October 2014
 |
| "The District" |
And it looks like an Elder is escaping the 'Nut House'.
 |
| Angels what happened to them ? |
But he is the 'Cool One'.
And mom, that family with the zombie make up is the Smiths, they were
my favorite family in Waycross, they're just awesome.
Oct 28, 2014 - "Halloween Party" & "Transfer to Palatka"
Wow this week flew by so fast I can't even remember what we did.
Honestly it feels like we didn't do anything. Last Tuesday and again
yesterday we went to the dentist, elder hale has been getting a lot of
work done on his teeth and will be going back again next week, I don't
know if I told you but he had a chipped tooth and 23 cavities, all
very small and a few big ones, not sure how it happened. Then this
week we did a lot of biking, no one seemed to be home. We knocked a
lot of doors and some a couple new people to teach, got some doors
slammed in our face, you know the usual thing. Then this week we also
went to a Halloween party that one of the members threw, there was a
lot of people, I even dressed up for it, I'll send a pic of it. Then
on Sunday Cody was confirmed and elder hale had the opportunity to do
that. Then yesterday was pretty interesting, after the dentist we had
no set appointment for the rest of the day, just people we were going
to go see. Well as we were out biking, we got a call from president
Craig, when I pulled the phone out of my pocket and saw his name on
the phone I thought oh snap, and was about ready to ignore it, but I
answered it, he called me to be a district leader(which is probably
going to be a mistake) I even asked him if he was sure about this, but
he was. Then last night I found out I'm getting transferred to Palatka
Florida, another town out in the middle of no where, gets referred to
as the butt-crack of the mission, then on top of all that I found out
today that my companion that I will have done there is elder Riley who
has only been out for 1 transfer so I have to finish training him too.
I got royally screwed over on this one, it will be interesting to see
how it will all turn out. Well that about it, sorry that I can't think
of anything else.
Love Ya
Honestly it feels like we didn't do anything. Last Tuesday and again
yesterday we went to the dentist, elder hale has been getting a lot of
work done on his teeth and will be going back again next week, I don't
know if I told you but he had a chipped tooth and 23 cavities, all
very small and a few big ones, not sure how it happened. Then this
week we did a lot of biking, no one seemed to be home. We knocked a
lot of doors and some a couple new people to teach, got some doors
slammed in our face, you know the usual thing. Then this week we also
went to a Halloween party that one of the members threw, there was a
lot of people, I even dressed up for it, I'll send a pic of it. Then
on Sunday Cody was confirmed and elder hale had the opportunity to do
that. Then yesterday was pretty interesting, after the dentist we had
no set appointment for the rest of the day, just people we were going
to go see. Well as we were out biking, we got a call from president
Craig, when I pulled the phone out of my pocket and saw his name on
the phone I thought oh snap, and was about ready to ignore it, but I
answered it, he called me to be a district leader(which is probably
going to be a mistake) I even asked him if he was sure about this, but
he was. Then last night I found out I'm getting transferred to Palatka
Florida, another town out in the middle of no where, gets referred to
as the butt-crack of the mission, then on top of all that I found out
today that my companion that I will have done there is elder Riley who
has only been out for 1 transfer so I have to finish training him too.
I got royally screwed over on this one, it will be interesting to see
how it will all turn out. Well that about it, sorry that I can't think
of anything else.
Love Ya
Oct 20, 2014 - "Cody and Kerrigan Baptism"
Boy oh boy, y'all just keep havin fun over there from go carting to
bobcat demolition to getting new rides, and it's not stopping, hmmm.
Crazy!! Well things here are getting pretty crazy as well, hunting
season is in full force and all these rednecks out here are going
crazy, almost everyone hunts whether with a bow or a rifle and they
keep inviting us to go with them. If only if only..... But we have
been getting a lot of meat. Well this past week has been pretty good,
spent a lot of time with Cody finishing up all the lessons and
preparing him for baptism which we had yesterday, it went really well,
him and his cousin Kerrigan both got baptized and afterwards he headed
down to Kingsland for a youth fireside. It was a beautiful baptism
lots of people were there for it, we had to move it into the chapel,
there was some where in the 80 to 90 people there, most of the youth
and a lot of his family that normally doesn't come, plus a lot of the
ward. He fits right in you can't even tell he's a convert. Well this
week once again we did a lot of service, from helping out at the
senior center, to helping out at the YMCA, to helping built a water
storage container for a member and moving a lot of stuff around.
Waycross is the only area that I've done so much service in, kinda
nice.
Now as for the teaching here it's starting to pick back up, our
mission president has instituted a new thing for all missionaries, we
now have our own home teaching list, were are given 20 families to go
see and there has been some good things coming from it. One actually
happened this week. We went to go see one less active who wife isn't a
member, when we got there he quickly ran inside but his wife and mom
stayed out to talk to us, the wife Tiffany had been reading a anti
book and the mom was answering questions about it, so when we got
there she started to ask us these questions, we answered a few and
then went on to teach the restoration, the spirit was so strong there
and Tiffany was left speechless, at the end Tiffany committed to be
baptized but no date was set, we let the sisters start teaching her
and she came to church yesterday and has a baptism date set for Nov.
10th. Hopefully the sisters don't screw it up, just joking, they
won't. Then also this week we found a family of 8 to teach, two parent
and 4 kids and the grandparents, we had a nice lesson with them and
they want to come to church, only problem is they don't have a car and
there is 8 of them, so 2 members in the ward said they will pick them
up next Sunday, which should be pretty good. It's amazing to see how
missionary work has changed since I've been here. When I first got
here it was pretty much all the missionary's doing all the work, but
just in the past two months, the members here have been doing a lot
themselves, from invited their friends or getting there home teaching
families to come back to church, it's a beautiful sight to see. Praise
the lord. Amen
Love y'all
bobcat demolition to getting new rides, and it's not stopping, hmmm.
Crazy!! Well things here are getting pretty crazy as well, hunting
season is in full force and all these rednecks out here are going
crazy, almost everyone hunts whether with a bow or a rifle and they
keep inviting us to go with them. If only if only..... But we have
been getting a lot of meat. Well this past week has been pretty good,
spent a lot of time with Cody finishing up all the lessons and
preparing him for baptism which we had yesterday, it went really well,
him and his cousin Kerrigan both got baptized and afterwards he headed
down to Kingsland for a youth fireside. It was a beautiful baptism
lots of people were there for it, we had to move it into the chapel,
there was some where in the 80 to 90 people there, most of the youth
and a lot of his family that normally doesn't come, plus a lot of the
ward. He fits right in you can't even tell he's a convert. Well this
week once again we did a lot of service, from helping out at the
senior center, to helping out at the YMCA, to helping built a water
storage container for a member and moving a lot of stuff around.
Waycross is the only area that I've done so much service in, kinda
nice.
Now as for the teaching here it's starting to pick back up, our
mission president has instituted a new thing for all missionaries, we
now have our own home teaching list, were are given 20 families to go
see and there has been some good things coming from it. One actually
happened this week. We went to go see one less active who wife isn't a
member, when we got there he quickly ran inside but his wife and mom
stayed out to talk to us, the wife Tiffany had been reading a anti
book and the mom was answering questions about it, so when we got
there she started to ask us these questions, we answered a few and
then went on to teach the restoration, the spirit was so strong there
and Tiffany was left speechless, at the end Tiffany committed to be
baptized but no date was set, we let the sisters start teaching her
and she came to church yesterday and has a baptism date set for Nov.
10th. Hopefully the sisters don't screw it up, just joking, they
won't. Then also this week we found a family of 8 to teach, two parent
and 4 kids and the grandparents, we had a nice lesson with them and
they want to come to church, only problem is they don't have a car and
there is 8 of them, so 2 members in the ward said they will pick them
up next Sunday, which should be pretty good. It's amazing to see how
missionary work has changed since I've been here. When I first got
here it was pretty much all the missionary's doing all the work, but
just in the past two months, the members here have been doing a lot
themselves, from invited their friends or getting there home teaching
families to come back to church, it's a beautiful sight to see. Praise
the lord. Amen
Love y'all
Oct. 13, 2014, "Volleyball - getting BIGGER and BETTER"
This week has been pretty good, we have been able to get a lot done and time just seems to keep zipping by. So last week the reason why I wrote y'all so early was cause we were having a zone pday, all the elders and sisters got together and we played some kickball and ultimate frisbee, which was a nice change up from our normal pdays up here of going to the church and emailing and playing basketball all day long. Anyway then that night we had a old couple in the ward( I keep saying old couple but they all seem to be daddy's age) take us out to eat at the Olive Garden. Believe it or not but that was my first time ever going there and it as actually pretty good. Then on Tuesday we went to the senior center and visits with all the people there, didn't play bingo this time just talked with them. My companion has also been doing a lot of service for the members in the ward, he's a big computer person and know how to fix a lot of stuff, so this week we have been doing a lot of that as well. Then Tuesday night we played volleyball, it seems to be getting bigger and better, new faces keep coming, members and non-members alike, my knees are getting petty bruised though, I seem to like to be on the floor all the time.then on Wednesday we went to the YMCA with the other elders and did some service there for them. We have become friends with some pretty cool people there. Then on Thursday we had some pretty good visits with some of our investigators, one was Vernon who actually just started up his own store called Pretty Kash. So we go over there to visit with him and his girl Maria who is actually a member, anyway there store is pretty interesting to say the least, it's a store for women to get night clubbing dresses for a cheap price. But he is pretty cool person, it's hard to get him focused when we are teaching sometimes but he likes to learn and come to church from time to time. Then that night we went and saw Cody sweat who is the 16 year old that we are teaching that I told you about last week. Anyway so on Thursday we went over with a member, Ronnie Musgrove to teach him, teaching the plan of salvation, we had a pretty good visit and he came to church yesterday, and afterwards we taught him again, he is so ready, all we have left to do this week to go over twice for the last two lessons and then get his interview down and it all already set up to go, he has even asked that I would baptized him next. Going to be pretty awesome, first time I get to put on my white pants, usually I like to have a member do it, but he wants me to do it instead. Oh then yesterday at church elder hale and I had to give talks, then had asked us the Sunday before to prepare for it. My run has finally been broken, I haven given a talk since my first month in the mission and was hoping to make it all the way through without giving one, but I guess it just caught up to me, they had me give it on the sabbath day observance, and I had no idea how to take 20 minutes talking about that, but I manage to do it, might have put a couple to sleep but I did it. I was joking around with elder hale that I would only take 5 min and give him an extra 15, and boy he didn't like that idea, in the end he ended going short himself and a member from the bishopric had to come up and speak, but it was all good. Well that about sums up our week here in Waycross, things are starting to get a little rough, our teaching pools are dropping and its getting hard to find new people to talk to, I feel like I've already talked to everyone in our area. But all there is to do is press on.
Oct 6, 2014 - Will the Bike Problems Ever Go AWAY!
Weekly report down here in the fiery furnace, things seem to be going well, temperatures have seemed to cool down, staying in the 80s mostly, with a few brisk nights down in the 50s. Autumn has come and leaves are falling but soon that awful heat will be back at the end of the week. Now let's see what has happened this week, back on Tuesday we had s zone meeting in which we got to watch the new movie the church is coming out with this weekend "meet the Mormons". Apparently they are sending a copy to all the mission presidents to let their missionaries see it. It's actually really good, a lot better than I thought, being a documentary and all, they even had Will Smith and Pres. Obama in it, won't tell to how, you will just have to go and see for yourselves, but honestly if you get a chance you should watch it, it has some really spirit filled powerful parts. Then Tuesday night when we got back we had volleyball, which is seeming to be getting better and better with lots of people coming, non members and members alike. It will be interesting to see how it all turns out once I leave, I've been pretty much the driving force behind it, getting people there every week and all, bit we'll see. Then the rest of our week was filled with bike problems left and right, I had taken mine in a couple weeks ago because it had a broken axel and he messed up on fixing it, the. My elder hale and the same problem, there's only one bike shop out here and he really doesn't know what he is doing, but all is well now. Still waiting on those brakes to come in. Then we had a miracle happen this week. So about two weeks ago, this lady I the ward told us that she wanted us to come teach her grandson who has been coming to church for the past few weeks, so last week we went over and talked with him and his grandpa(who is an avid hunter and will get you sidetracked so easily), it went pretty well we just talked and got to know him, his name is Cody Sweat and he is about 16 or so. Anyway so we went over to see him this week and taught the restoration, it went pretty well and then at the end when we invited him to be baptized he said he was already planning on it, he wants to be baptized on the 19th with his cousin that the sister missionaries are teaching, when we heard that I just had a mental freak out, I was so excited, that was exactly what I was thing of. Now we just have to get out to there house six more times in two weeks to teach him everything, and they live way out in the middle of no where in the woods, about 13 miles out. Then the rest of our week went pretty good, we saw DJ and Kira again, DJ has picked up another job and is now working two and Kira is quitting hers and focusing on school, it's crazy cause that was in essence the answer to my prayers, I've been praying for a way that Kira could get work off and be able to come to church and at the same time still be getting by financially, so now the only step is to get them married, which I can see happen, it may take a month or so before they get baptized but I know it will happen. They are honestly the only reason why I would be willing to stay another transfer here, I love the ward and the members here, I just want to see DJ and Kira get baptized be for I leave. Oh then this weekend has been pretty crazy as well, general conference was amazing, I learned so much from it, I think my favorite talk was Elder Ballard's, probably because he talked about rafting and all but it really was a good talk. Oh then on Saturday we had a pretty crazy experience, so between sessions we went to see this referral that the other elders had given us for a Randy, we were suppose to go seem him the day before at 4:30 but for some reason didn't make it out there, so Saturday when we went, we talked to him mom who told us he was in the hospital, went in the day before cause he was trying to hurt himself and was soon to be put in an institution. When I heard this my heart just dropped, I thought what if we had made it over at 4:30 the day before when we were suppose to, it might have prevented him from trying to hurt himself. I was so frustrated with myself after that, and said I wouldn't let something like that happen again, I know the power that is held within the gospel and its ability to change lives, I don't want another experience like that one, but who knows maybe it was what was needed. Well other than that this week has been pretty good Elder Hale and I are working hard and we are seeing things happen. Love y'all
Daddy, (Oct. 6, 2014)
Wow. I love the waterfall pictures, it looks beautiful, when I get home you are to have to take me there. How tall is the waterfall? Oh and those stories that you sent me, Ya I loved them too. Especially the one with the army's in heaven fighting the same night Joseph Smith received the plates, that one was my favorite. It opened my eyes to just how meaningful the Book of Mormon is and how hard satan was and is still trying to stop it from going forth. Since I've been on my mission I have taken such a greater interest in it and have learned so much. Honestly before I came out I had never read the Book of Mormon from cover to cover, I read parts of it, just not all of it, and now on my mission I have just barely finished it for my third time and have started again. Every time I read I always see something new that I didn't notice before, and every time I read I'm excited and want to keep going, that usually doesn't happen for me reading any other book the first time, let alone the second or third.
Daddy, (Oct. 6, 2014)
Wow. I love the waterfall pictures, it looks beautiful, when I get home you are to have to take me there. How tall is the waterfall? Oh and those stories that you sent me, Ya I loved them too. Especially the one with the army's in heaven fighting the same night Joseph Smith received the plates, that one was my favorite. It opened my eyes to just how meaningful the Book of Mormon is and how hard satan was and is still trying to stop it from going forth. Since I've been on my mission I have taken such a greater interest in it and have learned so much. Honestly before I came out I had never read the Book of Mormon from cover to cover, I read parts of it, just not all of it, and now on my mission I have just barely finished it for my third time and have started again. Every time I read I always see something new that I didn't notice before, and every time I read I'm excited and want to keep going, that usually doesn't happen for me reading any other book the first time, let alone the second or third.
No comments:
Post a Comment