Short p-day today! Only 20 minutes for emailing, so I don't have time to type up my entire journal for the week.
Monday, February 5th, 2018: To be added
Tuesday, February 6th, 2018: To be added
Wednesday, February 7th, 2018:
Today was busy. We didn’t even get to do personal or companionship study because something came up every time we tried.
Because our planning ran overtime (our average planning session
takes about 50 minutes now), we didn’t study before interviews with
President Hillier. In my interview, I asked President Hillier how to
get an area going, or how to build up an area. President Hillier suggested we develop relationships with the
bishop, WML, and ward council generally, which means we build trust with
them and follow through on all their assignments. It’s what helps the
work move forward most. He explained that
missionary work moves forward as members and missionaries focus on
specific individuals and what needs they have to get them to the next
step in the convenient path. After someone is baptized and confirmed a
member of the church (receiving the gift of the Holy Ghost), they start
progressing on the path toward eternal life. Some of the other key
points are receiving the Melchizedek priesthood, the temple endowment,
and the sealing ordinances. The last part is to endure to the end.
Anyone who isn’t an active member has some point they need to return to
to be on this path.
After interviews, we went to Jerk’s bike shop and picked up my
bike. The bike is much smoother after getting all tuned up. The bike light Jerk’s gave me works well, too. We then got home, changed, and helped someone move. I’m a lot
more fit and stronger since I left home; I could notice it when I helped
carry furniture items.
We almost got James and Tiana to get married tonight! We had
Elder Guapo come with us for the lesson; he had everyone take turns
reading paragraphs from the Family: A Proclamation to the World. He
then asked Tiana what God wanted her to do; she said “get married.” He
then told them they would be married tonight. A few surprised looks later, they told him that they wanted to be
married with their family around. They were going to their family in
May. Tiana stayed pretty strictly to that idea, but James seemed to
think for a while. The alternate plan is to get married civilly now,
but have a big ceremony and celebration later.
Thursday, February 8th, 2018:
In weekly planning, we were able to get to all our investigators.
That was nice. We weren’t really able to review our goals and finding
plan, which wasn’t so nice.
I talked to our landlords and they said we could use a pull-up bar. A little variation in our morning workouts is always nice.
We had an hour and a half visit and were slow at our apartment; it
felt like today lacked urgency, but that’s probably just to me.
We had a check-in with a WML for the Union Park 4th ward at
9:20-9:45. We did it over FaceTime. I don’t think we will do that
again, as it was too late to begin with (we only wanted to check in
regarding one investigator, but both the WML and ourselves were willing
to keep going so we did). On the other hand, it was very productive.
Friday, February 9th, 2018:
We called a lot of people today before running into a slower time.
Our zone meeting was filled with mini-trainings. They were on
charity and loving others, pleasing God, finding strong motivation for
the work, fulfilling our purpose, and so on. They were enjoyable
because each person had something to contribute. Everyone prepared.
Our lessons for tonight cancelled. We had two lessons and managed
to get things together for people from the ward to come with us for
both of them, so it was pretty disappointing.
The family that had us over for dinner tonight was pretty
enjoyable. The dad and one of the sons are into Star Wars and the
whole family likes LEGOs. I realized later that their switch could have
been a temptation (it came up after they showed us their lego Star Wars
sets, so they could have showed it to us) but it didn’t cross my mind.
In the evening, we met a guy named Mike. Mike is a former
investigator living in the Candlestick apartments. He stopped
investigating because of the church’s newer policies on the children of
homosexual parents. He is a wonderfully nice person. In
talking to him, he was willing to commit to reading the Book of Mormon
to know if it was true. What’s more, he teaches music theory at the U
and loves hymns. We showed him our hymnal, which got him very excited.
He sang a few hymns with us on his doorstep.
That made my day. That’s the first person I’ve found who really
loves religious music outside of the church. What’s more, we found out
later that some of the details he knew of the church policy were not
true (he told us he didn’t know for sure and we told him we didn’t know
for sure, either). He could start investigating!
Saturday, February 10th, 2018: To be added
Sunday, February 11th, 2018: To be added
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| A new commandment I give unto you: do not cut the vines on the fence by the chapel |
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