IT'S A BOY!!!
Hey Everyone!
Well, I have now been out just over 6 months and I honestly can't believe it's been that long. It feels like it's been 6 weeks! Elder Liptrott and I went to the top of a small mountain nearby and burned a tie to celebrate my 6 month mark. Other news regarding the title of this e-mail, I am going to have a mission son. I will be picking up my new companion from the mission home on tomorrow. He will be brand new from the MTC. I am pretty excited to be training a new guy and I hope he can realize what a beautiful part of the mission he is coming to. I don't have a daily update this week, but there are a few people I would like to talk about who really made an impact on me this week. We had our housing inspection on Wednesday, just making sure we are keeping the place clean. I will be sure to take a few pictures before we leave next Tuesday. We went to a ward party on Thursday and it was a chili cook off as well as a Pinewood Derby. So awesome to see most of the ward there.
Candice: I've told you all about Candice before. Well, we had another lesson with her this past week at our Ward Mission Leader's home and it went very well. She again said that she wants to get baptized. She is reading the scriptures and praying. She has stated that she doesn't know if the answers she have received are strong enough. We had a lesson on the first few commandments and helped her recognize that maybe she has received her answer. It was a wonderful lesson and I am so excited for her. It's been incredible seeing her coming closer to Christ. The first lesson I had with her she felt bad for not reading very much... she read 8 chapters since the previous visit! That's more than I've read most weeks in my life... before my mission. :P Anyway, I am very happy for the progress that she has made and can't wait to continue to work with her in the upcoming weeks.
Yolanda: She is a recent convert of a few months. She was baptized in August or somewhere around there. She has come a long way and has a strong testimony of the church, however our lesson with her on Wednesday she expressed some concerns of not feeling fully fellow shipped like she could have been. Just a few things came up and she feels she has lost the fire she had when she was first baptized. We helped her through it and seems to have a more positive attitude towards it. We are trying to have 2 visits a week with her and we might start going through the Book of Mormon with her again to try to help her rekindle that fire she once had.
Alex: This is the main one I wanted to talk about. Alex is well... Alex. He is less-active, but he comes to the third hour of church. He was coming to the first hour (sacrament meeting) but then the previous Elder, Elder Hughes told him that he should come to third hour and so now he only comes to third hour... Oh Alex. I don't know how else to describe it. I may have talked about him before, but I will give a brief overview. He has lived in the valley all of his life and was one of the kids that blew up peoples mailboxes and loved to have fun... He still does. He is the guy who we have been helping build a demolition derby car. We had not been teaching lessons on our visits, we would try to share spiritual thoughts while we were working or different things like that. After many visits and helping him with his car, his brother and his mom and now his sister are moving back in. His brother's girlfriend is moving is as well. Elder Liptrott and I went to go meet them and we were able to meet them. Alex invited us to come over Friday nights to teach the discussions again. He is hoping that his family will come back to the church. Looks like our work on the car paid off. He told us that he wanted the gospel and the spirit back in his home especially when his family who hasn't been to church in a while is living with him again. On top of all that happening, he got laid off from his job over something that was not his fault. Oh yeah! On top of that, a few years ago, he lost his arm in a saw mill accident. Oh and by the way, he has a very optimistic attitude about it all and knows that Heavenly Father has a plan for him and he keeps paying his tithing as he has a very strong testimony in tithing. This guy is incredible. We have talked to some of his high school friends and they have told us that Alex is the reason they keep going. People down here don't have much. They farm for a living. There have been occasions where they have allowed the crops to go into September/October and the crops have frozen from the snow. That's it, they don't have much money that year. That's how life is down here. Knowing that and looking at Alex, it's incredible. When he was in the accident with his arm, he showed up to work 4 days later. What an example.
I promise you all if you will remember who you are and remember that even though you go through hard times, there is always a bright side.
Keep up faith and no matter what, always try your best to come closer to Christ.
The more we serve, the more we recognize God's love for his children and the closer we come to Christ.
Have a great week!
I love you all and hope you are having a great summer!