Thursday, December 26, 2013

12-16-13


Hello my super amazing family!!

This week we haven't been able to meet with Robert or Rhiannon, but we were able to meet with a former investigator. His name is Mike. He's kind of got an interesting story of how he started meeting with the missionaries. His wife passed away from cancer about six years ago. Two days after she passed away the elders just happened to tract into him. Coincidence? So long story short, he has had the lessons multiple times and had many different sets of missionaries and we are starting to meet with him again. Hopefully we can find the missing pieces to the puzzle and find out why he hasn’t been progressing. We have also had some success with street contacting. We picked up a very promising potential and her family. She told us that were doing a very hard thing and that she appreciates what we do. She also said that one of her friends from work is LDS. She told us that she wants us to come back and share a message with her and her family. Golden, huh? So well see where that goes.

We had our musical fireside last night. It was amazing! We had all the youth from one of our wards sing in it, all the missionaries in our zone sing in it, and President Kendrick and Bishop Ridley spoke as well. All the songs testified of Christ, and it was just a spiritual drop kick to the face. That’s a pretty accurate way to describe it.

Last week we stopped by our second councilor’s house and got to talking to him and his family. I told his daughter that she gave a great talk the week before. Bad idea, because right after I said that, he said, “So, speaking of talks..." He asked one of us to give a talk the Sunday before Christmas so Elder Jacobsen and I had a rock, paper, scissors, tournament, and I failed. SO… I will be giving a talk next Sunday. Also on Saturday we got a text saying that we would be teaching Elders Quorum on Sunday. I thought when I left on my mission I was done with all that stuff!! Guess not. Being an Elders Quorum instructor before I left really did prepare me for my mission and teaching in general.

It's been kind of tough this past week. We talked to a less-active lady who told us that we were liars and terrible people, and that really bothered me. Also on top of that, just the constant ridicule and mean things from people on the street and from their cars have been adding up and really starting to get to me. I’ve been praying very, VERY, hard for strength and understanding. And I realized, why am I letting the opinions and believes of others cause me to feel this way? They can’t tell me what to do or what to think. This is my life, I choose to believe what I know and what I believe. I remembered a poem that I memorized in Ms. Davis's public speaking class my junior year at Sparkman. (I'm glad I chose to memorize something that actually had some meaning behind it.) The last stanza says, " It matters not how straight the gate, how charged with punishments the scroll. I am the master of my fate, I am the captain of my soul." One of the many things that a mission teaches you, is to be strong, and stand up for what you believe in. And I love that.

Thank you for all you guys do for me. Let me know if there’s anything at all that I can do for you guys. Stay true, stay strong, don’t be afraid to stand up for what you believe in, and look out for each other while I'm gone, alright?

-Elder Daniel

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