'.
So I tried to come up with a nicer way of telling him that. I told him,
"Chris, I care about you and it would seem to me like I was not caring
for you like I should if I didn't ask you to do this. Will you at least
pray about meeting with us?" He said he would and that he really
respects us.
If we invite out of love then they cant get offended!
So
after those experiences Elder Campbell and I agreed that we would
follow every prompting we recieved from the Holy Ghost no matter how
stupid we thought it would be. So after we saw Chris we felt like to
should see a particular potential investigator and they ended up not
being home. So now it was about 8:50... and while we were at the door
step and car pulled in to one of the neighbors houses. Elder Campbell
said, "Well we know they're home" So we knocked on their door. We
knocked about 4 times and they didn't answer. We didn't have "success"
from following the Spirit, but now God knows we are listening.
So one of the recent converts in the ward had her
birthday on Sunday. and on Saturday she told us that she wanted flowers
for her birthday... Well as Saturday rolled on we forgot to buy her
flowers... So Sunday we made flowers out of napkins! and we gave her a
card! So now she has flowers that will never die! She really liked
them!
Well I think that's it for this week!
Love you,
Elder John
"Time, that aged nurse, rocked me to patience" - Jon Bartlett
"We
are not always the already tempered and helpful hammer which is shaping
and pounding another. Sometimes we are merely the anvil." -Neal A.
Maxwell
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