Answers to Prayers

December 4, 2012

To answer your question Mommy, I'm pretty sure the whether isn't getting to me as much. But I will say, it stinks to never see the sun. It rains 6 1/2 out of the 7 days. It's crazy.

Ward correlation, Ward council. PEC, whatever the meeting is before church, it is the MOST IMPORTANT meeting that we as missionaries have all week. Especially now that we have a new bishop who is VERY missionary minded and from day 1 has talked to the entire council about how they can use us as missionaries better. Finally this last week we started getting some names of people to go visit. It's been good. this is the meeting where we ask for specific help from the ward. emphasis on specific! The next week the bishop makes a point to follow up on those assignments.

Service opportunities. I've moved 3 different families, re-enfforced a shed wall while it was still standing, pulled weeds, reorganized backyards and junk piles (people in Oregon are all hoarders, it's terrible), sung carols, given food to a hobo investigator that we got from a member that we were never going to eat. The list keeps going.

I'm running out of time, but we had an amazing experience this last week, and it all started with giving a blessing to a girl who was about to move. Because of that blessing, she felt inspired to invite her friend that she just met at the grocery store to church. He came to church and we talked to him, set up an appointment with him and then went on Tuesday. He didn't show up. We tried to find him, but it's hard to find a homeless guy that only told you approximate coordinates. We said a prayer asking in faith that he would call us and meet with us again. The next morning he called apologizing that he didn't make it. He had been arrested the day before. So we met up that day and Elder Belo had the inspiration to teach lesson three of Preach my Gospel first. So we did. As we were talking about baptism, he said, "I don't have that yet... yeah... I should get baptized." It was pretty cool. He then told us his life story. About his heavy drug usage in the past, how when he was past out once that people came to him asking if they could take over his body, because it would be easier for him, how his mother had sold his girlfriend into prostitution back in California, and how he wanted to move up to Canada to start a new life and get away from his family because of what they had done to him. That day we gave him a box of food we weren't going to eat. The next day we taught the restoration, and the next day we taught the word of Wisdom. He accepted it on the spot. Since, he has moved to Washington, but he calls us still and lets us know what's going on. The miracle is, 20 minutes before the girl invited him to church, he had prayed that God would lead him somewhere where he and his dog could have rest and peace.

I love you all!