Hey family and friends,
What a
wonderful conference we had. Conference is so meaningful when you are on
your mission. I think it’s because you are on the front line in the war
against Satan. I feel like there was so much that
the Lord was trying to tell me that I didn't have enough time to write it all
down before the speaker would move onto the next topic. Unfortunately I
missed most of the last session of conference because we were helping one of
the members with car trouble. It’s funny how obstacles will jump
in your way right before you are about to do something that you know the
Lord wants you to. I felt that this poor member needed our attention at
this time though.
In terms of
what we did the rest of the week, I need to give a little background.
Most of this week I was not even with Elder Graff, my companion.
This is because Elder Graff is our District Leader which means it is
his job to interview people for baptism. Well we had two people that
needed to be interviewed for baptism this week and they were very far
away. So to save on miles we decided that it was best to go on
a bunch of miniature exchanges and trade missionaries for a while so that
Elder Graff could interview everyone. Aside from General Conference,
Elder Graff was here for only a day this week. This meant that I was
in charge of the area for a week. Don't worry the area is still in
one piece.
Speaking of which the first thing we did was went to do some service at
a members house. So these members are trying to clean their house and
make it safe so that DCF will allow them to have custody of their
grandchild. They took the advice from last General Conference and
"asked the missionaries" for help. It was mostly cleanup of
their back yard and moving everything into either the burn pile or the dump
pile. After we got enough wood together we started burning
everything. It was a good time and we got a lot of work done, which
resulted in a clean yard and a 20 foot fire. The members said
the fire lasted for three days, which was perfect because on the fourth day we
came back and made another one.
Aside from
burning down the East Coast we got the opportunity to teach V... a lot this
week. It is a lot easier now that we have our car because we do not have
to make the hour and a half trek to his house to teach him. We decided
that it was important to let V... know that although he is not quite ready that
we are trying to help prepare him for the commitment of baptism. It was a
very strong lesson that the Spirit helped with. After the lesson,
Elder Fabrizio, the elder that was with me at the time, told me that I
said some things in there that seemed to be perfect. It was funny that he
said that because I felt the same way about the things that he promised and
taught V....
We also were able to meet with the Asian couple this
week. In our lesson with them we felt something strange, the way I
can describe it is as a connection between us and them. They think of us
as their teachers and yet they are comfortable enough to tell us about very
personal struggles and questions in their lives. I think the
strangest part of it all is that we have the answers to all their deep
questions. We probably do not explain our thoughts nearly as well as we
should be able to but they still understand everything that we are trying to
convey to them. They see us as messengers of truth and it gives me a zeal
that makes me want to help them with all that I am.
The last
story I have to talk about from this week is probably the most spiritual of
them all. I have come to learn how nothing in the Lord’s eyes is
coincidence. While we were going about looking for members that have not
come to church for a while we stopped at a house.
Elder Graff said "Oh this house, trust me we do not want to go
there." Now I would like to sound like I was being led by the Spirit
here but in all actuality I was thinking in my head, "I bet I have seen
worse than this house." So I convinced him that we should go
inside.
And to our astonishment it was actually cleanish. Well we
talked with them for a while and she told us that her mother was in the
hospital and that she was actually going to try to get a hold of us
soon so that we could go give her a blessing. We said after we left we
would go there and she told us that it was a huge blessing that we were there
and that she had had a hard day and did not know what to do or if the Lord
loved her. Then she said that every time she thinks that, the
missionaries show up at her door.
After we left her house we headed to the hospital and met her
mother. She had been waiting for us to come by and told us that she had
thought about joining the church before but knew that she had to repent
first. We asked her if she would like a Book of Mormon to read while she was
in the hospital and she accepted it gladly. She then told us about her
testimony of the truths in the Book of Mormon and how it has helped her in her
life.
Well I don't
think I have anything else to talk about, and I am running out of typing time
so until next week.
Elder Erb
No comments:
Post a Comment