07/21/2013

Dearest Mother and captive audience,

In this day and age it is perfectly acceptable to wear American Eagle moccasins while playing sports! I only played volleyball anyway! Carol certainly is feeling the blessings of being a part of this church. At this point, we are working with the bishop to retain her in the church but teaching her the discussions over again and introducing the temples and the other saving ordinances. That's good to hear what Sister Spencer said!! She is the etiquette queen, so I'm glad she approves. It's funny because she teaches her kids a lot of the same things you did! :) And they have a very clean house, which is a plus. She is a very solid and dedicated member of our ward, and she's great to work with.

Glad to hear about the funeral (I mean the good parts, that is) and about the Nutts! That's gotta be AWESOME! I'm so glad you guys got to see Lindy and those guys! I'm getting pretty consistent letters from Olivia, so now I'm just waiting for Sydney, Hallie, and everyone else. ;) haha just kidding. Good for Ashlyn! She will probably come home around the same time I will! I wish I could have seen more of her before I left... I got an email from Kayla and Henry, and I barely sent one to Zach. Hoping to hear from all of them! Amazing friends right here... That's funny that you found Elder Munoz! He must have been in the same district as Elder Taten Evans!

Oh my goodness...the things I would DO to have Utah heat! It's not the high temperatures that bother me, it's the fact that your hands because a human forehead windshield wiper for your sweat... It's not pleasant. The muggyness and constant sweating is what I can't stand!

Well this week was kinda sluggish.... A lot of our members are/going on vacation, and we are almost out of miles. Plus it seems like the sisters took the majority of the people we were working with! One of our investigators is getting involved with the wrong things... She's not following the Word of Wisdom and she's known as the town ruffian, which we never knew about until recently. We are approaching the situation with great caution. We had an amazing exchange on Friday! I went with another elder (Elder Owen) and went over to his area in Blanchard while his companion went with Elder Evans in my area. We spent time trying out potential investigators. We had some AMAZING experiences! Elder Owen and I decided to say a prayer right before we knocked on someone's door. He had yet to say a prayer with these people. We said a prayer to get into the house, and we miraculously did just that! Not only that, but Elder Owen and I both experienced our first Heavenly Gift kneeling down in someone's home! They really felt the spirit, and I can only wonder what amazing things will happen when Elder Owen and his companion go back! Okay, so I don't know if I ever told you what a Heavenly Gift is, but basically it's when you go tracting, someone opens their door, and you offer to say a prayer with them on whatever they need in their life. Offering up a prayer for people is what the mission calls the Heavenly Gift. Most people accept it, so it works well. Most Heavenly Gifts take place on the porch, so the fact that we got to kneel down with a family inside their home meant a lot to us!! We ran into some other people while we were biking and picked up some potentials while trying potentials! We even got to talk to Elder Owen's downstairs neighbors, and they will be having dinner with he and his companion! Anyway, some great things happened, and I kinda wish it happened in my area... but at least Elder Evans and Elder Ott did some great things in my area.

Yesterday had an interesting path in store for us... We went to try one of our investigators (we were on bikes). We got a call from our Zone Leaders to try a new member family that had moved into our ward that lives on Southridge. Well, we came to find out that there's a Southridge road in both our area and in the sisters' area... The new member family is actually in the sisters' area! While biking back from our Southridge road, we biked under the overpass of I-35 to find a hitchhiker hanging out under the overpass asking us if we had any water! One thing led to another, we gave him some water (which we conveniently had!), and we had a gospel discussion! We gave him a Book of Mormon, some more water, and a Restoration pamphlet. He walked from Ardmore (which is southern Oklahoma) all the way here, and he's trying to get to Montana to find out his purpose and a place to call home. It sounded like he'd been through a lot... Eventually we sent him on his way and encouraged him to seek a new adventure in God when he finished his current adventure. I wonder if I'll ever see him again... In any case, seeds were planted there.

Keep praying for our companionship. Improvement is slow, but progress is being made. Yelling and talking down to me still occurs. We both got humility lessons from our Zone Leaders. I gained some amazing things out of that! It was made apparent to me that you won't be weak or walked all over if you choose to be humble. Never once did the humble guy lose. We both have things to work on, and I especially need to not put up my punching gloves when something is said to me! He's striving to let things go that bother him. I don't try to irritate him by any means, but he's working hard not to be frustrated and bite me over everything. Most of all, I'm still trying to warm up to him due to everything that's happened... It's something that doesn't happen overnight. He's aware of that fact, and he's working towards me being comfortable around him so I can perform to the best of my abilities when I'm around him. We are having a Zone Conference tomorrow, and we get to go the OKC temple on the 31st!!!! That's going to be amazing!!

OH! And funny story... Sister Pfister made it known to me that I look like a 12-year-old with a 30-year-old voice... hahahaha. It was hilarious! We have some amazing sister missionaries in our ward, though! They are doing some amazing work over in Noble! It's always fun to hear the great things they're doing!

I love my wonderful audience and my family :)

--Elder Garner